Tag a Teacher: A Qualitative Analysis of WhatsApp-Based Teacher Networks in Low-Income Indian Schools

Varanasi, Rama Adithya; Vashistha, Aditya; Dell, Nicola

doi:10.1145/3411764.3445221

Cited by 11 publications

(4 citation statements)

References 77 publications

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“…The analysis presented in this study revolves around these discrete events but also weaves in elements of the social to understand the various interactions in the group holistically. The group and its subsequent transformation, once holistically charted and examined, becomes a case study ( Yin, 1989 , 1993 , 1994 ) that can potentially explain how other WhatsApp groups in similar contexts functioned in the same time period and the various measures they could possibly have undertaken.…”

Section: Remapping the Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Existing research indicates that some WhatsApp groups are created for very specific reasons and serve as sites for conversations on specific issues (Varanasi et al, 2021). In the same vein, the WhatsApp group examined by this study was established for a very clear purpose and all its participants were aware of the primary reason for its creation.…”

Section: Understanding the Group's Transformationmentioning

confidence: 98%

“…The potential of WhatsApp as a platform for effecting meaningful everyday change is observed by Varanasi et al (2021) in their qualitative study, in which they examine how teachers from low-income Indian schools use the platform to their advantage by curating, moderating, and sharing content, fostering cooperation and collaboration in their work in the process. The repurposing of SNS platforms and "making them their own" is also observed in the context of other such platforms, especially in urban India.…”

Section: Whatsapp As a Sns In Indiamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Repurposing a WhatsApp group: How a fantasy cricket group transformed into a site of care and support during India's second wave of Covid-19

Deshbandhu

Sahni

2022

Mobile Media & Communication

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Set in the context of India's second Covid-19 wave (April–June 2021), this article examines the transformation of a WhatsApp group originally created to study a pool of fantasy sport players into a site of care, concern, and support. By using netnography and in-depth interviews to chart the various challenges faced by the study's participants, the article analyzes how key health information was curated, moderated, and shared by the group's participants during the period. Our findings indicate that during the Covid-19 wave, users of WhatsApp relied on the personal connections it offered as they found ways to make the platform their own. By harnessing WhatsApp's capabilities with regard to accessing and sharing essential information that was both timely and locationally relevant, users of the service found ways to stay informed in moments that were fraught with uncertainty. By analyzing the various ways in which the group's participants shared information with each other and outside of the group, this study argues that the insights obtained can be used to understand broader social realities and the possibilities offered by platforms such as WhatsApp that could help navigate the various challenges presented by the ongoing pandemic in the Global South.

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Section: Remapping the Methodologymentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Understanding the Group's Transformationmentioning

confidence: 98%

Section: Whatsapp As a Sns In Indiamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Repurposing a WhatsApp group: How a fantasy cricket group transformed into a site of care and support during India's second wave of Covid-19

Deshbandhu

Sahni

2022

Mobile Media & Communication

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“…This information flowed through many top-down channels before reaching the low-income schools. While teachers in government schools had strong information channels (e.g., statebased WhatsApp groups [63]) that helped them get guidance during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, most teachers in low-income private schools had to rely on information support from different sources. One way to fill their information gap was to establish connections and seek support from teachers in governments schools who received the information faster.…”

Section: Problem-focused Support From Peers Through Smartphonesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Pandemic, Hybrid Teaching & Stress: Examining Indian Teachers’ Sociotechnical Support Practices in Low-income Schools

Gavade,

Sidotam,

Varanasi

2023

Proceedings of the 6th ACM SIGCAS/SIGCHI Conference on Computing and Sustainable Societies

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Support plays a vital role in the teaching profession. A good support system can empower teachers to regulate their emotions and effectively manage stress while working in isolation. The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a hybrid form of education, necessitating the acquisition of new skills by teachers and compelling them to adapt to remote teaching. This new development further amplifies the sense of isolation prevalent amongst the teaching community. Against this backdrop, our study investigates the availability of sociotechnical support infrastructures for teachers in low-income schools while also looking into the support practices embraced by this class of teachers following the pandemic. Through 28 qualitative interviews involving teachers, management and personnel from support organizations, we demonstrate how teachers have largely taken the initiative to establish their own informal support networks in the absence of formal support infrastructures. Smartphones have significantly augmented these support practices, serving as both a valuable source of support as well as a medium for facilitating support practices. However, in comparison to other forms of support received from these sources, the availability of emotion-focused support for teachers have proven to be inadequate, creating imbalances in their support seeking practices. Our paper provides different contextual ways to reduce these imbalances and improve the occupational well-being of teachers. CCS CONCEPTS• Human-centered computing → Empirical studies in HCI.

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WhatsApp Discourse Throughout COVID-19: Towards Computerized Evaluation of the Development of a STEM Teachers Professional Learning Community

Scherz

Salman

Alexandron

et al. 2022

Int J Artif Intell Educ

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This two-year study followed a professional learning community (PLC) of STEM Teachers Leaders, referred to as L-PLC. The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic accelerated changes in the focus of many professional development frameworks from face-to-face to online communication. We sought for new ways and tools to follow the professional development and the dynamics in our L-PLC. In particular, we explored professional knowledge development and social interactions, as derived from its WhatsApp group (43–48 participants) discourse, before and during the COVID-19 pandemic. Data were extracted from 6599 WhatsApp messages issued during four consecutive semesters (March 2019—March 2021), as well as from participant background questionnaires. The analysis incorporated both structure and content examination of the L-PLC WhatsApp discourse, using social network analysis (SNA), and a distinctive coding scheme followed by statistical analysis, heat map, and bar graph visualizations. These provided insights into whole group (macro), subgroups (meso), and individual (micro) profiles. The results indicated that over time, the participants gradually began to use the WhatsApp platform for professional purposes on top of its initial administrative intention. Moreover, the pandemic seemed to lead to a unique adjustment process, denoted by enhanced professional interactions, regarding content knowledge, professional content knowledge, and technological knowledge, and also accelerated the development of productive community behaviors, such as sharing and social support. The research approach enabled us to detect changes in key PLC characteristics, follow their dynamics under the influence of chaotic changes and navigate the community accordingly. Taken together, WhatsApp exchanges can serve as a rich source of data for a noninvasive continuous evaluation of group processes and progress. Supplementary Information The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s40593-022-00320-3.

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Tag a Teacher: A Qualitative Analysis of WhatsApp-Based Teacher Networks in Low-Income Indian Schools

Cited by 11 publications

References 77 publications

Repurposing a WhatsApp group: How a fantasy cricket group transformed into a site of care and support during India's second wave of Covid-19

Repurposing a WhatsApp group: How a fantasy cricket group transformed into a site of care and support during India's second wave of Covid-19

Pandemic, Hybrid Teaching & Stress: Examining Indian Teachers’ Sociotechnical Support Practices in Low-income Schools

WhatsApp Discourse Throughout COVID-19: Towards Computerized Evaluation of the Development of a STEM Teachers Professional Learning Community

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