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The impact of COVID-19 on instructional practices

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The impact of COVID-19 on instructional practices

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The Impact of COVID-19 on Instructional Practices
by
David Scott Knuffke

Rossier School of Education

University of Southern California

A dissertation submitted to the faculty
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Education

May 2022

© Copyright by David Scott Knuffke 2022
All Rights Reserved

The Committee for David Scott Knuffke certifies the approval of this this Dissertation

Dr. David Cash
Dr. Darline P. Robles
Dr. Larry Picus, Committee Chair

Rossier School of Education
University of Southern California
2022

iv
Abstract
Initial research approaches to investigating the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic in education
have been largely constrained by the ongoing acute nature of pandemic circumstances in which
that research has occurred. This qualitative study examines how different phases of the pandemic
have impacted the instructional practices of teaching faculty in the high school division of a
large, private international school located in Singapore. Aided by the comparatively short
duration of online Emergency Remote Teaching that typified the acute phase of COVID-19
impacts in this system, the study provides the perspectives of 17 members of the high school
faculty who have served as teachers and instructional coaches for the duration of the pandemic.
Using a semi-structured interview approach and subsequent coding of interview transcripts, the
study captures participant perspectives around how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted
instructional practices, how shifts in instructional practices have impacted teachers’ ability to
address what they consider to be their most authentic teaching practices, and the longevity of
adjustments that participants have made to their teaching practices in response to the changing
circumstances of the pandemic. Major findings indicate that there have been numerous and
varied pandemic-occasioned changes to participant teaching and coaching practices. Many of the
practices that participants implemented during the Emergency Remote Teaching phase of the
pandemic have abated with the return to in-person instruction, while those practices that are most
closely aligned with participant sentiments around the value of focusing on social-emotional
well-being categorize many of persistent changes that participants have made in their teaching
and instructional coaching work over the duration of their pandemic teaching.
Keywords: COVID-19, instructional practices, Emergency Remote Teaching, TPACK,
reflective practice, praxis, social-emotional wellness.

v
Dedication
This work is dedicated to my family:
To my parents, Betsy Salemson and Eric Knuffke, who both spent full and fruitful careers as
teachers, convinced me that I could do the same, and even managed to support my eventual
decision to move my own young family about as far away from them as can be arranged without
a ticket to Antarctica.
To my children, Connor & Lyra, who share the adventure of watching them grow up with me
every day. I am always proud of who you are, and excited by who you are becoming.
To My life partner, Alison Kelly, who supports both me and our family in innumerable ways
every day. None of this work would have been possible without your love and care.

Whatever is of interest or merit in what follows is a credit to each of these amazing people.
Whatever might be less-so, is squarely my own.

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Acknowledgements
Three years ago, I did not anticipate writing my
dissertation on COVID-19. If memory serves, my initial
thoughts for the project were on something comparatively
wonky like initiative implementation. But then 2020
started, and before I knew it, I found myself squarely in
the middle of the most significant event in the history of
modern education. A change in my research direction
seemed warranted.
I’d like to acknowledge the support of the faculty at
USC Rossier who have supported this work and enabled my wish to follow this suddenly open
path. Of course, this includes my gracious committee members, Dr. Darline P. Robles, Dr. David
Cash, and my committee chair, Dr. Larry Picus. But it also extends past these three awesome-
sauce people to include Dr. Artineh Samkian for her in-the-weeds support of my methodological
choices, as well as Dr. Ekaterina Moore who provided an excellent first-pass through qualitative
methodologies in her Research Methods I course. Rossier is also home to some truly top-notch
teachers. Aside from the afore-mentioned Doctors Cash, Samkian, and Moore, I also really
enjoyed the pedagogical approaches taken by Dr. John Pascarella and Dr. Briana Hinga for
modeling what great teaching can look like, even when handling their own, sudden, pandemic
circumstances.
It’s a remarkable thing to be able to do a dissertation as a function of one’s employment
in a school system. With that in mind, I’d like to acknowledge the gracious support of a long list
of colleagues. Deep gratitude to the “Secret 17” who participated in this research. My science

vii
department colleagues are also right at the top of the list, along with the larger faculty and
administration (past and present) of the school that I work in. A bit closer to matters of personal
encouragement, I’d like to acknowledge the support of Bob Helmer who has been a ceaseless
kindness over the course of both my work in this program and for my broader work since I first
walked into the school. Among other things, they do not make a better co-advisor than Bob.
While we’re on the subject of work cheerleaders, I’d like to thank Tom Flanagan for being as
great a friend as he is an interim semester co-sponsor, and Dr. Nathan Belcher for being a
continuous support as one who has walked this path before. And none of these gents even
touches the awesome members of the doctoral cohort, each of whom has provided nothing but
great comfort and aide over the time that we have worked together. In my own patterns of work,
my fellow high school cohort members have had to put up with me the most, so I’d like to
acknowledge Kristofer Munden, Jennifer Norman, Dan Skimin, Adrian Price, and Timothy
Trainor by name, if only to repay the smallest piece of the debts that I owe them for their time,
thoughts, and good wishes during this project. If we’re going deeper, I could easily list everyone
in the cohort, but for the specific utility of dissertation-related brain-dumping, I’m particularly
thankful for Christine Henning, Katherine McMullen, and Darnell Fine for being within easy
WhatsApp proximity on an as-needed basis.
If we accept the proposition that our ability to be where we are now is a function of all of
the cumulative experiences we have had in our lives, the list of people we should acknowledge
quickly approaches astronomical proportions. While I won’t suggest that any of those people
should not get their due in a section like this, constraints of time and space lead me to provide a
comparatively short list. My colleagues from the work I did for the first half of my career in Deer
Park UFSD come to obvious mind here. I’m grateful that Carla DeVito, Jessica Canale and

viii
Edward Libretto continue to be in my cheering section, even now that we’re separated by
multiple continents. A bit closer to home, those five people I called out in the Dedication section
are centrally important to me and to the work that I do, along with all the other members of the
Knuffke, Salemson, and Kelly clans that I get to call my own. I owe each of them my gratitude
for the life that I get to live.
Finally, I’d like to acknowledge every student that I’ve been able to work with during my
career. Each of them has done something for me for being in our class, even if it might not have
always felt that way for each of them all of the time. I’m particularly proud of the work that my
students have done over the past 3 years in these COVID circumstances. Their perseverance and
ability to roll with unprecedented punches gives me all sorts of feels. And while it is my
suspicion that Randall Munroe will need to update the xkcd cartoon that appears at the top of this
section to include a diesis next to the 2022 entry, here in the spring of that year I am also hopeful
that this year might also signal the end of this pandemic era. Good riddance.

ix
Table of Contents
Abstract .......................................................................................................................................... iv
Dedication ....................................................................................................................................... v
Acknowledgements ........................................................................................................................ vi
List of Tables ............................................................................................................................... xiii
List of Figures .............................................................................................................................. xiv
Chapter 1: Overview of the Study .................................................................................................. 1
Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 1
The Singular Nature of the COVID-19 Crisis ........................................................ 1
The Local Trajectory of the COVID-19 Crisis ....................................................... 1
The Impact of the COVID-19 Crisis on International Academy of Asia ............... 4
Statement of the Problem .................................................................................................... 6
Purpose of the Study ........................................................................................................... 6
The Goal of the Study ............................................................................................. 6
Research Questions ................................................................................................. 7
Importance of the Study ...................................................................................................... 7
Limitations .......................................................................................................................... 8
Delimitations ....................................................................................................................... 9
Assumptions ...................................................................................................................... 10
Definitions of Terms ......................................................................................................... 10
Organization of the Study ................................................................................................. 11
Chapter 2: Literature Review ........................................................................................................ 12
Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 12

x
The Impact of COVID-19 on Education ........................................................................... 13
The Developing Shape of the COVID-19 Educational Research Space .............. 14
Teaching in a Crisis .............................................................................................. 23
Conceptualizing Instructional Practices ............................................................................ 25
Delineating the Appropriate Unit of Analysis for Instructional Practices. ........... 25
Findings from Research on Instructional Praxis ................................................... 28
The TPACK Framework ................................................................................................... 29
Findings from the TPACK Corpus ....................................................................... 31
Conceptual Framework ..................................................................................................... 31
Concluding Remarks ......................................................................................................... 33
Chapter 3: Methodology ............................................................................................................... 36
Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 36
Population and Sample ..................................................................................................... 37
Study Population ................................................................................................... 37
Study Sampling ..................................................................................................... 38
Instrumentation ................................................................................................................. 40
Instrument Development Process ......................................................................... 40
Research Question-Focus Group Protocol Alignment .......................................... 41
Data Collection ................................................................................................................. 43
Data Analysis .................................................................................................................... 44
Establishing Reliability ..................................................................................................... 48
Internal Reliability ................................................................................................ 48
External reliability ................................................................................................ 50

xi
Additional reliability checks ................................................................................. 51
Positionality Statement ..................................................................................................... 52
Chapter 4: Findings ....................................................................................................................... 54
Introduction ....................................................................................................................... 54
The Use of Numbers in Discussion of Findings ................................................... 54
Initial Pandemic Impacts on Participants .............................................................. 55
Participant TPACK Evaluation ............................................................................. 56
Research Question One Findings ...................................................................................... 59
Pandemic Impacts on Participant Teaching Practices .......................................... 59
Identified Initial Supports for Participant Teaching Practices .............................. 70
Summary Discussion of Research Question One Findings .................................. 74
Research Question Two Findings ..................................................................................... 78
Authenticity Beliefs of Participants ...................................................................... 78
Pandemic-Occasioned Authenticity Impacts on Participant Teachers ................. 80
Participant-effected Changes to Teaching Practices During the Pandemic .......... 84
Coach-Specific Findings for Research Question 2 ............................................... 88
Summary Discussion of Research Question Two Findings .................................. 90
Research Question Three Findings ................................................................................... 92
Analyzing the Duration of Changes Made During the Pandemic ......................... 93
Instructional Changes that Ceased After ERT ...................................................... 93
Instructional Changes that Have Attenuated Over Time ...................................... 94
Persistent and Ongoing Instructional Changes ..................................................... 95
Summary Discussion of Research Question Three Findings ................................ 97

xii
Chapter 5: Discussion ................................................................................................................... 99
Discussion of Findings ...................................................................................................... 99
The Impacts of the Pandemic ................................................................................ 99
Instructional Authenticity & COVID-19 ............................................................ 100
The Persistence of Changes ................................................................................ 102
Limitations of Findings ................................................................................................... 102
Implications and Recommendations ............................................................................... 103
Implications and Recommendations for IAA Teachers and Instructional Coaches
............................................................................................................................. 103
Leveraging Pandemic Teaching and Coaching Experiences .............................. 106
Implications and Recommendations for the IAA Institutional Leadership ........ 107
Recommendations for Further Research ......................................................................... 112
Concluding Remarks ....................................................................................................... 113
References ................................................................................................................................... 115
Appendix A: Teacher Interview Protocol ................................................................................... 125
Appendix B: Instructional Coach Interview Protocol ................................................................. 130
Appendix C: Individual Reflection Prompts for Interview Participants ..................................... 135
Appendix D: Axial Codebook .................................................................................................... 138

xiii
List of Tables
Table 1 Salient Participant Criteria .............................................................................................. 39
Table 2 Research Question- Individual Interview Protocol Alignment Grid .............................. 42
Table 3 Major Coding Categories ................................................................................................ 45
Table 4 Self-Evaluation of Participant Technological Fluency ................................................... 57
Table 5 Participant Identified ERT Technology Supports ........................................................... 72
Table 6 Singleton-identified Missing ERT Supports ................................................................... 74
Table 7 Participant Provided Authentic Teaching/Coaching Beliefs .......................................... 79
Table 8 Persistent Pandemic-Driven Changes to Teaching and Coaching .................................. 96
Table 9 Participant Pandemic Lessons Learned ........................................................................ 105
Table 10 Participant evaluations of SIA’s Pandemic Response ................................................ 108

xiv
List of Figures
Figure 1 The TPACK Framework and its Knowledge Components ............................................ 30
Figure 2 Conceptual Framework of this Study ............................................................................. 32

1
Chapter 1: Overview of the Study
Introduction
This research focuses on the impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on teachers’
instructional practices and the factors that have influenced changes to instructional practice
during the pandemic. COVID-19 provides a unique example of a significant disruption to
educational systems worldwide, serving as an essentially unprecedented, natural-experiment-
style setting to investigate how teaching is impacted by significant disruption and subsequent
recovery in an educational system.
The Singular Nature of the COVID-19 Crisis
The global COVID-19 pandemic is an unprecedented generational crisis, significantly
affecting all aspects of modern society. In as much as anyone has attempted to measure these
impacts, the data astound. Cutler & Summers (2020) estimated a projected cost of 16 trillion US
dollars in October of 2020. This figure is approximately 90 percent of the annual US Gross
Domestic Product, four times greater than the financial impacts of the 2008 “great recession,”
and nearly twice the total monetary cost of all American military operations since September 11,
2001. As of November 2021, the World Health Organization (WHO) reports more than 255
million confirmed infections worldwide, with more than 5.1 million deaths, placing the acute toll
of COVID-19 among the most significant impacts in recorded human history (World Health
Organization, 2021b).
The Local Trajectory of the COVID-19 Crisis
While the COVID-19 Pandemic is global in its impacts, it is not uniformly so. Different
countries have had different experiences and different outcomes during the crisis. The reasons
for this are outside of the scope of this research, but it suffices to say that a combination of local

2
factors that are both intentional (ex., The local system of government) and serendipitous (ex.
Local geography) have resulted in these differences. As this research looks at the impacts of the
pandemic in a private international school in Singapore, some attention to the local trajectory of
the crisis in Singapore is helpful.
In many ways, Singapore has represented a best-case scenario for managing the
disruptions caused by COVID-19. This is not to say that the country has been immune to the
impacts of COVID-19. Economically, the country has suffered, with an estimated negative
growth in 2020 GDP of four to seven percent, particularly in the areas of travel, tourism, and
global shipping (Saw et al., 2020). When considered in terms of the health and well-being of its
residents, a more positive picture resolves. Aided by its small size, relative ease of border
control, and its position as one of the most highly developed countries in both the region and the
world, Singapore has been able to manage the pandemic effectively. Until the summer of 2021,
the nation had the lowest case-fatality rate (CFR) in the world, to that point having seen 34 total
deaths out of slightly more than 62,000 cases for a CFR of 0.05% as compared to the global
COVID-19 CFR of 2.16% (World Health Organization, 2021a). This was accompanied by an
aggressive vaccination campaign, resulting in more than 86% of the population fully vaccinated
by February 2022. In concert with widespread vaccinations, during the fall of 2021 the
government of Singapore shifted its approach to managing the pandemic from a so-called “zero
COVID” strategy that looked to isolate all cases to prevent the spread of the disease to one that
recognizes the endemic, ongoing nature of COVID-19 transmission. This “endemic COVID”
management has a focus on aggressive management of severe COVID-19 cases, while allowing
mild cases to recover in isolation at home (McGregor, 2021). Since this change in pandemic
management, infection rate and cumulative deaths from COVID-19 have increased, though the

3
overall CFR rate of 0.15% remains significantly below the global CFR of 1.3%, and among the
lowest in the world (World Health Organization, 2021b)
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared the emerging COVID-19 disease a
global pandemic on March 11, 2020 (World Health Organization, 2020). Singapore confirmed its
first case of COVID-19 on January 23, 2020 and reported its first two deaths from the disease on
March 21, 2020. During that time, the number of disease cases in the country increased steadily,
though at a relatively slow rate, aided by a robust contact tracing and disease surveillance
apparatus in the country and its famously high-quality medical care. During this initial phase of
the outbreak, the disease spread to the foreign worker community. The pace of the outbreak then
began to accelerate as transmission among foreign workers in their high-occupancy dormitory
residences and untraceable community spread increased. On April 3, 2020, Prime Minister Lee
Hsien Loong announced that the nation would enter a “circuit breaker” lock-down beginning
April 7, 2020, with all non-essential businesses closing and all schools transitioning to home-
based learning for the duration of the circuit breaker. Initially established until May 4, the circuit
breaker was subsequently extended until June 1, as untraced community transmission continued
(Yong, 2020).
Following the conclusion of the circuit breaker period, the Singaporean government
introduced a three-phase approach to resuming activities. In-person schooling was allowed to
resume from the beginning of phase 1 with special precautions for safe distancing and contact
tracing. During phase 3, most societal activities resumed, in concert with strict adherence to safe-
distancing measures and legally mandated mask-wearing and contact tracing. On May 8, 2021,
Singapore re-tightened restrictions in response to a detected increase in unlinked community
spread of COVID-19 and the development of several large clusters of linked infections involving

4
a public hospital and Changi airport (Lai, 2021). On May 16, 2021, these restrictions increased
again in response phase labeled “Phase 2 (Heightened Alert)” lasting until June 13, 2021. Phase
2 (Heightened Alert) involved several measures intended to reduce the rate of disease
transmission within the country, including strong encouragement of working from home, the
shuttering of all dine-in restaurants island-wide, and significant reductions in the numbers of
people that allowed to occupy social venues like shopping malls (Singapore Government, 2021).
Except for annual end-of-semester testing, all K-12 school activities on the island returned to
Distance Learning from May 19, 2021, until the end of the Semester on May 28, 2021 (Ministry
of Education, 2021).
The Impact of the COVID-19 Crisis on International Academy of Asia
When considering the impact of COVID-19 on an educational system, similar
interactions between the nature of any specific educational system and the impacts of the
pandemic are at play. Consideration of the nature of the trajectory of the COVID-19 pandemic
within the educational system that serves as the site for this research helps the reader understand
the specific educational circumstances being analyzed.
International Academy of Asia (IAA) is a private, independent, P-12 international school
located in Singapore. With a total student body of over 4,000 students, the school endeavors to
fulfill a vision that speaks to global leadership and critical thinking (International Academy of
Asia, 2020). As a private school, IAA is funded by a combination of managed endowment funds
and student tuition. While the specific amounts paid by students vary by school division, student
citizenship, and length of tenure spent at IAA, in the 2020-2021 school year, student tuition and
fees ranged from approximately 25,000 USD to 40,000 USD (International Academy of Asia,
n.d.).

5
Between the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in Singapore on January 23, 2020, and
the nation's entry into the circuit breaker lockdown, IAA had more than two months to prepare
for the transition to home-based learning. The first distance-learning practice drill was held
during the week of February 10th and involved all divisions of the school piloting possible
distance-learning structures while on-campus. Following this initial on-campus pilot, additional
at-home distance learning practices were held off-campus on March 19, March 20, and again for
the entire week of March 30 to April 3. During these off-campus pilots, teachers were
encouraged to work from home or campus as per their preference.
On April 3, 2020, the circuit breaker declaration transitioned all school staff and students
to at-home learning for the duration of the lock down. Following the end of the circuit breaker,
staff and students returned to campus from June 3 until the end of the school year on June 5th.
From this point forward, IAA transitioned out of distance learning and returned to in-person
instruction, though with some modifications for those students who were unable to return to
Singapore until October of 2021. This period of in-person instruction lasted for almost the
entirety of the 2020-2021 school year until the restrictions that were implemented with the move
to Phase 2 (Heightened Alert) in May of 2021.
With the increased restrictions that accompanied the move, IAA transitioned back to
distance learning on May 19, 2021, for all divisions, except for semester exams which were
allowed to be administered in person. Semester exams began on May 20, 2021. The high school
division of IAA had one day of distance learning, while the lower school divisions were in
distance learning until the final instructional day of the school year on May 25th. Since the
beginning of the 2021-2022 schoolyear, the high school division has been almost continuously

6
in-person with the exceptions of a scheduled distance-learning practice day and a one-day at-
home learning period due to a staff member testing positive for COVID-19.
Statement of the Problem
The problem this project focuses on is how the COVID-19 crisis has impacted the
instructional practices of IAA teachers. IAA positions itself as an organization at the forefront of
international P-12 education, as evidenced by its mission to provide each student with an
exceptional international education (International Academy of Asia, 2020). While the institution
has been spared from the more extreme disruptions that COVID-19 has occasioned due to a
fortuitous combination of local factors and its well-resourced position, the pandemic has still had
a pronounced impact on all aspects of the educational systems of IAA.
Effects of the pandemic on the instructional practices of the IAA teaching staff are of
particular interest because of the central role that teachers play in the daily functioning of the
school and the significant impact that they have on students. Instructional practice is a primary
driver of how teaching is realized in pursuing the IAA mission and vision. While working under
the constraints of the current COVID-19 reality, teachers' choices for their instruction will
impact the student experience and impact their learning. This problem also represents
considerations around the impact of COVID-19 on instruction more broadly, though the impacts
for IAA will be highly localized to its specific circumstances.
Purpose of the Study
The Goal of the Study
This study describes the factors that have impacted teaching practices during the COVID-
19 crisis. This research provides an understanding of how teachers perceive the work of teaching
during the COVID-19 crisis, focused on the work they do with students directly. It provides an

7
understanding of what factors teachers feel support their teaching during the crisis and those that
they feel work against them. By elucidating the interactions of different factors in teacher’s
perceptions of their work during the crisis, the research gives a view of how teaching practices
are affected by different factors during and after the acute phases of the COVID-19 crisis
(delineated as the period of emergency remote teaching) and how the interplay of practice-
influencing factors can both strengthen and diminish the ability of teachers to work from a place
that they feel is authentically aligned to doing the best work that they can for their students.
Research Questions
The research questions for this study are as follows:
1. How has the COVID-19 crisis impacted the instructional practices of individual teachers?
2. How have the shifts in instructional practices occasioned by the COVID-19 crisis
impacted teachers' ability to address what they feel are authentic teaching practices when
teaching students?
3. How have the adjustments that teachers have made in their instructional practices during
different phases of the COVID-19 crisis persisted or abated as the acute stage of the crisis
has receded?
Importance of the Study
Given the recency and extremity of the COVID-19 Pandemic, this type of descriptive
research project is hopefully well within what Geertz (1973) termed the ‘thick description’ of
human interactions within the context of an educational system handling an unexpected crisis.
There seems to be inarguable utility in rigorous documentation of the current moment in
education for its own sake, but the author does not think that this project is limited to
memorialized documentation of a unique moment.

8
While the COVID-19 situation is an example in extremity, it has utility for elucidating
how teachers’ instructional practices, and the factors that influence those practices, respond to
large-scale changes in instructional practices that also operate more universally as educational
systems undergo the typical, less-extreme changes that are omnipresent in the field, albeit less
overtly, and therefore less readily available for study. In this way, the work of this project is
helpful to teachers, administrators, and any other parties of the IAA educational system for
illustrating which factors are privileged by teachers when considering their instructional
practices and the ways in which those practices change with the circumstances.
This study utilizes a qualitative methodology that involves one-on-one interviews with
teachers. Participating teachers were encouraged to elucidate their perspectives about how the
pandemic has led them to make changes to their instructional practices (if any) and their
reasoning for why they have implemented changes to their instructional practices with
consideration for how any identified shifts in instructional practices have impacted teacher
ability to deliver instruction that they consider to be authentically positioned toward their
instructional goals. Additional consideration is given to teacher perspectives on how long-lived
they feel the changes they have implemented will be in their instructional practice.
Limitations
The study is subject to many limitations. One limitation of note is the ongoing impact of
the COVID-19 pandemic on the instructional environment of IAA and the larger environment of
Singapore. The sudden transition back to heightened restrictions in May of 2021 and the sporadic
distance learning episodes during the 2021-2022 school year demonstrates that the pandemic is
not over, and the local situation remains unpredictable.

9
Another major limitation is the specific nature of IAA as an institution. Given its position
as a privileged, privately funded, independent school system, it is reasonable to expect that much
of what this study uncovers is inextricably linked to the nature of the IAA school system. While
the dangers of generalizing qualitative research in over-broad applications are well established in
the literature (Lochmiller & Lester, 2017; Maxwell, 2013; Merriam & Tisdell, 2015), these
dynamics are amplified given how atypical the educational system of IAA is both in Singapore
and on a more global scale.
Delimitations
Several major delimitations factor into this study. The conceptual framework (illustrated
in Figure 2 and discussed in Chapter 2) has driven the nature of the research questions and the
choice of a qualitative research paradigm, all of which represent the perspective and interest of
the author. It is undoubtedly true that multiple other domains of the IAA system have had
significant impacts from the COVID-19 pandemic and that domains not considered in this study
may well benefit from different research questions and research paradigms.
The criteria that have been used to determine the population of interest for this study are
similarly delimiting. As the study looks at instructional practices, the population of interest is
teachers, but as Chapter 3 will demonstrate, not all teachers are equally well-positioned to
participate in this study. The result is that the population of interest are those teachers who have
been teaching non-performance subjects (Mathematics, English Language Arts, Social Studies,
Science, Learning Support and the Technology, Electives & Capstone departments) in the IAA
high school for the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic (from at least the beginning of the 2019-
2020 school year). Among other things, this delineation of the population of interest means that

10
the findings from this study will likely not generalize beyond this subdomain of the IAA
academe.
Assumptions
Like any other study, this project operates with several assumptions that are a product of
the epistemological and ontological perspectives of the author. The primary assumption is one of
authenticity on the part of study participants. It is assumed that those teachers who elect to
participate in this project represent their genuine perspectives on the topic. There is an
assumption that the researcher can believe participants.
Another assumption is that there is an impact on instructional decision-making by the
COVID-19 pandemic. From this overarching assumption, we can also assume that the research
questions, conceptual framework, and methodological approach are all useful for elucidating
those impacts.
A final noteworthy assumption is that teachers seek to work with students in ways that
they consider authentically positioned toward accomplishing their educational goals. This
assumption is the basis for the definition of authentic teaching utilized in this study, in that the
concept of authenticity in teaching is generated by the teacher’s own stated pedagogical goals
and perspectives.
Definitions of Terms
Authentic teaching practices- Teaching practices aligned with teachers' stated beliefs about what
they feel are the most important goals of the work they do with students.

11
Circuit breaker- The name given by the Singaporean government to the lock-down period lasting
from April 7, 2020, until June 1, 2020. This period was accompanied by mandatory at-home
learning for all students in the country.
Emergency remote teaching (ERT)- Taken from the delineation of online instructional modalities
offered by Bozkurt & Sharma (2020). ERT refers to online instruction that is occasioned by
sudden, unplanned emergency circumstances. The term applies to all online instructional
transitions driven by the acute phase of the COVID-19 pandemic. In this study ERT refers to the
instruction offered by IAA during the circuit breaker period.
Instructional practices- The term is operationalized for this research as any actions that a teacher
consciously engages in during their teaching practice to teach students and identifies as such. A
teacher's immediate decisions during a lesson are less of a focus in this work than longer-term
decisions involved in curriculum planning and instructional design.
Professional Learning Community (PLC)- A model of instructional planning and teaching that is
based on the collective work of a team of teachers. The PLC model, particularly as conceived of
by the work of Richard DuFour (2004), is the functional unit of instructional decision-making at
IAA.
Praxis- Stanced within the Freire conception of praxis “reflection and action upon the world in
order to transform it” (2000, p.51) whenever those actions are subsequently reflected upon by the
teacher when they consider their utility for teaching.
Organization of the Study
This dissertation is organized in a five-chapter format. Chapter 1 provides an overview of
the study, introducing the COVID-19 pandemic’s impacts in Singapore broadly and in the IAA
educational system. The statement of the problem and purpose of the study (including its goals

12
and the research questions) are introduced, along with a statement of the importance of the study.
The chapter concludes with a discussion of the study's limitations, delimitations, and
assumptions before providing definitions of terms.
Chapter 2 provides a literature review focused on three major areas: Impacts of COVID-
19 on educational systems, conceptualizing instructional practices at a level of resolution
appropriate for this study, and an overview of the TPACK framework for considering the
interaction of instructional technology and instructional practices. After this review, the
conceptual framework for the study is presented and discussed.
Chapter 3 describes the methodology that the study employs. The study population,
sampling, and instrumentation are all described, along with discussion around the development
of the research instruments being used and the methodological approach taken for data collection
and analysis. Considerations around establishing reliability are also provided.
Chapter 4 provides a discussion of findings from the study. Findings related to each
research question are discussed, along with overall summaries of the picture of the data that has
been generated for each of the research questions.
Chapter 5 summarizes findings and conclusions that can be drawn from the work.
Limitations of findings are discussed at length, and implications of study findings for both
teachers and institutional leadership are presented. The chapter ends with brief concluding
remarks.
Chapter 2: Literature Review
Introduction
The literature review that follows is structured as two forks that drive the work of this
study. First, a digest of research into how the COVID-19 Pandemic has impacted educational

13
systems is provided with some consideration of how that research connects to the previously
established, considerably more limited, research literature around teaching through other
disruptive historical crises. Following this, a review of the research around instructional practices
is presented, focusing on determining the appropriate unit of analysis for this study’s framing of
instructional practices and a spotlight on the role of teacher’s technological facility in the work
of teaching during the COVID-19 crisis. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the
conceptual framework that underpins the rest of this study.
The Impact of COVID-19 on Education
In much the same way that it has affected everything else, the COVID-19 pandemic has
disrupted global educational systems in ways that are unprecedented in their significance. The
statistics are astounding. At the peak of the initial wave of the crisis in April 2020, 1.6 billion
learners were affected by total or partial school closures in 194 nations, representing
approximately 90% of the world’s enrolled students (UNESCO, 2020a). At the time of writing,
more than one year into the course of the pandemic, the impacts remain profound, with the
United Nations reporting more than 145 million learners currently affected by total or partial
school closures, and a comparatively-minor 29 nations with total school system closures
(UNESCO, 2020a). Even as of May of 2021, as vaccine distribution continues to accelerate, the
extent of COVID-19 impacts on school systems would be among the most significant disruptions
to schooling in modern history were it not for the scale of the initial disruptions.
Bozkurt & Sharma (2020) suggested that due to the forced and rushed nature of the
COVID-19 transition for educators, it is best to conceive of moves to online education due to the
crisis as emergency remote teaching (ERT) rather than proper online distance education (p.2). In
making this distinction, the authors suggest that typical research paradigms and metrics that have

14
developed in the history of research into planned, non-crisis-driven online and remote learning
probably will not be wholly applicable to the current COVID-19 moment. Hodges et al. (2020)
echo this delineation. They suggest that the primary foci of the ERT transitions are preferentially
focused on creative problem solving for the emergency of the current moment and that the hurry
to get material into an accessible online format will likely result in a diminished quality of course
materials.
The Developing Shape of the COVID-19 Educational Research Space
A review of some of the literature written to this point on the impacts of COVID-19 in
education reveals several emerging patterns around the subjects, samples, and cognitive styles
that underlie much of the work reviewed for this dissertation. Several of these patterns are
discussed in what follows.
A Focus on Higher Education
To this point, much of the literature that is reviewed is focused on higher education
(Aristovnik et al., 2020; Assunção Flores & Gago, 2020; Bao, 2020; Cutri et al., 2020; Donovan,
2020; Humphrey & Wiles, 2021; Popa et al., 2020; Sjølie et al., 2020; Son et al., 2020;
Villanueva et al., 2020; Zhang et al., 2020). Reasons for this are likely due to the proximity of
most researchers to college and university education. During an unprecedented crisis that has
gripped the field that a researcher is working in and is characterized by profound disruptions to
regular patterns of work and interaction, it follows that a researcher may well be inclined to
study the populations for which they have the greatest ease of access. This may also be a driving
factor behind why much of the research described involving teaching and learning at the post-
secondary level is almost wholly qualitative for much of the early work reported, with
autoethnographic approaches and other forms of self-study showing up with frequency.

15
Donovan (2020) offered a fairly typical exemplar of this style, describing the experience
of making the transition to ERT in undergraduate chemistry classes, the struggle to adapt to
active learning strategies, and reporting that synchronous attendance for online lectures
decreased over the semester, as students shifted to using recordings of the lectures
asynchronously. In a similar mode, Berry’s (2020) autoethnography of their reflections as an
English professor provide both a discussion of how the pandemic has impacted the practices that
anchor the work of being a professor and suggest several reconciliations they feel they need to
make with the current moment (ex. Disconnection, interrupted cultural inquiry).
As interesting as these types of initial approaches to understanding the crisis are, they
typically do not allow for easy extrapolation to a wider understanding outside of what it was like
for this educator in one moment in the current crisis. Fortunately, the research picture continues
to develop with larger-scale projects and their findings being published. Aristovnik et al. (2020)
report their findings from a sizable survey of 20,383 college students from 62 countries
administered from May 5 through June 15, 2020. The survey, which had participants from the six
non-Antarctic regions of the globe, asked students to respond to a series of Likert scale items on
various aspects of their experience of learning during the pandemic. An interesting picture of
what it is like to be a college student in the current moment emerges (ex. almost half of the
respondents reported that they did not have a quiet place to study, and one-third reported no
access to printers (p.19). Son et al. (2020) report on a similar survey methodology, though
constrained to a sample of 195 students at a single large public university in the United States,
and find that the vast majority (71%) of student respondents indicated increased stress and
anxiety due to the crisis and a variety of negative stressors ranging from fear and worry about
their health (91%) to disruptions of their sleeping patterns (86%). These larger-scale more

16
quantitatively positioned survey approaches are inarguably illuminating about the impacts of the
COVID-19 pandemic on education. However, the utility of the research for the current project is
somewhat limited due to its focus on student reports rather than educator’s perspectives.
The relative lack of a focus on P-12 educational systems within the larger corpus of this
literature points to a clear utility for the work of this dissertation. Looking at the literature
emerging from studies in higher education discussed in this section, the pandemic has had
tangible impacts on both the experiences of students and teachers during this time. By focusing
on how the pandemic has impacted the IAA educational system, this study should provide a
useful and illuminating addition to the literature that has been, to this point, very focused on
higher education.
The Inequity of the Crisis
Another major pattern seen in the literature is the pervasive disparity that has
accompanied COVID-19 impacts on education. In their delineation around the nature of ERT,
Bozkurt and Sharma (2020) note that typically poorer students suffer more from the ERT
transition. Multiple studies all suggest tangible differences in how socioeconomic status and
resource availability impact how the crisis is felt both by educational systems and individual
students. In its October 2020 review of global impacts from COVID-19 on educational systems,
the United Nations reported myriad disparities in those impacts, with high-income countries
dealing with school closures differently than low and lower-middle-income countries.
Differences abounded in most aspects of what it means to run a school system from student
assessment practices to the use of online learning, support measures for remediation, and
governmental policies to support teachers, support parents and caregivers, boost access to
resources, prioritize safe reopening of schools, and long-term financing of crisis response

17
measures (UNESCO, 2020b). In every instance, lower-income countries were experiencing a
more difficult COVID-19 crisis, with a less robust response. These findings are in-line with the
large-scale student survey by Aristovnik et al. (2020), which showed notable differences in
response patterns by region. Students generally reported satisfaction with online instructional
modalities, though students from Africa reported below-satisfaction (p.8). Regression analysis
also found significant positive correlations (p < .001) between student satisfaction and reporting
hopeful emotions, receiving a scholarship, and the ability to pay for school, and significant
negative correlations (p < .01) between student satisfaction and study issues, internet access, and
quiet locations (p.17).
The work that has demonstrated the disparity of COVID-19 impacts on educational
systems as a function of societal inequities is certainly important for its own sake. Outside of the
clear utility of keeping this work in mind during this study, these dynamics are somewhat
secondary for this research project. For various reasons discussed in the preceding chapter,
political, geographical, and socioeconomic factors have a diminished impact on-site at IAA. By
most metrics, the IAA circumstance represents a best-case scenario for handling the disruptions
caused by COVID-19. In this way, any confounding local inequities should largely be absent
from the work of this study.
A Focus on Teaching and Learning Online
Putting aside previously discussed distinctions of COVID-occasioned ERT within the
larger sphere of online education, much of the literature around the COVID-19 crisis is focused
on the transition to online instruction. The predominance of this research focus is
understandable, given the specific nature of how COVID-19 occasioned a profound and sudden

18
shift to online-only instruction for much of the global education system. Several themes from the
literature around online instruction are discussed below.
Principles of Online Instruction. Much of the literature that was reviewed focused on
principles for online instruction through the lens of teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic
(Aristovnik et al., 2020; Assunção Flores & Gago, 2020; Bao, 2020; Berry, 2020; Bozkurt &
Sharma, 2020; Cutri et al., 2020; Dhawan, 2020; Donovan, 2020; Humphrey & Wiles, 2021;
Whittle et al., 2020; Zhang et al., 2020). The typical structure of literature in this category is a
series of observations about making the transition, followed by a set of strategies/thematic
suggestions for working in the COVID-emergency remote environment, along with
justifications. While the specific number and phrasing of suggestions provided by the author(s)
vary, many themes occur repeatedly.
More Intentional Focus on Resourcing Crisis Teaching. The literature frequently notes
a general lack of preparedness for meeting the current educational moment. Working from their
perspective on K-12 education in Portugal, (Assunção Flores & Gago, 2020) note a series of
difficulties for the nation, including lack of adequate equipment for pupils and for teachers
(many of whom reported they had to use their own devices to teach), not involving pupils in their
learning, lack of time in which learning can occur, lack of teacher training for online teaching,
and lack of support from parents (p.509). From the Chinese university perspective, Zhang et al.
(2020) explicitly calls for government assistance to provide educational infrastructure and
standardized home-based teaching/learning equipment.
Suggestions within this theme include increasing institutional preparedness for
emergencies that require rapid transition to online teaching circumstances (Bao, 2020;
Villarnueva et al., 2020; Whittle et al., 2020) and increasing support networks and assistance for

19
teachers (Bao, 2020; Villanueva et al., 2020; Wentz, 2020; Zhang et al., 2020). There is also a
repeated suggestion that the work done by teachers in the current moment may prove useful for
future educational crises with similar demands on educational systems (Bao, 2020; Cutri et al.,
2020; Hodges et al., 2020; Villanueva et al., 2020)
Shifting Teaching Practices to Modalities that are Suggested to be More Effective in
the Online Environment. In the previously described large-sample survey analysis by Aristovnik
et al. (2020), 86.7% of respondents reported being in forced distance-learning structures (p. 8).
Students generally reported satisfaction with the online instructional modalities on offer to them,
and most students (57.6%) felt that teaching staff provided satisfactory support (though, as noted
previously, with notable regional differences). Additionally, their regression analysis also found
significant positive correlations (p < .001) between student satisfaction and the use of recorded
videos, information about exams, teaching staff support, and informational channels from the
learning institution (p.17). In a much smaller-scale (n = 14) survey of undergraduate biology
students amid COVID-19 caused distance learning, (Humphrey & Wiles, 2021) report similar
findings with the majority of their respondents (12 out of 14), indicating that while the transition
to ERT was difficult, their professors had adjusted well to the circumstances. Villanueva et al.’s
(2020) survey of 109 undergraduate chemistry students showed that student perspectives around
specific ways of teaching online varied, and in their local circumstances, the grade distributions
in sections of the course that employed either synchronous, asynchronous, or a combination of
modalities did not differ significantly from each other (p. 2460). These positive aspects noted,
the picture from the literature is not uniformly so. In their mixed-methods study of how forced
distance learning affected the experience of 427 college students in the spring of 2020, Popa et

20
al. (2020) report findings that the didactic quality of the online learning experience needs to be
improved.
Suggestions here include dividing content into smaller, more manageable units (Bao,
2020; Whittle et al., 2020), elucidating and adjusting the instructional style to those more suited
for online instruction (Bao, 2020; Zhang et al., 2020), providing students with a variety of
learning materials both synchronously and asynchronously (Bao, 2020), and reconceiving
teaching and assessment practices to account for the online environment (Assunção Flores &
Gago, 2020) 2020; Donovan, 2020; Humphrey & Wiles, 2021; Whittle et al., 2020). Popa et al.
(2020) point specifically to professor-student interactions, obtaining feedback, and the pedagogic
design of online courses as areas that are all in need of development (p.11)
Working to Maintain Student Motivation. Multiple sources report that students indicate
that their motivation to learn in COVID-19 ERT circumstances attenuated over the duration of
the time spent in online learning (Humphrey & Wiles, 2021; Lepp et al., Popa et al., 2020).
There are several proffered reasons for this motivational flagging, including the nature of
COVID-19 ERT, both from the perspective of less effective online learning modalities as
compared to in-person instruction (Humphrey & Wiles, 2021), the difficulties of learning outside
of school settings due to resources (Aristovnik et al., 2020; Humphrey & Wiles, 2021). The
Aristovnik et al. (2020) survey reported that globally, 30.8% of student respondents indicated
their workload got smaller, 26.6% reported it remained the same, and 42.6% reported it had
gotten larger (p.9). Villanueva et al. (2020) report that notably more students withdrew from
their courses during the spring 2020 semester than at any point in the previous 5 years for which
data was available.

21
To help maintain student motivation, several recommendations are provided. Humphrey
& Wiles (2021) expand at length on the topic and offer recommendations including clear
communication and maintenance of expectations at the beginning of the semester and throughout
a course, providing students with the opportunity to make more decisions about their learning,
increased metacognitive reflection for students around their learning, and the thoughtful
inclusion of challenging course work in the ERT setting. Whittle et al. (2020) also note that the
ERT environment provides opportunities to develop learner agency and increase social
connections to learners and their support networks (ex. parents) in ways that might be unique to
ERT circumstances if teachers are provided the time necessary to develop fluency in
technological tools.
Returning from Emergency Remote Teaching.
Unlike much of the research in previous sections, this review did not turn up a
comparably robust corpus of literature dealing with the return from COVID-19 ERT
circumstances. That noted, given the nature of the work of this project, the literature that was
found is discussed herein. In his own Master’s Dissertation (Wentz, 2020) provides a small-scale
study (n = 3) of music (string instrument) teachers working in Maryland public schools during
the spring and fall of 2020. Given that the work spans a period of the pandemic that included
both remote-learning and (partial) return-to-school, some of it is discussed in prior sections of
this review. At the same time, when considering specific findings related to the return from
distance learning, Wentz notes that Teacher sentiments around success in the fall of 2020 (when
the return to in-person instruction was underway) were connected to specific actions of building-
level administration (p.38). Additionally, Wentz proposes three major personal qualities that
determined the overall perception of the impacts of the pandemic: Adaptation to emergency

22
circumstances, commitment to the work of being a teacher, and the teacher’s ability to provide
students with a sense of normalcy in decidedly non-normative circumstances (p.42)
Writing from a more systemic perspective, (Teräs et al., 2020) note the increase in
various proposed technological solutions for various aspects of teaching and learning during the
crisis, warning that uncritical acceptance of these solutions due to emergency needs may risk
perpetuating regressive educational technology practices once the acute emergency phase of the
crisis abates. To avoid this, they suggest that
“an urgent task in the Covid-19 pandemic is to actively engage people, networks,
projects, research and public discussions to promote critically and reflectively informed
praxis. We need to apply and develop critical applied research methodologies and create
design principles for democratic and emancipatory digitalization of education. Moreover,
we need wider societal dialogue about the purposes of education and about the kind of
society we want to develop in the COVID-19 world.” (p. 874).
In a similar vein, (Sjølie et al., 2020) note that the disruptive nature of COVID-19 on education
may allow for Mahon’s (2014) notion of critical pedagogical praxis, “creating spaces in which
untoward or unsustainable practices and arrangements can be understood and reoriented and in
which new possibilities for action can emerge and be enacted.” They hope that the post-COVID-
19 work of academe will involve not taking collegial relationships for granted, and continuing to
develop a “praxis-oriented, communitarian character” of their academic life. Writing from a
more systems-focused approach, Hall et al. (2020), posit that the impacts of the pandemic are so
extreme that their effects may well “fundamentally redesign the educational landscape we are
familiar with, and in ways that have not even been imagined yet.” (p. 7). At the same time,
results from a RAND corporation survey of more than 300 US public and charter school systems

23
suggests that while these changes are not easy to predict, they are certainly already well
underway, with one in five districts planning to adopt, or having already adopted a fully online
variant of their school programming in the period following the pandemic (Schwartz et al., 2020,
p. 11)
Given the relative paucity of work that examines the transition to, and return from ERT,
the work of this study should fill an intriguing gap in the literature on this front. On some level,
the lack of work looking at the ERT transition/return is simply a function of the relative lack of
historical precedent that would occasion shifts like the ones engendered by the COVID-19
pandemic. Given the pronounced impacts of COVID-19 on global educational systems, studies
like this one are well-warranted for the current educational moment.
Teaching in a Crisis
While COVID-19 is an extreme example of teaching through disruption, it is by no
means the only crisis that has affected educational systems. Dhawan (2020) provides 14 recent
historical examples (p.13), all of which are natural disasters ranging from the 2009 L’Aquila
earthquake to the 2019 heatwave in Bihar. In each instance, educational systems proximal to the
region where the disaster occurred were interrupted for some time. In each instance, the author
notes the need for robust online structures during the acute phase of the crisis. Certainly, the
experiences of educational systems during the pandemic have been highly reliant on the same.
That noted the extremity of the impacts from the pandemic, both in terms of duration and extent,
do limit the applicability of much of the prior work that has been done looking at how school
systems function in periods of disruption. Hall et al. (2020), note this dearth of relevant
literature, pointing to only one study on the impact of pandemics in education that they could
locate prior to the COVID-19 pandemic.

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Lessons from Hurricane Katrina
By many metrics, the most similar recent crisis for educational systems to that of the
current situation is the impacts of Hurricane Katrina on the school system of New Orleans in
2005. The storm, which resulted in breaching of the protective levee system, and widespread
flooding of large areas of the city, devastated the physical plant of Orleans parish schools,
leaving only 20 public schools suitable for occupancy in the aftermath of the floods out of the
120 school buildings that were functioning prior to the event (Alzahrani, 2018). The ensuing
changes to the structure of the school system of New Orleans were significant, including the use
of the recently established recovery school system, which had originally been created in 2003
separately from the pre-existing New Orleans Public School (NOPS) system at a state-wide level
to address issues with the lowest-performing schools in Louisiana. This process resulted in an
almost wholesale conversion of the school system to one comprising a series of charter school
networks. Once this transition had been completed, only five traditional public schools remained
in the New Orleans system, and 7,500 public school employees had been terminated from the
positions they held prior to the Hurricane (Goral, 2013).
As significant as the changes to the New Orleans school system have been due to
Hurricane Katrina, the specific nature of that crisis, and the response, are relatively limited for
this study. Most significantly, the circumstances in which Katrina affected NOPS are not like the
circumstances in which IAA is dealing with COVID-19 impacts. Thus, while the vast majority of
literature around Katrina that the author has surveyed deals with the impacts of the sudden and
large-scale transition of NOPS from one of a typical urban public school system to an almost-
wholly-chartered one (Alzahrani, 2018; Goral, 2013; Morse, 2010; Newmark & de Rugy, 2006;
Perry, 2006), and the ensuing developments used to further particular political purposes

25
(Tillotson, 2006; Tuzzolo & Hewitt, 2006), essentially none of that corpus applies to this work.
The student-family response is another aspect where the Katrina literature does not easily apply
to the current COVID-19 crisis. While firm figures do not exist due to the somewhat scattershot
nature of early recovery from the hurricane, perhaps as many as 50% of Katrina evacuees did not
return to New Orleans following the storm and its aftermath (Reckdahl, 2015). This type of
migration has not occurred during the Pandemic, suggesting that the types of large-scale changes
to the character of school systems will not be as pronounced in the aftermath of COVID-19.
Conceptualizing Instructional Practices
Delineating the Appropriate Unit of Analysis for Instructional Practices.
The research around instructional practice is deep and wide. A central finding of the
literature in this regard is that the sheer volume of decisions that a teacher makes during their
work in the moment with students relegates a significant portion to a level of consideration
below conscious action outside of managing the delivery of a planned lesson and its routines
(Calderhead, 1979, 1981; C. M. Clark & Peterson, 1986). Given the focus of this study on
intentional aspects of instructional practices, there should be some care taken to delineate the
aspects of teaching that arise from conscious decisions on the part of the teacher from those that
are unconscious, as only the former include the unit of analysis for this work.
Much of the research around teacher decision-making in the moment of action with
students have adapted to this sub-conscious aspect by having teachers engage with recordings of
themselves teaching or otherwise being presented with opportunities to think-aloud their actions
at particular moments, after the fact (Bishop, 1976; Calderhead, 1979). In their meta-analysis of
think-aloud studies, Clark & Peterson (1986) found that on average, teachers made one
interactive decision with students every two minutes (p. 61), with a comparatively small

26
percentage (14%) of those decisions pointed toward instructional objectives (p.52) and
considerably more (20-30%) devoted to the procedures and strategies of the lesson as planned
(p.54) and the immediate needs of the learner (40-60%) (p.55). Bishop (1976) found that
immediate teacher decision-making is situational, highly variable, and typically references prior
experiences. More recent research has established that immediate decision-making by teachers is
enactivist, determined by the relationships of what teachers know and the environments in which
they teach with the efficacy of immediate decision making by teachers developing over time
spent engaged in the work (Brown & Coles, 2011). In a mirror of earlier work, Herbst & Chazan
(2012) delineate four sources of professional obligations that influence teacher decision making:
the discipline of the subject, the individual child, social life, the institutions of schooling. As
illuminating as all this work is for larger questions around how teachers make instructional
decisions, it is not particularly useful for the work of this study.
It is inherently difficult to separate those decisions that a teacher makes unconsciously
from those more exemplary of the type of deliberate choices that typify more intentional
conceptions of instructional practices. Nor are these delineations necessarily clear. Does a
decision made by a teacher based on years of accrued experience but routinized through the
practice of expertise rise to the level of an intentional choice? The literature is not particularly
clear here, as the question rises to something more grounded in the philosophical realm (Brown
& Coles, 2011; Maturana, 1988). Additional concerns around the analysis of quick, heuristic-
driven decisions are raised by the corpus of work developed around cognitive biases and ex-post-
facto justifications for quickly-made intuitive decisions (Kahneman, 2003; Kahneman &
Tversky, 1979). For these reasons, when considering instructional practices for this research, the
author has privileged areas of teaching that require conscious choices on the part of teachers.

27
Research in the area of teacher planning, those aspects of teaching that involve the teacher
making decisions around how to structure their lessons, and reflection on planning decisions
after putting them into practice suggests that this area is one in which intentionality is more
clearly visible and where immediate more unintentional decisions are less prominent (Holmqvist
& Brante, 2011; Stern & Shavelson, 1983; Sullivan et al., 2012; Wiggins & McTighe, 2005;
Yinger, 1980). As such, teacher discussion and analysis around teachers’ planning decisions are
particularly useful for analyzing instructional practices at an appropriate level of analysis for this
study.
Areas in which instructional practices are investigated vary quite widely in the literature.
Contextual differences aside, the methodologies employed share certain unifying criteria. Torres
and Mercado (2004) point to the utility of self-study of teacher reflections (through reflective
journaling, collegial dialogue, and reporting on teacher-initiated auto-research projects) on their
work, which in turn changes their understanding of that work. In a related approach, Bieler
(2010) utilized discourse analysis from mentoring-generated discussions to occasion similar
praxis-driven shifts in English teacher candidates during their preparation. In this research,
conversations with mentee teacher-candidates were utilized to deliberately engage participants in
discourse analysis to help them make praxis-focused shifts in their instructional practices. Arnold
& Mundy (2020) required teacher-candidates to respond to cues around the pedagogical
orientation of their portfolios. While the specific ways in which praxis is investigated vary along
with the particulars of the methodologies employed, all approaches utilize teachers’ reflection on
their teaching work to occasion considerations of teacher perspectives. The common use of this
mode of investigation informs the methodological choices that underpin the work of this study.

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Findings from Research on Instructional Praxis
The framing of much of the work discussed in the preceding section in terms of
conceptions of teaching praxis helps to resolve thinking around the appropriate unit of analysis.
Notions around praxis in education are widely discussed and central to much of the discourse on
the work that teachers do with their students. The term is ancient, appearing as one of the three
major delineations in Aristotelian conceptions of the basic activities of all humans. In this view,
praxis refers to what humans do. Given its deep history, the concept explicitly shows up in
multiple western philosophical traditions and is implicitly considered in many more. In all
instances, the unifying aspect of the concept is around that of action to put knowledge into
practice. Marx held praxis to be a central aspect of his philosophy, holding that “all
mysteries...find their rational solution in human practice and in the comprehension of this
practice” (Marx, 2002). From the Marxist standpoint, praxis is viewed as fulfilling work (Hanley,
2017).
In the educational tradition, Freire famously utilized a Marxist conception of praxis in his
formulation of the concept as “reflection and action upon the world in order to transform it”
(2000, p. 51), which he in turn uses to establish an educational view of praxis as a cycle of action
and reflection upon that action in order to allow for learning. Praxis is like other modes of
iterative, dialectical human action in which the consideration of the results of that action inform
their continuance. The concept describes the intentionality of action from planning the action
through to consideration and reflection on an action’s resultant effects in advancing the intended
instructional aim.
Teacher praxis can describe all things that a teacher intentionally does in service of the
work of teaching. Hoffman-Kipp defines the term as the “dialectical union of reflection and

29
action.” (2008, p. 249) This includes all actions that a teacher consciously does when working
directly with students and includes activities that a teacher engages in before contact with
students (ex. lesson planning) and after that contact concludes (ex. reflective processes). Notably,
teachers do not necessarily need to be aware of the praxis conception in order to engage in
practices that typify working in praxis, as when Daniels (2010, p. 160) notes that one of her
subjects, at the time a teacher with 32 years of high school teaching experience, “was not
familiar with this term [praxis], but that they ‘used to call it the reflective practitioner.’”
The TPACK Framework
Given the centrality of educational technology when teaching during the COVID-19
pandemic, a review of the relevant literature is useful when considering how participants in this
study have approached their use of technology in actualizing their teaching praxis. While
conceptual frameworks surrounding educational technology have developed over time, the
Technology, Pedagogy, and Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework has become a major
frame since its development in the first decade of this century. Koehler & Mishra (2009) provide
the graphical representation of the TPACK framework presented in Figure 1.

30
Figure 1
The TPACK Framework and its Knowledge Components

Note. From Koehler & Mishra (2009, p. 63)

One aspect of the TPACK framework that is particularly useful is its use of multiple
different domains of teacher knowledge to elucidate effective instructional use of technology,
drawing on the domains of pedagogy, content, and technological knowledge. Koehler et al.
(2013) make this point explicit in pointing to the intentional grafting of technological knowledge
onto the pre-existing corpus of work that has been done looking at pedagogical content
knowledge (PCK) since the concept was first introduced by Shulman (1986). By adding the
additional dimension of technological knowledge to the PCK framework, the TPACK framework

31
considers several novel intersections of knowledge domains in teaching, specifically
technological pedagogical knowledge, technological content knowledge, and the trisectional
domain of TPACK itself.
Findings from the TPACK Corpus
A review of research that has been conducted through the lens of TPACK has several
interesting implications for the work of this study. Kim et al. (2013) found positive correlations
between teacher beliefs around the epistemological basis of learning specific to both the source
and structure of knowledge were significantly correlated with teacher conceptions about both the
learning process and the role of the teacher (r = 0422 to 0.447, p <= 0.05). Building on this
finding, they found strong positive correlations between teacher beliefs about effective ways of
teaching and technology integration (r= 0.673 to 0.882, p <= 0.05).
Clark & Boyer (2016) conducted interviews and focus groups among public school
teachers in North Carolina with 3-5 years of teaching experience. They found that exposure to
technologies alone did not mean that teachers could use them in ways that were effective for
instructional purposes. In a similar vein, Kopcha (2012) found that the use of situated
professional development, specifically direct mentoring transitioning to teacher-led communities
of practice, led teachers to indicate more favorable views of typical barriers to effective
technology use in teaching.
Taken together, studies like these are suggestive that for modern educators working in
non-emergency circumstances, effective use of technology is a central component of their praxis.
Given the unprecedented reliance on technology occasioned by the COVID-19 pandemic’s ERT
circumstances, explicit focus on teacher use of technology is warranted.
Conceptual Framework

32
The discussion of the literature that is provided in the preceding sections of this chapter
informs the conceptual framework that underpins this research project, presented in Figure 2:

Figure 2
Conceptual Framework of this Study

33
Figure 2 posits that the transition from previously established instructional practices to
COVID-driven Emergency Remote Teaching and the subsequent return to in-person instruction
in circumstances informed by the pandemic have tangible and reorganizing impacts on teachers'
instructional practices. Considering the specific nature of the COVID-19 pandemic and its
particular impacts, the framework suggests that different strands of the work of teaching (shown
in large-scale aggregations of authenticity, TPACK, and COVID-19 Impacts) will each play
different roles in the different phases of pandemic teaching, but that for however they might shift
in any particular phase, they will persist in informing and influencing the instructional practices
of teachers for the duration of the pandemic’s impacts and beyond. While the graphical
representation of the conceptual framework shown in Figure 2 may suggest a proposed return to
prior prominence of instructional practice influences once the phase of Acute COVID-19
instruction abates, this is not intentional, and only reflects a constraint of diagrammatic
representation.
Concluding Remarks
The literature review provided in this chapter demonstrates several major themes related
to the work of this study. The corpus of literature around impacts of COVID-19 is nascent,
rapidly developing, and predominantly occupied with studying impacts on higher education,
concerns around the inequities of pandemic-related impacts on educational systems, and a focus
on best practices for teaching and learning online. Comparatively little literature is pointed
toward the K-12 teaching environment or the return from COVID-19 occasioned Emergency
Remote Teaching (ERT). This suggests a clear utility for this study, which is specifically focused
on how the pandemic has impacted instructional practices among the teachers in the IAA high
school as they have transitioned to and returned from COVID-19 ERT.

34
COVID-19 is a specific and extreme instance of teaching during a crisis. Historical
literature around the impacts of significant crises on educational systems is relatively sparse and
inappropriate for analyzing the current situation. The review of literature in this chapter
surrounding the impacts of previous natural disasters on education, and specifically that literature
which is focused on the impacts of Hurricane Katrina on the educational system of New Orleans,
demonstrates that it is not easy to find a clear historical analog to the current moment, which is
understandable given the unprecedented nature of the COVID-19 pandemic in both scope and
scale. In focusing on the impacts of COVID-19 on the educational system of IAA, this study
looks to continue to advance the developing picture of how this singular moment in education is
impacting the educational systems in which it is occurring.
The driving focus of this study on instructional practices is well-supported by the
literature. The literature reviewed around instructional practices demonstrates that it has been a
topic of research focus for at least the last 50 years and has varied widely from the moment-to-
moment decisions that teachers make throughout a lesson (ex. Clark & Peterson, 1986) through
to the long-term planning decisions that teachers engage in throughout instruction (ex. Wiggins
& McTighe, 2005). This study’s focus on a unit of analysis for instructional practices related to
long-term planning is in keeping with much of the literature around the study of instructional
praxis and (more generally) reflective practice, which is particularly well-suited to the qualitative
methodological approach described in Chapter 3.
Finally, the research suggests there is strong utility in utilizing Koehler & Mishra’s
(2009) Technology, Pedagogy and Content Knowledge (TPACK) framework for understanding
how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted instructional practices, given the predominance of
technological approaches to handling the disruptions to instruction caused by the pandemic.

35
TPACK acknowledges that technological knowledge is crucial but not sufficient for effective
instructional decision-making, which also requires a comparable depth of knowledge related to
both content and pedagogy. The implications of TPACK on this research are similarly
demonstrated in the methodology and instruments used for this study.

36
Chapter 3: Methodology
Introduction
This study focuses on the impact of COVID-19 on the instructional practices of teachers
at IAA High School. In particular, the research questions that focus this work are restated here
from their introduction in Chapter 1:
1. How has the COVID-19 crisis impacted the instructional practices of individual teachers?
2. How have the shifts in instructional practices occasioned by the COVID-19 crisis
impacted teachers' ability to address what they feel are authentic teaching practices when
teaching students?
3. How have the adjustments that teachers have made in their instructional practices during
different phases of the COVID-19 crisis persisted or abated as the acute stage of the crisis
has receded?
Methodologically, this study approaches these research questions via a qualitative case study that
employs interviews with teachers from IAA high school division. The utility of the qualitative
approach for allowing participants to share their experiences as fully as possible and provide for
the type of rich description of the topic of study makes the approach particularly appropriate.
Looking to Maxwell’s (2013) delineation of the utility of qualitative research, this study seeks to
provide a process theory for how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted instructional practices
within the IAA system. As this work is focused on getting the richest picture of how COVID-19
has impacted instructional practices within the specific school system of IAA, the use of
interviews is well-suited for developing a clear picture of how the pandemic has impacted the
practices of these teachers working in the IAA high school while providing a methodological
approach that allows for suitably extensive coverage of the population of IAA high school

37
teachers. In addition, given the unprecedented nature of the COVID-19 pandemic, there are no
suitably robust survey instruments that can easily be utilized to address the research questions
while not suffering from the types of reliability and validity concerns that are characteristic of
underdeveloped quantitative instruments within the time-constraints of this research project.
Population and Sample
Study Population
This study focuses on high school teachers (grades 9 through 12) who work at
International Academy of Asia. From within the larger population of all IAA high school
teachers, the study population consists of teachers from the science, mathematics, social studies,
and English language arts departments who have worked at IAA high school since at least the
beginning of the 2019-2020 school year, along with teachers from two inter-academic
departments; the technology & careers department (name pseudonymized), and the learning
support department, along with the instructional coaching staff. In restricting the study
population to teachers and coaches who meet these criteria, participants were ensured to be high
school teachers and coaches who have worked at IAA over the entirety of the pandemic and have
experienced both the transition to COVID-19 emergency remote teaching (ERT) and the
subsequent return to post-ERT instruction. Restricting the study population of teachers to those
from these six academic departments also helps mitigate confounding factors related to the
fundamentally different way that performance-based subjects (ex. performing arts, and physical
education) have had to operate during all stages of the pandemic. To point to one illustrative
example of these confounds, due to concerns around aerosolized viral transmission, any music
subject that involved the projection of breath (choir and wind instruments) were unable to engage
in communal performance during the entirety of the first semester of the 2020-2021 school year.

38
For this reason, and a constellation of other, similarly particular aspects of teaching performance-
based subjects during the pandemic, the population of focus for this study only includes teachers
from the six specified academic departments, along with instructional coaches.
Study Sampling
The research phase of this project commenced in the fall of 2021. During the 2021-2022
school year, 51 teachers and four coaches were in the IAA high school faculty who met the
criteria for participation in this study. The study employed a purposeful sample of teachers and
coaches from the larger qualifying IAA high school teacher population (Merriam & Tisdell,
2015). All teachers and coaches who meet the population criteria were invited to participate in
the study via email and personal recruitment solicitations. From the total sample of 55 possible
participants, 17 teachers and coaches agreed to participate. Table 1 identifies the salient criteria
of participating teachers and coaches:

39

Table 1
Salient Participant Criteria
Criterion Number of Participants
Role:
Teacher
Department Chairperson
Instructional Coach
Technology Help Center Coach
Department:
Mathematics
English Language Arts (ELA)
Science
Social Studies
Learning Support
Technology & Careers
Technology Help Center (THC)

13
4
2
2

4
3
2
2
2
2
2

Notes. Due to dual roles (ex. Department Chairperson and Teacher), some participants are
counted more than once in the top panel of this table.

The participants represent 31 percent of the eligible high school teacher and instructional
coach population, 80 percent of eligible department chairpersons, and the entirety of the eligible

40
instructional coaches. In terms of institutional longevity, the median number of years that
participants had worked in the SAS High School division at the time of participation was 6, with
two participants having worked at the school for 3 years and three participants having worked at
the school for 15 or more years.
Instrumentation
The study exclusively employed individual interviews with teachers in academic
departments and instructional coaches. The appendices of this dissertation provide the individual
interview protocol for teachers (Appendix A) and the individual interview protocol for
instructional coaches (Appendix B). These protocols are materially similar, though adapted for
the different roles of teachers and instructional coaches. The protocols were developed to elicit
participant responses about their authentic teaching practices and how the COVID-19 ERT
transition and return to in-person instruction have impacted their instructional practices. They
directly ask teachers and coaches about how the pandemic has impacted their practices across the
different stages of its trajectory and how particular aspects of their work have been affected by
different aspects of the crisis, with particular focus on how technological facility and the various
realities of teaching during pandemic circumstances have impacted the instructional decisions
that teachers have made and the nature of the supports those instructional coaches have provided.
They also ask participants to speak explicitly to the longevity of any changes that they have
made in their instructional approach, along with discussions about their rationale for
implementing any instructional changes.
Instrument Development Process
The interview protocols were initially developed for the author’s doctoral research
methods coursework in the spring of 2021. The foundational instrument was initially conceived

41
of as the basis of a semi-structured one-on-one interview protocol. Initial prompts were drafted
considering the best practices identified in several current canonical resources on qualitative
research methodologies (Maxwell, 2013; Merriam & Tisdell, 2015; Patton & Patton, 2002;
Rubin & Rubin, 2012). The initial interview protocol was field-tested during the spring of 2021,
both prior to and after receiving feedback from the author’s Research Methods course instructor.
With the conclusion of the spring 2021 semester, the author worked with his dissertation
committee to revise and adapt the draft protocol for use in focus groups before qualifying to
conduct his dissertation research in the summer of 2021.
Research Question-Focus Group Protocol Alignment
Table 2 provides an alignment between the Research Questions of the study and the items
that seek to address them in the individual interview protocols:

42
Table 2
Research Question- Individual Interview Protocol Alignment Grid
Item # Summary of Item: Research Question(s):
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.

11.

12.
13.

14.
Name, Classes taught, years at IAA
Teaching philosophy and authentic beliefs
Self-evaluation of technological facility
Notable COVID-19 events
COVID-19 impacts on teaching practices
Support from IAA during ERT
Instructional practice changes due to ERT
Persistence of instructional changes from ERT
Impact of COVID-19 regulations on teaching practices.
Impact of return to post-ERT distance learning episodes
on teaching practice.
Impact of ongoing nature of the COVID-19 pandemic on
teaching practice.
One instructional lesson learned from COVID-19.
Evaluation of institutional response to the COVID-19
pandemic.
Open for additional thoughts
N/A (Demographics)
1, 2
1
1
1, 2, 3
1, 2, 3
1, 2
2, 3
1, 2
1, 2, 3

1, 2, 3

1, 2, 3
1, 2, 3

N/A (open item)

Note. Item numbers are aligned across both variants of the interview protocol.

43
A reflection document was also provided to all participants to help focus group
participants reflect on prompts and organize their thoughts. A copy of this reflection document is
provided in Appendix C.
Data Collection
All interviews were held during October 2021, with the bulk of the interviews (14)
occurring during the week of October 11
th
. Initial methodological consideration of using focus
groups instead of interviews was discarded as the study progressed. This decision was made due
to the nature of ongoing social distancing restrictions in Singapore during the period over which
interviews were held. Given Kreuger & Casey’s (2015) recommended minimum focus group
size of four participants, it was felt that it was not possible to utilize focus groups in ways that
are in keeping with institutional requirements from IAA and COVID-19 restrictions from the
Singaporean government while also allowing for a relatively efficient data-gathering phase that
was also reasonably convenient for participants. Fourteen of the 17 total interviews were held via
Zoom, with the remaining three occurring in-person, in compliance with the COVID-19 safe
distancing guidelines and requirements from IAA and the Singaporean government. The
interviews ranged in recorded duration from 19 to 58 minutes with a mean length of 37 minutes
and a median length of 38 minutes. Audio recordings of interviews served as the sole source of
data for this project. All requirements and best practices described in the University of Southern
California Human Subjects Protection Program Policies and Procedures document were adhered
to during the study to ensure that data was gathered ethically and protected for the duration of
this work. All participants provided explicit consent to record prior to participating in their
interviews and were provided with algorithmically generated pseudonyms.

44
Data Analysis
The rationale for the analytical approach described in this section is in keeping with
typical best practices for the analysis of transcript data as per several foundational texts that the
author has consulted during his doctoral studies (Auerbach & Silverstein, 2003; Lochmiller &
Lester, 2017; Maxwell, 2013; Merriam & Tisdell, 2015; Saldaña, 2013). The data for all three
research questions were analyzed via thematic coding of transcribed interviews. Transcripts were
generated from audio recordings of all interviews using the otter.ai automatic transcription
platform. The author reviewed these generated transcripts and edited them in tandem with a
review of the audio recording. Following this initial review, the edited transcript was provided to
each participant as an initial member checking step to establish reliability. As a result of this
initial member checking process, three participants provided additional edits to their interview
transcripts, all of which were non-substantive (ex. mistranscription of a word). Following the
initial member checking, the transcripts were uploaded to the ATLAS.ti Computer-Assisted
Qualitative Data Analysis (CAQDAS) program for thematic coding.
Coding of transcripts was conducted in the fall of 2021. The author employed an
elemental coding methodology based on several of the approaches delineated in Saldaña (2013),
oriented toward the generation of an inductive theory for the work of this project. Inductive
theory refers to using the data generated for a project to determine the underlying themes and
findings, as opposed to a deductive approach that maps a pre-existing theoretical corpus onto the
gathered data. The inductive approach is particularly useful for this project given the singular
and unprecedented nature of COVID-19 impacts on both educational systems and the
instructional practices of teachers.

45
Initial coding of transcripts began while data collection was still ongoing. Transcripts
were reviewed with an attendant focus on the study's research questions, but with initial
researcher agnosticism for specific coding methodologies that was refined through a cyclical
reflective process of transcript coding, analytical memo writing, and refinement of the
developing codebook. The primary coding approach employed during the initial analysis portion
of this project was typical of open/initial coding analysis. Open/initial coding is an approach to
qualitative data analysis that looks to develop codes from a review of the data rather than
approaching the data with a pre-established coding scheme. As the data was initially analyzed,
participant responses were coded as openly as possible. This initial review employed both
researcher-generated descriptive codes and in vivo codes taken directly from participant
responses. Ongoing reflective cycles resulted in the ultimate revision of initial in vivo codes by
researcher-generated codes
Along with these theoretical coding approaches, the author also employed various
grammatical coding methods to help organize the developing codebook. These grammatical
coding methods included recording participant attributes like those found in Table 1 in the
preceding Study Sampling section and some magnitude coding, particularly concerning
participant responses to Item #3 and Item #13.
As the reflective coding cycle work continued, analysis resolved 11 major categories of
codes. These categories and the number of individual codes within them are listed in Table 3:

Table 3
Major Coding Categories
Category Description Number of Codes

46
Axial Codes:
Practice Impacts

Authenticity Beliefs

Authenticity Impacts

Change in Practices

Change Reasoning
Attribute Codes:
Institutional Evaluation

Lesson Learned
Supports
Notable Events
TPACK
Magnitude Codes:
Change Duration
TPACK

Institutional Grade

Impacts of the pandemic on the work of
teaching/ coaching.
Statements of participant belief around their
authentic teaching/coaching practice.
Statements of how the pandemic has impacted
the ability to teach/coach authentically.
Changes made by teacher/coach in response to
pandemic impact(s).
The rationale for making changes in practice.

Participant evaluation of IAA’s pandemic
response.
Lesson learned during pandemic teaching.
Institutional supports provided/not provided.
Notable events in the pandemic trajectory.
Specific TPACK-associated response.

Duration of change(s) in practice made.
Self-assessment of ability to use technology
when teaching.
Participant grade for IAA’s pandemic
response.

52

17

13

19

10

8

10
22
15
7

3 values
A-F scale

A-F scale

47
These categories populate three major code-types. Axial codes are the major categories of
analysis that drive the larger work of moving towards a process theory that underpins the
organization, presentation, and discussion of project types. Additionally, participant responses
within axial code categories served as the major source of researcher analysis and reflection
when determining that the research was approaching saturation. Attribute codes are useful for
understanding the larger research picture of this work but are not as foundational for the work of
developing the underlying process theory. Three different magnitude codes were also employed
due to the nature of participant responses to interview questions three, eight, and thirteen.
A sub-coding scheme was simultaneously developed for the codes in some categories to
assist in the organization, management, and analysis of data. Sub-coding is a method of labeling
codes that employs a structure wherein codes share common elements to assist in the hierarchical
organization. Gibbs (2018, p. 102) uses the analogy of a tree to explain the utility of sub-coding,
with the more general elements of the code serving as more foundational, widely held
“branches” of the coding hierarchy. Sub-coding was particularly useful in those domains where
the participant's role throughout the pandemic had a large influence on their response to a
prompt, as well as to delineate between major typologies in participant responses (ex. provided
support vs. support that was not provided).
Following coding of all transcripts, a process of code landscaping (Saldaña, 2013, pp.
199–201) was utilized to organize the data that was generated within each category. Using a
spreadsheet program, the font size of codes was weighted based on the number of times they
occurred in the data set before being spatially organized to help visualize relationships among
codes. This landscaping step served the help visualize connections between codes within
categories, identify any possibly overlapping codes for the consolidation, and frame the overall

48
approach to presenting findings in chapter 4. Ongoing cyclical reflection and revision of the
project codebook continued during the analysis portion of the project and into drafting of the
findings presented in chapter 4. The codebook for all final axial codes utilized during analysis is
provided in Appendix D.
Establishing Reliability
The establishment of reliability is a crucial piece of the qualitative research process.
Merriam and Tisdell (2015) provide a variety of approaches to establishing reliability in
qualitative research. The following discussion provides an overview of the ways in which this
research project worked to generate reliable findings.
Internal Reliability
Internal reliability refers to how well the data gathered within a qualitative research
paradigm agrees with the reality it is describing (Merriam & Tisdell, 2015, p. 242). This research
looked to establish internal reliability in the following ways:
Large Sample Size
A large enough sample size for a qualitative research project is useful for establishing
two main checks on internal reliability. Having a large sample size of participants will help to
demonstrate triangulation in the data, a situation in which multiple data points all reinforce a
common finding. This helps to ensure that findings are robustly representative of the problem-
space of a qualitative research project, and do not overstate the beliefs or perceptions of any one
participant.
Aside from its function in triangulation, another way a large sample size supports internal
validity is through allowing a researcher to capture maximum variation in their data set. Simply
put, having enough data helps to make sure that as much of participant’s reality has been

49
captured as is reasonably possible. This idea of maximum variation is also useful for informing
saturation, or the point at which additional participant data does not continue to add novel
findings.
In the qualitative research tradition, there is no set number for an appropriately large
sample size. That said, the sample size for this project of 17 participants, representing 31 percent
of eligible educators is well within normal parameters for qualitative research of this scope.
Member Checking
Member checking refers to asking participants for feedback on findings during the
research project. It is useful as means to establish internal reliability because it provides
participants with an explicit opportunity to acknowledge that the findings of the researcher agree
with the perceptions of participants as to what they said and meant. This project utilized two
different member checking steps; the transcript review process described earlier in this section,
along with a presentation of the draft findings and conclusions in chapters four and five of this
dissertation to all participants in February of 2022.
Audit trail
The audit trail for a qualitative research project is a suitably detailed, publicly presented
description of the methodology of that project. The audit trail serves as a means for the research
community to understand what was done during a research project and to verify that the work is
in keeping with professional research standards. The audit trail for this research project is largely
found in this chapter of the dissertation, along with the presentation of the instruments and
research codes that are found in the appendices.

50
Researcher positionality
Explicit statement of researcher positionality helps to disclose researcher beliefs and
biases to the larger research community. As subjective judgement is an inevitable aspect of all
research paradigms, in disclosing one’s positionality and attendant beliefs, researchers endeavor
to make their subjectivity known so that the research they conduct is available for the research
community to interrogate with respect to researcher subjectivity. A positionality statement of the
researcher concludes this chapter.
External Reliability
External reliability refers to how well the findings of a research project can be applied to
other circumstances outside those of the project. Unlike the internal reliability mechanisms
discussed in the preceding section, external reliability approaches for this work were much more
limited. In the main, this limitation is an inexorable function of the nature of this work. As
discussed in prior chapters, the specific circumstances of the COVID-19 pandemic in IAA and in
Singapore are highly particular to the environment and system in which they have occurred. The
nature of this work as a study of a problem of practice for the institution in which it has occurred
is similarly limiting. It would be folly to even try to suggest that this work endeavors to describe
the state of IAA in a way that can be readily mapped onto other educational systems.
Another way in which external validity is limited in this work is due to the difficulty of
establishing saturation among findings for less-occupied roles in the IAA system. A sample size
of two (in the case of technology coaches, and instructional coaches), or four (in the case of
department chairpersons) is lower than would be ideal to develop thematic findings for the
experiences of serving in those roles during the pandemic. At the same time, these sample sizes

51
represent either an exhaustion or near-exhaustion of the total number of eligible participants who
serve in those roles.
Additional Reliability Checks
Along with the above validity checks, the author employed several other, associated
mechanisms of establishing validity. Unlike the above, these mechanisms served other purposes
in this research process as well. They are discussed below:
Analytic Memo Writing and Code Landscaping
Analytic memos are a major means by which researchers consider and interrogate their
developing corpus of codes and other findings during data gathering and analysis. The author
utilized a series of analytic memos to summarize findings from interview transcript analysis, to
develop and refine the categories and codes that emerged during analysis, and to frame the
logical organization and presentation of findings found in chapter 4. Along with analytic memos,
the code landscaping process described earlier in this chapter adapted from Saldaña (2013)
served a similar interrogative and organizational process.
Peer Review
Peer review is also a useful means of establishing reliability. In discussion with
researcher peers, researchers can engage in similar types of dialectical consideration of their
research process and findings, while also working to make sure that the methodological approach
being employed is sound and within well-supported guidelines for the work of a qualitative
research project. The author utilized peer review with multiple members of his doctoral cohort,
the members of his dissertation committee, along with consultation around his methodological
approach and data analysis practices with his former research methods professor.

52
Positionality Statement
Given the impact of researcher positionality on a qualitative research paradigm, there is
utility in explicitly stating that positionality. As author, my positionality follows in this section. I
am the sole researcher for this project. I spent 13 years as a high school science teacher in an
American public school system, and another 2 as the director of the same system’s science and
technology programs, before moving to Singapore to work at IAA, where I am employed as a
science teacher and serve as the incumbent department chairperson. I recognizee that the
institutional circumstances of IAA are significantly different and considerably more privileged
than those of the system I came from, and that the institutional circumstances of my prior school
system are considerably more privileged than many contemporary American public-school
systems.
I agree with Villaverde’s (2008, p. 10) suggestion that positionality is “how one is
situated through the intersection of power and the politics of gender, race, class, sexuality,
ethnicity, culture, language, and other social factors,” though I am also struck by the role of
personal history in establishing positionality similar to what is discussed by Eidinger (2017). For
as long as I have thought about it consciously, it has been obvious that my life has benefited
immensely from a series of choices that many other people do not get to make. My ontological
beliefs are an inexorable function of my life as a middle-class, northeastern American as the only
child of two middle-class, politically liberal, educator-parents. My father’s own childhood was
marked by pronounced familial poverty. My mother’s childhood was decidedly more privileged
but was punctuated by the blacklisting of her father, due to an accusation of membership in the
Communist Party and his subsequent refusal to collaborate when testifying before the House
Unamerican Activities Committee.

53
My training in science and science education, along with my religious atheism, has led
me to privilege post-positivist empiricism as the major means of epistemological determination
through which I view knowledge of the world and my place in it. That noted, I am aware of the
various and valid critiques of empiricism that have been on offer since its development as a
named school of thought.
As a teacher and department chairperson at IAA for the duration of the pandemic, I have
been acutely affected by its impacts on the work that he does teaching children and working with
his colleagues. While I recognize that all employees of an international school like IAA are in
some ways complicit in the colonialist legacy of international school projects more broadly, I
also recognize that there is an inarguable ability to subvert the most problematic dynamics of the
system I am working in through the work that I do.

54
Chapter 4: Findings
Introduction
Findings across all three research questions suggest that the COVID-19 Pandemic has
had significant impacts on IAA teachers and their instructional practices. This chapter presents
findings related to each of the research questions. Before considering findings around the
research questions, this introductory section presents several findings related to the general
pandemic experiences of participant teachers to help better resolve the picture of their experience
of the pandemic and frame the findings that comprise the remainder of this chapter, as well as the
following note around how the author has chosen to present findings.
The Use of Numbers in Discussion of Findings
Throughout this chapter, findings will occasionally reference the number of participants
who spoke to a particular theme in their responses. I have made this deliberate choice, with
recognition that the use of numbers when discussing qualitative research is an unsettled question
in a larger discussion about the nature of qualitative research. Maxwell presents several
advantages to the inclusion of incorporating numbers within a qualitative research paradigm,
which include the use of numbers to support the internal generalizability of the research by
demonstrating how characteristic a particular finding is among study participants, the aide of
numbers in helping to illustrate the diversity of the data in a study, and their utility in disclosing
a dimension of the amount of evidence being utilized to support researcher interpretations that
would otherwise be absent without their inclusion (Maxwell, 2010, pp. 478–479). At the same
time, he also identifies several problems that the inclusion of numbers can precipitate in
qualitative research, including the unintended implication that a widely-held finding is more
easily generalized to conclusions that extend beyond the locality of the study, and the risk that

55
using numerical distributions to inform researcher thinking can lead researchers to suggest causal
relationships between variables based on the magnitude of their incidence (Maxwell, 2010, pp.
479–480). In deciding to use numbers to present findings, I seek to avoid either of the later
concerns while embracing aspects of all the former benefits. This is aided by the ultimate
causality of the COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts on the IAA system in driving all findings
presented, and explicit recognition of the unique locality of this project within that system. It
would be improper for the reader to view a more-widely held finding as being more
representative of the larger picture of the IAA institution or seek to use the findings in this
chapter to broaden conclusions to circumstances outside of IAA.
Initial Pandemic Impacts on Participants
Interview question four asked participants to speak to those aspects of their personal and
professional life that were most impacted during the initial stages of the pandemic. The goal of
this prompt was to help resolve when exactly, during the initial acute phase of the pandemic, did
participants come to recognize the significance of the pandemic. Responses touched on a variety
of events and initial impacts. The cancellation of the 2020 Interim Semester week was identified
by most respondents in their answers to the question. Interim Semester, an annual event at IAA
since the 1970s, provides students with a variety of week-long, place-based learning experiences
both in Singapore, and in various countries abroad. Prior to the 2020 cancelation, the event had
never been previously cancelled. That it was cancelled (and the associated faculty meetings
around the cancellation) was identified as a significant initial pandemic event by 12 participants.
Amanda’s response to the question provides a representative example of participant sentiments
around the significance of the cancellation of Interim Semester. From the perspective of 15 years
working in IAA, she noted that Interim Semester was the most common aspect of the IAA

56
experience THAT alumni reference whenever she has attended alumni events, but that she was
personally relieved that it was cancelled for the spring of 2020 as the COVID-19 situation was
worsening.
Additional events identified by many participants included the transition to Emergency
Remote Teaching (ERT- nine participants), the significant changes to graduation events for the
senior class (eight participants), and a generalized initial recognition of the severity of the
COVID-19 pandemic (seven participants). Other common responses included IAA’s preparation
for distance learning (six participants), the loss of the ability to travel out of Singapore (four
participants), the impact of the pandemic on the children of participants, and the resumption of
in-person learning after ERT (three participants each).
Several impacts identified by instructional coaches were unique to their roles in the
organization. Three out of the four coaches interviewed identified the preparation for both
distance learning and in-person learning in accordance with COVID-19 regulations as a
significant event. In a related finding, three coach responses addressed other ways in which their
work during this period shifted, including supporting teaching staff to transition to ERT
instruction, supporting teachers during ERT, and changes to their work responsibilities during
the ERT period.
Participant TPACK Evaluation
Given the primacy of instructional technology for managing the initial impacts of the
pandemic during ERT, prompt three in the interview protocol explicitly asked teachers to self-
evaluate their ability to effectively utilize educational technology. The TPACK framework posits
that teachers need facility with technology, pedagogy, and content knowledge to be able to
effectively utilize technology (Koehler et al., 2013). To resolve the picture of participant facility

57
around using instructional technology, participants were asked to give themselves an A-F letter
grade for their technology usage and to explain their reasoning for the grade they gave themself.
Self-assessment of technological fluency is a commonly utilized methodology for TPACK
assessment (Scott & Nimon, 2020; Willermark, 2018). Table 4 lists the grades that participants
gave themselves along with the number of participants who assigned themselves each grade.

Table 4
Self-Evaluation of Participant Technological Fluency
Grade Number of Participants
A
A-
B+
B
C+
4
1
2
9
1

58
Given the grade distribution shown in table 4, findings here suggest that most participants
have a high degree of comfort in using instructional technology. Participant explanations for the
grades they gave themselves also support this finding, with seven participants indicating they
have a high comfort with instructional technology and have high usage in their work as teachers.
When explaining his self-evaluation of an A for his ability to use instructional technology when
teaching, Tate stated that he felt that he possessed a high-level of technological savvy in his
teaching, both solving his own technology-related problems as they arise and pursuing what he
termed as “innovative” uses of technology over the duration of his 11 years at IAA.
A perspective like Tate’s is contrasted with that of the six participants who indicated high
comfort with instructional technology, while also indicating that that they do not use it as
frequently in their practice as high usage participants do. Milton explained his less-frequent
usage in his response justifying his self-assessment of a B by expressing the sentiment that
instructional technology is often not aligned to his own values as an educator, which has led him
to use technology less frequently than he might otherwise.
Three participants indicated high comfort with instructional technology, while also
indicating a relatively low level of usage. Among all study participants Amanda was the only
participant to indicate less-than-high comfort with instructional technology, justifying her self-
evaluation of a C+ by citing what she characterized as a lack of general fluency in a wide variety
of technology, while also noting that she felt that she was very willing to learn and demonstrated
capable use of the technology that she employed regularly in her teaching.
Taken together, these findings suggest that educational technology and TPACK facility
among IAA high school teachers is generally quite high. This is not surprising given the level of
instructional technology in the IAA high school environment. All teachers on staff are provided

59
with IAA-issued laptops that are replaced every four years, along with electively issued iPads
that are on a similar replacement cycle. The learning environment is wholly 1:1 for student
computer access, and the effective use of educational technology is one of the institutional
priorities that teachers agree to when signing their employment contracts every year.
Research Question One Findings
Research question one is “How has the COVID-19 crisis impacted the instructional
practices of individual teachers?” In the broadest sense, findings suggest that the answer to this
question is that impacts have been substantial and widely varied. This section will delineate
those findings to a much greater extent, beginning with the impacts of the pandemic that
participants identified as influencing their practice as educators. Following this, the supports that
IAA provided to assist participants when making the transition to emergency remote teaching
(ERT) and the subsequent return to post-ERT instruction will be discussed, as well as
participants-identified missing supports from the IAA institutional response. A synthesis
discussion of data around research question one is provided at the end of this section.
Pandemic Impacts on Participant Teaching Practices
Impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on participant teaching practices comprised the most
numerous and varied category of responses in the research conducted for this project. In
organizing this section, findings are generally organized by the period of the pandemic in which
they occurred, beginning with impacts during the ERT period, followed by impacts during post-
ERT distance learning episodes, and then to subsequent impacts that participants felt are ongoing
in their nature, both due to various pandemic management regulations and more generalized
ongoing impacts. The section concludes with impacts identified by department chairpersons and
instructional coaches as a function of their specific roles in the organization.

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ERT-Related Impacts on Instructional Practices
Participants identified various impacts on their instructional practices during the ERT
period. These impacts generally related to changes in the experience of teaching during remote
ERT circumstances. The most widely identified ERT impact was alterations to typical one-to-
one student-teacher interactions (seven participants). Speaking to his experience around one-to-
one student interactions during ERT, Milton offered the following:
“I mean, how easy was it to sort of wait behind after class and have a quiet one on one
conversation? It wasn't as easy. I will say that, strangely, I did have like, two kids kind of
connect and just reach out and sort of say, "hey, look, you know, I’d love to chat about
some stuff that's going on." So, we were able to have those conversations, but I think it
was a lot more, kind of, there's a lot more back and forth.”
Most participants who spoke to this impact employed framing like the quote above, while also
indicating a similar level of ambivalence, identifying similar unexpected benefits for a minority
of their students. Brooke explained that in her ERT experience, it was easier to meet in more
private, one-on-one settings during ERT due to the ease of setting up private conferencing
through the Zoom platform.
Participants also indicated that ERT lead to other changes in their work as teachers.
Responses in this category touched on multiple aspects of the instructional practices of
participants. Five participants talked about how the ERT period drove overall changes to their
lesson design. Speaking to his own experience of the ERT period, Tate explained that he felt his
ERT teaching was much more like being “a private tutor for 100 students, rather than a teacher.”
While he was holding classes of 20 students in a synchronous Zoom environment, the lack of

61
student interaction in the class led to it feeling like a much less enjoyable experience for both
him and his students.
A reduction in the content that was taught during ERT was a common finding (four
participants). This finding is in-line with explicit directives from the IAA high school
administration to teachers that a reduction in the content of courses taught and assessed during
the ERT was expected and encouraged. Discussing her own work during the ERT period,
Amanda described how the Professional Learning Communities (PLCs) that she was a part of
during the ERT time responded to the ERT by reducing the both the scope of what was taught
along with the instructional tempo of her teaching work, and how this prioritizing of particular
standards over others, along with the reduction of class time from 75-minute blocks to one-hour
blocks led her to feel that the overall pace of her teaching shifted.
Another major finding around the impact of ERT on teacher’s instruction was an
increased focus on student social-emotional wellness during that period through both an
increased need to focus on student social-emotional wellness and help for students in managing
their emotional burden and burn-out. Osmond described how he worked to manage the social-
emotional well-being of his students during the ERT period by focusing on the emotional well-
being of his students much more than he had previously. Given that there was an increased sense
of disconnection among his students, he explicitly worked “to get some smiles and get people
just kind of smiling and maybe laughing and talking together about whatever it might be.”
This sense of disconnection among students was echoed by several other participants.
Ray noted that he had a subset of students who were “just sort of tuned out.” When he noticed
students off-task, his normal classroom management strategies (ex. varying his proximity to the

62
student) were not available to him in the online environment, and that management tools in
Zoom like removing students from the class were comparatively “crude” solutions.
ERT-Related Impacts on Assessments
Changes to assessment practices during ERT were noted by four participants. Like Ray’s
comments in the preceding paragraph, Gary discussed how ERT instruction led to a reduction in
the informal, formative assessment opportunities that he would typically apply in a physical
class, as he was not able to monitor student work as easily in real-time.
Most of the respondent commentary around ERT assessment practices spoke to similar
loss of typical assessment practices, though not uniformly so. Eva explained how she worked to
adapt their assessment practices during ERT by moving to an instructional model that utilized an
initial quiz to formatively assess student understanding and then targeting direct instruction to
students who demonstrated a lack of understanding on the initial quiz questions on a question-
by-question basis, while providing the other students in the class with self-directed with self-
directed skill work via the IXL application.
Post-ERT Distance Learning Episode Impact on Instructional Practices
Participant responses around the impacts of post-ERT distance learning episodes were
more uniformly positive than the ERT impacts described in the preceding section. Many
participants (12) indicated that post-ERT distance learning episodes have been less stressful due
to the forced practice that the ERT period occasioned. Morton spoke to his experience in this
regard:
“I think just a comfort level with knowing the stuff you need and knowing the stuff how
you do it. [Teachers] had six weeks to kind of tinker with the process. And now if we go
it's like, "okay, plug it in, plug it in. I know what I'm Zooming. The students are all super

63
comfortable with it. Everybody knows how to log in." It just it just flows a lot easier
now.”
The short duration of post-ERT distance learning episodes was identified by six
participants as yielding a beneficial change of pace due to their very short timeframes while
several participants indicated that these subsequent distance-learning episodes have been useful
for building relationships with their students. Alexis noted that subsequent distance-learning
episodes have provided one of the few opportunities to see students without masks on and
allowing for more understanding of who students are by providing a window into their home life.
Considering less-positive impacts of subsequent distance-learning episodes, two
participants indicated that the post-ERT distance learning episodes have resulted in a less rich
learning experience than what would have been possible during in person learning. Speaking to a
sudden, unplanned, distance learning day that resulted from a staff member contracting COVID-
19, Gary indicated that it was “a bit more work for that one day,” because the single-day
distance-learning episode in question only impacted one of the two alternating blocks of his
classes. In his view those classes that got the distance-learning version of his lesson got a less-
rich learning experience as a result.
Ongoing Regulatory Impacts on Instructional Practices
Participants identified many ongoing impacts to their teaching practice from the
pandemic. These impacts are highly varied in their nature. The ongoing impact of regulations on
instructional practices was the specific focus of interview question nine. This section provides a
thematic presentation of findings that participants identified as being specifically due to the
impacts of various institutional and governmental regulations.

64
Regulatory Impacts on the Instructional Experience. Participants identified various to
changes to the IAA in-person learning experience that have been occasioned due to institutional
and governmental pandemic management regulations. Ten participants indicated that
management regulations have had tangible impacts on their instructional planning decisions.
Brooke explained that have profoundly impacted her classroom environment, and the
configurations of students that she can have in her instructional structures. Over the span of in-
person pandemic teaching, changing regulations have allowed for different numbers of students
who can work together in groups, and if those groups can mix over the span of a lesson or not, a
situation that Brooke found to be both “frustrating” and “challenging” for her teaching, and
further exacerbated by requirements around cleaning rooms and periodic temperature checks of
student at the opening and closing of class time that has further impacted her instructional
design.
Several participants also note that changes to the in-person learning schedule, a shift
made by the IAA high school administration to be in regulatory compliance around the numbers
of students who can congregate in any area of the school at any time during the school day, has
led to various downstream impacts such as the significant loss of instructional time, and the
degradation of the IAA Professional Learning Community (PLC) model. Humphrey explained
that while the loss of 10 minutes from the daily schedule may not seem like much, it has an
insidious impact on subsequent days leading to a progressive loss of typical instructional pacing
over time and ultimately resulting in a feeling that his math instruction has felt “a lot more
rushed.”
Regulatory Impacts on Relationships. Six participants noted that regulations have an
ongoing impact on their ability to build relationships with their students. Kyle described the

65
impact of regulations on his ability to build relationships with his students, feeling that he does
not know his students as well as he has in previous years, due to mask-wearing and its impact on
the speed with which he can get to know his students.
Aside from the impact of regulations more broadly, responses like Kyle’s also touch on
the specific impact of regulation-enforced mask wearing on his relational work with students.
The impact of mask wearing on instructional practices is a major finding from this research and
is addressed in much more detail in the discussion of findings around research question two.
Regulations Drive Adaptations. The notion that regulatory impacts on teaching has led
participants to adapt their approach to the work that they do was a common finding. Six
participants described ways in which they have adapted their work for the regulated environment
that has existed while teaching in-person throughout the pandemic. Amanda explained how shifts
in regulations have caused her to plan her lessons with attention around flexibility of the
instructional approach she will use, likening the increased flexibility to experiences that she has
had in sharing classrooms with other teachers for many years
Ongoing Non-Regulatory Impacts on Teaching Practices
Various ongoing impacts were identified by participants that were not due primarily to
regulations. These impacts are wide-ranging in terms of how they have impacted teacher
practices, both explicitly and implicitly. Unlike many of the prior findings discussed in this
section of the chapter, the impacts of many of these findings are more nebulous in terms of how
they impact the day-to-day work of teaching students. At the same time, they have been
significant enough for participants to offer in response to questions around their instructional
practices, and as such they are presented here in illustration of the often-blurry lines that separate
a teacher’s instructional practices from the other dimensions of their work as an educator.

66
The Impact of Pandemic Stress. Seven participants noted that the prolonged duration of
the pandemic has led to an increased stress burden for them and for their colleagues, with two
specifically spotlighting the increased stress that has come from the loss of ability to easily travel
out of Singapore, or to have out-of-country family travel into Singapore during the pandemic.
Brooke spoke to this impact: “People are tired. And so, they're not as open. You know, they’re
just managing, I suppose for lack of a better word, grumpiness, or just exhaustion, or tempers. I
guess tempers-- just, you know, frustration.”
Change Fatigue. Connected to the impacts of pandemic stress discussed above, findings
around increased teacher fatigue due to the pace of changes in the IAA school environment over
the course of the pandemic was another common finding. Three participants noted a feeling of
general exhaustion over how quickly structures like the schedule and student grouping guidelines
have had to change at different points in the pandemic’s trajectory to maintain social distancing
compliance. Amanda described these impacts in noting that “there's just so many changes, and
you we never know when what's going to change, and when, and it's just a lot of yo-yoing. And
that's really challenging.”
Two participants noted that the initial IAA response to the pandemic had been to slow
down initiative rollout, though it was also noted that since the beginning of the 2021-2022
schoolyear, the pace of institutional initiatives has increased, adding to the overall sense of
change fatigue experienced by the participants who noted the change. Morton noted the impact
of this recent increase in the pace of initiatives as seeming contrary to what he considers to be the
more important work of focusing primarily on his instruction.
Altered Interpersonal Interactions. The impact of the pandemic on the nature of
interpersonal interactions within the IAA high school was another common finding among

67
participants. Most of the responses offered by participants in this category were negatively
framed as a decrease in various interpersonal interactions that participants value highly as part of
their work as teachers. These impacts include changed collegial interactions with other teachers,
altered interpersonal relationships with students, as well as the observation that IAA has had to
decrease the amount of what Tate categorized as “fun stuff” that used to make it a unique and
enjoyable environment for teachers and students. Milton indicated that he felt a sense of
“progressive disconnection” from his colleagues over the duration of the pandemic due to the
lack of social opportunities within the IAA environment.
Related to this was the finding offered by three participants that their extracurricular
obligations had decreased because of the pandemic, and while this had a positive benefit of
giving affected teachers some additional uncommitted time, it also represented a less-rich school
experience. Tate described his experience around this aspect of the experience of working at
IAA:
“Kids can’t have access to the jam room. There's no such thing as public performances.
We've tried to retool what can happen and keep those kids excited, like playing for each
other over Zoom and having a bit more of an online presence and that kind of thing. But
it's all that stuff that happens at home…the reason kids get in that club is so that they can
collaborate and make music together and basically rock out, and they can't do any of that
stuff.”
Changes to Teacher-Parent Contact Patterns. Alterations to patterns of teacher-parent
contact during the pandemic was a repeatedly identified by participants. Findings here were
ambivalent, with three participants noting that the pandemic has led to increased ease of parent
contact, as videoconferencing has become more commonplace, while two participants indicated

68
that they have experienced a decreased amount of parent contact over the course of the
pandemic.
Ongoing Increased Use of Digital Tools. The increased use of videoconferencing
described in the preceding paragraph is related to an additional finding that the pandemic has led
to an increased use of digital tools by the school community. Gale, one of the participating
instructional coaches in this study, indicated that she felt that the pandemic has resulted in a
lowering of the affective filter of teachers around seeking help when they need it due to the
unprecedented nature of pandemic circumstances.
Difficulty of Providing Learning Support. Ongoing, domain-specific impacts were
generally not noted by participants. The exception to this was in the Learning Support
department where both participants indicated that there has been difficulty in providing learning
support accommodations to students during all phases of the pandemic.
Unaffected Aspects of Instructional Practices
While not as numerous or varied as the impacts discussed in the preceding section,
participants also identified a series of aspects of their instructional practice that they felt had not
been impacted by the COVID-19 Pandemic. The most common finding in this area was the sense
that fundamental instructional planning (ex. lesson planning, content, and curriculum) remained
mostly unaffected due to the ongoing nature of the pandemic (six participants).
Findings in this area also determined a variety of less representative findings around
unaffected practices. These unaffected practices were each stated by one participant and include
the following aspects of their work as a teacher: Student-facing communication strategies, the
use of direct instruction as a teaching approach, the pace of work/professional expectations,
ability to assess in traditional modalities post-ERT, and the loss of various informal formative

69
assessment opportunities. For the sake of comparison, an equal number of study participants
indicated that nothing was unaffected or made easier by the pandemic.
Department Chairperson Specific Impacts
The department chairpersons who participated in this research identified two impacts
specific to their role. One participating chairperson noted a significant shift in their role during
ERT as they became the first point of support for the teachers in their department. Three of the
four participating chairpersons noted a general difficulty in managing and leading their
department teams due to ongoing stresses on both their teachers and themselves over the course
of the pandemic. Brooke described her experience as a department chairperson during the
pandemic as becoming more “exhausting,” with particular focus on the chairperson’s roles in
providing teams with information and helping department members to manage their emotions.
Instructional Coach Specific Impacts
Like chairpersons, participating instructional coaches also identified role-specific impacts
on their work stemming from the pandemic. These impacts tend to mirror many of the teacher-
identified impacts, with a focus on the coach-teacher role replacing the teacher-student role.
These findings include changes to the nature of the coaching relationship due to both the ongoing
nature of the pandemic and its attendant regulations, diminishment of opportunities to coach
teachers due to pandemic circumstances, a change in coaching focus, as well as specific shifts in
the roles that instructional coaches have played during the pandemic.
One interesting note is that during the run-up to the ERT phase of the pandemic, and
throughout ERT, IAA made a conscious shift in what it asked instructional coaches to do.
Technology Help Center coaches were tasked with developing and supporting the instructional
technology infrastructure of IAA to enable a maximally effective online learning ecosystem for

70
students, while instructional coaches were explicitly told to pause any teacher-facing
instructional coaching, and to pursue other aims during that time (ex. curriculum development).
Coaches in both roles were also heavily utilized as part of the high school team that prepared the
IAA campus to allow students to attend in-person school after the ERT period, as well as one-
time scholastic events like graduation, while still following social distancing and contact tracing
regulations.
Identified Initial Supports for Participant Teaching Practices
Participant teachers provided a variety of responses when asked to consider the support
that IAA provided to them during the initial phase of the COVID-19 pandemic, with a particular
focus on the transition to ERT. These supports were typically structural in nature, reflecting
adjustments to professional expectations and other encouragements to flexibility by the IAA
institution as most directly communicated to teachers via the high school divisional
administration at the time. Nine participants provided examples of ERT supports that encouraged
themselves and their PLCs to be flexible in their expectations of their students and of themselves
as teachers. Morton described his experience of this encouragement to flexibility, noting that he
found administrative directives around not needing to fill the entirety of Zoom meetings with
teacher-directed instruction to be reassuring because “it just kind of took the pressure off…
giving us space to be able to take our own space, and to be able to give space to students, while
still trying to make some progress.” Three participants pointed to the specific changes to the
daily schedule during the ERT period as being notably supportive for their work. Two
participants also noted that the level of communication from divisional administration during that
time was supportive in providing clarity during a chaotic period along with comprehensible
rationales for the changes being implemented.

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The amount of training that IAA provided to teachers in the period between the
emergence of COVID-19 as a possible concern and the move to ERT was particularly well-
represented in participant responses, with 13 participants explicitly pointing to the preparatory
professional development that Technology Help Center coaches and staff provided as being
supportive for the ERT transition. Tate noted the utility of Zoom “practice days” and technical
support around how to utilize Zoom effectively as being particularly useful. Methods of
providing teachers with informational resources for them to consult as needed were similarly
spot lit for their utility.
The impression of robust technology support is reinforced by the fact that all four
instructional coaches indicated that this period of support and training during the ERT transition
was the major avenue of support that they provided to teachers during this time. Mason described
his approach to his instructional coaching work as shifting from coaching around instructional
practice to what he described as “tech coaching,” providing teachers with possible uses of
instructional technology that might have been useful for what they were seeking to accomplish in
their online instruction.
Along with support from IAA’s professional development apparatus, seven participants
also noted that resource sharing and support from teacher colleagues was similarly useful for
their work as teachers during this period. One novel approach that was employed by the IAA
Technology Help Center during this time involved provisioning teachers into two different
“teams” based on self-assessment of comfort with digital tools. Milton noted the utility of this
approach for his work as a teacher during that time in encouraging teachers to help themselves
and each other in a very low stakes, “loose” structure.

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Instructional Technology Supports for Participants
One interesting subcategory of supports that participants identified during their
interviews were the instructional technologies that they found useful for different purposes
during the ERT period. Table 5 lists all identified supportive instructional technologies
mentioned during participant interviews, along with a summary of the purpose(s) that those
technologies served for teachers during ERT.

Table 5
Participant Identified ERT Technology Supports
Technology Support(s) Purpose(s)
iPad, Laptops, TI-Inspire
Schoology (LMS), Google Docs
Zoom
Flipgrid, Quizizz
Peardeck, Slido, QuestionPress
YouTube, LMS hosted videos
1:1 hardware
Management, curation, and delivery of curriculum
Video meeting platform for class meetings
Assessment
Synchronous lesson interactivity supports
Asynchronous content delivery

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Participant-Identified Missing ERT Supports
Participants were also asked to consider any supports that would have been useful during
the initial stage of the pandemic, but that were not provided by IAA. Missing supports are both
more varied than those that were provided, while also being much less commonly represented
among the sample, with most identified missing supports only being mentioned by one or at most
two participants. The only missing support identified by three participants related to a lack of
effective ERT assessment practices. Two participants noted a lack of centralized guidance
around instructional practices, and a desire for more planning time and less time spent on screen
during the ERT period. Two of the participating coaches also noted that they would have liked to
have provided more ongoing, large group professional development to teachers as the ERT phase
of the pandemic continued.
Outside of the above, all other identified missing supports were identified by single
participants. These missing supports are wide-ranging in their nature. Table 6 provides an
overview of these singleton responses from both teachers (supports that they indicated they were
not provided with), and coaches (supports that they felt they did not provide to teachers)

74
Table 6
Singleton-identified Missing ERT Supports
Category Missing Supports
Flexibility
Emotional
Predictive

Structural

Decreased meeting time burden.
Appropriately balancing teacher needs with student needs.
Anticipating difficulties with post-ERT return to in-person instruction.
Initial unforeseen technical problems.
Clear technical support for students.
Physical support for prolonged distance learning.
Managing teacher family needs.
Widely utilized training for pedagogical changes.
Coach Flexibility in hours and staffing for technical support.
Lack of utilization of coaches as educators during the ERT period.

Summary Discussion of Research Question One Findings
Taken together, participant responses around research question 1 suggest that the
COVID-19 pandemic has had profound and varied impacts on the instructional practices of
individual teachers. These impacts varied by the nature of the roles that participants played in the
IAA organization over the timeline of the pandemic, as well as with the nature of different
phases of the pandemic and the ensuing response of IAA high school.
The initial phase of the pandemic is characterized by a sudden transition to a period of
Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT) distance learning. Participants identified a variety of

75
impacts on their instructional practices from the ERT, notably including alterations to what
teacher-participants identified as their typical one-to-one interactions with students, alterations to
their lesson design, a reduction in the content that teachers and their PLCs taught and assessed,
and an increase in explicit instructional focus on the emotional wellbeing of their students.
Changes to assessment practices were another commonly identified impact during the ERT
period, with respondents identifying both a loss of informal, formal assessment practices, and the
utilization of novel modalities to assess students within distance-learning structures.
Following the ERT period, teacher-participants felt that subsequent, brief distance-
learning periods were generally more positive than the ERT experience, with participants
identifying their ERT experiences, and the brevity of these subsequent distance-learning periods
as contributing to the more positive reception of these later distance-learning episodes. In
keeping with participant’s identified increased focus on the emotional wellbeing of their
students, these post-ERT distance learning episodes served to help teacher-participants build
relationships with their students in ways that the in-person COVID-19 learning environment did
not afford, though a few participants did note that these subsequent episodes were somewhat
disruptive and limiting for their own instructional practices.
With the transition back to in-person learning that followed the ERT period and has
generally persisted since that time, participants identified the impacts of various institutional and
governmental regulations as being particularly impactful on their instructional practices. The
various requirements of teachers to comply with regulations around safe distancing of students,
mask wearing, and appropriate maintenance of the classroom environment were particularly
widely noted as being impactful on instructional planning with typically negative implications
for student grouping structures, and the instructional trajectory of both daily lessons and longer-

76
term lesson planning. Changes made to the IAA schedule to allow for regulatory compliance
were identified by several participants as having longer-term effects on their ability to effectively
lesson plan. Regulatory impacts on relationships between teachers and their students was another
common finding. These impacts established, many participants also noted that they have adapted
their work over the duration of the pandemic to operate within the altered and occasionally
shifting regulatory requirements.
Ongoing non-regulatory impacts were also identified by participants. These findings were
generally less clearly impactful on participant instructional practices, while still being indicated
by participants as impacting the work that they do as educators. Ongoing stress related to the
persistence of pandemic circumstances was identified by many participants as being a notable
impact, along with related impacts around change fatigue for the ongoing and unpredictable
shifts in the IAA high school environment. A few participants noted that the IAA administration
initially responded to the dynamic pandemic circumstances by slowing down initiative rollouts,
but that this adjustment was felt by them to be dissipating with the commencement of the 2020-
2021 schoolyear. Another notable finding was the observation that the various informal,
enjoyable interactions with students through extracurricular activities, and collegial relationships
with teaching colleagues were felt to have attenuated over the course of the pandemic.
Participants noted shifts in parent-contact during the pandemic, to ambivalent effect. This
was accompanied by an overall increase in the use of digital tools by IAA teaching staff.
Discipline-specific impacts were generally limited, though both participating members of the
Learning Support department noted a difficulty in providing learning support accommodations
has been a general feature of all stages of the pandemic.

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In speaking to aspects of their instructional practices that were unaffected by the
pandemic, several respondents indicated that fundamental, large scale instructional planning
around lessons, content and curriculum have been generally unaffected, along with another
selection of individually represented responses around specific instructional modalities, and
professional expectations.
Participating department chairpersons identified role-specific impacts around the
increased difficulties of leading their departments over the pandemic as their teams have worked
to manage increased stress burdens. Instructional coaches reported shifts to the nature of their
roles during the ERT phase of the pandemic away from their pre-pandemic coaching work in
keeping with adjustments made to these roles via administrative directives.
When asked to consider the supports that IAA provided to teachers during the initial ERT
phase, most participants pointed to specific examples of ERT supports related to explicit
encouragement to flexibility by IAA administration through a directed reduction in taught and
assessed course material during that time and shifts to the IAA high school schedule to better
function within the ERT context. A particularly robust finding was the nearly universal
identification of the utility of preparatory professional development during the ERT transition as
being a particularly useful support, with many participants also identifying informal, collegial
support as having utility for them as well. Instructional technology infrastructure for the ERT
period was pronounced (see Table 5- Participant Identified Missing ERT Supports), though also
a natural outgrowth of the generally high degree of instructional technology that was already
present for teachers within the IAA system. When asked to consider supports that were not
provided but that participants felt could have been useful for their work during this period,
participant responses were generally quite varied, with a lack of effective ERT assessment

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practices, centralized guidance around instructional practices, and a desire for more planning/off-
screen time being the only items identified by more than a single participant. Table 6 provides a
summary of singleton identified missing ERT supports.
Research Question Two Findings
Research question two is “How have the shifts in instructional practices occasioned by
the COVID-19 crisis impacted teachers’ ability to address what they feel are authentic teaching
practices when teaching students?” Unsurprisingly, findings for this question show that
participants have had their ability to teach from a place of authenticity widely effected by the
circumstances of teaching during the pandemic. This section will discuss those findings to a
much greater extent. The section begins with a delineation of participant-identified aspects of
their authentic beliefs around teaching and discussion of findings around how pandemic-
occasioned teaching circumstances have impacted participant authenticity. The section then
discusses changes that participants have made to their teaching practices in response to various
phases of the COVID-19 pandemic and participant reasoning for why they made the changes that
they identified. A synthesis discussion of data around research question two is provided at the
end of this section.
Authenticity Beliefs of Participants
To understand how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted teacher’s authentic teaching
practices, it was necessary to establish what participant teachers identify as their authentic
teaching beliefs. Interview question two explicitly asked participants to “speak briefly about
[participants] overall philosophy as an educator…I’d like you to speak to one or two practices
that you try to provide in your role as a coach/instructional support and the main reasons you
privilege these practices.” Table 7 provides an overview of the variety of participant responses

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to this prompt, while Appendix D provides example quotes from participants that illustrate each
of these identified beliefs.

Table 7
Participant Provided Authentic Teaching/Coaching Beliefs
Teacher Participant Beliefs:
Beliefs around what to teach
The teacher speaks to the value of teaching transferable skills in their work as a teacher.
The teacher places high value in curricular domain knowledge and practices.
Beliefs around how to teach
The teacher indicates they want students to be actively engaged in their learning.
The teacher speaks to trying to provide students with flexible and/or varied learning
experiences.
The teacher explicitly speaks to privileging learning-theory informed instructional
practices.
The teacher explicitly notes that they value teacher-centered (“traditional”) delivery.
Beliefs about relationships
The teacher speaks to valuing the building of trust and relationships.
The teacher frames their work as a “teacher of students,” not of their subject.
The teacher speaks to valuing learning over grades.
The teacher speaks to helping students achieve their goals.
The teacher speaks to wanting to encourage student reflection.
The teacher speaks to wanting students to challenge themselves.

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Coach Participant Beliefs:
The coach indicates that “anyone can learn.”
The coach indicates that they do not believe that intelligence is fixed over time.
The coach indicates that they work to respond to the needs of their coaching partners.
The coach frames their work as building a skill set for their coaching partners.
The coach values building relationships with their coaching partners.
The coach values teaching systems-level thinking skills

Pandemic-Occasioned Authenticity Impacts on Participant Teachers
Given the diversity of authentic teaching and coaching beliefs held by participants
presented in the preceding section, we can begin to understand how participants have felt that the
pandemic has impacted their ability to teach and coach authentically. Responses to many of the
interview prompts served to elucidate participant thinking in this area, with responses to items
five, seven, ten and eleven being the most direct in addressing this question. This section
presents findings thematically, beginning with ERT-specific impacts, before moving on to more
impacts from the broader experiences of participants during the general trajectory of the COVID-
19 pandemic. It should be noted that findings in this section focus first on participant teachers,
with a discussion of participant coach findings presented subsequently.
ERT-specific Authenticity Impacts
Like the findings from research question one, participants indicated that the period of
Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT) had several unique impacts on their ability to teach in line
with their authenticity beliefs. An increased difficulty of being able to understand the well-being
of students when engaged in ERT teaching was a widely noted finding, occurring in most

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teacher-participant responses. Simone provided a typical response illustrating this difficulty in
her interview, noting that the lack of incidental interaction with students made it much harder for
her to get a sense of how they were doing, and that when she did notice that students were
struggling, ERT teaching circumstances provided her with fewer approaches for touching base
with those students.
Other ERT-specific impacts were typically framed in similar deficit-oriented terms. Two
participants noted the difficulty of providing authentic learning experiences for their students
during the ERT period. Morton described the difficulty of providing authentic science learning
experiences, as he felt that the lack of in-person laboratory settings meant that his ability to
provide students with opportunities to engage in the process of inquiry-centered science learning
“completely went away.” While simulations may have provided students with a simulacrum of
laboratory experience, Morton felt that this part of his experience it was greatly diminished.
Two participants noted that the ERT period led to a loss of their ability to teach and build
on transferable skills with their students. Eva characterized difficulties as a shift from teaching
transferable skills to “more like we [were] just trying to get them through.” Thinking
retrospectively, Gary spoke to what he felt was an overall loss of flexibility during the ERT
period, noting that ERT served as “a bit of a wakeup call about how, when things are normal,
how much flexibility we do have. And maybe how we don't really take advantage of that because
we take it for granted.” Gary was also the only participant teacher to identify an impact from
ERT on his ability to teach authentically that can be viewed as positive, in that he was able to
map the fieldwork elements of his classes from his normal approaches within Singapore at large
to the local circumstances of students in their homes and immediately surrounding environs.

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General Pandemic Authenticity Impacts
Moving away from ERT-specific considerations, participants also identified a variety of
authenticity impacts from their broader experience of teaching during the pandemic. Many
participants indicated ongoing impacts to their ability to teach in line with their authentic beliefs.
The most indicated impact in this domain was the ongoing difficulties around teaching while
wearing masks and teaching a fully masked student population. Participants spoke about the
difficulties that have arisen from mask-wearing in a variety of ways. Osmond identified how
masks have contributed to a diminishment in his ability to get to know his students, noting that
compared to previous years, “I continue to find it difficult to read emotion and to pick up on the
nonverbal cues of students, of colleagues, you know, of everybody.” Amanda offered a
similarly framed description of her own difficulties in communicating with students through
masks, and how she has attempted to adjust her teaching practice as a result:
“It's challenging with masks, right? Because it's like this physical barrier. And I feel
really sad that I can't see my kids smiles, and that they can't see mine. Right? And so just
like learning that over the last year and a half or so, how to just communicate everything
through your eyes, right? And I'm pretty demonstrative anyways, like physically… But I
just wish we could see each other's smiles.”
Mask impacts are not solely relational. Morton described the physical impact of teaching through
masks on his ability to speak, noting that at the end of the day, sometimes his vocal cords are
“ripped,” and he feel exhausted from the work of communicating through masks.
Several teachers also noted how the ongoing nature of the pandemic has contributed to a
generalized negative emotional state, or a sense of unease. In his response, Milton expressed that
while he personally felt “lucky” that his own family has not had what he considers to be a

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significant concern during the pandemic (ex. bereavement), the length of time since he has last
been able to get together with his off-island family increasingly means that when travel from
Singapore does become available “there'll be so much that I've missed and that, to be honest,
does weigh on me a bit…it's hard for that to not sort of filter through into your day-to-day
existence. Work's sort of a large part of that.”
Leaving aside the pronounced and widely noted impacts of mask-wearing on teacher
authenticity and participant’s negative emotions and sense of unease, it is notable that participant
responses in this area are not as uniformly negative as those discussed in the preceding section
on the impacts of ERT on teacher authenticity. Several participants noted that they have found
themselves providing increased flexibility for their students over the duration of the pandemic.
Gary described how the pandemic has led him to plan his instruction more flexibly because of
the “abnormal” circumstances that have accompanied in-person instruction since the end of ERT,
and the possibility that those circumstances can shift in a variety of ways.
Simone offered a complementary view on how the pandemic has led her to increase her
own instructional flexibility, nothing that while her own propensity toward allowing students a
large degree of freedom can “get to a situation where these kids can you give them too much
rope,” that has means that she has had to increase the amount of focus she places on checking in
with students and parents to make sure that the freedom she offers students is done so in concert
with an appropriate amount of support.
In a related response, Eva noted that while she is still teaching transferable skills in line
with her belief around the authenticity of this practice, the skills that she is teaching have
changed. Speaking to her work teaching ELA, she noted how the end-of-year project for the
2020-2021 schoolyear was adjusted from a live speech to a recorded one as the PLC felt that the

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ability to speak in recorded and digital formats had increased due to the use of platforms like
Zoom over the course of the pandemic.
Participant-effected Changes to Teaching Practices During the Pandemic
The discussion of the ways in which participants felt that the pandemic has impacted their
ability to teach authentically is closely connected to participant responses around questions of
how, specifically, teachers have changed their instructional practices during the pandemic.
Participant teachers identified a variety of changes that they made to their teaching practices
because of the pandemic and its impacts. This section will present findings around participant-
indicated changes that they have made to their teaching practice, and discuss the rationales that
participants provided when asked to speak to their thinking around why they made these
changes.
ERT/Distance Learning Specific Changes
Participants identified a several changes in their practice resulting from Emergency
Remote Teaching (ERT) and distance learning. These changes included increased focus on
efficiency/time management during the ERT period, and increased mindfulness of possible
future distance-learning transitions. Talking about the impact of ERT on her instructional
efficiency, Simone described needing to plan for increased efficiency and being more mindfully
prepared at the start of a lesson for its entirety due to the instructional shifts required by teaching
through Zoom. Kyle described how his pandemic teaching experience has led him to have an at-
home instructional apparatus ready-to-go at short notice, indicating that “I don't think [the at-
home instructional apparatus] is going to go away. I think I always have to be ready for this.”

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Relational Changes
The most common changes identified by participants were relational changes. A
participant-identified increased focus on the social-emotional wellbeing of their students was a
widely distributed finding, with eleven participants providing responses to this effect. Milton
described the changes that he has made in this aspect of his practice, noting that while he felt that
he did not make enough of an effort in this regard during the 2020-2021 schoolyear, he has
intentionally made more of an effort in this regard during the 2021-2022 schoolyear with a hope
that this effort will increase the sense of connection that his students feel.
Related relational changes to the increased focus on student well-being included an
increased focus on relationship building with students, and relational changes to teaching
practice, including an increase in student discussion time during post-ERT in person learning
Simone offered a description of her own increased focus on student wellbeing as effected
through increased “community building” in her classes:
“I've given myself permission to spend more time on that community building. And so,
prior to the COVID-19, prior to the pandemic, I would sometimes ask starter questions at
the start of class, or I would sometimes, do little activities that no, I can't tie this to a
common core standard, but we're going to do it anyway. Because it builds a community
of learners. And I think that I engage in that much more consistently and much more
frequently. It's almost every class now where I prioritize that, and whereas before, I
would sometimes feel guilty, or like I was wasting instructional time on something else,
or that somebody else might come into my room and perceive that I was wasting that
time or whatever. I think I'm much more unapologetic about it now.”

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Instructional Changes
Participants identified several changes to their practice at the level of their instruction.
The reuse of distance learning tools and practices when returning to in-person instruction was
noted by several participants. Kyle offered an illustrative example of this in describing how
ERT-occasioned scaffolding that his PLC developed for performance tasks in his course have
been subsequently reused and increasingly developed in post-ERT semesters of the course.
Eva noted that her distance learning approach allowed her to provide increased
differentiation for her students, and that the instructional model that she developed during ERT
wherein students are provided with targeted direct instruction based on their performance on an
initial formative quiz has since been adapted by her for use in her subsequent in-person teaching.
A related finding was the participant-identified ease of bringing in external experts via
digital tools that were initially utilized during the distance-learning period. Gary explained that
this practice has been useful for his teaching and offered that it was also likely useful for the
speaker, as it greatly reduced the opportunity costs that are involved when experts visit schools
in-person.
Participant Reasoning for Teaching Practice Changes
When asked to speak to the reasoning that teachers utilized when considering specific
changes to their teaching practice, participants offered three major justifications for why they
decided to make a particular change to their teaching practice, maintain that practice, or discard
it. The needs of students were the most provided justification. This was particularly true for the
ERT period. Brooke justified the reasoning around the changes that her PLCs made during ERT
as coming from a desire to “keep students sane and try to help them manage their emotions and
reduce their stress level.”

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Importantly, the needs of students remained a common participant justification for
teaching practice changes into the post-ERT period. Simone described her reasoning for the
ongoing changes to her own practice:
“I'm confident in, you know, my seven years of reputation as a teacher that if someone
does come in and is like, "what are you doing?" I'm like, "Whatever. It works," you
know, so I think that I have that confidence. I think if I were to go into a new institution,
there might be time where it's like, "Is it okay to do this here?" or whatever, but
ultimately, I think that it because it aligns with who I want to be as a teacher, I think it'll
stick.”
Milton offered a similarly robust justification for why he continues to seat relational work with
his students at the forefront of his instruction:
“And then the relationship piece I look-- I always believed in relationships. I just believe
in it significantly more now, having experienced what it's like to perhaps not be as
intentional in developing that when half of someone's face is missing. And so yeah, I
think that is definitely going to stay with me.”
Less commonly cited were justifications rooted in participant’s experiences during the
pandemic. Brooke indicated that the instructional shifts that she had identified would remain in
her teaching “indefinitely,” because she now had a wider diversity of structures to choose from,
and where she felt that ERT-developed structures were appropriate to her purpose, she would
continue to use them.
Finally, it should be noted that several participants justified not continuing a particular
practice because they did not find utility in using the practice once the ERT phase of the
pandemic ended. Tate noted that he viewed the return to in-person instruction as a return to a

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sense of relative “normalcy,” and as such returning to the types of instructional structures that he
tends to use when in-person was a way of signaling that return to normal.
Coach-Specific Findings for Research Question 2
While the authentic beliefs of instructional coaches were presented at the beginning of
this section, the subsequent discussion has exclusively focused on participating teachers. This
section will provide an overview of findings related to research question 2 that are specific to
study participants who serve as instructional coaches.
Pandemic Authenticity Impacts on Instructional Coaching
In considering their work as instructional coaches during the pandemic, participant
coaches offered several ways in which they felt that the pandemic has impacted their ability to
engage in coaching that is pointed toward helping teachers to meet the authentic needs of their
students. In considering the ERT period specifically, Gale indicated her feeling that teachers
could still work within the period to teach authentically, noting that while the opportunities to do
so may not be as “intimate”, or might require changes to instructional mechanics, the
opportunities remained for teachers to utilize.
Shane noted concerns around the gradual loss of beneficial ERT learning over time as the
IAA system returned to circumstances that increasingly resembled the pre-pandemic state. In
particular, he pointed toward an increasing sense of urgency around matters that had been
consciously concepted as less urgent during earlier stages of the pandemic, resulting in an
increasing administrative messaging cadence around an increasing number of institutional
priorities.

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Participant Changes to Coaching Practices During the Pandemic
Instructional coaches described a variety of changes that they have made to their work as
instructional coaches during the pandemic. Three of the four participating coaches noted that
over the course of the pandemic, they felt that teachers have increasingly adapted to the reality of
the work of teaching during this time. Shane described his sense that “we are all better at
adapting…we've become more adept at dealing with frustrations, interruptions, and things not
going the way we planned.”
Different coaches identified different shifts in their work with teachers during the
pandemic. Gale indicated that her coaching work suggested that teachers are using digital
assessments in an increased capacity even following the ERT period. Both Gale and Mason
noted that they have been able to use the circumstances of the pandemic to build relationships
with their teacher partners that may not have been as easily afforded prior to the pandemic, or
even centered on the common experience of the pandemic, itself. Gale and Shane also indicated
that they felt the circumstances of the pandemic have led them to show their teacher partners
increased patience and flexibility.
Participant Reasoning for Coaching Practice Changes
Reasoning for changes in coaching practices was varied. Discussion of the way in which
instructional coaches were utilized during the ERT period was previously discussed in findings
around research question one. When considering their work during the ERT period, participating
coaches indicated that this shift in their work was driven by an administrative directive at the
time, though both Gale and Erin provided additional reasoning around the changes that they
made during the ERT period as also being driven by the needs of teachers during the ERT
period. Gale noted that teacher sentiments around difficulties with traditional assessment

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practices during ERT was a fundamental driver in adjusting her coaching practice during that
period to working with teachers and PLCs on problem-solving and support around assessment
practices. Shane spoke to how experience over the course of the pandemic has led to increased
ability to work effectively within the circumstances of the pandemic.
In a related finding, both Erin and Mason spoke to their belief that the pandemic has had
a reinforcing effect on their reasoning around the work that they do as an instructional coach.
When asked to consider her major learnings from her experience as a coach during the pandemic,
Erin offered that “I think staying flexible is important. I think finding ways to engage is
important. I think listening to students and teachers is important. Those are all things that were
affirmed or confirmed, not just pandemic learning.”
Summary Discussion of Research Question Two Findings
Findings around research question two demonstrate that the COVID-19 pandemic has
had wide-ranging and varied impacts on the ability of teachers to address what they feel are
authentic teaching practices in their work with students. Table 7 provides a summary of the
various beliefs that participating teachers and instructional coaches hold around what their
authentic beliefs about their instructional practice. These beliefs generally revolve around what
to teach, how to teach, and the value of relationships when doing the work of teaching and
coaching.
In discussing how the pandemic has impacted their ability to teach authentically,
participating teachers indicated that different phases of the pandemic have had different impacts
on the authenticity of their work. During the ERT period, most teacher participants noted that
there was an increased difficulty in being able to understand the wellbeing of their students.
Teachers also noted that the ERT period led to what they felt was a degraded experience in

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providing what they considered to be authentic learning experiences, a loss of instructional
flexibility, and a loss of their ability to teach transferable skills.
Considering the ongoing impact of the pandemic on teacher authenticity, the impact of
mask wearing on the relationships that teachers build with their students and the ability of
teachers to communicate effectively were widely reported by participating teachers. Several
participants also noted that the ongoing pandemic has led to an increased stress burden on them
which they indicated had a negative impact on their authenticity. These negative impacts noted,
participants also identified several ways in which ongoing pandemic teaching circumstances
have had more positive impacts on their work with the need to remain flexible in instructional
planning and shifts in the types of transferable skills that participants are teaching being the
major findings in this domain.
When asked to consider how the authenticity impacts of the pandemic have driven
changes that participants have made to their teaching practice, participants reported a variety of
changes that they have made and their reasoning for doing so. During the ERT period,
participants reported an increased focus on their instructional efficiency/time management, and a
more generalized mindfulness on possible, sudden, distance-learning transitions after the return
from ERT. Teachers also widely reported an increased focus on the social-emotional wellbeing
of their students that began in the ERT period and has continued afterwards. Instructionally,
some teachers noted that they are reusing structures that they developed during the ERT period
as they have returned to in-person instruction, and that there is an ease of bringing in external
experts via video conferencing technology.
Participants identified three major themes for why they or have not made changes to their
instructional practices. The needs of students were the most provided justification for making

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changes, both during the ERT period and afterwards. Another, less widely stated, reasoning was
participant experience during the ERT period of the pandemic serving as a reason for why they
have continued a particular instructional practice post-ERT. Related to this, a perceived lack of
post-ERT utility for structures developed during the ERT period was the most reported reasoning
for not continuing a particular instructional practice once in-person instruction resumed.
Instructional coaches noted their belief that teachers could still address the authentic
needs of their students during the ERT period, even if instructional modalities needed to change
for ERT circumstances. They also reported concerns that beneficial instructional practices
developed during the ERT period may be diminishing over time. In considering their coaching
practices, coaches indicated that both themselves and the teachers that they work with have
adapted in their work during the pandemic. The utility of the pandemic to provide a common
experience for relationship-building with teaching partners, and a more generalized increased
patience for teaching partners were both reported by multiple participating coaches. Reasoning
for changes in coaching practices during the ERT period were justified by administrative
directives from that period, while post-ERT changes were justified largely by the necessities and
reality of pandemic teaching circumstances at IAA. Multiple coaches noted the pandemic has
had a reinforcing effect on their coaching beliefs and practices.
Research Question Three Findings
Research question 3 is “How have the adjustments that teachers have made in their
instructional practices during different phases of the COVID-19 crisis persisted or abated as the
acute stage of the crisis has receded?” The duration of adjustments that participants have made
in their instructional practices varies with both participant and the nature of the change(s) that
they have made. This section delineates those findings to a much greater extent, providing a

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consideration of the different durations of changes that participants made to their practices, along
with a discussion of the types of changes that have persisted and abated in the period since
Emergency Remote Teaching (ERT). A synthesis discussion of data around research question
three is provided at the end of this section.
Analyzing the Duration of Changes Made During the Pandemic
Interview question eight asked participants to explicitly consider if any changes that they
made to their instructional practices during the ERT period of the pandemic have remained in
their instructional practices or not since the ERT period, and to offer their thinking around why
they did or did not keep the changes that they identified. Additional consideration of the duration
of changes to instructional practices during the pandemic were occasionally offered by
participants at other points during interviews. In all cases, responses around the duration of
changes were coded according to the longevity of the changes that participants indicated. This
process resolved three duration magnitudes for further analysis: Changes that ceased with the
end of the ERT period, changes that have attenuated over time as post-ERT in-person learning
has proceeded, and the changes participants identified as having an ongoing impact on their
teaching practice. Cross referencing of these duration codes with other axial codes around the
changes that participants made during the pandemic and their reasoning for those changes drive
the analysis that underlies the findings presented in this discussion.
Instructional Changes that Ceased After ERT
Four participants identified changes to their instructional practices that they indicated
ceased with the end of the ERT period. These instructional changes were universally structures
that these participants had put in place during ERT that they felt did not have any utility in the
post-ERT period. Osmond provided a representative justification for why he ceased using the

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digital tools that he had identified as having utility for him during ERT, saying “I think, what I
was trying to do online teaching was come up with practices or solutions that could best simulate
the type of activities that I would be doing in person.” With the end of the ERT period, Osmond
felt that the approaches that he used during ERT to accomplish those goals were less useful in
the in-person environment, noting that “none of those practices or digital tools were so
transformative for the way that I was doing those things that I thought that they were important
to keep in person.” Tate provided similar reasoning when discussing his own decision to stop
using his ERT instructional approach, offering that since everything his PLCs had developed for
use during the ERT period were online in nature, the return to in-person instruction allowed for
non-digital structures that he found to be preferable to their online analogues.
It should be noted that in all cases where participants indicated that they ceased
instructional changes after the end of the ERT period, no participant indicated that all the
changes that they made to their instruction (either during the ERT period or after it) have abated.
All participants in this project indicated that the pandemic has had some ongoing impacts on
their instructional practices.
Instructional Changes that Have Attenuated Over Time
Three participants identified instructional changes that they made during the ERT period
that remained in place during the initial post-ERT period, but that have since abated. Like the
changes and reasoning teachers identified when discussing changes that they ceased at the end of
the ERT period, changes in this duration category were similarly structural in nature. While one
respondent spoke to the lack of apparent post-ERT utility when discussing his reasoning for
ceasing the change that he spoke to in this category, two participants supplied reasoning for these
decisions that was different than that which was seen in the post-ERT responses discussed above.

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When discussing why he has moved away from the type of reliance upon recorded video-lectures
since the ERT period, Milton spoke to his skepticism around the use of video as an instructional
modality that agrees with his beliefs around pedagogical practices that are most aligned with his
authentic beliefs, likening his ERT practice of using pre-recorded video lectures to “an answer
key in motion. There's important pieces that you're talking about, but we didn't facilitate
meaningful dialogue with them, right?…And that's not good enough.”
Speaking from his position as an instructional coach, Shane noted that some of the
beneficial changes he had noticed around the patience of himself and his team had begun to
attenuate as the IAA system began to regain some of its ability to operate within normal
parameters since the ERT period, with effects that he felt could be detrimental. In considering
IAA’s approach to initiative pursuit, he observed that “as we shift back into an overload or as our
normal becomes our new normal…that the systems around all of that stuff revert to the way that
we had been doing that for so long, that sort of initiative overload.”
Persistent and Ongoing Instructional Changes
Eleven participants identified changes to their instructional practices that they explicitly
identified as ongoing in their impacts to their teaching and coaching practices. Table 8
summarizes the persistent changes to teaching and coaching practices that participants explicitly
identified:

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Table 8
Persistent Pandemic-Driven Changes to Teaching and Coaching
Persistent Teaching Practices:
Increased authentic digital assessment strategies
Increased differentiation for learners
Increased ease of guest speakers via online platforms
Ongoing planning for possible subsequent distance learning
Reuse of distance-learning structures and materials
Shorter instructional planning time-horizon
Increased focus on student social-emotional well-being
Increased time spent in student-centered discussion structures
Persistent Coaching Practices:
Pandemic-driven relationship building with teacher partners
Increased patience & flexibility
Increased system-level efficiencies

The details of these changes are discussed in greater detail in earlier sections of this chapter.
Reasoning for Persistent and Ongoing Changes
Analysis of reasoning for those changes to teaching and coaching practices that were
explicitly identified by participants as persistent in nature reveals several commonalities. The
most frequently provided reasoning for why participants have implemented a particular
persistent instructional change was student well-being. Morton spoke about his own increased
intentional focus on the wellbeing of his students during the pandemic:

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“Yeah, I mean, I think that's going to be a part of it for a long time. You know, whether I
teach digitally, or I teach together, then yeah, really trying to help students be intentional
about saying hi to each other. And developing some friendships and just having those
moments is something I think will continue.”
Another widely provided rationale for a particular instructional change was the
demonstrated utility of that change either during the initial ERT period, or in the subsequent
pandemic-teaching period. Eva described how the experience of using particular practices has
led to her continuing to use those practices, noting that “I have some good strategies verses when
we're starting out, it was like what? Oh my gosh, what's a breakout room? how's that going to
work? These days there's banked strategies that you know works.”
Interestingly, the reasoning employed by instructional coaches around persistent changes
to their practices mirrors the above teacher reasoning. The needs of teachers during the ERT
period, the pandemic as a learning experience, and the utility of the pandemic in reinforcing
beliefs around instructional coaching were all supplied by participant coaching as reasoning for
the persistent changes that they identified.
Summary Discussion of Research Question Three Findings
Findings around research question three suggest that various changes that teachers have
made in their instructional practices during the ERT period of the COVID-19 pandemic have had
varied longevity since that time. While some participants were able to identify changes that have
ceased either with the end of the ERT period, or since that time, no participant indicated that all
the changes that they have made to their instruction during the pandemic have abated. The
changes that were indicated by participants as having ceased with the end of the ERT period

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were wholly structural changes that participants had put in place during the ERT period that were
felt to no longer serve utility with the end of ERT.
Several participants identified instructional changes that they made during the ERT
period, and that they maintained for a period post-ERT, but that have since abated. Like changes
that ended with the ERT period, these changes were also structural in nature. Participant
reasoning for why they subsequently decided to discontinue these changes was more varied than
reasoning around changes that stopped with the end of the ERT period. One participant cited a
similar lack of utility for his reasoning, one participant noted a skepticism of the pedagogical
validity of the instructional practice in question (the use of course videos), and one participant
coach noted a system-wide dynamic influencing movement away from the decreased pace of
initiative pursuit that characterized his earlier pandemic work.
Most participants identified changes to their instructional practices that have an ongoing
impact on their current teaching and coaching practices. Table 8 summarizes these persist
changes, which are highly varied in their nature and which impact instructional practices across
multiple time scales. In speaking to their reasoning around why they have maintained these
persistent changes to their instructional practice, teacher-participant reasoning tended to focus on
a belief that the practice they were considering was an effective way to focus on the wellbeing of
their students. Another widely provided rationale for maintaining a persistent practice change
was the demonstrated utility of the change due to the pandemic-driven experience of
implementing the change. Participant coaches offered similar reasoning around persistent
changes, with the needs of teachers during the ERT period, the learning experience of the
pandemic, and a pandemic-driven reinforcement of their beliefs around instructional coaching
being their major justifications for persistent changes.

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Chapter 5: Discussion
Discussion of Findings
The findings from this study present a clear picture of how participant’s instructional
practices have been impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. These impacts are complex and have
varied with the roles that participants have played in the IAA high school over the duration of the
pandemic, as well as the different phases of the pandemic. The profiles of participants show a
relatively high level of comfort using technology to advance their instructional practices, well
within the model of technological fluency described in the TPACK model (see Table 4- Self-
Evaluation of Participant Technological Fluency). This high degree of participant’s technological
savvy is congruent with the larger structural and material resources of the IAA institution. The
robust nature of technical support and resources that IAA provides its educators is evident in
participant responses both around the material support that they received (see Table 5-
Participant Identified ERT Technology Supports), and the relative lack of participant-identified
missing supports (see Table 6- Singleton-identified Missing ERT Supports).
Any readers who are interested in a fuller picture of findings than what is presented
below are encouraged to consult the axial codebook provided in appendix D. The codebook
presents an exhaustive collection of all axial codes utilized in this research, including those that
were only tangential to the analysis of findings related to the research questions of the study.
The Impacts of the Pandemic
Participants indicated that the period of emergency remote teaching (ERT) that
characterized the earliest phase of the pandemic at IAA had unique impacts on participants that
were connected to their initial realization of the gravity of the COVID-19 situation more broadly.
One of the major delineations between teacher participants and instructional coach participants

100
was in these initial impacts. Participant teachers framed their responses around ERT impacts in
terms of changes to their instructional practices, while participant coaches indicated that the
nature of their roles shifted during the ERT period away from instructional coaching to providing
technical and practical support for teachers. Participant teachers indicated that the experience of
teaching during the ERT period was tangibly different from their in-person instruction. Among
the various impacts that were identified, teachers most identified changes to the relational aspects
of teaching during this period. Along with these relational shifts, participants also identified
ways in which they modified their lesson design to address the reality of the ERT period,
reducing the content burden of their courses, changing their approach to assessments, while also
being more intentional in the work of providing students with increased social-emotional well-
being. Of these three major categories of impacts on teacher practice, the social-emotional
wellness aspect is the one that provides the clearest through line of participant experiences after
the ERT period, while the ongoing stress burden of teaching in compliance with various safe-
distancing regulations (particularly the omnipresence of masks), was reported to increase in its
impacts once the ERT period ended and in-person instruction resumed.
Instructional Authenticity & COVID-19
Participants have a variety of beliefs around authentic teaching/coaching practices that
touch on what they should teach, how they should teach, and the centrality of relationships in
their work as educators (see Table 7- Participant Provided Authentic Teaching/Coaching
Beliefs). The ERT period is again pointed to by participants as having unique impacts on their
ability to teach in line with their authenticity beliefs. These were almost uniformly negative, with
the impact of ERT on the ability to provide a sufficient social-emotional focus for students being
reported by most participants. Participant teachers indicated that they felt that the ERT period

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impacted their ability to provide authentic learning experiences and their typical focus on
teaching transferable skills, along with a general loss of flexibility during the ERT period. These
authenticity impacts continued after the ERT period, with regulations and mask-wearing being
commonly identified ways in which teachers have felt their authenticity continues to be limited.
Participants also noted several ways in which the ongoing circumstances of pandemic teaching
have had positive impacts on their ability to teach authentically, with several participants noting
increased flexibility in their planning and in their interactions with their students.
In considering how teachers have changed their instructional practices during the
pandemic to address the authenticity of their work, participants identified several major areas of
changes. A major change that participants identified was an increased, intentional, focus on the
relational domain of their work. Participants also identified several aspects of their instructional
planning that they have changed because of the pandemic that they considered to be helpful for
the authenticity of their work. These instructional changes were generally technical in nature (ex.
providing students with increased scaffolding, bringing in external experts over Zoom). In
justifying the changes that they made to their instructional practices, participants typically
framed their reasoning in terms of the needs of their students both in considering changes made
during ERT and afterwards. A less common justification were the circumstances of the pandemic
itself when participants were considering whether to continue or discontinue a particular
instructional change that they had made.
The experiences of teachers described above are reinforced by the experiences of
participating instructional coaches. A common finding among participant coaches was the
perception that teachers have adapted their instructional practices to the realities of pandemic

102
teaching since the resumption of in-person instruction, while the underlying ethos for their
coaching work has not been challenged due to their pandemic coaching experiences.
The Persistence of Changes
Changes to instructional practices made by participants have had varied persistence.
Changes made during the ERT period that ceased with the resumption of in-person learning were
structural changes that were felt to have no real utility outside of the distance-learning
circumstance. Several participants identified similar structural changes that remained post-ERT
but have since abated. Reasoning for why participants discontinued the use of these practices
over time was framed in terms of a lack of utility, a feeling that a particular instructional change
was at odds with an authenticity belief, or the loss of the practice as the IAA system resumed
aspects of its pre-pandemic state.
Participants also identified a variety of persistent changes to their instructional practices
(See Table 8- Persistent Pandemic-Driven Changes to Teaching and Coaching). Student well-
being was the most often provided rationale for why participants have maintained a particular
change, with the circumstances of the pandemic as a demonstration of the utility of a practice
serving as the other major justification for the persistence of that practice. This reasoning is
mirrored in the responses of participant coaches when considering the needs of their teacher
partners.
Limitations of Findings
There are a variety of limitations to the findings from this study. The limitations to the
study discussed in chapter 1 impact the findings of the study. These limitations involved the
ongoing nature of the pandemic, the unique circumstances of the IAA institution and the local
context of Singapore, and the fundamentally constrained nature of the qualitative research

103
paradigm employed in the study. These limitations noted, it bears repeating that the findings
from this study are representative of one way in which the impacts of the pandemic have affected
the instructional practices of IAA high school teachers, and even then, only of teachers within
the departments that were eligible for participation. Additionally, the requirement that
participants in the study have been members of the IAA high school faculty since before the
onset of the pandemic means that perspectives of teachers who have subsequently joined the IAA
high school faculty have not been captured within the scope of this work.
Implications and Recommendations
The limitations of the findings presented above established, this section provides a
discussion of the implications of the study for different audiences and consequent
recommendations. Implications for teachers and instructional coaches are presented first,
followed by implications for the institutional leadership of IAA.
Implications and Recommendations for IAA Teachers and Instructional Coaches
Findings indicate that the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic on teaching and coaching
have been pronounced and highly varied. Given the unprecedented significance of the pandemic,
this finding is relatively rote, and well within agreement with the larger picture of the literature
around COVID-19 presented in chapter 2. This study shows that the impacts of ERT
instructional modalities at IAA have been different than the impacts of in-person pandemic
teaching. ERT instruction was notable for the sudden and large-scale disruptions to what
participants indicated were the normal instructional structures and relationships that typified their
teaching and coaching work. Many of the changes that participants made to their practices during
the ERT period were driven by these aspects of the ERT period and the desire of participants to
mitigate some of the more disruptive parts of ERT. With the return to in-person instruction

104
following ERT, many of the changes that participants made during ERT abated, with subsequent
changes being made by participants in response to the novel circumstances of teaching in-person
under the various restrictions occasioned by the continuing pandemic.
The Centrality of Relationships
While there are many granular differences, overall, the centrality of how the pandemic
has impacted the relational work of teaching is a constant finding across all stages of the
pandemic. Whether it is due to the difficulties of a rushed move to teaching online or the
difficulties in communication that come from teaching while wearing masks, the relational focus
of both teaching and coaching is the central theme of both the impacts of the pandemic, and the
changes that teachers and coaches have made to their work over its course. The need to center
relationships is also the major reason why teachers have made changes to their instructional
practices during the pandemic. In this way, the pandemic has served as a causal driver for
increasing teacher and coach focus on intentional relationship-building in their work. The
persistence of participant’s focus on relationships is reflective of the type of educator practice
and action that exemplifies an authentic, praxis orientation for teacher decision making.
The Pandemic as Technical Learning Experience
Aside from its impacts on the relational aspects of teaching and coaching, the pandemic
has also served as a means by which teachers have broadened their instructional practice toolkit.
The ERT period was particularly useful in this regard. While not all participants indicated that
they brought back practices from the ERT period to their work once in-person schooling
resumed, many did. These practices tended to be technical in nature, with ERT demonstrating the
use of a particular way of presenting material, or a more efficient means of assessment, rather
than driving more fundamental shifts in practices due to changes in a participant’s authenticity

105
beliefs. This may be why some participants reported a gradual attenuation of some practices after
the conclusion of ERT (to say nothing of those practices that were discarded immediately
afterwards).
Participant’s Lessons Learned
Interview Question 12 asked participants to state a lesson that they learned from their
pandemic teaching/coaching experience. In considering these lessons, the author feels strongly
that there is utility in letting participant’s words speak for themselves. Table 9 provides the
lessons that participants spoke to in their responses:

Table 9
Participant Pandemic Lessons Learned
Teachers:
Morton: “Being in-person matters.”
Gary: “[Distance Learning] is nowhere near the same relationship.”
Brooke: “We are resourceful. As a team, we're resourceful, and we can come up with
other ways to connect and deliver.”
Tate: “Plan for a shorter future.”
Kyle: “Be flexible, and at any given time, be ready to teach from home.”
Humphrey: “Be flexible.”
Eva: “We can adapt and change.”
Osmond: “I think we as students and teachers, and more broadly, as people are very
adaptable.”
Amanda: “Just breathe and go with the flow.”

106
Alexis: “If you're working in a place that is stable, in a country that's stable, and an
institution that stable that you are in the best possible place to ride out a storm like
this.”
Simone: “How incredibly privileged we've been, to be able to have the resources we
have to manage the pandemic.”
Ray: “Intentional checking in on students, even if it seems silly or obligatory, is
absolutely worth doing.”
Milton: “Don't underestimate the value of relationships.”
Instructional Coaches:
Gale: “Give grace and listen, and be listened to, read and be as proactive as possible.”
Shane: “Give people grace and act with as much flexibility as possible.”
Mason: “We can do anything. We really can.”
Erin: “I think staying flexible is important. I think finding ways to engage is important.
I think listening to students and teachers is important.”

Leveraging Pandemic Teaching and Coaching Experiences
Looking at the responses in Table 9, it is clear that the utility of flexibility in practices is
a major take-away from participant’s experiences during the pandemic. The pandemic has
required participants to recontextualize their work into ways of thinking about instruction that
allow for sudden, unexpected changes to instructional circumstances. What is most striking about
these lessons is how optimistic they are for the work that participants are doing and have done
over the course of these pandemic years. This is certainly a function of the circumstances of
IAA, but it also shows that an unprecedented disruption, generally characterized as broadly

107
negative in its impacts, can lead teachers and coaches to engage in the types of reflective
practices that typify notions of educational praxis. That the most widely discussed changes in
this realm are stanced in an increased focus on the needs and well-being of students implies a
hopefulness for the ongoing, post-COVID work of teaching and coaching at IAA.
Recommendations that emerge from this study for the work of IAA teachers and
instructional coaches center around using the experiences of pandemic teaching and coaching to
frame their work going forward. Using participant learnings around the centrality of
relationships, the increased focus on student well-being, and increased flexibility around
planning and lesson structures will serve as a particularly useful approach for pursuing the
ongoing work of teacher and coach development at IAA. This is particularly true given
participant concerns around the resumption of the return to the “normal” pace of initiative
implementation that may otherwise lead to a loss of the most authentic identified shifts in
instructional practices. At the very least, teachers and coaches should feel encouraged to pursue
those approaches to their work that have developed over the trajectory of the pandemic that they
feel are most resonant with their authentic beliefs around the work of education.
Implications and Recommendations for the IAA Institutional Leadership
While certainly not being an exhaustive evaluation of the overall institutional response,
the research conducted for this project helps to inform the picture of how IAA has functioned
over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic. Findings present several clear implications for the
institutional leadership of IAA.
Participant Evaluations of IAA’s Pandemic Response
Interview question 13 asked participants to evaluate the response of IAA to the
circumstances of the pandemic by assigning the institution a grade from A to F, and to explain

108
their reasoning for their evaluation. Table 10 provides a summary of participant evaluations of
the IAA institutional response along with additional context where needed.

Table 10
Participant Evaluations of IAA’s Pandemic Response

Grade Count Additional Context
A+
A

A-

B+
B

C+

C
1
9

2

4
6

2

1
The grade was for the overall IAA community response
One grade was for the response until June of 2020, one grade was
explicitly for the High School Division, one grade was for “effort.”
One grade counts the entirety of a participant’s rating of “B+ or A- or
A.”

One grade was for the institution overall, one grade was for the
response during the 2020-2021 schoolyear, one grade was for the HS
administration, one grade was for "overall efforts."
One grade was for “results,” One grade was for unspecified aspects of
the system-wide response.
The grade is specifically for the response since August of 2021.

Note. Rating total exceeds participant counts due to multiple ratings by some participants

109
It is hard to look at the picture of evaluations provided in Table 10 and not think that the overall
institutional response to the pandemic has been effective. That the institution in question is one
of the most well-resourced and well-positioned K-12 educational systems in the world for
handling the impacts of a global pandemic should demonstrate to leadership that they have
largely stewarded the institution as they should have over the course of the COVID-19 crisis.
This noted, there are several additional implications from this work for the institution that are of
interest for leadership.
The Gradual Loss of Institutional Pandemic Knowledge
It is not clear that there has been any intentional work by leadership to capture the
knowledge that is has developed over the course of the pandemic. Outside of this research
project, the author is not aware of any additional work being done to collect data on the impact
of the pandemic on any aspect of the IAA system, much less those aspects related to teaching
and learning. This is particularly noteworthy given the more transient nature of the faculty of
international schools. The transition of teachers out of the IAA high school has been significant
over the past three years, and it is not clear that any real attempt to capture their experience of
teaching during these pandemic years. This study provides a palate of best practices for IAA
related to online learning, working within pronounced constraints, focusing on the social-
emotional needs of learners, and other aspects of the work that has been done at IAA during this
time. To this point, outside of this study, no systematic attempt to capture these best pandemic
teaching practices has been made by IAA. From the standpoint of best practices related to
material resources and institutional support during remote learning, leaders are encouraged to
consult prior sections of this study, particularly the discussion around initial institutional
supports for teaching practices. The list of participant-identified technology supports in Table 5

110
(Participant Identified ERT Technology Supports) is useful for any leadership that wishes to
understand what resources were felt by study participants to best support them in the ERT online
learning environment. Similarly, both the discussion of participant-identified missing ERT
supports as well as the list of singleton-identified missing supports found in Table 6 (Singleton-
identified Missing ERT Supports) are useful for any retrospective consideration of the IAA
institutional response to the early-stage pandemic and can inform future planning around online
instruction. Going forward, leadership should prioritize capturing ongoing information from
teachers and coaches related to their work during the pandemic. This can be done through
interviews, surveys, and even as part of the typical exit interview for staff that are transitioning
out of the organization. An intentional effort around capturing this information will be helpful
for resolving those pandemic teaching and coaching practices that are most robust and widely
developed among the IAA teaching and coaching staff. The data gathered from such an
approach will also help inform leadership about the current state of the IAA instructional system
as they consider return to a more typical pace of initiative pursuit and various other aspects of the
IAA culture in the new instructional reality that exists, post-COVID19.
A Rushed Return to “Normal”
In a similar vein to implications around the loss of institutional learning from the
pandemic, there is a similar undercurrent in findings from this project that participants feel that
IAA is moving too quickly to resume the pace of innovation and initiative-pursuit that typified
the pre-pandemic culture of IAA. This pace, characterized by one participant as a “hamster
wheel,” was suggested by multiple long-term IAA teacher participants to have been challenging
for educators in pre-pandemic circumstances. That it would be resumed while the pandemic is
still continuing is not well-supported by findings in this project. Negative impacts of this rushed

111
return to normal can clearly be seen in participant responses around the habituation of teachers
and coaches to pandemic circumstances, the attenuation of participant-identified beneficial
practices that had initially developed during early stages of the pandemic, along with accounting
for the entirety of lower-end evaluations presented earlier in this section in Table 10. A
resumption of a pre-pandemic initiative-pursuit tempo might be attractive to leadership for
signaling that institutional circumstances are improving, but it carries distinct negative risks in
suggesting that reality is different from what is perceived by teachers and coaches. With this in
mind, it is useful for leadership to consider if the resumption of a pace of initiative pursuit that
already had negative impacts on teachers and coaches prior to COVID-19, is worth the loss of
beneficial pandemic-occasioned shifts in teaching and coaching practices. It is not at all clear
that an academic culture that privileges innovation can do so authentically if its driving tempo is
leading educators to discard practices that they regard as innovative.
Playing to Pandemic Strengths When Framing Priorities
IAA is an educational institution with multiple long-term goals and initiatives. While the
preceding section discussed some concerns around resuming a pre-pandemic pace of initiative
pursuit too quickly, findings from this study also provide leadership with approaches to framing
initiatives in a way that is most agreeable for educators. Where any institutional priority can be
grounded in a recognition of the various lessons learned by IAA during the pandemic, doing so
helps to establish buy-in from teachers and coaches. To take one current example, illustrating
how the IAA initiatives around culturally responsive pedagogy are in-line with the durable
changes that educators have made to their practice that center relationship-building can help
educators see how the priorities of the institution are aligned with the aspects of their work that
they most value rather than things that are required in addition to that work. Similar positioning

112
can be made around all the major IAA initiatives. More generally, acknowledging that there are
valid lessons from this pandemic period that have been learned and encouraging the use of this
knowledge when helping educators to frame their own priorities will be a fruitful avenue for
leadership to consider when doing the work of advancing the IAA vision.
Recommendations for Further Research
This project suggests many possible avenues for further research around the impacts of
COVID-19 on both IAA and educational systems more broadly. Given the significance of the
COVID-19 pandemic for education, the author is certain that it will become one of the most
widely studied events in the history of education research, even absent his musings in this area.
Still, there is some utility in delineating some of the possible approaches that future research
could take at least within the context of IAA, which follows below.
In terms of the IAA context, understanding how COVID-19 has impacted teaching in
portions of the faculty not represented in this study would be useful. The experiences of teachers
in more performance-based departments such as physical education, and fine and performing arts
almost certainly differs in some respects from the experiences of study participants if for no
other reason than the more pronounced impacts of regulations in constraining the instructional
approaches available to teachers of these subjects. Similar utility may be found in studying the
impacts on teachers outside of the high school division. The experiences of teachers who have
joined the IAA system during the pandemic is another unrepresented demographic that could
demonstrate a useful addition to the overall picture of how the pandemic has impacted the
experience of teaching and learning (and on-boarding of new hires) at IAA. None of this
considers the experiences of other stakeholders in the IAA system over the COVID-19 period,

113
with a clearly suggested utility around research into the experiences of students and their
families.
Research into other aspects of the IAA system outside of teaching and learning may also
be clarifying. Additional value would be given to the application of research paradigms other
than the wholly qualitative approach utilized in this project. In all cases, aspects of further
research that are congruent with the findings from this project will be illuminating, as will the
differences that will inevitably present themselves.
Concluding Remarks
This research project was developed to consider how the most significant disruption in
the author’s career as a teacher was impacting the work of teaching. That this disruption also
happened to also be one of the most significant global disruptions to education in history gave
this project a degree of utility that it might not otherwise have had. At the inception, it was clear
that the pandemic had significant impacts on all aspects of the IAA educational system,
instructional practices included. That this project has served to delineate the highly varied ways
in which instructional practices have been impacted by the trajectory of COVID-19 is useful in
and of itself. That it has subsequently demonstrated the continual positioning of student
wellbeing at the forefront of instructional decision-making is affirming for the work that is done
when teaching students at IAA.
It is clear to the author that the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on education will be
felt for a very long time. Understanding this and understanding how teachers have responded
during their time working in the pandemic will be useful for anyone who wants to understand
how school systems have functioned in this unique crisis and develop ideas about how we might
move schools to a post-pandemic reality that is more effective for the work of teaching and

114
learning, informed by the experience of this current moment. In as much as this study helps to
illuminate some small corner of this larger project, it has been successful in its goal.

115
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Appendix A: Teacher Interview Protocol
I. Background and Demographics:
I’d like to start by asking you some background questions about you as a teacher.
1. First, let’s talk about you and your background in education.
a. What are your preferred pronouns?
b. What subject(s) do you teach?
c. Tell me about your role in the program/school.
d. How long have you been in your current position at the school?
2. Let’s talk briefly about your overall philosophy as a teacher. Let’s begin with a bit of
discussion around your overall philosophy as a teacher. If possible, I’d like you to speak
to one or two practices that you try to provide to your students when you work with them
and the main reasons you privilege these practices. This is a big question, so please feel
free to take a moment to reflect and gather your thoughts. If it helps, please use the space
provided in the reflection materials to help you organize your thinking.
3. I’d also like to get some sense of your comfort with using technology when teaching.
Give yourself a grade from A to F, and briefly describe why you have given yourself this
grade. Again, we’ll take a moment for reflection, and please feel free to use the space
provided in the reflection materials to help you organize your thinking.
II. Main Section of the Interview:
I’d like to ask about your experiences teaching during the COVID-19 pandemic:
4. In researching the overall trajectory of our work as an institution during the COVID-19
pandemic, I’ve identified several different notable moments in the initial stages of the
pandemic when the pandemic caused us to adjust our schedule or the way in which we

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could work with our students. There is a timeline that identifies some major moments in
the reflection materials, along with some space to organize your thoughts if it’s useful.
a. Looking at this timeline [provided in reflection materials], and considering your
own experience as a teacher during this time, what moments are memorable to
you, if any?
b. Are there any additional moments that you remember that are not identified on the
timeline? If so, please identify them for me.
5. I’d like to discuss how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted your work as an educator.
We’ll consider how the pandemic has impacted your work in different ways. If it is
helpful for you, there is some space provided to help you organize your thoughts in the
reflection materials.
a. What aspects, if any, of your work as a teacher have been made easier by the
pandemic?
i. Tell me about how the pandemic made these aspects of your work easier.
b. What aspects, if any, of your work as a teacher have been unaffected by the
pandemic?
i. Tell me about why the pandemic did not affect these aspects of your work.
c. What aspects, if any, of your work as a teacher have been made more difficult by
the pandemic?
i. Tell me about how the pandemic made these aspects of your work harder.
d. [Department Chairpersons Only] How has the pandemic impacted your work in
the Department Chairperson role, if at all?

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Now I’d like to focus on the first transition to Distance Learning during the last two
months of the 2019-2020 school year and the return to in-person instruction during the
2020-2021 school year. We’ll focus on particular factors that may have impacted your work
as a teacher during these stages of the pandemic.
6. Please describe the support that you received from the school during the COVID-19
pandemic distance learning transition when needing to adjust your teaching practices, if
any?
a. What are some of the sources of support that you received?
b. Give me an example of something the school provided to support your transition.
c. What are some of the major areas of your work as a teacher where you don’t think
you were as supported if any?
d. Let’s imagine that you could get any additional support that you needed. What
would be some of the additional supports that you would have liked to have if
any?
i. How would these additional supports assist you?
e. [Department Chairpersons Only] Please talk about how your work in the
Department Chairperson role was supported or not supported during the Distance
Learning transition.
7. How did your approach to your teaching practice change when we had to move to
distance learning, if at all?
a. If you implemented any changes, what were the reasons you made those changes?

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b. Some people say that the COVID-19 Distance learning transition had negative
impacts on the ability of teachers to address the authentic needs of their students.
What are your thoughts on this perspective?
c. [Department Chairpersons Only] How did your approach to your work as a
Department Chairperson change when we had to move to distance learning, if at
all?
I’d like for us to consider a series of prompts around your thinking about how you have
taught in ways that address the authentic needs of your students in the time since the end of
the 2019-2020 schoolyear.
8. When we returned to in-person instruction at the beginning of the 2020-2021 school year,
what changes that you implemented when we moved to distance learning remained in
your instructional approach if any?
If affirmative:
a. Can you describe some of the reasoning you used when deciding to keep these
changes in place once in-person instruction resumed?
b. How long do you imagine these changes will remain as parts of your teaching
practice, assuming they have not already ceased?
If negative:
a. Can you describe some of your reasoning for why you did not retain any changes
from the distance-learning experience?
9. Can you briefly discuss how aspects of your teaching during the pandemic have been
affected by the institutional regulations that have been implemented by the school and the
Singaporean government, if at all?

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a. Do you feel these regulations prevented you from realizing aspects of your
teaching or that you had to adapt those aspects?
Moving forward in time, I’d like to ask about the transitions back to distance learning that
have occurred since the 2019-2020 school year (at the very end of the 2020-2021 school
year, and on occasion during the 2021-2022 school year) and around the ongoing nature of
the pandemic.
10. Can you describe any similarities or differences around experience of these subsequent
distance-learning transitions as compared to the first transition during the 2019-2020
schoolyear?
a. How did any of your experiences and learning from the first distance-learning
transition impact these subsequent distance-learning experiences, if at all?
11. Can you describe how the ongoing nature of the pandemic has impacted your teaching, if
at all?
III. Closing Questions:
12. In considering your work as a teacher during the pandemic, if you had to state one lesson
that you think you have learned from the experience, what would that be?
13. Institutionally, if you had to give our school a letter grade for how it has responded to the
COVID-19 pandemic, what grade would you give us, and why?
14. I invite you to share any other thoughts about our conversation today around how
COVID-19 has impacted the work that you do as a teacher that I might not have covered.

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Appendix B: Instructional Coach Interview Protocol
I. Background and Demographics:
I’d like to start by asking you some background questions about you as a teacher.
1. First, let’s talk about you and your background in education.
a. What are your preferred pronouns?
b. What subject(s) do you teach?
c. Tell me about your role in the program/school.
d. How long have you been in your current position at the school?
2. Please speak briefly about your overall philosophy as an educator. Let’s begin with a bit
of discussion around your overall philosophy as an educator. If possible, I’d like you to
speak to one or two practices that you try to provide in your role as a coach/instructional
support and the main reasons you privilege these practices. This is a big question, so
please feel free to take a moment to reflect and gather your thoughts. If it helps, please
use the space provided in the reflection materials to help you organize your thinking.
3. I’d also like to get some sense of your comfort with using technology when
coaching/providing instructional support. Give yourself a grade from A to F, and briefly
describe why you have given yourself this grade. Again, we’ll take a moment for
reflection, and please feel free to use the space provided in the reflection materials to help
you organize your thinking.
II. Main Section of the Interview:
I’d like to start by asking about your experiences as a coach/instructional coach during the
COVID-19 pandemic:

131
4. In researching the overall trajectory of our work as an institution during the COVID-19
pandemic, I’ve identified several different notable moments in the initial stages of the
pandemic when the pandemic caused us to adjust our schedule or the way in which we
could work with our students. There is a timeline that identifies some major moments in
the reflection materials, along with some space to organize your thoughts if it’s useful.
a. Looking at this timeline [provided in reflection materials], and considering your
own experience as a coach during this time, what moments are memorable to you,
if any?
b. Are there any additional moments that you remember that are not identified on the
timeline? If so, please identify them for me.
5. I’d like to discuss how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted your work as a
coach/instructional support, if at all. We’ll consider how the pandemic has impacted your
work in different ways. If it is helpful for you, there is some space provided to help you
organize your thoughts in the reflection materials.
a. What aspects, if any, of your work as a coach/instructional support have been
made easier by the pandemic?
i. Tell me about how the pandemic made these aspects of your work easier.
b. What aspects, if any, of your work as a coach/instructional support have been
unaffected by the pandemic?
i. Tell me about why the pandemic did not affect these aspects of your work.
c. What aspects, if any, of your work as a coach/instructional support have been
made more difficult by the pandemic?
i. Tell me about how the pandemic made these aspects of your work harder.

132
Now I’d like to ask some questions about the first transition to Distance Learning during
the last two months of the 2019-2020 school year and the return to in-person instruction
during the 2020-2021 school year. We’ll focus on particular factors that may have impacted
your work as a coach/instructional support during these stages of the pandemic.
6. Please describe the support that teachers needed from you during the COVID-19
pandemic to help them adjust their teaching practices if any.
a. Give me 1-2 examples of something you or the larger school
coaching/instructional support apparatus provided to support teachers during the
transition.
b. What are some of the major areas of work as a teacher where you don’t think our
coaching/instructional support apparatus has been as supportive for teachers if
any?
c. Let’s imagine that you could provide any additional support to teachers. What
would be some of the additional supports that you would like to be able to provide
if any?
i. How would these additional supports assist teachers?
7. How did your approach to your coaching/instructional support practice change when we
had to move to distance learning, if at all?
a. If you implemented any changes, what were the reasons you made those changes?
b. Some people say that the COVID-19 distance learning transition had negative
impacts on the ability of teachers to address the authentic needs of their students.
What are your thoughts on this perspective?

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I’d like for us to discuss your thinking about how you have supported teachers in ways that
help them to address the authentic needs of their students since the long duration period of
distance learning at the end of the 2019-2020 school year
8. When we returned to in-person instruction, what changes that you helped to implement as
a coach/instructional support when we moved to distance learning remained in the
instructional approaches of teacher, if any? What changes remained in your work as a
coach/instructional support, if any?
If affirmative:
a. Describe some of your thoughts as to why these changes remained in place once
in-person instruction resumed.
b. How long do you imagine these changes will remain in place going forward,
assuming their use has not already ceased?
If negative:
b. Describe some of your thoughts for why changes from the distance-learning
experience did not remain in place once in-person instruction resumed.
9. Can you briefly discuss how aspects of your coaching/instructional support during the
pandemic have been affected by the institutional regulations that have been implemented
by the school and the Singaporean government, if at all?
Moving forward in time, I’d like to ask about the transitions back to distance learning that
have occurred since the 2019-2020 school year (at the very end of the 2020-2021 school
year, and on occasion during the 2021-2022 school year) and around the ongoing nature of
the pandemic.

134
10. Can you describe any similarities or differences around your experience of these
subsequent, briefer, distance-learning transitions as compared to the first transition during
the 2019-2020 school year?
a. How did any of your experiences and learning from the first distance-learning
transition impact these subsequent distance-learning experiences, if at all?
11. Can you describe how the ongoing nature of the pandemic has impacted your coaching
practices, if at all?
III. Closing Questions:
12. In considering the work of coaching/instructional support during the pandemic, if you
had to state one lesson that you think you have learned from the experience, what would
that be?
13. Institutionally, if you had to give our school a letter grade for how it has responded to the
COVID-19 pandemic, what grade would you give us, and why?
14. I would like to invite you to share any other thoughts about our conversation today
around how COVID-19 has impacted the work that you do as a teacher that I might not
have covered.

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Appendix C: Individual Reflection Prompts for Interview Participants
Reflection space for your philosophy as an educator. If possible, list 1-2 practices you provide to
your students and why you privilege these practices:
Philosophy:

Practices:

Reflection space for considering your comfort with using technology. Give yourself a grade from
A-F and describe the reasons why you have graded yourself as you have:
Grade:

Reasons:

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Timeline of IAA COVID-19 Response

Particularly memorable moments:

Any other memorable moments that are not identified? If so, please identify them here:

137
The impact of the pandemic on your work as an educator:

Aspects of your work that have been made easier (if any):

Aspects of your work that have been unaffected (if any):

Aspects of your work that have been made harder (if any):

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Appendix D: Axial Codebook
Category: Practice Impacts
Code Description Example
Change fatigue The teacher indicates that ongoing changes to
IAA school system are fatiguing.
“I think the biggest challenge is just that there's
just so many changes, and you we never know
when what's going to change, and when, and it's
just a lot of yo-yoing. And that's really
challenging, and it can be very stressful for
people.” Amanda Page
Collegial relationships The teacher indicates that their collegial
relationships have been impacted by the
pandemic.
“I had a feeling that the COVID was having a
positive effect on our community, as well as the
world perhaps so it's actually everyone was in that
situation…if it was something that just happened
in Singapore, and nowhere else in the world, we
probably would have hunkered down and become
a closer community. So, I felt a greater
collegiality, people were a bit warmer to each
other, a bit sympathetic. But as things are
loosening up, I think things are getting back to
normal.” Gary Ingram
ERT 1:1 Student: teacher
interactions
The teacher indicates that 1:1 interaction with
students during the ERT period was altered.
“I mean, how easy was it to sort of wait behind
after class and have a quiet one on one
conversation? It wasn't as easy. I will say that,
strangely, I did have like, two kids kind of
connect and just reach out and sort of say, "hey,
look, you know, I’d love to chat about some stuff
that's going on." So, we were able to have those
conversations, but I think it was a lot more, kind

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Code Description Example
of, there's a lot more back and forth.” Milton
Daniels
ERT Advisory relationships The teacher indicates that the ERT period altered
the relationships with their advisory students.
“I kind of felt like there was even more
authenticity, for my advisory. Wake up it would
be like the eight o'clock check in, you know, and
I'd see [STUDENT], get out of bed, like, no shirt
on, like "[STUDENT], it's still dress codes, you
know," and we'd have a laugh, and things of that
nature and people would kind of groggily get up
and move and there's authenticity to that.” Mason
Smith
ERT Assessment practices The teacher indicates that the ERT period altered
assessment practices.
“I didn't assess as often. And I felt I had to be
upfront. I said "I know for a fact you guys could
all cheat if you wanted to. But that's not going to
do any of us any good. And just trust me in 20
years, nobody's going to think the spring of 2020
your grades are a little bit lower than usual." And
so definitely the assessment piece was more like I
had them all on the camera, but I know darn well
they could have been cheating. But that was a
challenge for me not being able to kind of look in
their eyes and see what they're doing and just
trusting them to do the right thing.” Humphrey
Valdez
ERT Content reduction The teacher indicates that the ERT period caused
them to reduce the amount of course material they
taught.
“I mean we had to reduce, obviously, what we
were able to cover. So that had to change. We had
to really like think, prioritize certain standards
over others, and let things go. And then I would
say they were one-hour blocks instead of 75-
minute blocks. And so, there was a different kind

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Code Description Example
of strategy there too, in terms of the pacing out of
the time together.” Amanda Page
ERT Formative assessment The teacher indicates that formative assessment
practices have been impacted.
“I think that very informal assessment, which is
happening all the time. Just by being in the class,
looking over the shoulder, looking at the work,
asking questions. You're just constantly
monitoring "Do the kids get it or not? Do I need
to give another example? Do I need to adapt my
lesson?"…I couldn't do that real time monitoring
of whether learning is taking place.” Gary Ingram
ERT Instructional design The teacher indicates that the ERT period caused
them to change their instructional/lesson design.
“Teaching-wise, I almost felt like I was a private
tutor for 100 students, rather than a teacher. Five
classes, and I was very one-on-one. And even
though it was 20 at a time, it was like I had to, I
don't know. They couldn't talk to each other. They
weren't talking to each other. And it was kind of a
whole different environment. So, I guess that
feeling changed of how class kind of operated. I
think we still got through everything, just wasn't
as fun.” Tate Higgins
ERT Social-emotional focus The teacher indicates that the ERT period caused
them to change their focus on the social-
emotional domain of their practice.
“I tried to do just a lot more. More thoughtful
about the kid’s kind of emotional well-being and
maybe even just acknowledging the fact that, for
a lot of our kids, it was a time where they were
lacking a lot of connection, and maybe just fun,
joy, whatever you want to call it…I just tried to
get some smiles and get people just kind of
smiling and maybe laughing and talking together
about whatever it might be.” Osmond Dawson

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ERT Student
burnout/management
The teacher indicates that they had a noticeable
change in managing student behavior during the
ERT period.
“There was just a certain segment of the students
who were just sort of tuned out. You can see them
on their phone doing something else, or just not
really taking it seriously. And you can't use the
physical proximity, and the other classroom
management tools that you've got on hand. I had
to get really harsh with a couple classes and just
boot students out. And that's a really crude tool
for behavioral management, for classroom
management.” Ray Hancock
Extracurricular obligations The teacher indicates that their extracurricular
obligations have changed during the pandemic.
“Kids can’t have access to the jam room. There's
no such thing as public performances. We've tried
to retool what can happen and keep those kids
excited, like playing for each other over Zoom
and having a bit more of an online presence and
that kind of thing. But it's all that stuff that
happens at home…the reason kids get in that club
is so that they can collaborate and make music
together and basically rock out, and they can't do
any of that stuff. Which kind of takes something
off my plate, even though I worry about it and
think about it and am in contact with those kids
about what to do.” Tate Higgins
Informal personal interactions The teacher indicates the nature of informal,
personal interactions has changed during the
pandemic.
“Yeah, the being disconnected from family, being
actually progressively more disconnected from
colleagues, right? We don't have a lunchroom
anymore, there's just like lots of little social
nuances at school that just don't exist. I can be a
pretty bad-- it's quite easy for me to be a loner for

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several days in a row. There's the human
interaction piece is missing.” Milton Daniels
Initiative rollout The teacher indicates that IAA initiatives have
been impacted by the pandemic.
“I think it kind of gave the school a pause on
some of the initiatives that can happen…but I
think that IAA, historically, or you just hear from
people can be a very-- I don't know if aggressive
is the right word, but a very forward-motion
machine. And you can definitely see that…I think
it kind of gave everybody a little bit of a chance
to kind of just pause and relax a little bit.” Morton
Santos
Learning support The teacher indicates that the ability to provide
learning support for students has been impacted
by the pandemic.
“Learning support kids, they struggle, I mean,
with executive function. And so that's the reason
they're in support, and that's very difficult to
navigate. When your teacher gave you some
instruction, then you have to go on, read things,
and sort of sort all those things out by yourself.
And I think for our kids, it was quite, quite
impactful.” Alexis Warren
Nothing unaffected/ made
easier
The teacher does not identify any aspects of their
instruction that have been unaffected or made
easier by the pandemic.
“It's hard to sort of say that nothing has been
affected, I think I would not be acknowledging a
whole host of undertones. So, I can't really say
anything's unaffected.” Milton Daniels
Parent contact The teacher indicates that parent contact has
changed during the pandemic.
“I think one thing would be the ability to-- the
comfort level with conferencing with anybody
whether that's a student, parent, colleague,
without meeting in person. I mean, I had very
little professional experience with virtual

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Code Description Example
conferencing previously. And so that is something
that that I think has been made more accessible,
and easier. Like our recent parent teacher
conferences. That was easier I think because of
it.” Osmond Dawson
Professional Learning
Community (PLC) model
The teacher indicates that the IAA PLC model
has been impacted.
“Cutting PLC time to-- what is it like 20-25
minutes or what have you? I really don't like it. It
just reduces-- What kind of meaningful
collaboration can you get done in that time? It
just, completely changes, shifts the PLC mode.”
Milton Daniels
Post-ERT distance learning The teacher indicates impacts from post-ERT
distance learning episodes.
“A few colleagues said, "You know, I really
didn't mind. I don't want to do it long term, but I
really didn't mind having the one day. Just, it felt
like a breather." So, while there might have been
some initial stress, like "Oh, no, what does this
mean? Is it one day? Is it two weeks? Are we
doing this for who knows how long?" I think
when it ended up only being the one day, and the
school was able to respond so quickly with the
contact tracing and identifying close contacts and
all of that, and having us back on, it might have
been easier just to kind of go, "Okay, we're doing
it Friday, too, and now we have four days to
figure it out by Monday.” But we were right back
on campus on Friday, which I think showed that
our systems work. And that was reassuring.”
Amanda Page

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Recent initiative uptick The teacher indicates that there has been a recent
(since August 2021) increase in pace of
initiatives.
“From an institutional perspective. I feel like stuff
is starting to pick up again and there have been
meetings, or there are things we've been talking
about through various professional development
days, or time in the first week of school, where
it's like, "I don't know, if we need to be talking
about this. Give us some time to get stuff done."
And try to have, you know, time, you know, to
chat with some people, versus having full-on sets
of meetings. Yeah. So that's where we are.”
Morton Santos
Regulation adaptation The teacher indicates that they have adjusted
instructional practices for pandemic regulations.
“I'm a pretty flexible and adaptable person
anyway. I've been classroom sharing for a number
of years. And so, I'm kind of used to showing up
in a space that's a shared space and working with
what I got, right? Okay, what can we do? And
before we had to have the furniture set in specific
ways, I'd walk into a room and we’d change the
setup, and then we'd put it back. So, every time
there's a change in the number of kids we can pod
together, right? From five to eight to two to like
what? Who knows what's next, right? I just in my
head think "Okay, so I had a plan for pods of five,
and now we're back to pods of two. So, we're
going to be doing pair-shares instead of pod
discussions."…I'm like, "Okay, this is what we're
doing now. All right, then, whatever." Honestly,
nothing surprises me anymore.” Amanda Page
Regulation planning impacts The teacher indicates that pandemic regulations
impact their ability to plan their instruction.
“It's impacting my classroom environment, right?
Not being able to have students in groups, even
going from groups to pairs, recently, or feeling

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like I had to separate students and not let them
work together. That's frustrating to me. So those
regulations that you had to limit the amount of all
that at the beginning was very challenging last
year. The start of the year where you couldn't
have the students mix, they couldn't get help. So
that impacted. And then taking time out of your
classroom to clean a desk, or we had to reduce
our assessment time and how long it was because
we needed to have all these other things that were
in place so that we could maintain the regulations
of doing temperature checks, or the cleaning.”
Brooke Doyle
Regulation relationship
impacts
The teacher indicates that pandemic regulations
impact their ability to build relationships with
students.
“I don't know if I know the kids as well as I
would have in previous years. There's a piece of it
with a mask and a piece of it with just kind of the
interactions that I feel like I knew kids better a
few years ago, quicker. Where now it may not be
as quick. It's going to take longer. I think that's
one of the big things.” Kyle Covington
Schedule-driven advisory
impacts
The teacher indicates that their work with their
Advisory students has been impacted by
pandemic schedule changes.
“And I would say the last one is sort of a positive
one. The Advisory curriculum that we've got
together. I've had so much time with my Advisory
that we really jelled and got to know each other
really well. So that was super beneficial.” Ray
Hancock
School enjoyment The teacher indicates that enjoyable aspects of
school have been impacted by the pandemic.
“But I also-- speaking to some colleagues-- feel
like a little bit at the heart of the institution has
been missing as of late. And I recognize that
they're exhausted, and they've got loads and loads

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of things to do. But there might also be some
opportunities for us to just express that gratitude
and value in some different ways. Or just make
people feel that a little bit more.” Milton Daniels
Second-order schedule
change effects
The teacher notes that changes to the in-person
IAA high school schedule have second-order
impacts (ex. loss of instructional time).
“Class time cut out is huge. For people from the
outside, it doesn't seem like much. But if you lose
10 minutes, one day, which is really 15, between
cleaning up and wiping the desktop, and then
you're 30 minutes behind the next day, then 45
minutes behind the next day. And in math, you
can't just say "well just cut out a few things."
They [students] have to be ready for the next
class. So, it's definitely a lot more rushed. That's
been more difficult.” Humphrey Valdez
Student feedback modalities The teacher indicates that they have changed the
way(s) in which they provide feedback to
students.
“I think I'm adapting somewhat but not as quickly
as I need to, but I do think I adapt fairly quickly.
For example, some of the-- just the check-ins--
you just can't do it. Just seeing how students are
doing physically. That is, you can't do it as well.
However, I am getting more written feedback. So,
it's somewhat of a replacement, but I can't say that
I'm adapting and getting back to where I was, but
I'm starting to.” Ray Hancock
Teacher pandemic stress The teacher indicates that themselves or
colleagues have been impacted by additional
stress during the pandemic.
“People are tired. And so, they're not as open.
You know, they’re just managing, I suppose for
lack of a better word, grumpiness, or just
exhaustion, or tempers. I guess tempers-- just,
you know, frustration.” Brooke Doyle

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Teacher-student relationships The teacher indicates that the pandemic has
altered their relationships with their students.
“The biggest one is relationships with kids. And if
we're still sticking to [ERT], I was fortunate
enough to have, at that point, built a good level of
relationship with my students. But thinking to the
next year, I really underestimated just not being
able to see half of someone's face, and how much
that would progressively delay all the
interactions.” Milton Daniels
Unaffected- Direct instruction The teacher indicates that direct instruction
elements of their teaching practices have not been
affected by the pandemic.
“And I think the elements of my teaching that are
direct instruction, have also, not been changed by
the pandemic.” Simone Stokes
Unaffected- Instructional
planning
The teacher indicates that aspects of their
instructional planning (ex. lesson design,
curriculum) have been unaffected by the post-
ERT phase of the pandemic.
“The majority of my lesson planning, big picture
lesson unit plans haven't changed very much.
There might be-- a group project might be an
individual project or something like that. But I
would say the overall flow of the school year is
relatively the same. I'm also using a lot of the
same protocols I used before, like how to call
randomly on students and, you know, entry
protocols, exit protocols. So overall, I would say
those big things haven't changed much.” Ray
Hancock
Unaffected- Professional
obligations
The teacher indicates that their professional
obligations have been unaffected by the
pandemic.
“Expectations on teachers and students hasn't
altered. And I think it probably should, because I
feel like that's why everybody's feeling so burned
out, because we're all trying to run at the same
speed and function the same way as we as we did
when it didn't have COVID times and things were

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less restricted. And I think that the pace doesn't
seem any less to me now.” Alexis Warren
Unaffected- Room
configuration
The teacher indicates they have not had to adjust
their classroom configuration due to the
pandemic.
“I think the way I had my classroom set up, desks
in rows individually. Now that doesn't mean I
wasn't being collaborative, or I wasn't interacting.
It wasn't me lecturing. But that hasn't really been
affected. You can still put the kids in pairs which
you do multiple times during a lesson if they're
not working. So, I think I was kind of fortunate,
maybe, that was a bit old school with my
classroom setup that the pandemic when we're in
school, didn't affect it.” Gary Ingram
Unaffected- Student-facing
communication
The teacher indicates that their student-facing
communication strategies have not been affected
by the pandemic.
“I think I was always really clear with my
communication. Every class had a slideshow, and
that slideshow had everything. And so, I think
maybe some teachers perhaps had to adapt the
workflow elements of how they communicate,
how they receive work, etc. And that didn't affect
me at all.” Gary Ingram
Unaffected- Traditional
assessment (post-ERT)
The teacher indicates that their traditional
assessment practices have not been affected by
the post-ERT phase of the pandemic.
“So, AP Lang, for example, has a lot of
standardized kind of assessments that we need to
prepare students for, where students are sitting
when they write their, 60, or 50, or 40-minute
essay. The traditional modes of assessment
haven't really been affected.” Simone Stokes

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Department Chair- ERT
support
The chairperson indicates that their role had
increased teacher support during the ERT phase
of the pandemic.
“We were, I think, supposed to forward that on to
[TECH SUPPORT COLLEAGUES] if they had
technical issues. We were sort of like the go-to
person who then fed back so that they weren't
receiving a million individual emails. And so, I
feel like that support was there, for me as a
Department Chair, that I had a place to go with
the questions that we encountered, to try and
ensure that people's needs were met.” Simone
Stokes
Department Chair-
Management/ leadership
The chairperson indicates that they have had
altered management and leadership experiences
during the pandemic.
“Doing the work that is presented to us. Going to
those meetings and hearing what's going to
happen and taking that back. Knowing that the
department, we're feeling, sensing that the
department's reaction is going to be one that
you're going to have to try to lift up for. It's just
really exhausting trying to maintain all those
things myself, in addition to colleagues, in
addition to having new teachers join the team and
helping them adjust. And there's just a lot going
on.” Brooke Doyle
Coach- Coaching
opportunities
The coach indicates that their opportunities to
coach have been altered or reduced.
“I wonder if it's a double-edged sword that not
only do you have things to talk about with
COVID, you also have maybe people who don't
want to talk about the pedagogy. People have
other things on their plate, so I do feel there is a
natural need to say "Hey, we're not going to do a
coaching cycle, we're just going to make sure
you're okay." So almost a therapist role has
started to become part of my-- and not for

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everybody because the trust isn't there-- but
definitely, there's been a therapy role involved as
a listening hat. Yeah, being a listener.” Mason
Smith
Coach- Device wear and tear The coach indicates that instructional technology
is under an increased use burden during the
pandemic.
“Providing hardware has been harder. There's
much more demand on batteries. There's much
more demand on network traffic. There's much
more strain on any given piece of material, and
we've found whether we're sending monitors
home with people to use in their own offices, or
we're replacing batteries at a rate like we've never
done before, people are just chewing through
them. We get a lot more instances of damage,
because people are just trucking their machines
back and forth a lot more.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- ERT Coaching focus The coach indicates that their coaching work
changed focus during the ERT period.
“Wow did my role shift. I felt that my coaching
just went away. It was like, "We're not talking, we
don't need coaching right now." It was tech
coaching…So I was able to help upskill myself. I
did some courses and just trying to get people-- I
could get myself—on-board and then I would
lead out…"hey, you're online, you might want to
try these things." So, I was coaching but in a
much different way. It was not individual
coaching; it was much more "sign in if you want
to be a part of this if you need help."” Mason
Smith

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Coach- Habituation to
pandemic reality
The coach indicates that the IAA high school
system has become more accustomed to
pandemic circumstances over time.
“I mean, it was those types of activities that we
were dealing with at that moment. Fast-forward to
just a couple weeks ago, that one caught
everybody off guard. And so, the panic was
around a nine o'clock announcement…I guess the
differences would be we had practice and we had
planned...And so now that practice is in place, but
it's nice to know that we do have these delivery
systems. That we could physically go and get
stuff and have stuff delivered.” Gale Carline
Coach- Impact of regulations The coach indicates that pandemic regulations
have altered their coaching focus or the nature of
their coaching work.
“I think that it's been impacted some in terms of
who's on stay-home notice, who's not on stay-
home notice, who is present in the building, and
who's not present in the building. So, depending
on the size of a meeting, if we have to move to
Zoom, if we don't have to move to Zoom, if it's
just that one of our facilitators has decided to
work from home because work from home is the
default, then we're all on Zoom. So those types of
things, yes, it is impacted.” Erin Harding
Coach- Increased technology
coaching
The coach indicates that the pandemic has led to
more technology-related coaching.
“I think there's this possible stigma that might be
attached to coaching as the person receiving it
might say, "there's something like, wrong with me
as an educator, and I need help." But on the tech
side, it seems to be safe. And I don't know how to
articulate that, but I'll do my best. It's almost like
there's a bright shiny tool out there. And they
want to use it. And because it's so brand knew
they don't mind coming in asking for help.” Gale
Carline

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Coach- Learning
management system (LMS)
The coach indicates that the LMS used by IAA is
not effective.
“I think the circuit breaker pretty much gave us
the evidence that Schoology is just not an
effective tool for what we needed to do. And I
think it gave us that evidence. It's just not, it's not
pretty, it's clunky, it doesn't connect with different
tools that we needed to connect it with, with
attendance and with grading systems and with
being able to push things out to students, you
know, easily.” Gale Carline
Coach- Onboarding new staff The coach indicates that the onboarding of new
staff has been impacted.
“The connection with people during onboarding. I
was part of the team that was delivering the initial
onboarding training for every group that's coming
in the last four years. That was really my
touchstone for then getting to know those people
throughout the year. That's gone because we've
digitally sourced that. Now I don't have the face-
to-face time with them. We have difficulty putting
the hardware into their hands. We've turned into
sort of a delivery service over the course of the
summer. We're trucking them out to isolation
hotels, so that they can get on-board. And then
they can do the lessons digitally-- from the hotel
room-- so that we don't waste any time. So that
delivery has been a challenge.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- Peer to peer learning The coach indicates that there has been more
peer-to-peer learning during the pandemic.
“I would say there's a wider format of teaching
delivery, where online delivery was never part of
the part of the thing. And now it's not just that,
but all kinds of things that lead back to that online
delivery. I'd say we're getting way more. It's been

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easier, because there's more people that are
capable of doing the online delivery, whereas they
had no familiarity with it before. Colleagues are
leaning on colleagues; PLCs are leaning on PLC
leaders. Students are leaning on students. Not so
much adults and students leaning on me or on the
people in my team. I think they've all brought
their game up when it comes to the digital stuff.
That's the easier part of it.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- Post-ERT Distance
learning pause
The coach indicates that post-ERT distance
learning episodes have pauses.
“When we have the small interruptions, I still
think that the instructional coaching pauses,
because people don't have any bandwidth to go
and do coaching. I mean we're not going; we have
not decided to go watch a Zoom session, right?
So, I think it stalls for my role when it's called off,
and it's Zoom land…So, when it goes off for a
week, that's where it starts to become a struggle.”
Mason Smith
Coach- Teacher relationships The coach indicates the pandemic has altered
their ability to build relationships with teachers.
“And I just happened to say-- you know, this was
maybe three weeks ago-- "hey what's going on?"
and we were talking about COVID, right? "I
really want to go home" and then over the break, I
saw her again. I said, "I saw Spain is opened up
are you going to go back?" She says, "My
husband's heading back." "Good for him. When?"
"Tomorrow," and then it's just like all of a sudden
you have this connection with someone. And
what happens, it makes coaching easier when you
go into those classrooms and the trust is there.”
Mason Smith

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Coach- Teacher stress
impacts
The coach indicates that teacher stress has
impacted coaching work.
“I think that the ongoing nature of the pandemic
impacts my work in a variety of ways. Definitely
around that idea of fatigue and around people's
ability or cognitive capacity to process too many
things at one time in order to take on new
learning. If they are currently so absorbed in
learning rules and regulations for the Singaporean
government which seem to change so quickly and
so often, then they have a reduced capacity to take
on, for instance, their own professional goal of "I
want to learn how to do anecdotal note taking."
That seems you know so secondary to safe, alive,
healthy.” Erin Harding
Coach- Teacher support The coach indicates they have increased their
support for teachers during the pandemic.
“My concern, the amount of headspace that's
taken up thinking about-- whether it's teachers I'm
supporting, or students that I'm supporting-- I
think that has grown. Or I've become, not more
mindful, but it just seems to take up a lot more
room in my head than it did.” Erin Harding
Coach- Technology
budgeting
The coach indicates that the instructional
technology budgeting priorities have changed
during the pandemic.
“We started seeing that the existing equipment
could not handle all of the online work, so to
speak. The processors on the, you know, the
school issued computers, couldn't handle all the
Zooming that was being done. It was not designed
for that. And so that really-- based on the fact that
we weren't flying out, we weren't traveling, so a
lot of that money started getting redirected.” Gale
Carline

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Coach- Troubleshooting from
a distance
The coach indicates that the work of
troubleshooting with a teacher is impacted by
increased distance during the pandemic.
“It's just harder. If I can sit down with somebody,
and they can demonstrate their problem to me,
sitting next to me, and I can look them in the eye
and I can get a sense for how comfortable and
uncomfortable they are with the issue that we're
facing. That's always been better than having
them say, "Okay, you share your screen with me."
There's still sort of a little bit of a lack of
familiarity with the tools to the point where I
think that people are not quite as comfortable
sharing the content of their screen with me that
way as they were sitting down next to one
another. The troubleshooting has been a
challenge.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- Work time burden The coach indicates that the distribution of their
work time has been altered.
“I would say, my hours of service. I'm still there
at 7:30 in the morning, and I'm still out of there at
4:30 in the afternoon. Being tuned into what
people need. If it comes to me digitally? Great.
It's just not walking in the front door. But you
know, they haven't sort of said, "Listen, you're not
going to be too busy today. Why don't you take
the first two hours off?" So, the hours of service
for me or for the members of my team probably
are not affected. Honestly, you'll do it somehow.
You'll sit on Zoom, or you'll answer a chat, or
you'll try to be instructional in some other format.
You'll record a lesson or whatever.” Shane
Alvarado

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Category: Authenticity Beliefs
Code Description Example
Domain-specific knowledge
and practices
The teacher privileges domain-specific
knowledge and practices from the subject they
teach.
“As a science teacher, an important practice is to
engage in scientific inquiry that would involve
students asking questions, forming hypotheses
and testing those hypotheses and or predictions
through the collection of data and reflection
afterwards with not only on their own data but the
sharing and reflection of looking for the story or
trends from the larger data set gathered by the by
the group.” Osmond Dawson
Encouraging student
reflection
The teacher seeks to have their students reflect on
their learning.
“I value learning more than grades and when I
talk to students, I like to help redirect them if they
seem to not agree with that philosophy right
away. That when they have a question or when
they're having trouble or when they seek
clarification, let's make the conversation about
learning and not about points or grades.” Tate
Higgins
Encouraging students to
challenge themselves
The teacher seeks to provide a challenging
learning experience for students.
“You know, it's not an easy thing for a kid to kind
of-- particularly like even our most advanced 10th
grade kids-- to just sort of be able to go ahead and
grapple with that and so, you know, there's a lot
of pushing kids towards, the edge of their
competence.” Milton Daniels
Helping students achieve
their goals
The teacher values helping students meet their
goals.
“I want them to achieve the highest
possible...whatever their goal is, I want to help
them get to that goal. So as opposed to making it

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about me, it's usually about what is their desire
and how can I help them achieve that?” Brooke
Doyle
Learning theory-informed
practices
The teacher utilizes findings from cognitive
psychology to drive their instructional design.
“What I mean by the Learning Sciences is, there's
a pretty good set of research at this point
cognitive psychology and neuroscience and all of
those things. And at this point, trying to use the
strategies and ideas of spaced repetition,
interleaving, all of those types of ideas, in order to
help students develop a robust mental model of
the scenario.” Morton Santos
Providing varied learning
experiences
The teacher endeavors to provide a variety of
learning experiences for students.
“I like to mix things up. I don't just want to
lecture the whole time. But I don't just want them
to do group work the whole time. So, I try to keep
things lively that way. Because I know math can't
be-- it's not always the most exciting subject for a
lot of kids.” Humphrey Valdez
Students should be active
participants in their education
The teacher believes that students should be
active participants in their education.
“I really believe that school isn't something that
should be done to students. And whether it's
considering, the constructivist approach or the
democratization of education, or however you
want to look at it, that's ultimately what it boils
down to is that students should be able to access
education in ways that feel relevant and that they
want to engage with.” Simone Stokes
Teacher of students over
subject
The teacher prioritizes themselves as a teacher of
students over teaching a particular subject.
“I wouldn't say I'm an English teacher or a math
teacher. I really do feel I'm a teacher of students. I
don't, there's no particular subject that I love more

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than others. But, I think, looking at the student
and what they need and meeting students where
they're at and providing the support necessary.”
Eva Reeves
Teacher-centered
(“traditional”) delivery
The teacher notes that they value a teacher-
centered learning model.
“I would say, in general, I’m probably pretty
traditional teaching in terms of math. A lot more
delivery is probably given by me.” Brooke Doyle
Transferable skills The teacher notes the value of teaching skills that
supersede their discipline boundary.
“I don't teach content; I teach kind of form and
practice. So, a big thing that I use is cognitive
coaching models, whether it be the full cognitive
coaching, in terms of the kind of planning or
reflecting. Or else kind of design thinking as well
as part of it.” Kyle Covington
Trust & relationships The teacher privileges their role in building trust
and relationships with and between students.
“I guess one of the most important things I feel in
the…classroom is to create community.
Developing respect, getting kids confident,
helping them to sort of feel that they can trust me
and trust the other people in there. So, it becomes
like a peer support group almost within the class.”
Alexis Warren
Coach- Anyone can learn The coach believes that anyone has a capacity to
learn.
“My overall philosophy is I just think anybody
can learn when the conditions are safe and
inviting. And so, I don't really think it really
matters, what we're trying to learn, I just think
overall we can learn, there's the ability to do that.”
Gale Carline

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Coach- Building a skill set The coach works to help teacher partners acquire
and develop skills.
“I think one of the reasons why I like teaching, or
one of the ways I really like to approach it is by
getting people to string their learning along like a
set of pearls, where one pearl is related to the
prior one, a prior piece of structure that they had
that helped them to understand the world. Make
sure those are right, and then add another one on
top of it.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- Building relationships
with coaching partners
The coach works to build relationships with their
coaching partners.
“I think listening is something that I make sure
that it is at the forefront because building
relationships is the most important to me.
So…being a classroom teacher for so many years,
I was able to build some credibility with
colleagues and so it's a little bit easier to kind of
get into the classroom, people that-- the most
important thing with any relationship is trust. So,
trust was built for a majority of the colleagues.”
Mason Smith
Coach- Intelligence is not
fixed over time
The coach believes that people have a varied
capacity to learn and that this capacity changes
over time.
“Not every person is at their peak in high school.
I think some people peak in middle school, they
get their binders all in a row, and life is good. I
think a lot of people may not peak until after
they've had their first job, or after they've had
their second child, or until after their family's
moved out. And I think that's important to sort of
recognize and to kind of dwell within. I think
there's such a thing in an individual's sort of
peaking beyond their potential too early. And I
think that, people have got to continually be given

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that second, third, fourth try because they may not
be in a part of their life where they're really at
their best.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- Responding to a
learner’s needs
The coach seeks to tailor their instruction for the
needs of their teacher partners.
“I believe with adults, as I do with learners of any
age, in meeting people where they are.
Determining what their goals are to improve their
practice or to grow and learn. So being responsive
to a learner's needs is like a lynchpin of my own
beliefs in the classroom no matter the age of my
learners.” Erin Harding
Coach- Systems-thinking
skills
The coach frames their work in terms of system-
level impacts.
“I know it's weird to talk from inside of a large
organization like IAA-- but perhaps it's because
it's so large-- I really feel that systems do evolve
the way they evolve for a particular reason. But I
don't think that that makes them above some form
of skepticism regarding them, and the need to
have them continually sort of rethink and justify
the reasons that they do things the way that they
do.” Shane Alvarado

Category: Authenticity Impacts
Code Description Example
Authenticity unchanged The teacher indicates that their ability to teach
authentically has been unchanged by the
pandemic.
“My focus on education and trying to teach math
and teach whatever content we have put up. That's
been unaffected. That's still my focus. My focus

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Code Description Example
is still the student trying to be achieved the best
they can achieve and enjoy math.” Brooke Doyle
ERT Difficulty of providing
authentic experiences

The teacher speaks to difficulties in providing
authentic learning experiences during ERT.
“The process of science completely went away.
And so, I really didn't have that option. I mean
maybe I could have done a better job in terms of
using some simulations, or some other things. But
on some level, again, simulations, students don't
necessarily see simulations as real science…if
you define kind of the authentic needs of students
as they're learning the process of science, then
absolutely.” Morton Santos
ERT Difficulty understanding
well-being of students online
The teacher indicates difficulty in understanding
the well-being of students in the online ERT
environment.
“I think the lack of incidental interaction with
students made it really difficult to have a sense of
how they were genuinely doing. I can think back.
I had several ninth-grade students who it was just
like, "I can see that you are gaming on another
monitor during this lesson, and there's nothing I
can do without drawing everyone's attention to
you," right? So, there aren't really any super
discreet ways that you can go about connecting or
touching base with students besides emails after
the fact, and our students are hit and miss when it
comes to even checking their emails. You don't
know if they ever received it.” Simone Stokes
ERT Disrupts transferable
skill-building
The teacher indicates that the ERT phase of the
pandemic did not allow them to effectively teach
transferable skills.
“I also did feel a little bit like we were just trying
to get them through, in terms of are we building
transferable skills? No. But it felt a little bit,
especially for learning support, it felt more like
we're just trying to get them through.” Eva Reeves

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Code Description Example
ERT Ease of providing
authentic experiences
The teacher speaks to ease of providing authentic
learning experiences during ERT.
“I think I was pretty resourceful. For example, I
have two [SUBJECT] classes. They both had
fieldwork elements. I still did the field work.
They still did surveys, from their own apartments
to people in their building about living in that
neighborhood. They did surveys out their window
of whether it's traffic levels, or services, car
counts, pedestrian counts.” Gary Ingram
ERT Loss of flexibility The teacher indicates that they had less flexibility
during the ERT period.
“From a personal point of view, it might be a bit
of a wakeup call about how, when things are
normal, how much flexibility we do have. And
maybe how we don't really take advantage of that
because we take it for granted.” Gary Ingram
Mask difficulties The teacher indicates that continual mask wearing
causes difficulty in communicating with students,
developing relationships with students, or
otherwise monitoring student wellbeing.
“I felt like I did not know my students nearly as
well as I had in previous years. I think the mask
wearing, at least this is the story I've told myself,
is that I continue to find it difficult to read
emotion and to pick up on the nonverbal cues of
students, of colleagues, you know, of everybody.”
Osmond Dawson
Negative teacher emotions The teacher speaks to how aspects of pandemic
teaching have contributed to their negative
emotional state.
“All of the other stuff of not being able to get
home and see your family. I'm lucky that it hasn't
been as significant of an issue for myself as it
might have been for other colleagues who wanted
to get home and see family members and weren't
able to do that or needed to get home or
bereavement. You know, I've been lucky on that
front. But when I do, finally, get to plug back into
my family life back in the UK, there'll be so much
that I've missed, right, and that, to be honest, does

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Code Description Example
weigh on me a bit. And it's hard for that to not
sort of filter through into your day-to-day
existence. And work's sort of a large part of that.”
Milton Daniels
Post-ERT Increased
flexibility
The teacher indicates that they have increased the
amount of flexibility in their instructional
practices over the duration of the pandemic.
“I think the other thing, like I mentioned before,
is the willingness to be flexible, because we still
have to reflect, we're not back to normal. So, I'm
still having to think, what's my fieldwork unit
going to look like in the next two months? And
what I now have is that range from normal
situation where I've got total flexibility, to
complete lockdown, to lack of flexibility. So, plan
for both.”
Gary Ingram
Teaching different
transferable skills
Teacher indicates that the pandemic has led them
to teach different transferable skills.
“English felt a little bit different than that, for
example in English, our end of year summative
was supposed to be a speech. And so, we adjusted
it. And so, it was a recorded speech. And part of
the reason we wanted them to record is because
we're like, if Zoom is going to be this new thing
and have all these recorded things, there are skills
around this.” Eva Reeves
Coach- ERT Shifting
teaching practices

The coach indicates that teacher practices needed
to change during ERT to maintain authenticity.
“I still think you can make intentional
connections with your students. In this virtual
setting. It's not as intimate but you know, you still
can do it. I also think that you see a lot if you do
those alternative assessments, so you see a lot
more than just the paper and pencil. And when
you go virtual, even in writing, and we're utilizing
Google Docs, you can, you know, they're

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working, you can have 20, open up on your
screen, and you can actually see them doing the
editing real time.”
Gale Carline
Coach- Loss of beneficial
pandemic changes over time
The coach indicates that beneficial changes from
the pandemic are attenuating over time.
“And I fear that some of those could erode some
of the good things that we've learned in terms of
our online, our existence online for all of that
teaching. I'm seeing it in my team, I see it in
[COLLEAGUES] to some extent. We're here to
do the job, but we can do the job without you
know, brushing people off so quickly into sort of
moving from problem to problem.” Shane
Alvarado
Coach- Skepticism of
pandemic impact on
supporting authentic teaching.
The coach expresses skepticism at the premise
that the pandemic impacted their ability to
support authentic teaching.
“I know that two teachers that I am working with
this year have-- we've talked a lot about progress
monitoring and looking for and connecting to
specific needs. Love the students in the room, and
just a small bit about how you differentiate to
meet those needs. But I think that is initial work
happening in High School.” Erin Harding

Category: Changes in Practice
Code Description Example
Differentiation The teacher indicates that they have increased
differentiation for students during the pandemic.
“I mean the stuff we did with the quizzes while
we were on distance learning, in terms of, let's
find out what are the specific areas kids need help

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in and provide small group specific intervention
on that. I wouldn't say we continued that specific
model. We were doing it every single class. But
those practices have continued. I think it's been
beneficial, not always with Kahoot, or I mean not
always with quizzes, but paper pencil activities.”
Eva Reeves
ERT Efficiency The teacher indicates that ERT impacted their
efficiency and/or time-management.
“I realized that the Zoom time, I had to use the
time really wisely. I didn't just have this 18-
minute block of time which was flexible I can
come in and out. I had to say what needs to be
said efficiently, have everything ready, and then
let the kids go.” Simone Stokes
ERT Student feedback The teacher indicates that ERT impacted their
solicitation of student feedback.
“I probably did more quick surveys. When I
experimented with Quizizz, or I was teaching a
lesson, or having them to watch the video, come
back and then take the quizizz, was something
that I was experimenting with and just asking the
students more often for feedback. “Did that work
for you? How did that go?” I probably did way
more of that during the circuit breaker than I have
ever, even now. I don't check in quite as much to
say "Hey, how's it going? We're here in classes.
are you liking the way that...?" I've done it a little
bit, but just not nearly as much.” Brooke Doyle
Guest speakers The teacher indicates that online tools have
increased ease of bringing in guest speakers.
“It seems to be that for some speakers, Zoom has
a big advantage in the face on the big screen, and
there's a slight, you don't have that-- It's not guilt.
I don't know what the word is-- when someone's
traveled an hour to school, you know, from work,

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Code Description Example
come, presented the kids for an hour, then went
home, that's a three-hour commitment. I don't feel
so bad now. Just one hour. It's doesn't have to be
an hour. That's the thing you have. "Okay, we've
got the visiting speaker we've got to use." And so
now I can just say "Just want a 15-minute chat.
Some of the kids got these questions," and that
thing's not going to go away.” Gary Ingram
Planning for possible distance
learning
The teacher indicates they intentionally plan for
possible distance learning.
“I even have my own system set up. So, when I
work at home now, I put this [school lanyard] on.
You feel like I'm in school. And then when I don't
have this on, I'm not working. It's the small stuff
like that. It's like having an office set up in your
house. I know how to do that quickly. I've got a
monitor here that's always here that I can use
from school. There's just there's stuff that I
learned just about the basic mechanics of it, and
how to teach more virtually and have it be a little
more flipped. That I don't think they're going to
go away. I think I always have to be ready for
this.” Kyle Covington
Post-ERT Increased
discussion time
The teacher indicates they provide more time for
discussion in their post-ERT teaching.
“I guess when we came back to class. I mean, the
actual structure of my lessons didn't really change
but I think it was, those kinds of discussions were
deeper, and I guess longer, because kids feel more
comfortable to speak in person than they do
having to mute themselves and unmute
themselves and come back in and all that sort of
stuff. And some kids aren't really comfortable
with that either. So, I think, that definitely was
one thing that-- it just wasn't what I did that

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changed. It was just the nature of the environment
changed. And so therefore, how it went about was
changed.” Alexis Warren
Post-ERT Reuse of distance
learning structures
The teacher indicates they continued to use
distance learning structures once the ERT period
ended.
“For [COURSE] as an example, there's
performance task one that is a paper and
presentation. Performance Task two, paper and
presentation. Then the final has a Part A and Part
B. And for each one of those things, we created
this kind of map of all the rubrics, any tips, any
kind of tools that we can use, a bunch of
exemplars and a bunch of stuff that doesn't work
well. So, it's really one page for each of these
tasks. It has everything that we're constantly
referring back to in it. So, I think one thing is
curating some of that information into one place.
And we had stuff like that on Schoology and
would pop it in and out, but the kids have access
to all of it at first. I think that's really good.” Kyle
Covington
Shorted planning time-
horizon
The teacher indicates they are planning for a
shorter time-horizon.
“We don't plan as far in advance as we used to.
So, setting quiz and test dates or what's going to
be on what quiz and how many number of quizzes
per unit and all that kind of stuff. We used to kind
of lay that out for the whole semester, and I feel
like we've learned not to do that. You just never
know. That has probably been affected the most.”
Tate Higgins

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Code Description Example
Social-emotional learning The teacher indicates they have increased their
focus on social-emotional learning/ the well-being
of their students.
“I've given myself permission to spend more time
on that community building. And so, prior to the
COVID-19, prior to the pandemic, I would
sometimes ask starter questions at the start of
class, or I would sometimes, do little activities
that no, I can't tie this to a common core standard,
but we're going to do it anyway. Because it builds
a community of learners. And I think that I
engage in that much more consistently and much
more frequently. It's almost every class now
where I prioritize that, and whereas before, I
would sometimes feel guilty, or like I was
wasting instructional time on something else, or
that somebody else might come into my room and
perceive that I was wasting that time or whatever.
I think I'm much more unapologetic about it
now.” Simone Stokes
Supplementary resources The teacher indicates they have changed the
number of supplementary resources they provide
to students.
“Some of the ways that I communicate. The
objectives for the day, the agenda for the day, the
resources. I know, some teachers have websites,
right? I, again, being the C plus techie person,
don't have anything flashy like a website. But I
went beyond Schoology as just where I'm posting
my materials and things like that. So, I have
something called "[SUBJECT] Today," which is
just a running document, which gives the kids
access to everything they need. So that's been
really helpful, because I had a couple of off-
Island students, and they were joining us late.
They could follow along very easily. They knew

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Code Description Example
exactly what we were doing on any given class.
All of the links were there.” Amanda Page
Target-Method match The teacher indicates they have changed their
target-method match when planning instruction.
“We were talking about what are the skills they
need? And the way the world works today is the
skill we want to target and teach the live
presentation? Or is the skill we want to target and
teach this recorded presentation? And they're both
skills they need, interconnected, but I guess it
may have broadened our conversations in terms
of what is it that students need to be citizens of
the world we live in now?” Eva Reeves
Unaffected- Practices during
ERT
The teacher indicates that they endeavored to
maintain prior practices during ERT.
“At that particular moment in time [ERT], I think
I had good-- my classroom would have been set
up in groups of four, and those teams will have
been working together for quite a significant
period of time. And so, the functionality of Zoom
to be able to put them into a breakout room after
an opening problem, or what have you, and
support them in that way. They weren't shy in
asking questions. So, I think, I'm not pleased
about this, but I think much of much of what I
tried to do was maintain pretty much my practice
in the regular classroom in terms of basic
structures.” Milton Daniels
Unaffected- Relationship
building
The teacher indicates that they do not think their
relationship-building with students has been
impacted by the pandemic.
“I'd like to think most of my relationships have
been unaffected. I think it's quality over quantity.
I think we're in, as you know, kids get off the bus
at 7:20, they're right in class. And so, I like to
think that didn't affect it. What was taken away

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with class time, was kind of put back in other
ways. Let's say relationships. So that’s one thing
that's been kind of unaffected.” Humphrey Valdez
Coach- Adaptation to
pandemic
The coach indicates that IAA teachers and school
system have adapted to pandemic teaching over
time.
“We're all better at adapting. It's been a year of
interruptions to workflows, interruptions to
relationships, and a change in format of
instruction. But because of all of those, I think
we've all become a lot more resilient. I don't think
we show up every week, expecting that any given
week is all going to go completely normal. Yeah,
I think we've become more adept at dealing with
frustrations, interruptions, and things not going
the way we planned.” Shane Alvarado
Coach- ERT focus of work The coach indicates their work during the ERT
period changed focus.
“Well coaching work is a small part of the work.
What the work looked like during that time was
revising and aligning all the rubrics in
[DEPARTMENT ONE] and revising and aligning
rubrics for the [DEPARTMENT TWO]. And
communicating some of those revisions to
[DEPARTMENT ONE], and working with
coaches to think about "How can we align those
tools from grade 6 to grade 12?" So that computer
work, managing the competencies, Excel
spreadsheets. We started some work on learning
spaces right before we left, so touching base with
that Math and Science Group. Research.
Reading.” Erin Harding

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Code Description Example
Coach- Increased authentic
digital assessment strategies
The coach indicates that they have noticed an
increase in teachers using authentic, digital
assessment strategies.
“Some of those assessments that [TEACHERS]
were using online, they're continuing to use. So
online discussions, people have now started their
slide decks, but they're intentionally using like
Slido and Pear Deck. So, they're starting to build
in some of those other pieces where the kids are
online and or can interact with the slide deck so
they're starting to do that they're using Flipgrid as
like an extension either in class or an extension of
class and they're opening that up so that they can
have an online discussion and you know, and
different they're doing it in groups but they're also
doing it whole class. So, I'm starting to see some
of those.” Gale Carline
Coach- Pandemic-driven
relationships
The coach indicates utility of pandemic
circumstances to build relationships with
teachers.
“Cup half full, you know, you really do have the
ability to do meet everybody on staff. And so,
whether it was a new staff and I had to go in
because I you know you're new and I want to help
you out or is this just catching up with people, it
was it was nice. In that sense I felt like I was able
to know everybody's name, know something
about that person, and just be able to carry on a
conversation, whereas maybe in the past when I
first started I was, there's a couple departments
that I really didn't know and I didn't go into those
rooms very often because it just didn't know them
and how do you just start building up those
relationships, So I feel like now, because of the
pandemic, I will keep it positive.” Mason Smith

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Coach- Patience and
flexibility
The coach indicates they have increased their
patience and flexibility when working with
teachers during the pandemic.
“I think we became- I became, sorry-- a little bit
more patient, a little bit more tolerant of folks.
That folks that were stuck into a situation they
didn't ask for, they didn't volunteer for. They were
suddenly forced, in the face of this whole rapid
change. They were forced to do something that
we knew that they weren't comfortable with. So,
for me, I think it was just a matter of like, you
know, being "do you have time?" and I'd be like
"the automatic answer to this question is yes, yes,
I have time.”
Shane Alvarado
Coach- System efficiencies The coach indicates that the pandemic has led to
more efficiencies within the IAA system.
“I think we had a bit of an epiphany when we
stopped just signing up for random meetings like
"Okay, let's just make a meeting." Pal, that's a
randomly generated number. Nobody would ever
know what that is, unless it gets shared. And it
has to be shared, like on a bit-by-bit. I think we
shifted our emphasis away from that. And we
realized, "Oh, a personal meeting identifier, is an
absolutely consistent thing. It's just like an email
address." And then we shifted our thinking to
that. So many of our systems eased up. And that
bottleneck, early experience we had around Zoom
bombing, that eventually went away.” Shane
Alvarado

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Category: Change Reasoning

Code Description Example
ERT Change fatigue The teacher indicates concerns over change
fatigue during the ERT period caused them to
deliberately not adjust a practice.
“On reflection, were there some additional things
that I could have done? Or would that have been
too much of a job for my kids? Would they have
felt like, “wow, okay, there's already enough
change going on in my life right now, and now
he's completely going to change out the way that
we're going to come and run our class. And we've
got exams a couple of weeks like this.” So, I don't
know if it would have been better or not.” Milton
Daniels
ERT Demonstrated utility The teacher indicates that the ERT period
demonstrated the utility of an instructional
practice.
“I tend to tinker, like if someone says, "Hey, I
really enjoyed this," I will try it. Now whether or
not I do it enough to make it become a habit, you
know. I don't necessarily have habits that get
formed from it. I just have a plethora of things to
choose from. And in that moment, I think of "Oh,
yeah, this would be good for this."” Brooke Doyle
Experience The teacher indicates experience with a tool or
strategy drive a change in practice.
“I guess just probably more familiarity with it for
me…"oh, now that I know this tool," I know it's
the go-to. I've used it to go search and do things
like that.” Brooke Doyle
No apparent post-ERT utility The teacher indicates they do not see the utility of
an ERT practice outside of ERT circumstances.
“I don't know maybe just-- well part of it, just in
personal habit, like, you know, "hey, we're back
to normal. Let's go back to normal and like, all
that stuff we did online was just kind of
temporary, emergency fix kind of stuff. And
philosophically, let's get back to normal as much

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as we can". So, none of it apparently, I guess, at
the time, none of it felt like it was enhanced by
moving to distance learning. So, let's go back to
the old ways.” Tate Higgins
Skepticism The teacher indicates skepticism about the utility
of a particular instructional practice.
“The video design has to align with the
overarching purpose that I'm trying to kind of
push towards in my course if it's going to remain.
And so, I think when we went to circuit breaker
there was this kind of, okay, yeah, this is going to
be a sort of, I don't want to say like, an answer
key in motion. Like there's important pieces that
you're talking about, but we didn't facilitate
meaningful dialogue with them, right?…And
that's not good enough.” Milton Daniels
Student well-being The teacher indicates student well-being as the
primary driver for an instructional practice
change.
“It was sort of to protect us. So that we could
have less on our plate because there was-- the
transition did occupy a lot of our space. But I
think that mostly we were really hyper-concerned
about their social emotional wellbeing. That's a
big transition for them. So, if we were going to
push more or less, we're going to err on the side
of less.” Ray Hancock
Coach- Administrative
directive
The coach indicates an administrative directive
drove a change in their practice.
“It did change because we were advised not to
intrude upon, not to assert, not to move forward
any of the initiative agendas that we'd worked
with, coaching included. It seems in the high
school to be viewed more as an initiative then as a
support. So, we were told to wait.” Erin Harding

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Coach- ERT Teacher needs The coach indicates the needs of teachers during
ERT drove a change in their practice.
“People were starting to have conversations about
the assessments that they wanted to get, like, they
really needed help problem solving the types of
assessments because they found out very, very
quickly that they could not do those traditionals
very well. And they, you know, to help them
think through that, some did not want to
deviate…When the PLC is making this decision,
you can help them problem solve, or you can help
support them. So you start off problem solving.
And the next thing you know, they've made a
decision. So now you switch into supporting that
decision.” Gale Carline
Coach- Pandemic as learning
experience
The coach indicates that pandemic circumstances
have driven learning around a practice.
“We've developed systems that sort of deal with it
more and more effectively, now. For the first
year, we had to deliver laptops, for example, to
folks that were in quarantine facilities…We
learned, got better. We got better at, you know,
"Here's the cluster of hotels. Here are the people
here's how long we've been there."…So this last
summer, we weren't just feeding our incoming
teachers in various stages, but we were dealing
with incoming families, with sixth grade families
that were working that way and so that wasn't just
me, that was obviously the whole middle school
team. We've just all gotten better.” Shane
Alvarado
Coach- Pandemic
reinforcement
The coach indicates that pandemic circumstances
have supported their thinking about the utility of a
practice.
“I think staying flexible is important. I think
finding ways to engage is important. I think
listening to students and teachers is important.
Those are all things that were affirmed or

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confirmed, not just pandemic learning.” Erin
Harding

Abstract (if available)

Abstract Initial research approaches to investigating the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic in education have been largely constrained by the ongoing acute nature of pandemic circumstances in which that research has occurred. This qualitative study examines how different phases of the pandemic have impacted the instructional practices of teaching faculty in the high school division of a large, private international school located in Singapore. Aided by the comparatively short duration of online Emergency Remote Teaching that typified the acute phase of COVID-19 impacts in this system, the study provides the perspectives of 17 members of the high school faculty who have served as teachers and instructional coaches for the duration of the pandemic. Using a semi-structured interview approach and subsequent coding of interview transcripts, the study captures participant perspectives around how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted instructional practices, how shifts in instructional practices have impacted teachers’ ability to address what they consider to be their most authentic teaching practices, and the longevity of adjustments that participants have made to their teaching practices in response to the changing circumstances of the pandemic. Major findings indicate that there have been numerous and varied pandemic-occasioned changes to participant teaching and coaching practices. Many of the practices that participants implemented during the Emergency Remote Teaching phase of the pandemic have abated with the return to in-person instruction, while those practices that are most closely aligned with participant sentiments around the value of focusing on social-emotional well-being categorize many of persistent changes that participants have made in their teaching and instructional coaching work over the duration of their pandemic teaching.

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University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

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Asset Metadata

Creator Knuffke, David Scott (author)

Core Title The impact of COVID-19 on instructional practices

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Educational Leadership

Degree Conferral Date 2022-05

Publication Date 03/05/2022

Defense Date 02/25/2022

Publisher University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag COVID-19,Emergency Remote Teaching,instructional practices,OAI-PMH Harvest,praxis,reflective practice,social-emotional wellness,TPACK

Format application/pdf (imt)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Picus, Larry (committee chair), Cash, David (committee member), Robles, Darline P. (committee member)

Creator Email dknuffke@sas.edu.sg,knuffke@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC110768185

Unique identifier UC110768185

Legacy Identifier etd-KnuffkeDav-10419

Document Type Dissertation

Format application/pdf (imt)

Rights Knuffke, David Scott

Type texts

Source 20220308-usctheses-batch-915 (batch), University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

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Repository Name University of Southern California Digital Library

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