Negatieve impact van schoolsluitingen op schrijfvaardigheid van basisschoolleerlingen

Over de impact van de schoolsluitingen als gevolg van het coronavirus is al veel geschreven. Een nieuw onderzoek, gepubliceerd in het Journal of Educational Psychology, beschrijft de impact van de schoolsluitingen in Noorwegen op de schrijfvaardigheid van leerlingen in groep 3. De schoolsluitingen in Noorwegen duurden 7 weken en tijdens deze periode gaven de Noorse leerkrachten online onderwijs. De studie van Skar, Graham en Huebner laat zien dat de schoolsluitingen een significante negatieve impact hadden op op de schrijfvaardigheid van leerlingen. De auteurs noemen hiervoor verschillende verklaringen: er was eerder sprake van emergency remote instruction dan van effectief ontworpen online onderwijs en veel jonge leerlingen hadden slechts minimaal contact met hun leerkracht tijdens de schoolsluitingen.

Het uit het abstract:

The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and the sudden cancellation of in-class instruction for many students around the world presented an unprecedented disruption in children’s education. As the COVID-19 pandemic took form, multiple concerns were raised about the potential negative impact on students’ learning. The current study examined this proposition for children’s writing. We compared the quality of writing, handwriting fluency, and attitude toward writing of first grade Norwegian students during the COVID-19 pandemic (421 girls, 396 boys), which included emergency remote instruction for almost 7 weeks, with first grade students in the same schools a year before the pandemic began (835 girls, 801 boys). After controlling for variance due to national test scores, school size, proportion of certified teachers, students per special education teacher, school hours per student, student gender, and native language, we found that students attending first grade during the pandemic had lower scores for writing quality, handwriting fluency, and attitude toward writing than their first grade peers tested a year earlier before the COVID-19 pandemic emerged. Implications for policy and instruction as well as future research are presented.