Identifying the Factors Influencing Online Education of School Students in the Colombo District

Abstract

With the rapid growth of information and communication technologies, the 21st century can be described as an era in which the universe has become one village. As a result, most countries worldwide tend towards online methods in their education sector. According to the last few years in Sri Lanka, it can be noticed that the children are more attracted to information technology tools than adults. Even though, universities or higher education institutions often use online platforms for their education, it was not seen until the end of 2019, when school students tend to have online education. Even though, many researchers in other countries have focused on online education in universities and schools (Almekhlafy, Brish, Chandra, and Joshi, 2020), researchers have not paid much attention to online school education in Sri Lanka. However, due to the Covid-19 outbreak, Sri Lankan schools have been trending toward online education since 2020. The face-to-face classroom education system has been shifting towards an online education system for the last two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic, which has spread worldwide. However, Sri Lankan students have newly experienced online education, and those experiences vary from region to region in the country due to the teacher's lack of devices, signal variation and awareness level regarding online education. Therefore, it is very important to discuss the online education of Sri Lankan students and the factors that affect online education.