Reflections on Teaching a Cooperative International Project During the COVID 19 Pandemic

Reflections on Teaching a Cooperative International Project during the COVID 19 Pandemic

Mikel Garant (Beijing Institute of Technology, Zhuhai, China)

Elizaveta Shikhova (ITMO University, Russia)

Martin Parsons (Hannan University, Japan)

This presentation will focus on the reflections of teachers working in three different countries, China, Japan and Russia, engaged in online cooperative teacher development project during the spring semester of 2020. The emergence of COVID 19 meant that teaching was done online instead of face-to-face, leading to various unforeseen issues that needed to be addressed as the project unfolded. For example, due to travel restrictions, one of the teachers was located in Finland for the entirety of the project while his students were in China. This video presentation will show teachers reflecting on international EFL teaching cooperation between Japan, China and Russia during COVID 19, the teaching process in each country and online teaching challenges. Presenters will also reflect on learner topic choice, learner reactions to online teaching during COVID 19, differences in videos between countries, and online teaching compared to face-to-face teaching. Reflections on future recommendations will also be discussed. International cooperation of this type enriched the online learning environment for the participating students. If also provided an environment for the teachers to share ideas with each other and reflect on their teaching and develop professionally.