Fostering Creativity in an Online Teaching Environment During Covid-19 in Ahmedabad City

Abstract

As a part of the consequence of the Covid-19 pandemic situation, a lot of schools in Ahmedabad, Gujarat; India closed in March 2020. Teachers were asked to adapt to online teaching with training and workshops related to technology provided to them by their respective schools. The pandemic has compelled the academic fraternity to provide education from K-12 to higher education in online mode. This system has allowed the academic institutions to continue to disseminate knowledge to students while maintaining covid protocols, but it has also been found vulnerable to certain limitations of its own. The limitations raised questions, like, how virtual classrooms can foster creativity among the students; what the proficiency of the instructors in terms of development of online teaching materials is; how efficiently, the instructors are conducting online classes/lectures, and do all students have access to internet and smartphones. The current study aims to explore and answer such questions in a scientific manner. The study was conducted using the method of an online survey, by applying the technique of research scale. The study findings highlighted, that, the instructors/teachers/faculties from the entire academic fraternity ranging from K-12 (school), college, and universities are actively involved in teaching in online/virtual mode. The study also found, that, the teaching fraternity is efficiently using their available resources to develop a conducive teaching-learning environment, leading to the promotion of self-motivation among the students participating in the virtual platform.
The worldwide pandemic situation caused by the Coronavirus disease (Covid-19) has led to a state of despair for a lot of sectors. The education system changed dramatically with the distinctive rise of e-learning platforms. There was a sudden shift from the classrooms in many parts of the globe, wondering whether the adoption of e-learning will continue post-pandemic. The descriptive study demonstrates how the education system was re-designed to provide students and teachers with opportunities to learn and teach online. The paper presents the results of a survey conducted in August and September 2020 based on teaching creativity and collaboratively during the times of Covid. Analysis of potential factors such as school-computer technology, teacher-education learning techniques, Information, and communication technology tools (ICT) access, etc. Findings from regression analysis show changes in the teacher competence and teacher education opportunities to learn digital competence.