Impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on Students in Nigeria

ABSTRACT: COVID-19 pandemic has been a global serious issues that adversely impacted human's life. This study aimed to investigate the impacts of COVID-19 on students' learning in higher education. Quantitative data findings showed that Students did not experience a constant online teaching and learning during this period of COVID-19. Findings also revealed that COVID-19 pandemic devastatingly affected students'learning in higher education in Nigeria. In addition, the qualitative finding revealed that the students had problems with internet and technological facilities in their learning and they suggest that the Federal Ministry of Education should design and introduce a practical online platform which will be free and accessible with a poor internet connection because some of the students live in areas where the internet speed is very low. The findings of the study will help educational managers and higher education leaders to review and adopt policies for teaching and learning in emergency cases. It will also help lecturers to design a proper plan and improve their instruction. 

INTRODUCTION: The corona virus 2019 pandemic in Nigeria is part of the worldwide pandemic caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2(SAR COV-2). Coronavirus are common in certain species of animals, such as cattle, camels and bats which can be transmitted to humans, some health experts believe that the new strain of COVID-19 likely originated in bats or pangolins.

      The first transmission to humans was in Wuhan, China. Since then, the virus has mostly spread through person-to- person contact. The most common way that this virus spreads is through close contact with already infected person. When people with COVID-19 breathe out or cough, they expel tiny droplets that contain the virus. These droplets can enter the mouth or nose of someone without the virus, causing the spread of the infection to occur.

     The first case of COVID-19 was reported in Nigeria by the Federal Ministry of Health on 27th February, 2020. This was the case of an Italian citizen who works in Nigeria and returned from Milan, Italy to Lagos. Over the years, humanity had fought various global health scourges which threatened to wipe human beings of the face of the earth. It is worthy to know that coronavirus is different when compared with the plagues and epidermis that have ravaged humanity throughout it's existence in the sense that none has greatly affected the education of everyone in the world like COVID-19.

    As part of measures to contain the spread of COVID-19 in Nigeria, the Federal Ministry of Education, through the permanent secretary in the Ministry, on March 19th ordered the immediate closure of tertiary institutions, secondary and primary schools across the nation over the outbreak of the disease in the country. In addition to this, restrictions were placed on inter-states movement, market places were locked, religious gatherings of more than 10 persons were banned, social activities such as parties, ceremonies, club meetings, etc were placed on hold. All public and private schools have to shut down the doors of their schools following the Government directives. The pandemic has unmarked substantial inequities in the education sector. While some private schools in urban areas are engaging their students through online teaching like they do in the developed countries. Thus, the slope of school closure due to this pandemic COVID-19 on educational system in Nigeria. This paper also examines the strength as well as challenges of online/virtual education which served as a substitute to face-to-face method of teaching in Nigeria.

BODY: 

IMPACT OF COVID-19 ON NIGERIAN 

EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM

Impact of School Closure on Children

School attendance is one of the best public tools available to raise a child’s skills, awareness and ability. However, this long period of school closure will have significant consequences on skill acquisiton and growth of school children. It is worthy to note that schooling provides adequate learning but when schools close, children aredeprived the opportunities for academic growth as well as academic development. The disadvantages of school closure are enormous for under-privileged students who tend to have fewer or no educatonal opportunity outside school. The closure of schools, colleges and unversities does not only interrupt the teaching of students around the world, it also coincides with a key assessment period and many examinations have been postponed or cancelled as a result of COVID-19. For instance, Cambridge International Examinations that include Cambridge IGCSE, Cambridge, OLevel, Cambridge International AS and A Leves, Cambridge AICE Diploma and Cambridge Pre-U examinatons for May/June 2020 diet were cancelled worldwide.. Though candidates could be awarded grades based on the forecast grades sent by their teachers, but, to some extent, this would not represent the true performance of the candidates as some teachers may be biased and either over-grade or under grade their students while predicting scores for them. Other International examinations that were cancelled due to COVID-19 include international Baccalaureate, Scholastic Apttude Test (SAT) and American College Test (ACT). Apart from these, students who sat for Senior Secondary Certficate Examination (WAEC) in the West African countries had their examinatons postponed. The implications of this candidates is that, thousands of students will be forced to defer the start of their studies for their undergraduate studies to a later year since 2020/2021 admission processes would have ended before their results would be released.

ONLINE/VIRTUAL EDUCATION

Definition of Online/ virtual education:

Online/virtual education is the process of using online classroom environments to disseminate informaton. Onlne teaching and learning processes involving some digital technologies that permit teachers and students to not necessarily be present in the same room. It is the only mode of teaching that can be of help in passing instructions tostudyents in a time like this that social distancing is of utmost important.

ONLINE AND VIRTUAL TEACHING

Before the current COVID-19 crisis, digital technologes have also allowed us to move much of our lives such as heath, education, social and economic life online. Mostly, onine teaching, open teaching, web-based teaching, computer mediated teaching, blended teaching etc. have in common the ability to use a computer/mobile phone connected to a network or radio/television set that offers the possibilty to teach from anywhere, at any time, in any rhythm, and by any means. In such a leaning environment, students can be at home or somewhere else and still enjoy the lesson. 

Online teaching and learning environment can be in two forms: 

The synchronous learning environment and 

The asynchronous learning environment. 

The synchronous learning environment is structured n a way that students attend live lectures, there are real-time interactons between educators and learners, and there is a possibity of instant feedback. Synchronous earning can provide a lot of opportunities for social interaction. On the other hand, asynchronous learning environments are not properly structured as learning content is not avaiable in the form of live lectures or classes; t is available at different learning systems and forums. Also, nstant feedback and immediate response are not possible under such an environment. Online education has played a vital roe in the past as it has helped some institutions to overcome the barrier of educational continuity in the time of global crisis. For instance, it was online teachng that Universty of Camerino resorted to when earthquake destroyed almost all their infrastructures and face-to-face interactons were not possible. Online education also helped University of Canterbury to operate when it was faced wth a great earthquake in 2011. Recenty, this disaster is in the form of Covid-19 which has made all schools, colleges, and universities to shut down so as to curb further spread of the vrus. Many academic institutions, propretors, State and Federal Governments are, therefore, seekng the help of onlne educaton so that teaching and learnng processes are not further hampered. For nstance, some state governments such as Lagos, Abia, Enugu, Ondo, Akwa Ibom, Nasarawa, Imo as well as Ekiti States n Nigeria proffered onine-virtual education as the possible way out. In general, a complete online education requires an elaborate lesson plan design, teaching materials such as audio and video contents, as well as technologcal support teams. In additon, some schools, especally private schools make use of some onlne applications to engage their students while the schoo doors were physically closed. There are several of such online tools avalable which are important for an effective and efficent earning environment. Educators can use a combination of audio, videos, and text to reach out to their students in order to maintain a human touch to their lectures. This also help in creating a collaborative and interactive learning environment where students can give ther immedate feedback, ask queries, and earn interestingy. 

CHALLENGES OF VIRTUAL EDUCATION IN NIGERIA

1. Lack of technical know-how on the part of the teachers and students:

Online users face many technical difficulties that hinder or sow-down the teaching–learning process. Teachers in the form of faciitators face a lot of troubes while working or preparing for online lesson because some of them lack adequate technical training. Students may also face some challenges in assessing the online essons as most of them are not technically oriented. 

2. It is costly and time consuming: A lot of time and cost is involved in online teaching. A considerabe amount of investment is needed for getting the devices and equipment, maintaining the equipment, traning the human resources, and developing the online content. 

3. Poor electric power supply: Epileptic power supply being experienced across the country is one of the chaenges that rendered onlne teaching programs useess in Nigeria. Many Nigerians who live in the urban centers where we are expected to have power supply for 24 hours cannot boost of having it for at least 3 hours a day. On the other hand, there are thousands of students who cannot partake in online teaching because they live in rural areas that do not have means of power supply at all.

4. High poverty level among Nigerians: Not all the teachers and students have access to all digital devices, internet and W-Fi. Chidren in rural and underserved communties in Nigeria are being left behind as they are not equipped to adapt or transtion to new methods of learning. A lot of Ngerian parents cannot afford to provide three square meals for their family not to tak of buying mobile phones or aptops, data charges and other online devices or tools for their children in order to participate in online learning. Apart from this, parents will still not be able to go to their placesof work as they need to be with the children to help them operate the device so that they do not damage the device.

5. Problem with slow learners: One of the weaknesses of online teaching is that there is no direct communcation between the learner and the educator. All students and learners are not the same, there are variations in their level of confidence, capabilties as well as understanding. Some students who are slow learners may not comprehend easily without the teacher beng around to put them through. Some of these slow learners depends on their friends to re-explain the concepts of what has been taught by the teacher, but now that they are isolated from others how will they manage the situation? These learners may never catch up with their peers and they will continue to feel the effect of this gap long after the pandemic has ended. The importance of collaborative learning among learners cannot be over emphasized as s a means to bridge the gap between slow learners and fast learners.

6. Flexibility nature of online education: Lack of personal attention on the side of students is a huge challenge facing onine learning. Online teaching is too flexible and lazy students may never find time to do it. Also, there is a ow-level of readiness and seriousness among the students when it comes to finding time to attend online class. Teachers are not visible to supervise and monitor what they are teaching, therefore students are free to do whatever they like with their time. Unless some lethargic students are being monitored by their parents, they will not be committed to online teaching, instead their attenton may be diverted and use the online resources for other thngs like chatting with friends, watchng movies, playing games, etc. 

7. Difficulty in assessing the students: Most of the schools that partake in online teaching during the lockdown find it dfficult to assess their students. When the teacher give assignment, how will he mark it and feed the students back except the assessment questions are objectives. Some universities that use online medium to teach their students coud not conduct examinations. During or after each online lesson, students and teachers found it difficut to interact by asking and answering questions. 

8. Disparity in scheme of work: Scheme of work differs from schoo to school, as the topic that is scheduled to be taught in first term in school may be scheduled for second term in another school. There is no clear stipulation by the government in their educational policies and there is no uniformity,adequate quality contro as well as e-content delivery n the learning processes.

9. Network and internet connectivity problems: Unavailabiity of proper digita tools, internet connectons or WiFi connections can cause a lot of setback due to which many students might lose out from the learning process. Digital equity is very crucial in this tough time but unfortunately, it is not every teacher and student that have access to digital services.

10. Lack of conducive environments for learning at home: Lack of conducve earning environments for students is a major setback as students are easily distracted by noise and many other activities going on in ther surroundings and could affect their academic performance. Obed et al. (2018) opined that learning environment affects a child's abilty to earn, and could be the determinative factor for some children as to whether they succeed or fail.

All these factors above affected deeply the education system of our country Nigeria. 

RESULTS: 

To protect the people, social distancing and isolations are major things, but it is having a significant impact on the educational system as physical appearance is required for offering knowledge through classroom activities. The institutions are not allowed to take classes and gathering of the students. This kind of situation is creating issues for the educational system to maintain the flow of courses and activities of learning and sharing the knowledge to students. The low attention of parents for online learning makes it more difficult for the teacher to offer to learn to the 4-10 years old children. 

Moreover, some of the parents are not financially strong to setthe digital learning system for attending online classes. Lack of devices and internet facilities is also creating issues for offering knowledge and information about the course. The online learning is a good option, but for small schools and universities, it will be difficult to retain the students as passive learning can be done from leading and reputed institution.

REFERENCES: 

Alaba Tolulope Agbele & Emmanuel Oyelade(2020). Impact of COVID-19 on the Nigerian Educational system: Strengths and challenges of online/virtual Education. Asian Journal of Education and social studies 13(1): 26-35

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Gerado Gómez-Garcia, Magdalene Ramos-Navas-Parejo2, Juan-Carlosdela Cruz- Campos 2, and Carmen Rodriguez- Jimenez 2 Impact of COVID-19 on university students: An Analysis of its influence on Psychological and Academic Factors 

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UNESCO Education from disruption to recovery 2020 d

 

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Zamira Hyseni Duraku, Linda Hoxha, Corresponding author: Zamira Hyseni Duraku, Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, Faculty of Philosophy, University of Prishtina, Hasan Prishtina. Address: Eqrem Çabej #21, 000, Prishtinë, Kosovë, email zamira. hyseni@unipr.edu, ORCID: https://orcids.org/0000-0002-8268-3962 The impact of COVID-19 on Education and on the wellbeing of Teachers, Parents, and Students: Challenges Related to Remote (online) learning and opportunities for advancing the Quality of Education.