Blackboard learning prior Covid 19 pandemic era: A challenging or resourceful case

ABSTRACT

The eruption of the COVID-19 pandemic era has resulted in infused technology learning. eLearning has since been regarded as an essential aspect targeted toward effective schooling. Teaching-learning approaches had to be re-looked as universities struggled to engage in online contact sessions through Blackboard as a Learning Management System (LMS). This paper aims to examine whether Blackboard learning has any substantial influence on learner academic attainment. Little is noted by literature on predicaments entangling rural schooling environments for implementing eLearning. The examination was administered through a qualitative research approach embedded in a case study design. Three purposefully nominated teachers from a university located in a rural Eastern Cape Province were interviewed as participants. It was divulged as the findings that (i) connectivity glitches, thus having an impact on (ii) contact session attendance, as well as (iii) limitation of eLearning-related soft skills, were the significant hiccups to this emergent learning platform. The study concludes that teachers and learners are held liable to acquaint themselves with eLearning, hence the digital world, entirely. This paper recommends alterations and re-inventing of teaching-learning approaches, thereby curbing situations of rural-urban digital variations.