Post Covid Learning Environment and The Use of Scaffolding in Higher Education

Abstract

Covid 19 has forced teachers to rethink how to engage students. Instead of a face to face environment or a combination of face to face and online learning, the higher education system has been required to reinvent themselves and refocus their approaches to enable learning to continue. In particular, students have missed out on vital face to face learning with both their teachers and their peers, leading to a major gap in the developmental processes of learning. This paper will examine the use of scaffolding in the discipline of law to assist students, in a fully online environment, to assist with overcoming this developmental gap. The scaffolding approach uses three arms: introduce to students/teachers support learning; students apply/teachers provide guidance and then students achieve proficiency/teachers facilitate self-sufficiency. I will report on the use of this approach in the teaching of taxation law to law students with examples used from legislative situations and judicial decision making. The outcome has been a marked increase in students improving their individual grades.