ABSTRACT
COVID-19 pandemic has had a hard impact on all educational sectors where access to schools, educational institutions, and university campuses is forcibly halted. In this context, the Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research urged teachers to move from face-to-face to online learning to mitigate the spread of the virus, keep up the regular schedule and save the academic year. This paper highlights the issues, perspectives, and pedagogical practices of the instructors' overnight change, switching pre-existing face-to-face learning to the online environment. It also refers to the challenge of those learners lacking intercultural communication skills needed to participate virtually. The researchers used the documentary research method to develop their leading research question and analyse existing research documents and other e-sources of information such as university and government reports, newspapers, PDF books, papers, and YouTube channels to collect relevant data for this study. As a result, we could illustrate the Algerian universities' response and analyse government and university sources such as newspaper articles and ministry decrees. Therefore, we believe that the emergency to digitalize teaching in our higher institutions is a significant opportunity to keep engaged in the online environment now and after the pandemic and take advantage of the universities' best pedagogical practices. Thus, prepare for the online shift to better address the digital divide by promoting equal opportunities for all students to access the Internet, possess and effectively use Information and Communication Technology (ICTs) to fully participate in the modern educational system.