As hybrid learning continues to gain momentum, it’s important that teachers aren’t lost in the discussion

For World Teacher’s Day, Peter Collison, Head of Formative Assessment and School Platforms at RM, touches on the challenges the education sector has had overcome in the last 18 months and as conversation around hybrid learning continues to gain momentum, it’s important that teachers aren’t lost in the discussion.

Technology should be there to better the relationship between pupils and students, and as many schools turn to facilitate remote learning and virtual lessons, we now need to look at technology as more than a pandemic-related solution.

Peter Collison, Head of Formative Assessment and School Platforms at RM

“After a torrid year and a half for the UK’s education sector, there’s never been a better time to celebrate the hard work of teachers up and down the country. Faced with new challenges both professionally and personally, teachers adapted to entirely new ways of teaching while simultaneously managing social distancing measures to keep pupils and staff safe and, ultimately, keep education a constant for young people in Britain. Now, it’s down to parents, schools, and governments to rally in the same way to shine a light on the hard work of the education professionals pushed to their limits during lockdown.

“After all, there’s more that all of us can do to support teaching staff as we move towards a more permanent hybrid learning structure. Often, the conversation around implementing technology in schools is thought of from the perspective of pupils are parents only; however, on this World Teacher Day, it is important to remember that technology should better the relationship between teachers and students. For this to happen, schools need to access to effective training – especially given that, according to our own data, over half of teachers state they lack the right technology to support pupils.

“While many schools will look to new technologies to facilitate remote learning and virtual lessons, it is vital we now look at technology as a more than a short-term, pandemic-related solution, and instead a long-term development that needs our long-term attention. Teachers need to be sufficiently trained in order to hone skills in operating education technology so that they can reduce their time spent marking, and developing new materials, in order to focus on what they do best; building effective relationships with learners and inspiring a passion in new subjects.”