Learning Management Systems as a platform for information sharing during the COVID-19

as a collaborative and knowledge sharing platform during a global crisis. Contribution: The study contributes to information and knowledge sharing disciplines to create awareness to authorities on the importance of technology during a crisis.


Introduction
The emergence of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), a deadly respiratory disease, was jointly announced by the World Health Organization (WHO 2020); Centers for Disease Control (CDC 2020) and the United Nations (UN 2020) on the 20th of January 2020.The announcement was that COVID-19 started in Wuhan, China (Sumardi, Suryani & Musadad 2021;WHO 2020).It became a global pandemic because of its exponential spread with a short space of time resulting in loss of human lives and productivity.The global economy closed down its operations to mitigate the spread of the virus.This effectively signalled the restricted movement of people except those in designated essential services (WHO 2020).By mid-March 2020, more than 130 countries had been severely affected by the COVID-19, and South Africa was in the list of top African countries affected (WHO 2020).
As a direct response to the WHO's call towards minimising the spread f the deadly COVID-19 pandemic, the South African government announced a hard lockdown on the 26th of March which took effect from the 27th of March 2020.A number of interventions inter alia wearing of face masks, sanitisation, social distance and prohibitive inter-city or inter-provincial travels, social gatherings, funerals et cetera formed part of the national intervention strategy (Raza et al. 2020).During the lockdown, people were subjected to social distancing, self-isolation and self-quarantine for a minimum of 10 days if they were infected with the virus (Anderson et al. 2020).The severity of the virus disrupted the status quo.Every aspect of human life, business model and economy activity was affected (Chigada & Madzinga 2021).The only means for information and knowledge sharing were social media, radios and televisions.Universities had to find ways to share

Learning Management Systems as a platform for information sharing during the COVID-19
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knowledge and information with their stakeholders, students and staff to facilitate teaching and learning.
During the peak of COVID-19, millions of people around the country remained in their homes to prevent the virus from spreading.This affected the livelihoods of the citizens and the rural-based universities especially those that offer face-to-face teaching and learning (Anderson et al. 2020;Netshakhuma 2021).In South Africa, universities are classified as urban and rural universities (Patel, Kadyamatimba & Madzvamuse 2018).Rural universities are those universities that are previously disadvantaged and strategically situated in rural communities with the aim of providing high-quality education for rural growth in their communities (Francis, Kilonzo & Nyamukondiwa 2016).However, the emergence of the global COVID-19 forced a paradigm shift and reconfiguration of teaching and learning through online learning management systems (LMS) (Raza et al. 2021).Staff, stakeholders and students vacated university campuses and offices as a response to government directive towards restricted movement of people.
The Department of Higher Education (DHET) urged universities to identify appropriate, cost-effective teaching, learning and research solutions such as online platforms (Gamede, Ajani & Afolabi 2021) These online platforms also known as LMS (Chigozie-Okwum, Ezeanyeji & Odii 2018; Gamede et al. 2021;Mtebe 2015) are designed to administer, record, monitor, report, automate and deliver educational courses (Lopes 2012).Learning management systems as e-Learning tools have made it possible for rural-based universities to continue with teaching and learning during the COVID-19 lockdown period (Zwain 2019).Lecturers provided lessons remotely, which were accessed by students in the comfort of their homes at any time using LMS (Patel et al. 2018).This affirms that teaching and learning are no longer confined within a classroom (Rahmanda, Sandhi & Sunaryo 2020).
As the COVID-19 lockdown disrupted ways of doing things, there is a need to examine the use and effectiveness of online LMS in rural-based universities (Sumardi et al. 2021).Gamede et al. (2021) state that many researchers have been focusing on examining the relevance of LMS in South African universities.Most of these studies investigated the impact of online LMS on teaching and learning in universities that are situated in urban areas (Patel et al. 2018).In recent times, some studies have been conducted to focus at factors that influence the acceptance of online LMS during the COVID-19 pandemic in Higher Education Institutions (Gamede et al. 2021;Raza et al. 2020).Given the different studies that have focused on LMS, this study has identified that there is a dearth of information suggesting studies focusing on the challenges faced by South African rural-based universities transitioning to online teaching and learning during the COVID-19 pandemic.Therefore, the objectives of this article are to: • Examine the state of readiness of a rural-based university to use an online LMS as a platform for knowledge sharing.
• Establish challenges faced by a rural-based university while using an online LMS as an information sharing platform.• Explore the benefits of an online LMS for knowledge and information sharing.

Literature review
This section reviews literature on key concepts that underpin this article, inter alia LMS, benefits, challenges and knowledge sharing.

Learning management system
Learning management systems are defined as a server or cloud-based online applications (Emmamoge, Hassan & Kauthar 2020;Lopes 2012) that include Success Factors, Blackboard, Moodle, Sakai, MyGuru2, Sum Total, etc. (Gamede et al. 2021;Mtebe 2015).Online LMS are used to facilitate teaching and learning in educational institutions as well as uploading and downloading learning materials (Mtebe 2015).Learning management systems can also be used for assessment and for student interactions (Mohd Kasim & Khalid 2016).Therefore, LMS complements traditional brick 'n' mortar information and knowledge sharing platforms such as the face-to-face interactions.
Janson, Söllner and Leimeister (2017) posit that LMS have become popular in recent years because they enhance the traditional tools used in teaching and learning through online learning platforms.Learning management systems enable synchronous communication between students and lecturers because a message sent by either lecturers or students gets delivered instantly, unlike asynchronous communication where a message gets delayed to be delivered (Emmamoge et al. 2020).These applications save the university, students and lecturers resources and time (Raza et al. 2021).The university saves resources such as water, electricity and paper because students will access their lessons online from their respective geographic locations or in the comfort of their homes (Lopes 2012;Raza et al. 2021).In this case, students save time and money travelling to campuses because they will access teaching and learning digitally (Setiawan & Fitriyah 2021).In addition, LMS have inbuilt capabilities to record, store and share large volumes of information.Students access learning materials and information through their student numbers.

Online learning management systems aspects
Online LMS comprises curriculum planning, instant evaluation, content management and learner engagement components (Kulshrestha & Kant 2013).Curriculum planning is a common feature of online LMS.Usually, Technical Educational Institutions (TEIs) lecturers are involved in curriculum planning, which is carried out before the beginning of the semester or year.This feature is used to create a course plan (Kulshrestha & Kant 2013;Wardah et al. 2020).The course plan is a comprehensive structure that outlines the lecture schedule, what will be covered, an overview of the chapters, learning resources, timetable and the total number of hours required for the course (Chigozie-Okwum et al. 2018;Lopes 2012).The essence of various components of an LMS is to create an interactive platform and knowledge repository that can be used repeatedly (Chigada & Ngulube 2015).
The instant evaluation feature also known as the grading feature (Chigozie-Okwum et al. 2018) is used to mark multiple choice questions (MCQs) and true or false questions (Emmamoge et al. 2020).While making use of instant evaluation features to mark these types of questions, students get their results instantly.Therefore, when the student selects the answer, the instant evaluation feature grades the student's choice and when the student clicks the submit button, the system automatically displays the results (Chigozie-Okwum et al. 2018;Wardah et al. 2020).This feature improves the turnaround time for marking scripts.
It also reduces the anxiety of the lecturers caused by marking students' scripts (Gamede et al. 2021).Students can access their marks through grading feature without necessarily calling or visiting the examination office.
The control of course material is not a common feature for most students (Kulshrestha & Kant 2013).The content management feature is used to create, maintain and store content for future use.Lecturers who teach the same modules every semester or year can use the same material (Chaubey & Bhattacharya 2015;Kulshrestha et al. 2013).
Students use this feature for revision even though they have passed the module (Kulshrestha & Kant 2013;Mohd Kasim & Khalid 2016).
Learner engagement is the real relationship in which students and lecturers interact (Heaslip, Donovan & Cullen 2014).This feature can be used by students to interact with their lecturers using e-chat rooms, texts, forums, wikis, just to name a few, where students or lecturers can post topics and learn from other students through their responses (Janson et al. 2017;Mohd Kasim & Khalid 2016;Setiawan & Fitriyah 2021).

State of readiness to implement a learning management systems in the context of digital age
The presence of information and communication infrastructure in South Africa is not reliable, specifically in rural areas.
Internet connectivity is very poor, thus there is a high possibility of high failure rate.However, the authors acknowledge that the digital age has made it easier for students and educators to interact.Khadim (2018) agrees that access to information has become very easy and cheaper than before.The digital age has paved way for learning that harnesses power, speed and ubiquity of digital capability.However, the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic caught many institutions unprepared for change.Thus, crises can accelerate change leading to reconfiguration of business models (Khadim 2018).

Benefits of an online learning management system
• Boundaryless education: An LMS promotes education without boundries of geography nor locality (Aljawarneh et al. 2008)

Challenges encountered when transitioning to an online learning management systems
Chigozie-Okwum et al. ( 2018) established that lack of Information Technology (IT) skills, high cost of internet connection, reluctance to embrace change, unavailability of infrastructure and support are the challenges that affect the adoption of online LMS.Seedat (2022) conducted a study that examined the challenges faced while transitioning to an online LMS and established that data costs in South Africa are very high and beyond the reach of many students.Given that there were restricted movements, students would not go to public places to use unsecured public Wi-Fi.Many households in South Africa do not have Internet-enabled facilities let alone communities in rural areas, which struggle with connectivity problems.
Unavailability of infrastructure and support includes the availability of information systems components and the skilled staff to support these components.Unwillingness to embrace change has been found to be one of the challenges in the high institution of learning.Both lecturers and students become complacent with the way they do things (Gamede et al. 2021;Raza 2020).Parasuraman (2000) states that people's readiness to interact with technology is a key challenge facing many institutions.Technology readiness refers to 'people or firms' propensity to embrace and use new technologies for accomplishing goals in home life and at work.An institution must be ready enough to cater for all the requirements as demanded by the innovation.Infrastructure, support structures, training, etc., are some of the things that should be put in place to support successful integration of technology in education (Parasuraman 2000).
Mawere, Chigada and Sambo (2020) state that technology has positively impacted the education sector especially during and post-COVID-19 because many institutions have knowledge and information sharing platforms.Students interact with their lecturers remotely and, on the other hand, there is tele-commuting.
The next section discusses the research methodology adopted in this article.

Research methodology
A positivist approach was adopted to guide the authors study in order to understand the phenomenon associated with the subject (Myers 2013;Saunders, Lewis & Thornhill 2019).This approach was used as a science to examine the challenges faced when using an online LMS as an information sharing platform in academia, specifically in a rural-based university in South Africa during the COVID-19 lockdown period.
The research paradigm influences the research methodology of the study.According to Creswell (2014), there are three methodologies that can be selected to conduct an inquiry, namely quantitative, qualitative and mixed methods.
Qualitative research is a way of understanding and exploring the human or social problem ascribed to groups or individuals.Qualitative research collects non-numeric data inductively to understand participants' views, opinions, experiences and concepts in general through the generation of themes (Creswell 2014;Kothari 2004;Myers 2013).On the contrary, quantitative research is used to aggregate variables from a group of respondents.Qualitative research collects numeric data from the participants to measure the association between variables in order to accept or reject the hypothesis (Creswell 2014;Saunders et al. 2019).In quantitative research, data are collected through a survey using a questionnaire (Cresswell & Clark 2011).
This study adopted a quantitative research methodology because the data were collected using a questionnaire from rural-based university students and lecturers who adopted an online LMS because of the COVID-19 lockdown.
In research, the purpose of research design is to present a plan that will be used to collect and analyse data to address the research problem.Therefore, this study was conducted during the COVID-19 lockdown in a rural-based university in South Africa, Vhembe district.The participants in this study were students and lecturers who used LMS during the COVID-19 lockdown.A total number of 200 participants were targeted.Random sampling techniques were used to pick the participants from the population.The authors chose the students and lecturers as the main respondents because they were the main users of online LMS for teaching and learning.Simple random sampling technique gave everyone an equal opportunity for inclusion in the study.Kothari (2004) states that randomisation minimises bias or favouritism while selecting sample elements for a study.
Data collection is a systematic method of gathering relevant data from the target population to address research problems and questions (Myers 2013).Data can be collected from primary and secondary sources (Creswell 2014).Secondary data refer to data gathered through the review of books, conference articles, journal articles, magazines, government reports and other published materials.Primary data are collected by scholars through empirical work directly from the respondents.This data can either be collected through questionnaires, interviews, focus group, etc. (Myers 2013;Saunders et al. 2019).When using quantitative research methodology, primary data are collected using the survey data collection technique (Myers 2013).In this study, primary data were collected using questionnaires.A questionnaire is a way to elicit feelings, beliefs, experiences, perceptions or attitudes from the respondents (Kothari 2004;Myers 2013).
Hard copies of questionnaires were distributed to the respondents who were on campus to give their responses and those who were not on campus because of COVID-19 restrictions a google forms link was sent to their emails to complete the questionnaire online.The researcher used Google forms to collect data online.
A total of 162 responses were distributed and received as follows: 132 responses were collected using Google forms.
Out of 132 Google form responses, 23 responses were not appropriate for analysis.On the other hand, a total of 30 printed questionnaires were distributed to students and lecturers who were on campus.Out of 30 printed questionnaires, 28 questionnaires were returned and all of them were appropriate for analysis.Therefore, 137 responses were analysed for this study.The respondents who used Google forms to participate in this study were asked to select appropriate choices by clicking a radio button and those who used a printed questionnaire were asked to mark appropriate choices using a cross.The next section presents the results.

Results
This section begins by presenting the findings about demographic information.A total of 130 (94.90%) responses were collected from students, and 7 (5.10%)respondents were collected from lecturers.Other questions in this study dealt with the level of study.This question was only answered by the students who studied at a rural-based university.Findings show that the majority (83 [63.85%]) of the respondents were undergraduate students, while the second highest (38 [29.23%]) respondents were busy with their honour's degree followed by the 7 (5.38%)respondents who were busy with their master's degree.At the time of data collection, only 2 (1.54%) respondents were busy with their PhD degrees.
Furthermore, there were questions that dealt with the usage of online LMS in a rural-based university.According to Table 2, 104 (75.91%) respondents used Moodle, while 24 (17.52%)respondents used Blackboard and 9 (6.57%) respondents used other LMS as knowledge and information To address and answer the research questions, the following data were collected using the Linkert scale and analysed thereafter.The respondents were asked to choose from strongly agreed (SA), agree (A), uncertain (U), disagree (D) and strongly disagree (SD).The first question looked at the benefits of online LMS during the transition period.The results in Table 2 show that 93 (67.88%) of respondents strongly agree and 41 (29.93%) of respondents agree that LMS were useful for teaching and learning during COVID-19 lockdown.A total of 2 (1.46%) of the respondents were uncertain, whereas 1 (0.73%) respondents strongly disagree that LMS had a great impact during COVID-19 lockdown.
Furthermore, a total number of 78 (56.93%) and 49 (35.77%)respondents strongly agreed and agreed that it was easy to upload or access learning material using LMS during COVID-19 lockdown, while 5 (3.65%) respondents were uncertain and 2 (1.46%) and 3 (2.19%)respondents strongly disagree and disagree with the that.
As shown in Table 2, a total of 80 (58.39%) and 37 (27.01%)respondents strongly agree and agree that Online LMS enables interaction between the students and lecturers, while 8 (5.84%) respondents were uncertain about the statement.A total of 5 (3.65%) and 7 (5.11%)respondents disagree and strongly disagree with the question.
Furthermore, a total of 68 (49.64%) and 66 (48.18%) respondents strongly agree and agree that they could access online LMS on any smart device during COVID-19 lockdown.A total of 3 (2.19%) of the respondents are uncertain.Lastly, a total of 80 (58.39%) and 51 (37.23%) of the respondents strongly agree and agree that the use of LMS helped students and lecturers to share study material among each other during lockdown.A total of 5 (3.65%) of respondents are uncertain.A total of 1 (0.73%) respondents strongly disagreed with the question.
On the contrary, the researchers examined the challenges encountered during this transition.The researchers found that the issue of internet connectivity was the main concern because a total of 85 (62.14%) and 40 (29.20%)respondents strongly agree and agree that they experienced internet connection problems when using online LMS during COVID-19 lockdown, while 4 (2.92%) respondents were U and 6 (4.38%) and 2 (1.46%) respondents disagree and strongly disagree with the question.
A total of 19 (13.87%) and 44 (32.12%) respondents strongly agree and agree that there was a lack of digital infrastructure to access LMS during the COVID-19 lockdown, while 20 (14.60%) respondents are uncertain about the question.A total of 49 (35.77%) and 5 (3.64%) respondents disagree and strongly disagree with that.
Furthermore, as shown in Table 3, a total of 35 (25.55%) and 38 (27.74%) respondents strongly agree and agree that there was a lack of training on how to use LMS during COVID-19 lockdown.Again, 10 (7.30%) respondents are uncertain and 48 (35.04%) and 6 (4.01%) respondents disagree and strongly disagree with the question.
Table 3 shows that a total of 42 (30.66%)and 42 (30.66%)respondents strongly agree and agree respectively, that they were easily distracted when using LMS at home during COVID-19 lockdown, while 5 (3.65%) respondents were uncertain and 42 (30.65%)and 6 (4.38%) respondents disagree and strongly disagree with the question.
Lastly, a total of 75 (54.74%)and 43 (31.39%)respondents strongly agree and agree that it was difficult to write or set assessments using online LMS, while 8 (5.84%) respondents were uncertain and 6 (4.38%) and 5 (3.65%) respondents disagree and strongly disagree with the question.

Discussion of findings
During the transition to online LMS, the process was not a smooth sailing.The universities, students and lectures enjoyed some of the benefits that come with the adoption of online learning management; however, there were challenges that threatened the transition.Most respondents indicate that  they were not trained and they found it difficult to use online LMS.This finding is supported by Mashau (2016) who suggests that training is important in the technology usage and will influence the adoption of the new innovation.
Furthermore, most respondents were unable to use online LMS for learning because of intermittent internet connectivity problems.A study by Chigozie-Okwum et al. (2018) asserts with this finding.It shows that internet connection affects the use of learning management in some areas globally.The issue of internet connectivity encompassed the issue of access to digital infrastructure.Most respondents indicated that they did not have a digital device to access online LMS.

Conclusion and recommendations
This study sought to explore the transitioning to an online LMS during COVID-19 in order to identify the benefits and challenges encountered during COVID-19 lockdown.In this study, it was found that most participants had the experience of using online LMS such as Moodle and Blackboard.Furthermore, the data show that the students and lecturers were able to continue with the teaching and learning using online LMS.However, they experienced some challenges.A lack of digital devices and internet connection was found to be a challenge that affected ruralbased universities in South Africa.
Therefore, this study recommends that rural-based universities should fuse online LMS to their programmes even post COVID-19 lockdown because students and lecturers showed a willingness to adopt online LMS.However, training is a key to the adoption of learning management in universities.For successful adoption, rural-based universities should develop a culture of technology readiness to enhance the uptake of technology adoption.The emergence of COVID-19 surprised many institutions, resulting in many challenges towards transitioning from system to the other.
Sakai is a popular e-learning site that is used by prominent universities in the world and in South Africa.
e-learning, which has been customised for lecturers to be registered as users who can edit the site.The MOODLE comprises four e-learning environments: iLearn for teaching and learning assesses for assessments, engage for engagement and Incoko for research, which is hosted by the NMU Business School.Students can register at anytime and do not need to be physicaly present on campus:• Blackboard: This is a teaching and learning tool that entails the use of tests, surveys, assignments, grading systems, reporting and assessments.• Sakai: family or work-related commitments.These LMS facilitate seamless information and knowledge sharing across regions; however, users should be wary of security breaches because credentials to join or participate remotely can be shared by many people.
(Chigozie-Okwum et al. 2018)n, students can study anywhere, anytime as long as there is Internet connectivity and do have data(Chigozie-Okwum et al. 2018).Students can structure their studies so that they do not clash with

TABLE 2 :
Benefits of an online learning management system.

TABLE 3 :
Students and lecturers' challenges of online learning management usage., strongly agreed; A, agree; U, uncertain; D, disagree; SD, strongly disagree. SA