Technology as an indispensable asset in Malta’s education sector : shedding a light on the benefits and challenges faced by educators and guardians alike

Abstract

This research aims to show how technology is a crucial resource for Malta’s educational system, with an emphasis on the advantages and disadvantages both parents and primary-level educators face on a daily basis. Other aims include to discover the main technological devices that are mostly used by educators and to determine whether they are satisfied or not with them. The main reasons to why parents use technology for and the home-schooling experience for both educators and parents during the COVID-19 pandemic are also investigated. To fulfil the above-mentioned objectives, a quantitative approach was deemed to be the most suitable approach to gather the primary data. A total of 105 educators and 102 parents took part in this research. The findings highlighted that most parents use technology because it is very convenient and accessible to communicate with the class teacher. On the other hand, a large number of educators said that Starboard vis-à-vis the interactive whiteboard is the most type of software used to deliver a lesson. With regards to whether home-schooling was an easy experience or not, most of the parents answered in a negative way because they argued that it was difficult to juggle their own work and supervise their child/children.