Challenges of Implementing Online Teaching in Universities during Covid-19 Global Pandemic: A Developing Country's Perspective

Educational institutions in Sri Lanka like schools and universities were primarily based on traditional face-to-face mode of teaching until the beginning of year 2020. The sudden outbreak of Covid-19 shook the entire world while challenging the education system across the globe. The situation led universities and other educational institutions to shift their teaching/learning activities to online mode from on campus, almost overnight. Online education was not popular in Sri Lanka by the time of this rapid transition and there were very fewer number of online courses offered by limited number of universities. Online teaching/learning that emerged with the pandemic, has been challenging in Sri Lankan university system as students, teachers and administrators were not either prepared or trained for it. This paper attempts to explore key challenges confronted with the implementation of online pedagogical approach, so that this understanding may help universities to enhance the experiences in online teaching/learning in future endurances. Amongst several, lack of training in pedagogy for online teaching is the severest challenge faced by many institutions. Most of the instructors were new to online teaching and had shifted with little or no training or preparation specific to this mode of delivery. Instructors must receive proper professional training and development to have higher expectations and to adapt their teaching to appropriate online teaching strategies