Developing Teachers' Knowledge for Teaching in Virtual Contexts

The 2020 worldwide pandemic signaled the COVID-19 crisis as a real threat and forced K-12 schools to move teaching and learning from face-to-face classrooms to online virtual classrooms. Educators searched for a silver lining amid the hardships created by the virtual teaching and learning environments. This chapter answers an important question: How has the knowledge that teachers need for teaching changed as a result of School Lockdown 2020-2021? Analysis of the chapters in this book in addition to extensive qualitative observations of two middle school virtual computer science classrooms over six months identified two important lessons needing consideration when requiring K-12 virtual instruction: (1) teachers' knowledge for teaching requires developing their technological pedagogical content knowledge for teaching in both face-to-face and virtual contexts, and (2) teaching virtually relies on a social presence that assures students' sense of belonging to engage in virtual learning experiences.