The Many Ways EdTech Has Created Future Learning Opportunities

The COVID-19 pandemic caused much disruption in the educational space, but also created new opportunities made possible by education technology.

How can we make sure students receive a personalized hybrid learning experience?

Even while meeting remotely, teachers still want to engage with students in a meaningful way. Since it is so easy to hide behind a computer screen, teachers need to set clear expectations from the beginning of the course. Are students expected to have their cameras and microphones on? Are students expected to raise their hands to ask questions? 

When students understand what is expected of them, teachers can start to build a rapport with each student. When that happens, remote learning doesn’t feel so far away, even if you are halfway across the world. 

Where do you see education technology heading post-pandemic? 

As hybrid learning continues to expand and the emphasis on in-person learning lessens, the user experience of learning management systems (LMS) will improve. 

Previously, LMS was seen as a nice add-on, giving teachers a repository for posting assignments and files. If there were problems, students could always ask their teacher for help when they came to class. Now, more emphasis will be made on having a reliable, intuitive, and easy-to-use LMS, to allow a student to succeed without any interaction with a teacher. 

What is the biggest trend you have seen in the education technology space during the pandemic?

At InVision, we have seen a lot of growth in usage of our digital whiteboard, Freehand. Even with tools like Zoom, where teachers could see and speak to their students, the need still arose for a board that a teacher could write on in real time, just as they would in class. It was amazing to see that, regardless of subject or location, teachers sought the same sort of tool, one that would allow them to do what they always had, but virtually. 

How has technology helped empower the education space to most effectively elevate classroom engagement, foster collaboration, encourage creativity, and increase student comprehension and performance

As adoption of educational technology has increased, teachers and students have benefited by learning best practices of other users. For example, we recently released templates for Freehand and allowed our users to see what templates others created. Now a diagram, flow chart, or mental mapping model that worked for one class can also work for another class that might never have thought of it themselves. It is available for free and everyone benefits.

How can we make sure students receive a personalized hybrid learning experience?

Keeping students engaged and ensuring they have a personalized learning experience while attending school through a hybrid learning model is extremely important. The technology we have access to includes analytics, AI, the ability to track how students react to online quizzes, tests, assignments, and much more. Teachers are receiving real-time feedback and responses much quicker than if they were tracking manually. Through those assessments, educators can make informed decisions about what’s working and what’s not for their students as individuals. 

It’s becoming even more real-time through the digital curriculum and digital ways of teaching. Long term, I believe there will be a positive outcome for students because educators have access to more advanced technology that can help them evaluate and personalize each student’s experience.

Where do you see education technology heading post-pandemic?

The pandemic has essentially compressed years of experience and evolution for education into one year. Many school districts already offered online learning as an option pre-pandemic, but it wasn’t ever widely adopted. However, getting students back into in-person learning environments where they can have physical interaction with students and teachers while utilizing edtech tools is where the future is headed. Edtech tools can support any learning environment, but utilizing them in in-person environments will further help educators and students flourish.

What is the biggest trend you have seen in the education technology space during the pandemic?

Over the past year, the main priority for school districts has been to continue learning for students safely. Many focused on getting back to the basics by effectively leveraging edtech in a new learning environment. While doing so, districts also found ways to leverage edtech to support equity in the classroom and at home. By providing access to technology, districts are helping dismantle the barriers to equity by allowing a level playing field for students to learn and engage. This is a trend that will evolve beyond COVID.

How has technology helped empower the education space to most effectively elevate classroom engagement, foster collaboration, encourage creativity, and increase student comprehension and performance?

The use of education technology has opened the door for elevated student engagement, collaboration between students and teachers, and increased creativity and student comprehension. Interactive displays allow for a live teaching process where remote students stay highly engaged because they can see the lesson, the teacher, and the whiteboard, so it’s almost as if they’re in a mimicked classroom setting. 

The implementation of interactive displays are ideal for bringing lesson plans to life and creating new experiences for students. For example, if you’re teaching a geography lesson, you could have the specifics of the lesson on one part of the interactive display, and the other part could have a live map with annotations on it. Remote learning becomes compelling for students when lesson plans are delivered directly to their devices. Interactive displays are often fully integrated with resources such as Google Classroom, allowing teachers to easily manage their classroom regardless of whether it’s remote, hybrid, or in-person.

When educators fully utilize a suite of edtech tools, it is easier for them to stay organized and deliver lesson plans and information to students directly. Managing presentations, images, apps, videos, and more into a single, compelling lesson plan suddenly doesn’t seem like a challenge with the proper edtech tools.

How can we make sure students receive a personalized hybrid learning experience?

Historically, K-12 classrooms were not wired for technology. They were singularly focused on the in-classroom experience and found themselves unprepared for the necessity of hybrid learning, which happened practically overnight. Being forced into solving for hybrid learning posed its challenges: testing, acquiring the technology, implementing, and instructing teachers on how to use it. Now that these classrooms, schools, and universities have been implementing a hybrid approach, we can offer experiences that feel organic, immersive, and inclusive no matter where the student or teacher is located. 

Where do you see education technology heading post-pandemic?

The pandemic shed light on some shortfalls in some industries, education being one. We see educational technology having staying power for a handful of reasons, and democratization of education is the first. Each student has the right to learn no matter their location, and technology is the foundation that powers learning from anywhere. 

Inclusivity is another major shift in education. Some students with physical disabilities or mental illness may need more flexibility in where they learn, without the ability to make it to a physical space every day. With the rise of technology, we now can support these students and make them a part of the conversation, rather than feeling left behind. 

What is the biggest trend you have seen in the education technology space during the pandemic?

All technology is not created equal. Now that educational technology has become table stakes, implementing the right technology has been a growing trend. Teachers are demanding more organic in-classroom technology that allows them to teach the way they’ve always taught. They are looking for technology that is dynamic and moves with them, resulting in an immersive experience for those in-classroom and learning virtually. Otherwise the result is a stationary and distracting experience, which leaves less time for learning. 

How has technology helped empower the education space to most effectively elevate classroom engagement, foster collaboration, encourage creativity, and increase student comprehension and performance?

We’ve proven that a physical classroom is not the only location that is conducive to learning. Triggered by the pandemic, hybrid learning was implemented and in some cases gained overnight acceptance. Now, students, teachers, and parents know what it’s like to learn remotely, and have experienced the challenges and benefits first-hand. 

It’s now up to finding the right technology for navigating a better hybrid learning experience for the future. Effective tech means more organic teaching and learning experiences, the ability to have all voices be heard, and a platform where participants can actively participate despite their location. Technology, when implemented correctly, can bridge divides and create inclusive experiences, connecting teams, teachers, and students globally. 

How can we make sure students receive a personalized learning experience?

We must remember one caution about personalizing learning: We must retain some things in common or we will fall apart. Common experiences bond us together. Common memories create traditions. Common goals help us learn to work together with people different from ourselves. The teacher and classroom are uniquely positioned to help students collaborate and work together even as we use technology to personalize learning on an individual basis.

Technology should personalize learning and help students in remedial classes  where they are, not where we think they are. Additionally, it should help students progress at their own speed as students learn concepts. Teachers and technology should be able to partner together efficiently and simply to support students in a personalized way, but also in a way that supports common goals and experiences.

Where do you see education technology heading post-pandemic?

As teachers are now using many apps, those apps often have common rosters through single sign on, such as Google Classroom, Office 365, or Clever. However, two more things must be able to sync between apps: content and student results. Teachers must not only re-enter data in many apps, but they’ve also had to become great aggregators of how students are doing between many different apps. It has to be easier. 

There have been times when I had an excellent lesson, but had to enter the same questions and content into three or four different apps. Then I had to go between those apps to determine what students know and measure progress. So rosters, content, and student results should easily move between apps so teachers can focus more on teaching and less on tech-ing. 

What is the biggest trend you have seen in the education technology space during the pandemic?

Sadly, while many apps are now being used, the reality of disengaged students has come to the forefront. Additionally, some experts argue that students are unable to show the self-control required to focus on schoolwork. I believe computers and phones should have a “school” mode, which enables the use of educational tools while filtering out apps of mass distraction. 

Students need technology, however, technology depends too much on the weak executive functioning of still-developing kids who use technology more for entertainment than education. We are at a point of growth where we see that technology can be useful, but we question how useful it is in its present state. 

Engagement, ease of use, reduction of distraction, and better integration between apps are emerging as desires for parents and teachers alike, as well as students. The education apps are there, but integration and use must become more efficient and realistic.

How has technology helped empower the education space to most effectively elevate classroom engagement, foster collaboration, encourage creativity, and increase student comprehension and performance?

Right now, technology has empowered the triage teaching required by the pandemic without necessarily being used with best practices that existed long before 2020. However, for many of us who have been in-person, technology has helped us with social emotional learning as we created tools for mood check-ins and surveys, and to help us connect with students since we couldn’t get as close as we usually like to in schools. Additionally, the effective use of collaborative tools, passion projects, and personalized learning tools has helped some teachers. 

How can we make sure students receive a personalized hybrid learning experience?  

Luckily, personalized learning can be very flexible and adaptable. Without the in-person connection between teacher and student, of course, it can be more challenging to assess each student’s individual needs. We’ve seen teachers having to make a lot more effort to meet with students one-on-one or in smaller breakout rooms to give students the personal attention they need. 

Many schools have supported their teachers with much-needed professional development in this area. We champion those efforts with our Infobase Learning Cloud training courses.

Where do you see education technology heading post-pandemic? 

The value of education technology and digital tools during the pandemic cannot be overstated, and I think their use will continue to grow in class lessons and learning models in the future. The flexibility, the fresh new ways of engaging with the material and with the teacher and other students — it might have taken a real crisis like the pandemic to emphasize this need, but I believe education technology will keep taking a more prominent role in education. 

What is the biggest trend you have seen in the education technology space during the pandemic?

The beginning of the pandemic saw challenges and hurdles for educators as they were forced, with no notice, to create new ways of teaching through digital platforms, engaging with the class material, and connecting with the class. Now educators are harnessing those same digital tools and technology platforms to achieve exciting levels of freedom, flexibility, and personalization that I believe are here to stay. There’s no more one-size-fits-all model of instruction. 

How has technology helped empower the education space to most effectively elevate classroom engagement, foster collaboration, encourage creativity, and increase student comprehension and performance?

Education technology empowers educators and students with a wide variety of flexible tools that can encourage creativity, connection, and exploration, and there’s no turning back from it now. Virtual breakout rooms have made it possible for students to collaborate and stay connected with each other even from remote settings and for teachers to give more personalized attention to smaller groups.