Teaching about the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

The purpose of this research study was to investigate the perceptions and practices of elementary science teachers in Lebanon on teaching about COVID-19. The COVID-19 pandemic, with its links to science, politics, ethics and economics, can be classified as a socioscientific issue – an open-ended and controversial issue connected to science content. In the era of the COVID-19 pandemic, teaching about the current socioscientific issue has become prominent. An emerging field of research recommends that science teachers start educating students about COVID-19; however, it is not clear how teachers perceive teaching about it and what their teaching practices look like inside the science classroom. This study employed a survey design that drew upon a questionnaire and semi-structured interviews as data sources. The target population constituted 299 elementary science teachers. Participants were recruited using the snowball sampling technique. They completed a questionnaire comprising eighteen Likert-type questions. Next, follow-up, semi-structured interviews were conducted with a random sample of 20 participants. The questionnaire was analyzed quantitatively through the use of descriptive statistics. Pearson’s correlation coefficient (r) was calculated to examine the relationship between the two variables of the study: perceptions and practices. The transcribed interview responses were analyzed using qualitative thematic analysis and triangulated with the quantitative analysis from the questionnaires. The findings of this study revealed that elementary science teachers have a strong belief in the importance of teaching about COVID-19 and in its role for enhancing scientific literacy. The results showed that teaching about COVID-19 is not part of the current teaching practices for most science teachers. Although this study is limited to elementary science teachers in Lebanon, the findings raise new questions for future research. Recommendations are provided to science educators, policy-makers and curriculum designers.