Dilemma in distance learning during the covid-19 pandemic: The EFL teachers’ perspective

The dilemma in teaching has been long discussed in the discourse of education, yet the topic has received little attention concerning online teaching, especially during the latest The Covid-19 pandemic. Addressing the gap, the study utilized interview and document analysis that organized following Schwab’s curriculum commonplaces to discover the dilemma encountered according to the perspective of English teachers of SMPN 6 Tangerang Selatan in distance learning during the Covid-19 pandemic situation. The result of interview of four on-duty EFL teachers of SMPN 6 Tangerang Selatan and the analysis of the teachers’ lesson plans and the Circular Letter of Ministry of Education and Culture No. 4 Year 2020 showed the dilemma comprised issues of optimizing teacher s’ efforts and authority, maximizing learning comprehension, developing favorable attitudes, maximizing learning time usage, maintaining the children’s academic availability, maintaining a motivating environment for students, and offering academic opportunity for students. The findings inferred a central conflict between teachers’ interests and expectations of the curriculum. From the account of the teachers, they tackled the conflict by improving their IT skills and modifying the learning schedules. However, since the conflict was dilemmatic, the two solutions of teachers still left residual problems both for the teacher and the students.


Introduction
reported that most teachers or lecturers consider shift from conventional learning to e-learning as an abrupt transformation for their performance in teaching. Qian (2020) reports difficult circumstances that could appear in distance learning. Dilemma is one of phenomena arises in educational field (Winter, 1982). The term dilemma is often used to describe different forms of phenomena with occurrences called difficulties. Although both indicate problems and lead to hardships in the teaching and learning process, the difficulty is not conflicting by its nature and merely renders a course of plan challenging to be put into action (Komorowska, 2016). Both signify an obstacle.
However, in case of approaching a difficulty, creating a sort of balance is not necessarily required. The condition in which teachers are pushed to adopt distance or online learning as a substitution for the conventional learning system might collide teachers' expectations and habits with the features unique to elearning, which might build up dilemmas (Billig et al., 1988;Teräs, Suoranta, Teräs, & Curcher, 2020).
The curriculum science is undeniably prominent in shaping educational theories and practices (Kridel, 2010). Schwab's curriculum commonplaces are fundamental aspects of the curriculum that signify how a curriculum would answer society's inquiries. The five Schwab's commonplaces are the commonplace of 1) teachers, generally comprises on how they identify themselves; 2) learners, generally comprises of learners' background and interests; 3) subject matters, concerns about how the learning contents are presented; 4) context, concerns about the broader scope of community, such as the parents; and 5) curriculum-making, discusses how the rest of commonplaces should be combined (Null, 2016).
Five studies have investigated issues related to the topic. The first study is a study conducted by Jennifer Sumsion (2000) which discusses an ethical dilemma that a universitybased teacher educator faced in completing teaching based on the attitude of caring. The second related study is conducted by Şeyda Selen Çimen and Şevki Kömür (2019), which discusses the dilemma of Turkish student teachers from their teaching experiences after completing teaching practice in practice schools through teacher reflection. The third related study was of Hanna Komorowska (2016), who describes the dilemma of standardizing proper language teachers in the university context. The fourth related study was a longitudinal case study conducted by Smagorinsky, Wilson, and Moore (2011) that concerns the issue of teaching English grammar and writing in a high school setting. The fifth related study was study of Churiyah et al. (2020) that discusses on distance learning during Covid-19 pandemic within Indonesian context.
Although there are sheer amount of studies exploring the topic of problems in educational practice during the Covid-19 pandemic, the majority of them only cover general challenges or problems of teaching in the Covid-19 pandemic situation instead of dilemma. Thus, this research aims to discover the dilemma of distance learning during the Covid-19 pandemic according to the perspective of EFL teachers of SMPN 6 Tangerang Selatan.

Research Design
This research is qualitative research with a case study design. The researcher used this design to study objects that are hard to extract, such as feelings or thought processes (Creswell, 2012). The case study design was also chosen for its appropriateness for studies of dilemmas and people's perspectives (Winter, 1982).

Data Source
This case study was conducted at SMPN 6 Tangerang Selatan in the first semester of the academic year 2021/2022. The writer conducted the study under the permission granted by the principal and viceprincipal for curriculum management of the school. The study took place from October 14th to October 19th. The samples were four English teachers of the school.
The two instruments used were interviews with the questions designed from the adaptation of five curriculum commonplaces of Schwab (Flick, 2004;Schwab in Null, 2016) and analyzing documents that their uses were strategic in conducting distance learning, comprising lesson plans and two official announcements of regulation, the Circular Letter of Ministry of Education and Culture No. 4 Year 2020 and the document of new curriculum requirement (Bowen, 2009). The interview was the open-ended questions used to acquire the teachers' explanations of their thoughts on distance learning. The document review was utilized to obtain additional information to support the explanations provided by interviewing the teachers. The interview was conducted once for each teacher, and then the results were transcribed. Then, the analysis of documents studied in the study resulted in the input of information that could be used to evaluate the interview results.

Data Source
The interview is a formal interview in which the questions have been planned. The interview questions are based on parts of Schwab's questions of his five curriculum commonplaces (Null, 2016). Data review might supplement the rest in research that uses an interview and other data gathering techniques. In particular, using the document as data to be gathered strengthens the portrayals of belief and value that the participants possess towards the circumstance (Stake, 1995).

Data Analysis
As the primary data collecting technique of the current study, data obtained from the interview undergoes the most fundamental analysis steps within the study.
This primary data will be analyzed following the model in Milles and Huberman (1994). This model consists of three steps: first, the data from the interview transcript will be read several times; then, content that features one theme will be grouped as a particular theme, and this also applies to the other themes found in the data through coding. The codes or labels will be applied to specific parts of the body of the interview transcript. The coding recognizes particular keywords to identify competing values or dilemmas. Those keywords are adapted from a dilemma identification rubric in Scager et al. (2017).  Scager et al. (2017) No.
Interview Questions 1 analysis, iterative reading process will be done to the entire data, while in thematic analysis, data that are related to the research questions will be codified. Data review could be used as confirming or extraneous data for the data extracted from the former technique (Stake, 1995).

The dilemmas and their implication to the teachers
The first research question is about the dilemmas teachers faced in distance learning during the Covid-19 pandemic. Based on the interview result of the subject, the researcher presents the expected findings. The data were also taken from the document in the form of the subjects' lesson plans and official announcements.

b.
Preserving students' mannerisms "As for students, we cannot observe all of them properly." (problematization) "So, in your (the interviewer) opinion, between a student that gets bad grades but has manner, and a student that gets good grades but has no manner, which is better?" (question) Maximizing teachers' efforts "It was indeed difficult to activate the classrooms during this pandemic." (problematization) "The advantage was that it could open up for wider information access…That is the only thing good from it (in contrast with the numerous disadvatages)." (deliberation) Two hesitations were found in teacher commonplace. From the two hesitations, the dilemma concluded was embracing educational IT skills vs. optimizing teachers' efforts and authority. The dilemma will be further recalled as dilemma TR.

c.
Maximizing learning comprehension "Majority of them (students) can submit (the tasks). For that part, it could do (make learning easier). Yet, about the comprehension, it (distance learning) was lacking." (deliberation) "Rather, I perhaps did not explain it fully, because we did not directly face each other." (problematization) Maintaining learning motivation "I can no more force it (motivating students)." (problematization) Developing favorable character "It was limited (to access learning materials) from books, but they should have found it (cheatingly) from Google." (deliberation) Three forms of hesitation were found in student commonplace. From hesitation (a), it was concluded that the dilemma was applying more flexible learning vs. maximizing learning comprehension, catalogued as dilemma ST-A.
The last two hesitations, hesitation (b) and (c), formed a single dilemma which was increasing ease in learning vs. developing favorable attitudes or dilemma ST-B. Maximizing learning time usage "The learning time was longer (enough to teach completely), because it (achievements) had been cut off. But, that was the bad side…If the materials were not taught, the students would never understand." (deliberation) "They cannot practice on problems, because we had no time to do so." (problematization) Only one hesitation was found in subject matter commonplace. The dilemma concluded from the hesitation was achieving higher students' competency vs. maximizing learning time usage or dilemma SM. Maintaining the children's academic availability "Because this school is for middle-to-low class (families)…Don't even talk about it, many of them did not even know a thing (about the learning materials)." (problematization) As with the previous commonplace, a single hesitation was found in context (parents) commonplace. The dilemma concluded from the hesitation was carrying on domestic duties vs. maintaining the children's academic availability and listed as dilemma CP.

b.
Maintaining a motivating environments for students "The good thing was that there was no ranking system for students…Certainly, for some students, distance learning was not a good thing. While for some who were lazy, they made it as (their) weapon." (deliberation) "Distance learning did only prioritize the (completeness of) teaching the material…It is why I always told the students that good grades did not matter anything for me, the only thing I did care was character." (problematization) Offering an academic opportunity for students "As for students, they won't ask you for more materials. Kids, if they were taught anything, would accept it (regardless of how little the proportion was)." (problematization) "Distance learning had never satisfied me…So, I had to repeat teaching some of (previous) materials." (problematization) Two hesitations were found in curriculum making commonplace. From each hesitation, a single dilemma could be concluded. From the hesitation (a), it was concluded that the dilemma was embracing supporting students' academic life vs. maintaining motivating environment for students or dilemma CM-A. Then, from the hesitation (b), it was concluded that the dilemma was keeping a realistic educational environment vs. offering an academic opportunity for students or dilemma CM-B.
Then, the analysis of lesson plans of any grades showed that the following lesson plan contents evidenced the dilemmas below: Table 8. The dilemma and the related lesson plan content The lesson plans, as actual documents that were used by teachers to manage their classroom activities, provided direct information about which dilemmas that were relevant in the teaching process. From the table it is shown that many elements in learning became the areas in which the dilemmas possibly happened. Learning from home through distance learning should be done to provide a meaningful learning experience for students without burdening them with fulfilling all achievements.
Distance learning activities and tasks may vary between students, according to their respective interests and conditions, including considering access/facilities for distance learning.

TR ST-A CM-B
3 School exams that required students' attendance should not be done. TR From the findings, despite many roots (the commonplaces) of the dilemma that have been identified, it could be deduced that the seven dilemmas appeared to descend from a single common substance was clashing of the resources available for teachers with the expectation of curriculum. As in Scager et al. (2017), this conflict of interest indeed had forced teachers to risk-taking some course of actions to produce the best teaching and learning results, although it could be inferred that they had a hard time deciding the steps or needed some adaptations for doing those course of actions. The expectation of curriculum against the teachers is problematized in Billig et al. (1988), and it was also shown in the research of (Sumsion 2000) and (Çimen & Kömür, 2019).

The emergence of dilemmas and its effect on teachers' situation
The second research question is how the phenomena became considered dilemmas. Any participants agreed on the difficulty of keeping achievement standards that desired students' learning results and favorable characteristics with distance learning platforms. This concurs with Doghonadze et al. (2020) that distance learning results may be worse than traditional learning. Despite the difficulties, teachers tended not to refuse the general advantages IT disruption on schooling activities probably offers. The youngest participant did not show any problems with IT disruption, in line with the study by Kong (2020) that shows that the elderly or middleaged teachers were the most paralyzed in catching up with modern technological advancement. Yet, all of the teachers agreed on the capability of IT use to help assist both teachers and learners in school, which was also noted in Bouhnik and Marcus (2006). Then, with the recent great disruption of IT for education, they say they must adapt themselves and expand their learn-to-teach efforts, which is a common motivation, as reported in Doghonadze et al. (2020).
However, the disadvantages seemed to dominate the impression since the participant reported that they would better use IT platforms to keep their version of proper teaching and learning. One participant said:

"I think that distance learning does not possess any advantages for English teaching."
Then, the other still hesitated to judge by saying: "…That was the good thing about distance learning. We cannot compare each other. Each of them got their own good and bad sides." This dilemma is very much affected by the relationship between teachers and students (Moore in Bouhnik and Marcus 2006). Yavuzer in Ulug, Ozden, and Eryilmaz (2011), teachers' positive relationship is important to build a good rapport with students and allows teachers to reinforce positive behaviors in students. Positive interaction between both parties is critically needed for distance learners to come under the influence of teachers (Bouhnik & Marcus, 2006;Simonson, Zvacek, & Smaldino, 2019).

5
School exams can be carried out in the form of a portfolio of report cards and previously obtained achievements, assignments, and other forms of remote assessment.
School exams did not need to measure the completeness of overall curriculum achievements. Regarding learners' motivation, it is noted that distance learning yields a bigger possibility to cause laziness. The firm framework lacks distance learning, while distance learning simultaneously requires a high level of discipline (Marcus in Bouhnik and Marcus 2006;Doghonadze et al. 2020). Indeed, motivating K-12 students to distance learning is especially challenging because they do not necessarily choose whether they should or should not take distance learning, especially regarding the Covid-19 situation (Simonson et al., 2019). Then, declining learner motivation is strongly related to minimal teachers' effort in teaching since strong learner motivation supports learning (Holmberg in Simonson et al. 2019). Simonson et al. (2019) addresses that difficulties in communicating with students were at risk of happening in distance learning. Experience of active learning could also become lost. All of these confirm with participants' problems. As the one participant said in the interview: "If somebody says that distance learning facilitates more nuanced learning, no, it does not. It (really) does not." While it is reported from the interview that teachers did see embracing flexible learning could enhance students' capacity to discover learning material at their election, as also supported in Bouhnik and Marcus (2006), however, the participants reported that this opportunity did not necessarily offer help to the overall learning activity as in the study of Marcus in Bouhnik and Marcus (2006). While a teacher's presence increases students' success and enhances learning, communication and interaction are generally limited within distance learning (Swan in Bouhnik and Marcus 2006;Simonson et al. 2019;Ulug et al. 2011). Moreover, Kong (2020) and Doghonadze et al. (2020) note that distance learning could produce worse results than traditional learning. It is also cited in Bouhnik and Marcus (2006) that the learning atmosphere lacks a distance learning environment.
A study by Ulug et al. (2011) shows that communicating is one of the positive behaviors and other behaviors that lead to teacher visibility. Yet, while it is widely known that distance learning could become an easier learning facet (Bouhnik & Marcus, 2006;Simonson et al., 2019), Smaldino et al. in Simonson et al. (2019) urges that it is critical in distance learning that students recognize the complexity of distance learning environment to develop proper etiquette. While considering students' convenience in accessing the resources is important in distance learning (Simonson et al., 2019), a study by Burgason in Herdian, Mildaeni, and Wahidah (2021) argues that the special capabilities of students to use technology are the most vital factor for academic dishonesty. Then, Golden and Kohlbeck in Herdian, Mildaeni, and Wahidah (2021) states that academic dishonesty is riskier to take place online learning environment. Ultimately, Herdian, Mildaeni, and Wahidah (2021) relate findings of academic dishonesty to a lack of students' understanding of distance learning, as in Simonson et al. (2019), which Peled in Herdian et al. (2021) argues is caused by declining in students' involvement in online learning.
The circular letter of the Ministry of Education on the urge to compromise students' achievement aimed to rearrange of studying pace. However, most of teachers said that the amount of time they had was not sufficient to explain the materials thoroughly, indicating the feeling of unfulfillment with their responsibility as a teacher. This becomes rather important since teachers' level of efficacy has a positive relationship with students' achievement (Soraya, Hambali, & Siregar, 2014). Teachers' self-efficacy is related to burnout, performance, and motivation (Savaş, Bozgeyik, & İsmail, 2014). Moreover, teachers tend to embrace some responsibilities for the failure of students (Georgiou, Christou, Stavrinides, & Panaoura, 2002).
Concluded from participants' reports, parents' assistance was of different levels-the first level of assistance in preparing and embracing students mentally and academically. The second assistance level was preparing students mentally and academically. The third level was limited to only providing students with the learning peripherals. The lowest level was very minimum or no support at all. The point of the dilemma was that taking care of children's academic development meant considerable labor for the parents.
Participants often caught unpleasant comments from the parents of the second group, which were the majority, regarding distance learning from having to discipline children more often to not being able to help their children in learning since the instruction was not understandable (as in the first and second dilemma). The research of Susilowati and Azzasyofia (2020) stated a high level of stress among parents caused by meeting online learning needs. Liu et al. in Fox and Buchanan (2017) assert that parents can have a big role in students' online learning. However, it isn't easy to figure out and have a good definition of parental responsibility in online learning. One participant said: "Not all of parents could teach, right? Nor did they even understand English." The dilemma results in a negative outcome for the third and last group of parents. Because parents had to keep daily duties or their economic background vital for their living, putting the effort needed for distance learning, such as providing a companion or even a device and internet connection, could be unlikely. This would leave distance learning unbearable. Staker in Fox and Buchanan (2017) says that parents are required 'to love and nurture' their children to make them fully engaged in online learning. According to Simonson et al. (2019) the phenomenon of digital-divide is a real challenge for distance learning.
The Circular Letter of Ministry of Education and Culture No. 4 Year 2020 states that the examination results do not have to fulfill the achievement standards. This was very important since many limitations were exceptional to distance learning and not found within traditional learning. The lower socioeconomic background gets the most risks in distance learning (Fox & Buchanan, 2017;Simonson et al., 2019).
However, the participants problematized this learning design mainly because the low standard applied for distance learning devastates students' motivation. As explained in Simonson et al. (2019), the assessment could become an activity that boosts motivation. Also, looking at students' being distant from teachers (and other students), Swan's study shows that the more the learning is based on discussion, the more students' satisfaction was, and the more they perceive learning. Students' satisfaction is related to their motivation (Bouhnik & Marcus, 2006). One participant embarked: "The students were bored. Maybe, (it is) because they have not met their teachers for a long time." Regarding keeping a realistic educational environment, for the second participant, the issue was her uneasiness with the low achievement standards and students' decreasing performance in distance learning. She observed the students' incapability to reach the target despite the government's 'discount' on the achievement standards. She felt that lowering the achievements did not affect students' performance. Meanwhile, the fourth participant said that the issue was the curriculum for the pandemic that put too much stress on the aspect of knowledge than the aspect of the skill. Teachers' dissatisfaction goes well with the explanation of Parkay and Stanford in Soraya et al. (2014) that good teachers take their highest satisfaction from their success in promoting students' progress.
The curriculum design for the pandemic situation emphasizes yielding a beneficial learning experience despite not attending the school without worrying too much about incomplete achievement standards, as inferred from Circular Letter of Ministry of Education and Culture No. 4 Year 2020. All participants were aware of the urgency that made some achievement standards must be eliminated despite their disappointments above. Kong's study (2020) indeed asserts that the elderly teachers would become 'victimized' by the reinforcement of distance learning; it is good to note that in the setting of the pandemic, this becomes a great requirement for them to do their teaching job properly, leaving no room for them to avoid it. In solving the dilemma, teachers took the action of developing IT skills more as a solution. This is one saying among others: "I, too, as an old-fashioned teacher, I started to understand (distance learning), now (I) could use Google Meet." Any course of actions that a dilemma experiencer has taken should be important to be considered since the dilemma is a condition since any actions should hinge on a decisionmaking process which is a dilemma, becomes more grave because there is no absolute solving (Cushman & Young, 2009;Komorowska, 2016;Scager et al., 2017). Therefore, despite the certainty that this decision-making would occur in the teachers' cases and their sense of 'duty,' this should be identified as an active decision (Soraya et al., 2014). Then, IT skills encompass vast abilities related to IT platforms, thus stating teachers having developed their skills also means a wide scope of things (Simonson et al., 2019). The teachers admitted they were pretty concerned about students' distance learning activities. Some even 'enlarged' their actual teaching proportions: "I worked till night. Students' could have submitted their works anytime…I became working overtime." The pressure of time, workload, and changes (the most obvious for this study) are the main teacher stressors (Kyriacou in Bernard 2016). In Bernard (2016), Geving said that the main factor of frustration among teachers is students' poor behavior, which includes dealing with unmotivated students and maintaining their discipline (Kyriacou in Bernard 2016). This would leave the teachers' stressed and create a sense of failure, as indicated from one teacher's report, further yielding a low sense of self-efficacy. Selfefficacy is defined as teachers' belief in whether their efforts could make a difference (Schunk & DiBenedetto, 2021). Self-efficacy is important to moderate teachers' stress (Friedman in Bernard, 2016). More importantly, keeping self-efficacy is critical since it correlates positively with students' motivation (Shahzad & Naureen, 2017).
It is very important to note that the subjects agreed that the more development they could make for the students, the greater the sense of satisfaction would be, as in Soraya et al. (2014). Generally, the teachers acted upon two different means to apply the decision: making another supplementary session and reteaching the lesson. In making another supplemental session, the parents sometimes did not agree with teachers' plan. The teacher herself who made this decision reported that this decision was not entirely effective, although preferring it, she said: "As for me, I tried to add (the teaching session), so it will make the students not miss the lesson, won't it?" However, the heavier challenge faced by the teacher may yield a low sense of selfefficacy that gradually demotivates and drags the teacher into more stress, yielding a latent problem for teachers (Bernard, 2016). Furthermore, the disintegration between teachers, as part of the institution of school, and parents as a member of the wider community could become an uneasy move for the success of students since it would worsen the school climate, as the school climate positively influences the students' level of achievement, finally triggering a dilemma for the teacher (Stevens & Sanchez, 1999). Then, the other decision that the teachers mentioned was that they reteach the materials whenever possible within the ordinary school's schedule, especially during the face-to-face meetings after the long school closure. One teacher went on to say: "I would not become indolent, (like) 'I regretted putting much effort'. No, I was sincere (for doing this). I actually often repeated teaching students the previous materials." While the teachers, as demonstrated above, did possess occupational commitment that could relieve the stress, all subjects agreed that they lacked achievement in teaching with online learning. Hence, the point of the dilemma is that while abandoning students' learning performance was not a favorable attitude among the teachers and dissatisfied them, re-teaching the students may put the teachers in an unfavorable environment to work in (Bernard 2016;Larkin 2015;Forrest in Soraya et al. 2014). This will ultimately lead to job dissatisfaction, a theme that the writer always perceived to be communicated by the teachers.

Conclusion
The findings show that the dilemmas appeared on any curriculum commonplaces. The variations of dilemma and the causes behind them could be reduced into a single general substance: the conflict between the interest of teachers and expectations of the curriculum. Then, from the interview result, the teachers made decisions for this common dilemma by finding the most moderate action that may satisfy the two opposing necessities, even though those decisions may cause stress and dissatisfy themselves. Then, teachers could explore deeper the literature about practicing distance learning. The finding showed that teachers' literacy for distance learning needed some improvements. Quoting Simonson et al. (2019), the knowledge of distance learning is often less developed or non-existent among educators.