Inevitably, Indonesia has to apply online learning (in the network) during the Covid-19 pandemic, this aims to anticipate the spread of the Covid-19 virus itself. However, there are still many problems in its implementation.
The problems found during online learning come from students, educators, and even the system itself. This causes the existing curriculum targets not to be achieved.
Curriculum
Based on the Decree of the Minister of Education and Culture of the Republic of Indonesia Number 719 / P / 2020 concerning Guidelines for Implementing Curriculum in Education Units in Special Conditions which was signed on August 4, 2020, it has the objective of providing flexibility for educational units to determine the curriculum according to the needs of students. However, it was reported from news.detik.com that the Minister of Education did not oblige to follow this emergency curriculum and provided 3 options, namely:
- Keep referring to the national curriculum
- Using an emergency curriculum
- To simplify the curriculum independently
Judging from the current situation, it is very difficult to follow and pursue the curriculum targets that are commonly used, therefore the next option is a very good option to run in the current online learning period. A simplification that does not make students stressed and can still focus on taking online learning.
Home Atmosphere & Student Psychology
Each student has a situation that is not the same as each other at home, different when students are in the same class, uniting them in one room and many individuals so that some problems at home can be forgotten for a moment and focus on learning.
In the classroom the teacher can pay attention to the psychology of each student and can apply special attention when one of the students experiences “problems” in the learning process. However, it is not fair if in online learning students are given the same demands while the teacher does not know how the psychology of each student is at his home.
Limited Access
One other big problem is the limited internet access, this can be affected by the internet network, internet quota, smartphone or other hardware. As a teacher, of course this kind of thing has been considered and made a more flexible learning policy, of course.
In practice, there are still teachers who do not understand this problem. Demanding students to be able to work on assignments in a matter of hours, this certainly makes students get pressure to be able to catch up on time within limitations.
Within these limitations it can cause negative attitudes to students, for example, such as students asking their parents to force their parents to buy quotas without understanding the economic conditions of the family, or students who even experience pressure due to inability in several matters related to online learning.
In this case, the teacher should give a long enough period of time for an assignment, giving time for students to meet the needs of access to online learning so that they can take part in this online teaching and learning process.
Creativity
Not only students are required to be creative in online learning, but teachers should also be creative in online learning to create a fun learning atmosphere.
Many cases occur in online learning so that it seems that the teacher is only limited to giving assignments at each meeting. Not without reason, this opinion was born in the community during the online learning period because generally that is the reality that happened in learning during the pandemic.
Teachers can use and take advantage of technology without having qualified skills in the technology field. The most important thing is the willingness and awareness to learn, unless the teacher doesn’t want to learn anymore. The existing limitations can be communicated by fellow teachers to create a creative breakthrough that can support this online learning.
There are many examples of the use of technology that can be used by teachers, one of which is the podcast through this media, students can listen to the teacher’s explanation anytime and anywhere, and of course listening to audio through podcasts is more efficient in using internet data.
To find out the understanding of the material in students, students can also repeat the material in their own style and then upload it into podcast media again. This does not only train students ‘understanding but also learners’ skills. Or teachers can use other means and methods to be able to teach in online learning.
Another example could be using an animaker, a website that creates simple animations that can be created to support learning to be more interesting. With animation media, of course this is more interesting than the powerpoints that are commonly used, especially during this learning period, powerpoints are generally distributed to students without further explanation.
Furthermore, there are many small problems that we see in the implementation of this online learning, one of which is the teacher who asks students to use whatsapp profile photos using personal photos, because previously the profile photos of students used photos of Korean idols. This can be used by the teacher to get closer to students and support learning by connecting learning with Korean idols.For example: In learning Indonesian, the teacher can ask students to make stories by including Korean idols as the main character.
The widespread use of Youtube, Tiktok, Instagram and other social media as a means of entertainment should be used by teachers to create creative learning. It is unfortunate if during this online learning period the teacher cannot create creative things which are of course useful for achieving the learning target itself. Rigid learning methods combined with heavy learning demands are a time bomb for students to be able to damage the psychology of the students themselves.
