Open AccessSecondary School Teacher Support and Training for Online Teaching during the COVID-19 Pandemic
Author(s) -
Cecilia Fissore,
Marina Marchisio,
Sergio Rabellino
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
european distance and e-learning network (eden) conference proceedings
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2707-2819
DOI - 10.38069/edenconf-2020-ac0029
Subject(s) - covid-19 , pandemic , christian ministry , interrupt , medical education , work (physics) , mathematics education , psychology , phase (matter) , training (meteorology) , initial training , teacher education , pedagogy , medicine , political science , computer science , engineering , geography , law , pathology , virology , outbreak , telecommunications , transmission (telecommunications) , mechanical engineering , disease , infectious disease (medical specialty) , chemistry , organic chemistry , meteorology
In Italy, due to the Covid-19 pandemic, all schools were closed on March 5, 2020 and it was mandatory to switch to “distance learning”, in order not to interrupt the teaching continuity and to guarantee the right to education for all students. The Ministry of Education suggested several initiatives to teachers, including the PPS national project. In the paper we analyse why and how the PPS project, intended for teachers of secondary schools of the STEM disciplines but opened in the emergency to teachers of all disciplines, was able to provide much needed support and not only. Following this opening and the consequent registration of many new teachers, three different phases were carried out: an analysis phase of the teachers’ needs for online teaching, a phase of support and initial help, and a training phase. The results show an extremely high participation of the teachers and a wide online collaboration. All the teachers of the PPS will certainly have an advantage in the post-covid teaching, since they can take advantage of the work done and the experience and skills gained in the past.