Teachers’ Perceptions of Their Goals: Toward Pro-SEL Pedagogy

Abstract

The switch to online teaching that the global COVID-19 crisis necessitated has been discussed in many studies. Few papers, however, have investigated teachers’ perceptions and the self-initiated changes they made due to such a transition. This study adopted a mixed methods design to determine the perceptions of teachers and the changes they made during the crisis. For this undertaking, a purposive snowball sampling of thirty in-service teachers in Israel was used. The study revealed that considerable changes were made in the participants’ pedagogical practices, and there was a significant correlation between these changes and teachers’ perceptions of their teaching profession. The changes essentially applied to two main categories: teaching goals and teaching strategies. In addition, the findings showed that the revised teaching goals and strategies were executed to the teachers’ own volition and were consistent with Social Emotional Learning (SEL) pedagogy. To enhance the social-emotional competence and well-being of teachers and students, the researchers recommend elevating and enhancing the teaching profession by establishing SEL pedagogy in all schools, not only in times of crisis but as a policy empowered by advocacy.