Parents must be aware of these evolving education trends

The COVID-19 crisis has turned our world upside down affecting almost every sector. The year gone by has been very challenging for one and all but students in particular have been more impacted. Given the current scenario, it’s tough to know exactly what the upcoming school year would look like. The best way is to keep up to date on current trends in the educational sphere so that you can get back to school more informed, irrespective of whether you’re in a classroom or teaching at a distance.

In a new era of innovation, education is not limited to the curriculum. Parents want their children to be more self-dependent, learn entrepreneurial and life skills so as to be ready to cope with challenges which life throws at them. Moving from a job seeker mindset to an entrepreneurial mindset, confident enough to build their own career choices. Technology has created a major impact on the learning and teaching methodologies and many ideas have emerged on how education will evolve in this new ‘Stay at Home’ era. Not only teachers but even parents need to keep a close eye on the upcoming trends in the educational front to prepare their kids for any eventuality. Educational institutions will also need to embrace new and innovative trends in 2021 that will positively impact students, teachers, and parents alike.

Some evolving trends in education, such as shifting from STEM to STEAM, cultivation of empathy, industry-based learning, customised learning plan, integrated learning techniques, entrepreneurial learning and life skill development.

Shifting from STEM to STEAM

While a STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math)-based curriculum that prepares students to enter the workforce with practical, high-demand skills is more familiar with students and parents alike. However, adding the arts alongside these subjects (thus creating STEAM: STEM plus arts) can significantly improve the academic performance of your students.

For example, an arts assignment when combined with math and science lessons can help low-achieving students understand STEM subjects better. In addition, it improves creativity—a useful skill for any academic subject. STEAM curriculum is also shown to provide a well-rounded and practical education than STEM alone.

Cultivating empathy

A positive character encompasses compassion for others, good communication skills, empathy, and a good relationship with fellow classmates.

Empathy is extremely crucial to build up a trusted and friendly relationship among students which will help them in future relationships as adults. The teachers must encourage interaction among students and include more group activities on a regular basis.

The schools which focus on cultivation of empathy have higher achieving students as their outcome.

Industry-based learning

While we all agree that work will never be the same, even if we do not yet know all the ways in which it will be different. However, parents and teachers must strive to prepare kids to face any problems that may come their way.

Gone are the days when students sat passively at desks while professors lectured endlessly, expecting the class to soak up all the knowledge.

A project-based learning approach allows students to collaborate, think critically and work in a group to develop innovative projects and come up with solutions to complex problems. All of these skills are must haves for any career choices to make in future and even prepares them for their journey to entrepreneurship right through college if they want to pursue it.

Companies today are offering industry-relevant projects to students so that they can adapt to a new way of learning while learning the skills expected by the corporate world.

Integrated learning approach

Integrated learning approach offers a mix of classroom learning with some amount of direct teacher intervention and partially through self-directed activities. It might be perfect if students are learning from both school and home next year.

As it is still difficult to say how and when students will get back to schools, many experts in the field believe that a blended learning approach will surely see a significant rise this academic year.

Customised Learning

Personalized learning has been on the rise for the past few years, more so to support individual student progress because each child can move at their right pace. In addition, adaptive software programs offer teachers the flexibility to use the same program for all students in their classroom—including those with learning disabilities.

The bottomline

As guardians of their future, let’s prepare our kids to learn how to tide off this crisis with an entrepreneurial mind-set by imparting the right mix of education and technology at hand while giving them the opportunity to chase their dreams with immense confidence.

Modelling entrepreneurial skills early in children

Entrepreneurship skills turn children into leaders, therefore, it is necessary to impart these skills early in childhood. A future thought leader in whatever sector, role or career choice they choose, your ward will stand out from the crowd. Today, with the uncertainty in regular jobs, the upcoming gig economy and constant upgradation of technology, these skills will help sail through the tough times.

Parents play a critical role in passing on essential skills and knowledge to children and regular mini lessons on these skills can encourage their creativity and observation skills. Other routine activities to impart life skills include taking them along to banks and stores, making a purchase and demonstrating negotiating skills. Children’s minds are very receptive, hence parents can impart some skills or virtues through their daily activities. Parents can play a very important role in developing self-esteem, resilience, empathy, industriousness, problem-solving attitude, creativity, and optimism. With these virtues children can make themselves impactful thought leaders of the future.

(The writer is Co-Founder, Kidzpreneur)

Strategies Teachers Can Optimally Utilize In Phygital Education System

Teaching in the post-COVID world has become an entirely new experience, requiring a different skill-set and a fresh perspective towards pedagogy. It is commendable that most of our professors and lecturers adapted so well to this sudden paradigm shift. Thanks to initiatives like Digital India and other e-services by the Government of India, online teaching has been achievable by most towns and cities in the country. Nonetheless, there are still some ways in which the virtual and blended learning modules can be improved, especially in this phygital world. Teachers can incorporate some novel strategies which will optimize their classes. 

1.  Using the online educational resources provided by the government:

MOOCs like SWAYAM, e-PG Pathshala and various e-libraries like Shodhganga, NDL, e-Shodh Sindhu provide access to a vast array of course materials and resources. Such resources can be used freely by teachers to enhance their coursework. Very often, the resources found here are virtually-friendly and can encourage the teachers to create similar modules for teaching online.

2.  Creating videos that can be used multiple times:

Teachers are increasingly being asked by institutions to provide video recordings of their lectures in order to lessen their effort while taking multiples classes on the same topic or grade. Pre-recorded videos enable the students to cope up with the classwork at their own pace and refer to it whenever needed. It can also immensely help with the flipped-learning method.

3.  Flipped-learning modules:

The flipped-learning module has proven to be quite useful in the phygital educational system as it enables the students to learn the classwork at home and discuss the ‘homework’ and projects with their teachers during college hours. This system works in online courses as students get much more involved with their group or individual projects and thereby contribute more in the class. If the coursework is pre-recorded by the teacher, it also saves their time during class hours.

4.  Giving a percentage of the course-work as Self-Study:

Given that most youngsters today are very digitally advanced, there are many elements of certain modules that can be given for self-learning to improve the experience of both, students as well as teachers. Easy parts of the coursework that can be considered as basic knowledge or easily accessible to all can be allotted for self-study. This is to direct students towards understanding primary fundamentals of the course-work which can be discussed in class while concentrating more on the applications or elaborations of the significant components.

5.  Making classes more interactive using digital tools:

Most of the online platforms which are used to teach are equipped with adages that can be used optimally to include all participants in discussions from time to time. If teachers learn how to use these applications and involve the maximum number of students, it will greatly enhance the quality of education and interactions during class. Keeping it interactive also encourages the students to feel connected with the class and lessens the feeling of being virtual. But this is easier said than done and needs some amount of proficiency with technology.

6.  Making the time-table more achievable:

Unlike a normal physical classroom, the digital classroom relies heavily on the students’ capacity and willingness to participate in the activities of the class. In order to make the curriculum more achievable and participatory by the students, the coursework can be broken down into smaller units and more measurable outputs. The traditional evaluative structure focusses heavily on semester-wise exams and assignments. But, in order to ensure that students are at par with what is being taught, it is necessary to break down the evaluation into ‘bite-sized’ modules that the students can ‘consume’ periodically. The teachers can break down the module into achievable weekly, monthly and semester-wise modules that can be evaluated accordingly. This will ensure the continual engagement of the students and be more useful in checking their progress. 

Techniques such as these can be implemented by teachers to improve the phygital education system. Of course, more and more teachers are finding newer and better ways to blend the physical and digital worlds and it will only be a matter of time before ‘blended learning’ becomes the normal pedagogic style in the entire world.

Here are the top technology trends that will impact education in 2021

 

The Covid-19 has served as a catalyst for positive disruptive change in the way teachers teach and students learn and assimilate information. It has accelerated the need for technology-enabled education – something that will define the very future of education – and this paradigm shift away from conventional patterns of teaching and learning is expected to continue long after the end of the pandemic.

In 2021, we can therefore expect to see a strong focus on connectivity, adaptability and student-centred learning. Indeed, I see the top technology trends that will impact education as follows:

Video-assisted Remote Learning

Remote learning became the top trend overnight in 2020 due to the pandemic. This has given rise to new and improved online education and management platforms that enable students, teachers and school administrators to effectively deliver and access their learning journey without disruption. The use of video-assisted remote learning, which allows a teacher to reach students wherever they may be located, will increase in the year ahead.

Artificial Intelligence / Machine Learning

It is no longer just a buzzword; it is a booming trend with increasing relevance to education. At its basic functionality, it can help automate certain teacher and administrator tasks, such as grading and tracking attendance. However, the true potential of machine learning lies in its ability to learn the progress and needs of an individual student and provide deeper insights for enhanced learning outcomes. Educators can use these insights to better cater to each student’s academic and personal growth.

Hyper-personalised and Adaptive Learning

Leveraging cognitive technologies in the development of numerous applications unlocks a level of personalisation not seen before. We will be better able to understand what a student is looking for and what he or she needs in order to learn, re-learn or explore. This allows course content and pathways to be tailored to the individual learner, meaning students may not always experience the same class in the same way, as content will be increasingly personalised.

Immersive Learning with AR and VR

The increase in demand for virtual experiential learning has boosted the adoption of Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR). Pushing the boundaries of traditional learning to make it more interactive, immersive technologies allow for virtual transportation into scenarios previously deemed unfeasible or even unsafe. By providing a digitally constructed reality or an enhancement of their surroundings, students can perform surgeries without risks, explore Mars, perform science experiments, or even attend a music concert with their peers around the world.

“Bigger” Data

Big data is getting bigger. With the multi-fold increase in usage of technology and digital tools, we can expect to see an exponential rise in the amount of data being transferred and collected. Data is being used to support predictive analytics use cases such as early alert systems in student success, or to determine future courses based on analysis of historical course-taking patterns by students. The possibilities to enhance the quality, access and personalisation of education in 2021 will be endless. Content creators and instructional designers will be able to use the insights they have gained into students’ experiences to better customise and create digital learning resources. Educators can not only benefit from their students’ understanding, but also use the data to improve their skills and delivery where needed.

On Demand Learning

Remote learning will lead to an enhanced understanding of how we want to better use our time. With fully-online and blended learning models on the rise, students want greater adaptability and flexibility in their education experience. Students will have increasing power in terms of what, when, how and where they learn. On-demand learning will see an increase in adoption, while ‘traditional’ school will be less limited by geography.

All in all, we can expect 2021 to be an optimistic year, powered by resilience and new learnings. Technology-assisted learning will be the central priority of any school, university or education model in the new year.