Teaching English Online during the Covid-19 Pandemic: A Systematic Literature Review (2020 – 2022)

Abstract

Sine qua non to keep the education from going on with minimal hassle or completely low disruption, online teaching is perceived as one of the most important channels to all educators and learners. In 2020, a novel term entitled Covid-19 had changed and impacted people across the globe. As schools were forced to shut due to mandatory closure, online teaching or e-learning played a pivotal role to become the support pillar in educational sectors across the world. English educators enjoyed the benefits of using online platforms to teach during the Covid-19 pandemic. At the same time, challenges as well as problems surfaced always outweighed the benefits. Therefore, this paper aims to explore the benefits of using online platforms to teach English during the pandemic and identify the challenges faced by English language educators. This systematic literature review adopted the method of five phases of reviewing proposed by Khan et al. (2003) to analyze 21 journal articles published in between 2020 and 2022. The findings showed that the benefits are elevating teachers’ ICT competency and creativity in designing lessons, reaching out to their learners, and embracing the flexibility of online teaching. The challenges are unreadiness to shift from traditional teaching to online platforms, unavailability of internet access and facilities, appalling learners’ learning attitude and unideal environment of working from home. By considering all the points stated, this paper would contribute to stakeholders and policy makers as an enlightenment to revamp the existing policy and elevate the curriculum to a more holistic and comprehensive level.