The online class as séance: Challenges and strategies in the light of pandemic pedagogies

Abstract

The shock that the pandemic instilled on the pedagogical praxis, and especially, on face-to-face teaching-learning processes, lead to a sudden “blended turn”, whose bluntness barely allowed the necessary time to reflect upon the meaning and the implications of establishing an appropriate and robust online didactic dynamic. This article reviews some baffling characteristics of this transfer as well as the shortcomings that this has revealed in regards to university teacher training. Likewise, a series of renovating strategies and approaches before the emergence of a “new educational normality” is presented which will allow to conceptualize the current paradigm of uncertainty as an opportunity for knowledge(s)-production. For this, there is a response kit comprised of three core ideas: (1) the design of a bimodal workshop titled “COVIDactics. Exploratory instruments for an emerging post-pandemic pedagogy”; (2) the inclusion of asynchronous practical assignments that could help us build an interactive space of expression for students, and; (3) the acknowledgement, exploration and analysis of informal teaching-learning communities who posed a radical position in relation to conversation and communication in the virtual agora. From this framework, we will be better prepared to navigate and manage in favorable and creative ways the emerging post-pandemic world of education.