Solving the Problem of Adaptation to Online Learning: The Path to

Sustainable Development of Education

Svetlana M. Kutsenko

, Svetlana F. Malatsion

and Elena A. Saltanaeva

Kazan State Power Engineering University, Krasnoselskaya st. 51, Kazan, Russian Federation

Keywords: Sustainable Development, Digital Education, Online Education, Pandemic, Educational Content,

Questionnaire, Adaptation, Control and Measuring Materials.

Abstract: The article attempts to summarize the most common difficulties in the transition of students and teachers to

online education in higher educational institutions and outline ways to solve them in the light of sustainable

development of digital education. In the context of an emergency transition to exclusively distance learning,

students have developed problems associated with a decrease in motivation to learn, deterioration of health,

with the disfunction of the relationship with the teacher, an insufficient level of material and technical

equipment of workplaces, the lack of a stable Internet connection and the inability to self-organize. The

teachers noted the shortcomings of online learning associated with an increase in the time to prepare for

classes, a decrease in the level of feedback from students, a decrease in the quality of education of students,

etc. The teaching community got the opportunity to rethink the organization of the educational process in new

conditions and find approaches to solving the problems that arose in connection with the transition to online

learning. Educational institutions must solve problems related to organizational, legal, economic,

psychological issues that arose when organizing distance learning in a pandemic: ensuring the availability of

educational content, using high-level digital developments, creating high-quality control and measuring

materials to check the formation of competencies, accounting for additional labor costs of teachers during

online training implementation, etc. Sustainable development of education, including its digital

transformation, are priority areas in the strategy of the state development.

1 INTRODUCTION

During the pandemic, heads of universities and other

educational organizations organized the work of the

teaching staff and students exclusively in the

electronic information and educational environment.

Most of the universities were ready for such a quick

transition to distance education of students due to the

timely created or adapted support base for distance

learning (Abramyan and Katasonova, 2020). Since

the abrupt transition to online learning was a forced

and urgent measure, not all educational institutions

and individual teachers were ready for a radical

restructuring of the educational process. The reason

for this is the different level of development of the

information infrastructure, the provision of

disciplines with educational resources, the readiness

https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7024-798X

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https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0430-9748

of teachers to use platforms and services in the

educational process. Each educational institution has

its own set of tools and scenarios for the

implementation of distance learning: LMS platforms

for posting content and testing students' knowledge,

video conferences for online lectures, messengers for

communication between teachers and students, and

sending information by e-mail. The media have

repeatedly raised questions about the possible

replacement of traditional forms of education with

online education without losing quality. At the same

time, the economic benefits of such a transition were

mentioned. In the articles there was a substitution of

the concepts of "online learning" and "educational

technologies" used in the context of an emergency

transition to distance learning. This caused a heated

discussion in the parental environment and the

620

Kutsenko, S., Malatsion, S. and Saltanaeva, E.

Solving the Problem of Adaptation to Online Learning: The Path to Sustainable Development of Education.

DOI: 10.5220/0010594906200625

In Proceedings of the International Scientiﬁc and Practical Conference on Sustainable Development of Regional Infrastructure (ISSDRI 2021), pages 620-625

ISBN: 978-989-758-519-7

teaching community, which was reflected in

numerous publications (Kiselev, 2020; Kutsenko and

Malatsion, 2020.; Frolova, Rogach and Ryabova,

2020; Neborsky, Boguslavsky, Ladyzhets, Naumova

and Anisimov, 2020.; Dozhdikov, 2021).

2 MATERIALS AND METHODS

At Kazan State Power Engineering University, in the

context of preventing coronavirus infection, students

of all courses and all forms of education were

transferred to the distance format in a short time. This

was facilitated by the presence of an electronic

educational environment at the university. Students

and teachers, using their login and password, had

access to their personal accounts around the clock.

From personal accounts, teachers and students had

access to information resources of KSPEU.

To stimulate the filling of the platform with

KSPEU annually held the “Best EER” competition,

the winners of which received monetary rewards.

Most of the teachers of KSPEU underwent advanced

training under the program "Electronic educational

environment of the university" and created author's

courses on the subjects taught, including the main

elements: 1) lecture material; 2) guidelines for the

implementation of coursework, laboratory, practical

work; 3) glossary; 4) questions for a test or exam; 5)

tests; 8) forum, etc.

Thus, by the time of the transition to remote

learning, thanks to the LMS Moodle platform, the

university had a sufficient number of courses in

various disciplines. These courses have passed an

internal examination and were approved by the

educational and methodological department of the

university. With the urgent transition to distance

learning, a number of teachers, with the permission of

the authors, were able to become co-organizers of

these courses, creating their own section in them.

Thus, time was gained, which is necessary to create a

separate course. Other teachers urgently began to fill

their own developments with content in order to be

able to work with students during the semester. Since

the teachers did not have experience in conducting

current and intermediate certification on the basis of

the LMS Moodle platform, the educational and

methodological department conducted training on

organizing tests, examinations, defense of internships

and final qualification works.

To conduct classes in the mode of video

conferences, Kazan State Power Engineering

University at the beginning of the coronavirus

pandemic purchased a commercial version of the

Zoom service, due to which streaming lectures were

organized with a large number of participants and

without time limits. For group sessions, educators

used Zoom's 40-minute free trial. To continue the

lesson, students connected to the conference again.

Teachers and students quickly mastered the work

in this Zoom service.

Teachers and students could take advantage of

free access to online courses from leading Russian

and foreign universities hosted on online platforms. A

number of teachers used this opportunity as additional

information on the discipline.

Long before the pandemic, various elements and

forms of distance education were used by the

university to organize the independent work of full-

time and part-time students. This form of education

was limited, because the traditional form of education

was predominant (Zainasheva and Malatsion, 2014).

However, since the beginning of work exclusively

in online mode, problems began to appear associated

with the adaptation of students and teachers to the

new format of education. The stressful situation for

all participants could not but affect the attitude

towards online learning and other distance

educational technologies. To study the problems of

adaptation, a study was carried out from September to

October 2020 in the form of an anonymous survey of

the first and the second year full-time students, as

well as teachers of Kazan State Power Engineering

University. The survey involved 307 technical

students and 67 teachers. Questionnaires were

developed to identify the problems of adaptation of

students to online learning, which contained the

following questions:

1. Is there a computer equipped with video

communication?

2. Is there a stable internet connection?

3. Did the study load increase during the online

learning period?

4. Did the motivation for learning decrease

during the period of online learning?

5. Does the quality of education suffer from

distance learning?

6. Is the distance form convenient for laboratory

studies?

7. Is the distance form convenient for practical

training?

Has distance learning had an impact on your

health (for the worse)?

9. Did you quickly adapt to online learning?

10. Can you work independently without a

teacher?

Solving the Problem of Adaptation to Online Learning: The Path to Sustainable Development of Education

621

11. Is the teacher's assessment of your learning

activity objective in online learning?

The questionnaire for identifying the problems of

adaptation of teachers to online learning contained

questions (from the first to the ninth) from the

students' questionnaire and was supplemented with

the following questions:

1. Are you satisfied with the level of test items

for the current and intermediate certification of

students?

2. Does the educational process of online

learning suffer?

3. Is it difficult to assess the learning outcomes

of distance learning?

4. Is it difficult to organize feedback with

students?

5. Have you met while conducting classes in an

online conference with an unauthorized connection in

order to disrupt the class?

6. For what forms of training and in what

disciplines would you recommend using online

training?

7. Have you used open online courses from other

universities in your work?

8. Specify your specialization.

9. Specify your age.

At the end of the questionnaire, statistical

processing of the results was carried out.

3 RESULTS

The results of the study indicate that in the conditions

of online learning, students have problems associated

with a decrease in motivation to learn (48%),

deterioration in health (34%), with a disfunction of

the relationship with the teacher (lack of "live"

communication) (75%), insufficient level of material

and technical equipment (21%), with the lack of a

stable Internet connection (15%). Some of the

respondents noted their inability to work

independently without a teacher (31%) and the lack

of objectivity in the teachers' assessment of their

educational activities (27%). Nevertheless, the

majority of students quickly adapted to distance

learning (77%).

The results of the survey of teachers showed that

the period of adaptation of teachers to online learning

depended on the age of the respondents, the level of

material and technical equipment of the workplace,

and professional specialization. Many problems of

adaptation of teachers coincided with the problems of

students: deterioration of health (89%), an increase in

labor costs in preparation for classes (85%), a

decrease in the quality of feedback from students

(88%), insufficient quality level of test tasks created

by teachers in a short time during the pandemic

(49%), the occurrence of psychological problems

(15%).

4 THE DISCUSSION OF THE

RESULTS

In the process of analyzing the survey results, the

features and disadvantages of online education were

identified, which were especially pronounced in the

context of the pandemic.

1) Distance learning systems periodically freeze

due to the lack of high-speed communication

channels and the low speed of computers of students

and teachers. A number of students at home and in

dormitories do not have modern and reliable

computers equipped with video communication

systems and Internet access. This problem is still

difficult to solve, since it depends on the income of

the educational process participants.

2) Students enrolled in engineering and natural

science educational programs without classes in

subject laboratories with special laboratory

installations cannot fully acquire subject skills and

competencies obtained in the course of traditional

classroom studies, because ordinary viewing of video

materials will never replace live communication with

the teacher and independently conducted experiment.

3) The labor costs of teachers working remotely

increased many times, since work with students was

carried out not only in a group, but also individually.

4) A number of students were found to have low

motivation and interest in independent subject,

research, search activities in the process of online

learning.

5) During online learning, communication

suffered from the remoteness of the teacher and the

student, students did not have quick feedback,

because there were no prompt answers from teachers

to current questions arising in the process of solving

an educational problem.

6) There was a lack of objectivity in assessing the

educational activities of students (the results of

practical classes, laboratory work, etc.), associated

with the problem of independence in the

implementation of individual tasks. Successful

students independently completed assignments and,

as a rule, shared their results with classmates, and the

teacher did not have the opportunity to identify the

true author of the completed assignments and was

ISSDRI 2021 - International Scientiﬁc and Practical Conference on Sustainable Development of Regional Infrastructure

622

forced to evaluate almost the entire group with the

same scores.

7) The educational process has suffered, since it is

formed with direct classroom contact between

students and teachers. Nothing can replace live

communication between a teacher and a student.

8) The complexity of the transition of teachers of

the older generation to remote work was revealed,

since these teachers are accustomed to traditional

classroom teaching. The assimilation of new

technologies, and in a short time, led to the fact that

teachers were in a stressful state.

9) Not all educational and methodological

complexes (lectures, laboratory classes, workshops,

assessment tools, etc.) have been converted to digital

format for organizing distance learning.

10) During the midterm and current certification

online, the teacher was limited in assessment tools.

The experience of conducting current and

intermediate attestation in remote access conditions

showed that teachers mainly used tests as assessment

tools, which did not sufficiently reflect the formation

of the necessary competencies. Tests that had to be

constructed urgently did not always meet the

methodological requirements for such evaluative

tools. If the teacher used an oral conversation or a

written survey as an assessment tool, then it was

difficult to control the independence of the task,

because there could be various sources of information

in front of the student that were out of sight of the

teacher.

11) Working for many hours in front of a

computer screen negatively affected the health of

students and teachers.

12) The work experience has shown the insecurity

of online conferences conducted by the teacher from

unauthorized connection of intruders trying to disrupt

the lesson. The teacher spent time solving this

problem.

13) There were psychological problems

associated with the fact that new formats of education

cause a feeling of rejection, both among teachers and

students.

14) The wide range of applications used made the

work of teachers and students difficult, as they had to

learn the basics of working in each of them. The

teachers lacked the skills to work in a digital

environment, time to master new tools and restructure

the educational process.

15) The provided opportunities for access to open

online courses could not ensure their full-fledged

development by students, since free access to course

content did not imply methodological support for

students and teachers from universities - holders of

online courses.

5 CONCLUSIONS

As a result of the pandemic, education has received a

unique chance to conduct a global online experiment,

the results of which should determine the problems of

modern education and ways to solve them. The

teaching community got the opportunity to rethink the

organization of the educational process in new

conditions and find approaches to solving the

problems that arose in connection with the transition

to online education.

First of all, this is the problem of ensuring the

availability of educational content for students and

teachers, since all of them should have a workplace

equipped with a personal computer with access to the

Internet. This requires social support for students.

Online learning is impossible without an IT

infrastructure that requires significant investment.

To conduct laboratory exercises, it is necessary to

develop or purchase virtual laboratories. Moreover,

only the use of high-level digital developments can

bring virtual laboratory work closer to the traditional

format and form the necessary competencies

(Torkunova, Korosteleva and Krivonogova, 2020).

To carry out the current and intermediate

certification, it is necessary to systematically work on

the creation of certified tests in disciplines containing

case problems and practical tasks of various levels of

complexity. With such assessment tools, the teacher

will be confident in the formation of the necessary

competencies in their discipline (Kutsenko and

Malatsion, 2019).

In addition, it is necessary to carefully monitor

technological tools for distance education and choose

the most appropriate for the teacher and students.

Taking into account the existing variety of technical

solutions available on the market, this should be an

independent choice of the teacher. Universities need

to purchase software products that support a large

number of users working at the same time, allow

downloading and receiving large files, keep track of

attendance and evaluate the work of students. At the

same time, it is necessary to protect the used services

from unauthorized connections in order to disrupt

classe.

It takes a lot of time to develop a high-quality

online course in the discipline and to test it.

Experience has shown that it is not enough to transfer

text materials of lectures, practical and laboratory

classes, as well as tests to an electronic platform. An

Solving the Problem of Adaptation to Online Learning: The Path to Sustainable Development of Education

623

online course must meet the following requirements:

the presence of a flexible interactive online

environment, an attractive pedagogical design for

involving students in the learning process, a large

number of high-quality control and measuring

materials of various levels of complexity to control

the formation of the necessary competencies;

elimination of the influence on learning outcomes of

external factors that reduce the validity of the

assessment, the individual pace of mastering the

course, etc. (Means, Bakia and Murphy, 2014).

Online learning is not just a process of transferring

information via the Internet, but, above all, cognitive

and social interaction of participants in the

educational process.

The best result can be obtained when

implementing a blended learning format, using

elements of distance education to obtain additional

information on the studied disciplines when

conducting all types of classes online. Distance

learning is more suitable for the implementation of

inclusive education, as well as for advanced training,

obtaining a second higher education, and the

implementation of distance learning.

The workload of teachers should reflect the time

spent preparing content for the educational platforms

used, as well as the time to check the work uploaded

by students.

To solve the psychological problems associated

with the transition from traditional forms of education

to digital, it is necessary to conduct training courses

and advanced training for working in new services

and platforms (Avdeeva, Zaichkina, Nikulicheva and

Khapaeva, 2016; Nikulicheva, 2019).

It is necessary to develop a legal framework for

the provision of educational services in the context of

a forced transition to training in remote access mode.

The pandemic that has engulfed the entire world

is not over yet, and in the future, perhaps, humanity

will face similar threats. Therefore, educational

institutions should look for ways to solve problems

related to organizational, legal, economic,

psychological issues that arise when organizing

distance learning in self-isolation in order to provide

the consumers of educational services with education

of high quality. The university community should

exchange best practices in the interaction of

participants in the educational process and their

adaptation to online learning, since scientific

discussions are often closed, and research results do

not go beyond the scientific community (Kuznetsova,

2015).

All this will contribute to the sustainable

development of education, including its digital

transformation, which is a priority in the strategy of

the state development.

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