What teachers need from technology to cope with blended learning

The events of the past year saw almost 1.6 billion children worldwide out of the classroom as the education sector delivered blended learning during the national lockdowns. And while in England schools were reopened from March 8, we should still expect some level of blended learning to remain.

Education technology (edtech) has become the centre-point for students, staff and teachers in successfully delivering blended learning and as such will remain more important than ever before. Undoubtedly, 2021 will be the true turning point for its adoption across the sector.

The current state of edtech

Existing edtech solutions need to support time-stretched teachers and Multi-Academy Trust (MAT) leaders much more than they currently are. They are losing valuable time and bandwidth they simply don’t have, adding to the already significant challenges involved in delivering blended learning.

Traditionally, Management Information Systems (MIS) have been kept behind the locked doors of school administration offices up and down the country. This forced teachers to waste precious time and energy looking for and extracting information such as academic results, attendance and safeguarding notes. Without this insight easily accessible, it was difficult for teachers to plan effectively, step in at the point of need, and fairly assess their students. A situation exacerbated when COVID first hit early last year, with teachers and senior leadership teams unable to access the critical data they needed while working and teaching remotely.

Edtech needs to support blended learning

It’s been announced that A-Levels and GCSEs are once again out for another year in England, and one in two schools plan to let their pupils sit “mini exams” for their GCSE and A-levels marked by teachers. Given the importance of these exams for students’ futures, it’s imperative that teachers have the intelligence they need to moderate, level and benchmark students fairly and consistently.

MIS technology makes it easy to access the essential insight educators need to make informed decisions about their classrooms. This technology is crucial for senior leadership teams as they look to make delivering blended learning easier for both teachers and students in the coming school years.

However, MIS technology that delivers to the level SLTs and teachers need has been hard to come by in the education sector. They need an intelligent cloud-based MIS, driven by automation, that enables senior leaders to track students across their learning career so they can easily step in at the point of need. For example, understanding why a student is good in physics when they struggle in maths will enable them to proactively provide the best help and ensure they are improving the life chances of that student.

What’s needed is a real-time intelligence system that provides teachers with one single source of trusted data – regardless of how big the school or MAT is, or where it is located. One where academic results, attendance, behaviour and safeguarding notes are all stored on a centralised, easy-to-access-and-use system. This technology would provide education professionals with the genuine valuable insights required to inform their decision-making, plan more effectively, step in at any point if needed, and – arguably most importantly – accurately predict grades for their students.

Only by harnessing an integrated platform that acts as a technology backbone will schools and Trusts gain one single source of truth that encompasses academic, financial, staff wellbeing and parent engagement – enabling them to realise their objectives.

However, to make blended learning really successful, teachers and senior leaders must be empowered to use the technology at their disposal. They must also be armed with the correct know-how in handling and getting the best out of these systems. A level of support not currently provided is required to ensure MIS is being used well. This will be incredibly helpful to have in 2021 to ensure senior leadership teams, teachers and students can benefit as much as possible from continued blended teaching.

MIS for blended learning

The world is changing and it’s not a question of going back to normal, but rather of embracing the next normal. And nowhere is this clearer than in education.

What teachers need from technology to deliver blended learning is a powerful MIS to gather the intelligence required to deliver on what truly matters in the classroom – improving the life chances of their pupils. With access to real-time, integrated data, teachers will be able to make informed decisions for the betterment of their students. Bringing MIS out of the school office and into the hands of teachers will ensure their precious time is focused on teaching, delivering blended learning, and ultimately improve the life chances of children.