ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHERS’ EXPERIENCES OF INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGIES DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC

This paper aims to describe the experiences of elementary school teachers who teach in schools of different socio-economic levels with information and communication technologies (ICT) during Covid-19 pandemic. This study, designed in qualitative method, is a holistic multiple case study. The data collected from 16 teachers who were chosen in deviant case sampling method- one of the purposeful sampling methods- through standardised interview forms were put to content analysis. The results obtained in this study suggested that elementary school teachers who teach in schools of differing socio-economic levels described digital divide which they considered as an obstacle in front of equality of opportunity in education and that they thought Covid-19 epidemic increased the interactions between all stakeholders available in ICT ecosystem in educational environments. While the teachers with adequate technological awareness and skills tried to cope with the restrictions by using freeware resources in the process, the teachers in private schools closed the gap even though they were inadequate in using technology because resources and environments were provided for them. Another important result obtained in the study was that trying to implement ICT at the level of primary school during Covid-19 caused certain difficulties for students due to their age.