Abstract:
Universities worldwide transitioned to online learning during the COVID-
19 pandemic, leading to a digital revolution in higher education. The aim of this
study is to give a unique insider’s perspective of how students experienced the shift
to online learning within a Qualitative Methods course at the beginning of the
pandemic. Our data is comprised of a thematic analysis of three focus group
discussions (FGDs) with the Master’s in Public Health Sciences programme students
at Karolinska Institutet, Sweden, on their experiences of learning and applying
qualitative methods online. The findings showed different processes of adaptation
to the learning environment at the early stages of the pandemic. Use of digital
technologies for online education were learnt and re-embodied by students, to the
point they eventually defined themselves as “Zoom beings”. An overarching theme
describes the process of students’ re-embodiment of their student-researcher role
in a dematerialized online classroom. The adaptation to the learning process
resulted in growing pains, but also enabled student to foresee complementarity of
online and physical worlds. Understanding the students’ experiences of the sudden
switch to online learning can guide the adaptation for potential future disruptions of
campus-based teaching.
