To study or Not to Study Online? Students’ Views on Distance Education During the COVID-19 Pandemic: A Diary Study

Abstract

Distance learning is a type of instruction between a teacher and students separated by a physical distance where communication takes place through mediated information encompassing one or more technological media. In other words, the instruction participants stay in different places, yet take part in the same learning activities sequenced, paced and controlled by the teacher using new technologies to facilitate both the student-teacher and student-student rapport. The aim of the paper is to gain  insight into this kind of learning from the perspective of university students. The sample constituted 128 students of the English Philology at the University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland. The findings of a diary study exploring the subjects’ reports on their attitudes towards online studying at the time of the COVID-19 period shows how students’ view change with an increasing infection rate, and, in fact, present the advantages and disadvantages of education during the pandemic, be it a face-to-face or remote mode. In conclusion, the question of whether to study or not to study online seems to be difficult to answer unequivocally. Though, some suggestions are given on how to improve distance education at times of university closure and lack of full participation in the process of building the academic community and identity that have been ascribed to the university construed  as an indestructible social system for ages (Sowa, 2009).