Pedagogical continuities in teaching and learning during COVID-19: Holding up the bridge

Abstract

2020 and 2021 in higher education were characterised by pandemic-related disruptions to conventional modes of teaching and learning. These prompted discussions about pedagogic shifts, academic continuity and the future of teaching and learning. Debates on the ‘future-focused’ university have raised questions about system-level and resourcing issues, teaching and learning practices and new ecologies of e-learning. This paper engages with these debates to better understand the continuities and discontinuities in the new pedagogies and how these affect what universities may do differently going forward. The pandemic prompted exploration of hybrid models of teaching and learning, with radical changes to traditional face-to-face teaching. The theoretical framework of the paper synthesises the concepts of pedagogical continuity and social justice to analyse the research findings. The research is based on data collected from interviews with 15 senior academic leaders at the University of Johannesburg (UJ) about how they negotiated pedagogy during the transition to emergency remote teaching (ERT) and online teaching and learning. The findings indicate that academic staff were able to draw significant gains in the transition to ERT that may offer new opportunities and possibilities for learning in an uncertain future.