English Teaching and Learning & Online Assessment during the Covid-19 crisis

It is almost 2 years that all aspects of human life, worldwide, have been affected and severely impacted because of the outbreak of Covid-19 pandemic. The pandemic not only affected the health systems and the economy across the globe but also had a great impact on education systems. Because of Covid-19, schools, colleges and universities were closed and face-to-face education was suspended for certain periods of time, whereas a shift to online teaching was instituted. 

English language teaching and learning took its share in this transition. Following the pandemic outbreak several studies were conducted to investigate the effects of the pandemic on online teaching/learning and assessment of English. Findings show that the online teaching and learning of English created challenges because of the internet connection problems and students’ access to computers or smartphones. On the other hand, this situation enhanced the educators’ digital literacy skills and highlighted the significance of online teaching and learning in case of emergency situations. 

Study: https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/1677427

Meanwhile, English teachers need to evaluate the achievements of their students and assess the knowledge they gained on a regular basis.   According to a study, the teachers had a negative perception about online assessment during the Covid-19 pandemic. This is due to the fact that they faced some obstacles during the online assessment, some of which include:
        –     the internet connection;

• the validity of the assessment; 
• and   the   low   level of   students’ enthusiasm. 

However, in practice the use of online assessment helps the teachers in distributing the   material   and assessing students’ achievement.

Study: http://ejournal.uki.ac.id/index.php/jet/article/view/2770/1912