Teachers' professional development in solving the challenges of distance education

The COVID -19 pandemic began in 2020 and caused a major turnaround in education systems all over the world. Legislators were faced with a decision: to close schools and save lives or to preserve the economy intact. In most countries around the world, they decided to close kindergartens and primary and secondary schools, as well as the universities, or to introduce distance education. The so-called COVID-19 crisis put teachers in front of some completely new tasks and more challenging challenges that were hitherto unknown and required them to adapt and respond immediately in educational practice. In just a few weeks, teachers had to place traditional classroom teaching in an online environment. Because social and emotional aspects have a significant impact on students’ learning, teachers had to learn how to conduct distance education as effectively as possible. With the emergence of the pandemic, they also had to think about how to organize the individual stages of the teaching process, what to do as direct distance education, and prepare for unpredictable distance education. This complex situation was a challenge even for the most prepared and experienced teachers. Although smartboards and PowerPoint presentations are already established in traditional teaching, the integration of technologically supported distance education is at a completely different stage than teachers have been accustomed to and trained in so far. The COVID -19 pandemic has led to teachers being suddenly forced to start teaching online, which, among other things, poses a challenge to transforming teacher education and institution-specific education. In the theoretical part of the master's thesis, we defined the teacher's professional role, professional development of teachers, teacher resilience, distance education, challenges during distance education with the emphasis on the professional development of teachers during distance education, and stress in teachers during distance education. In the empirical part, we used survey questionnaires and partially structured interviews to research what challenges teachers faced during distance education, how they solved challenges, how teachers developed professionally during distance education, and what stress they experienced during that time. The research approach was qualitative and quantitative empirical research in which classroom teachers from the 1st to the 6th grade participated. The results of the survey showed that the participating teachers think that they were partially prepared for distance education in spring 2020 and well prepared in autumn 2020 to winter 2021, which means that teachers were better prepared for another lockdown. Awareness of technology, more education, and more experience contributed to better preparedness for school closures. Teachers believe that appropriate technical conditions, good knowledge of technology, encouragement, school support, and clear instructions and goals from the school are important for the success of distance education. Teachers would like more education on the topic of making distance education materials and content. Participants see the possibility for better quality distance education in sharing experiences and cooperation. As sources of stress, the participants pointed out technical problems, more difficult implementation of some forms of lessons, and preparation of materials. The vast majority of the participants state that the challenges of distance education have had a significant impact on their professional learning and development. The research provided insight into distance education between the first period (spring 2020) and the second period (autumn 2020 to winter 2021). The results of the research represent a professional contribution in the field of didactics and are useful for future students and classroom teachers in the design of distance education