The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Student’s E-Learning Experience in Jordan

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The reviewed article addresses a very important and current problem of distance learning, which has become the primary method of education in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors presented the online learning experiences of Jordan universities.

The article is very interesting, but I think the weakness is their review of the scientific literature on distance learning.

It is worth referring to the publications presenting the previous research (theoretical and empirical) of the impact of distance learning on the effects of education and the social consequences of maintaining this type of education.

I think that it would be useful to broaden the purpose of the article to identify the potential positive and negative consequences of online learning.

At the presentation of the research could be an attempt to refer to research about what part of all students studying in Jordan was examined. I think that should be more widely used questionnaire to discuss and explain its structure and the reasons for its formulation.

Author Response

Thank you for your valuable comments, kindly find attached our response to your comments. 

Point 1: The reviewed article addresses a very important and current problem of distance learning, which has become the primary method of education in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. The authors presented the online learning experiences of Jordan universities.

 

Response to Point 1: Thank you.

 

Point 2: The article is very interesting, but I think the weakness is their review of the scientific literature on distance learning.

 

Response to Point 2: Distance learning has been further covered in lines

. New links between distance learning and electronic commerce has been highlighted in a new section titled “The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Education”.

 

Point 3: It is worth referring to the publications presenting the previous research (theoretical and empirical) of the impact of distance learning on the effects of education and the social consequences of maintaining this type of education.

 

Response to Point 3: A new section titled “The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Education” has been added to highlight the impact of distance learning on the effects of education and the related social consequences

 

Point 4: I think that it would be useful to broaden the purpose of the article to identify the potential positive and negative consequences of online learning.

 

Response to Point 4: This has been addressed in the newly added section titled “The Impact of COVID-19 Pandemic on Education”. Distance learning advantages and disadvantages have been mentioned.

 

Point 5: At the presentation of the research could be an attempt to refer to research about what part of all students studying in Jordan was examined. I think that should be more widely used questionnaire to discuss and explain its structure and the reasons for its formulation.

 

Response to Point 5: the study tried to include all the students studying in Jordanian universities across the twelve governorates of Jordan that includes both public and private universities. In the methodology section, we have discussed and explained the used structure and why it has been formulated in this manner for the benefit of the research.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

It is only a summary descriptive analysis. 

It is interesting as a database, but not as a research article. The data could be used in other researches to detect how many university students could participate in online courses, how many of them have internet access and the types of apps use. 

It does not contain any deep analysis about the quality of courses, of the knowledges and abilities acquired by students, how much the students want to learn online and why etc. 

Please, introduce more data analysis which can illustrate some interesting hypothesis. 

Author Response

Thank you for your valuable comments, kindly find attached our response to your comments.

Point 1: It is only a summary descriptive analysis.

Response to Point 1: We tried to summarize and organize characteristics of the data set that has been collected.  Then see the collection of responses or observations from the used sample in order to describe the characteristics of the responses, such as the average of responses on one item, or the relation between two items.

 

Point 2: It is interesting as a database, but not as a research article. The data could be used in other researches to detect how many university students could participate in online courses, how many of them have internet access and the types of apps use.

Response to Point 2: We cannot understand this point, why to use the collected and analyzed data in another paper to detect the same aspects? However, we tried our best to see how the pandemic has affected the student’s e-learning experience.

 

Point 3: It does not contain any deep analysis about the quality of courses, of the knowledges and abilities acquired by students, how much the students want to learn online and why etc.

Response to Point 3: The objective of the paper was not to analyze the quality of the courses which require testing the learning outcomes and whether the students’ acquired the set of skills outlined in the course plan. However, we tried to see how the students have done in learning online and how was their attendance rate and engagement and what the main challenges were.

Point 4: Please, introduce more data analysis which can illustrate some interesting hypothesis.

Response to Point 4: This has been solved in the newly added sections and the modified discussion and recommendation sections.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

The topic that is exposed does not have much to do with the theme of this magazine. This subject should be presented in one of the magazines dedicated to education.

 The online learning experience of students in Jordanian universities, as well as thepreparing for online learning during the pandemic is a topic that should be presented in another forum.

The situation is described from some online surveys obtained during the Pandemic, without describing how the situation was previously in the different Jordanian universities in order to establish a comparison of the situation.

In addition, teaching in a studies of letters, science or engineering is not the same. This topic does not go into this description, which could also be interesting.

The article describes only the data obtained without analyzing each one of them. It does not establish any discussion of the why of these and how it could be improved.

There is a lack of references related to the transition from face-to-face teaching to online teaching and the characteristics that this should have.

It is necessary to put some bibliographic references of data obtained in other situations and countries on this same topic, in order to establish a comparison.

This work should be improved with some treatment of the data obtained and with a little more discussion, and it could be published in another journal.

 

 

Author Response

Thank you for your valuable comments, kindly find attached our response to your comments.

Point1: The topic that is exposed does not have much to do with the theme of this magazine. This subject should be presented in one of the magazines dedicated to education.

Response to point 1: The authors have highlighted the link of the paper with the journal theme as stated in the abstract lines 16-17. A new section titled “the role of electronic commerce in transforming distance learning” that highlight the link with the journal theme has been added.

 

Point 2: The online learning experience of students in Jordanian universities, as well as the preparing for online learning during the pandemic is a topic that should be presented in another forum.

Response to point 2: Since the main author of the paper is an associate professor in electronic business and commerce as well as the director of teaching and learning center at his university, he believes that there is a strong link between e-commerce and distance learning, the COVID-19 pandemic has shed the lights on this link. I believe it is interesting to see the challenges of such systems and how e-commerce can play a major role in the on-demand education as a form of distance learning, this could be further discussed.

 

Point 3: The situation is described from some online surveys obtained during the Pandemic, without describing how the situation was previously in the different Jordanian universities in order to establish a comparison of the situation.

Response to point 3: Up to our knowledge there is no data for the situation in the Jordanian universities before the pandemic, the purpose of the paper was not to compare the situation before and after, it rather focuses on the experience as an impact of the pandemic.

 

Point 4: In addition, teaching in a studies of letters, science or engineering is not the same. This topic does not go into this description, which could also be interesting.

Response to point 4: We agree that it is worth to study the difference between the students of different specialties; however, this was not among the study objectives.

 

Point 5: The article describes only the data obtained without analyzing each one of them. It does not establish any discussion of the why of these and how it could be improved.

Response to point 5: We tried to present the data and highlighting the most important ones before discussing them and draw our conclusions and provide our set of recommendations which we did in the “Discussion and Recommendations” section; we could do that while presenting the data if you see best.

 

Point 6: There is a lack of references related to the transition from face-to-face teaching to online teaching and the characteristics that this should have.

Response to point 6: We agree and therefore have reviewed and used the following references:

Thompson, V. L. & McDowell, Y. L. (2019). A case study comparing student experiences and success in an undergraduate course offered through online, blended, and face-to-face instruction. International Journal of Education in Mathematics, Science and Technology (IJEMST), 7(2), pp. 116-136.

Sadeghi, M. (2019). A shift from classroom to distance learning: Advantages and limitations. International Journal of Research in English Education, 4(1), pp. 80-88.

Alharthi, M. (2020). Students’ attitudes toward the use of technology in online courses. International Journal of Technology in Education (IJTE), 3(1), pp. 14-23.

Al-Husban, N.A. (2020). Critical thinking skills in asynchronous discussion forums: A case study. International Journal of Technology in Education (IJTE), 3(2), pp. 82-91.

 

Point 7: It is necessary to put some bibliographic references of data obtained in other situations and countries on this same topic, in order to establish a comparison.

Response to point 7: It is, but we don’t want to compare it to any other country especially in such a pandemic; however, the following references have been used to explain:

 

Offir, B. and Lev, Y. and Bezalel, R. (2008), “Surface and deep learning processes in distance education: synchronous versus asynchronous systems”, Comput Educ, 51(3), pp. 1172‐1183.

Watts, L. (2016), “Synchronous and asynchronous communication in distance learning: a review of the literature”, Q Rev Distance Educ, 17(1), pp. 23‐32.

Abdullah, W. (2018), "Blended Learning Model in Improving Learning Effectiveness", Fikrotuna, 7(1), pp. 855–66.

 

 

Point 8: This work should be improved with some treatment of the data obtained and with a little more discussion, and it could be published in another journal.

 Response to point 8: as we said in point 2, we believe that there is a strong link between e-commerce and distance learning, the COVID-19 pandemic has shed the lights on this link. Therefore, it is interesting to see such topics in JTAER journal.

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

Thank you for up-grading the article accordingly to our comments. 

Author Response

Thank you for taking the time and effort to improve our manuscript. (Round 2 response attached).

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 3 Report

With the modifications introduced and the new sections, this publication may make more sense. Publication may be appropriate. The presentation of the results obtained could be the subject of discussion in future communications.

Author Response

Thank you for taking the time and effort to improve our manuscript. (Round 2 response attached).

Author Response File: Author Response.docx