Education and Technology: Rethinking Education in the digital era

Aims

In the last five years UK schools have spent more than £1 billion on digital technology. From interactive whiteboards to tablets, there is more digital technology in schools than ever before. But so far there has been little evidence of substantial success in improving educational outcomes.

The changing nature of the economy makes it essential that children on leaving education enter the workforce with the appropriate levels of digital skills to enable the UK to remain both competitive and leading-edge. However, there appears to be a fundamental issue that threatens this, namely our teacher’s inability to utilise hi-tech kit that is at their disposal to enhance the learning of their pupils. A recent report from NESTA entitled “Decoding Learning” said that whilst there is clear evidence that technology can boost learning, lack of training and understanding of modern technology amongst the teaching workforce is preventing this from occurring.

The main purpose of this course is to try to bridge the clear gap between the technology on offer and the limited skill base of those who have to utilise it. Many schools are clearly still using technology to support 20th century teaching methods and learning objectives. We are all acutely aware that technology could be much more effective if teachers and learners are given the right sort of training and use it in the right sort of ways.

Objectives

Attendance at this course will provide you with a knowledge and skills set that you will be able to take back to your workplace to the benefit of you organisation, including:

• How technology can boost learning
• Understanding the power of technology in transforming education
• Utilising the incredible potential of digital technology in and beyond the classroom
• Unlocking the vast opportunities for pupils to learn with others through the potential of digital technology
• Getting industry and education to work together to harness technology to put learning first
• Helping schools understand what technology to buy and how best to use it
• Helping the education system to embrace technology
• Preparing pupils adequately for a post-school period of study and work in a digital age
• Accelerating the adoption of best practice in schools across country