Changes in activity and content of messages of an Estonian Facebook group during transition to distance learning at the beginning of the COVID‐19 pandemic

BACKGROUND: The coronavirus pandemic has affected education worldwide. Estonian schools moved to distance learning on March 16. OBJECTIVES: This paper outlines the stages of unexpected and temporary changes affecting different stakeholders based on activity and content of the messages in the Facebook group ‘Homeschooling with technology’. Also the applicability of the concerns‐based adoption model was explored to explain these changes. METHODS: The investigated timespan includes the week before the emergency situation and the weeks of the school term and school holidays during the emergency situation, with 52 days in total, divided into seven periods. The 872 messages were coded by two researchers and changes were examined. RESULTS AND CONCLUSIONS: Four stages were identified, from low exposure and involvement with the change to focusing on collaboration and skipping the consequence stage. Furthermore, the new changes in the educational system might focus people again on personal concerns. IMPLICATIONS: The results help capture the changes in teaching and learning situation caused by the coronavirus pandemic in order to learn from these changes and be prepared for such situations in the future.