HYBRID LEARNING IN EARLY CHILDHOOD EDUCATION IN THE COVID-19 ERA

Abstract

The change in educational communication among teachers, students, and parents in Early Childhood Education (PAUD) due to the non-natural disaster of the Covid-19 pandemic has pushed the change from face-to-face into online learning at home. Changes in communication in the field of early childhood education are worried to reduce students' understanding of materials. This study used a qualitative research method with a case study research design, which is hoped to obtain an understanding of educational communication with the aim of reviewing, exploring, and analyzing how educational communication is carried out by teachers, students, and parents at PAUD schools during the pandemic. The results showed that there was a change in the form of educational communication among teachers, students, and parents at PAUD consisting of several phases. At the pre-pandemic phase, educational communication was carried out face-to-face, but in the pandemic phase this communication was carried out online, then in the post-pandemic phase, the communication changed back to being conducted in a hybrid by combining direct face-to-face meeting and online communication. This has resulted in educational communication among teachers, students, and parents at PAUD due to the covid-19 pandemic experienced communication barriers. The barriers in the pandemic and post-pandemic were much heavier than in the pre-pandemic. Of the findings of the communication barriers, the unpreparedness in dealing with this situation from all parties involved became the most crucial one. Educational communication activities in PAUD occurred incompletely due to fast-paced changes in situations, which tended to be too late to be anticipated and adapted.