In the master's thesis The role and functioning of the classroom community during distance learning we wanted to find out what the connection between students within the classroom community at the time of the epidemic was, when schools were closed and distance learning took place.
In the theoretical part, we first defined social groups and their importance for the individual, and we were especially interested in the importance of social groups in the holistic development of children and adolescents. The classroom community is one of the social groups that significantly influences various aspects of (individual's) schooling, development, and life in general. One of the key roles in establishing a quality classroom community and maintaining quality relationships in it is played by the teacher. Thus, we were interested in his or her role and work with the classroom community. The important factors in establishing the quality of life of the classroom community are the lessons of the classroom community and the contents that are being discussed by the class as a community during these lessons. In the second part of the theoretical introduction, we focused on distance learning. We presented instructions and guidelines for distance education in the Republic of Slovenia, which were prepared by the Ministry of Education, Science and Sport (MIZŠ) at the closing of schools. We described the conditions of quality distance education, the obstacles that need special attention and the role of class teachers and their experience in teaching and working with the distance classroom community. We paid special attention to social relations, social development, and the emotional experience of students, which was neglected during distance education.
In the empirical part, we used surveys of students and class teachers from 6th to 9th grade of primary school to determine how respondents assess the impact of distance education on relations in the classroom community, the importance of classroom community lessons and the frequency and content of these lessons. We were also interested in the opinion on the performance of class teachers in maintaining the class community in distance education and how students generally experienced distance education.
We found out that the majority of respondents were satisfied with the relations in the class community and that these did not change significantly during distance education. This may be due to the fact that the class teachers conducted the lessons of the classroom community quite or very often, that they assessed them as important and that lessons were also conducted in terms of content. A very positive fact is the finding that students rarely experienced loneliness during distance education.
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