Background
Universities, Colleges and Schools in Sierra Leone were closed from March 2019 to February 2020 due to preventive measures put in place by the Government as a result of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. With this general closure following the COVID-19 health crisis, distance learning and blended learning have become a credible alternative to maintain students and pupils in educational, training, and research links. All academic staff of the university have been instructed to prepare their course outlines, lecture notes and reference materials for transmission to students through the university’s online course delivery platform.
The overall objective of the study was to get a better understanding of the current situation of the digital learning environment, and the accurate picture of stakeholders’ (public, private, international, etc.) interventions in this domain in Sierra Leone. More specifically, this report aims at assessing the use of distance learning tools in Sierra Leone. The study utilised qualitative research methods: interviews; focus group discussions; qualitative survey and document reviewing. The research participants were teachers, education officials and information technology experts. The study results showed that the digital learning modalities used were radio, television, mobile phone, and online platforms such as Moodle, WhatsApp, Zoom and Skype.
This paper is organized in five sections: Section one gives the background to the study leading to delineation of the research problem; statements of the aim, objectives, the research questions, the significance and limitations of the study. Section two, the literature review, includes the careful study and review of various research journals, books, dissertations, thesis, research papers, articles and other sources that are directly or indirectly related to the problem under study. Section three describes the methodology used in this research. The choices made in methodology are related to the research problems, research questions and research objectives. Section four highlights how the actual data was collected, analysed, coded and conceptualised. Finally, section five provides recommendations and conclusions of the study.