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Engagement, Gamification, Learning, Motivation

Optimising learning through digital technology

In an increasingly digital world, the education sector is in a period of transformation driven by technology and new working models and methods. This digital strategy requires flexible education that encourages students and academic institutions to be active, innovative and entrepreneurial.

Electronic devices and the broader digital environment have become much more accessible to students. In terms of tools, technology has given rise to a wide range of platforms, equipment, systems, networks and applications that are already in use in many educational institutions and are expected to become even more common in the future. From the traditional textbook to a variety of digital materials, courses and support systems, content is expanding and diversifying.

As part of the Digital Education Action Plan (2021-2027) the European Commission conducted a public consultation at the end of 2020 to obtain the views and experiences of citizens, institutions and organisations on the impact of COVID-19 on education and training, the consequent evolution towards remote and online learning, and the future of digital education in Europe.

Respondents expressed that online learning resources and content should be more relevant, interactive and user-friendly, and not dependent on the financial resources of a city or local council. More than 60% felt that their digital skills had improved during the pandemic, and more than 50% confirmed that they wanted to improve them further.

The study conducted in the Action Plan helps to reiterate the current trend towards online and hybrid learning that has been accelerated by events in recent years. These changes have led to the discovery of new and innovative ways in which learners and educators organise their online learning and teaching activities, engaging in more personal and flexible interactions

Support and motivate students with digital technology

Digital motivation is about applying the capabilities offered by new technologies to increase students’ confidence. Thus, making them feel more comfortable in their educational environment and ultimately improving their performance. Active engagement, cooperation among students, quick feedback on work or assessments, and the ability to put what they learn into practice are some of the conditions for students to learn effectively using technology. Students’ lack of motivation is not only a barrier to understanding topics, but also a challenge for teachers in their everyday work.

Academic institutions can support students on a personal level while providing a comprehensive and integrated understanding of university systems. Digital and interactive portals provide connections to all relevant systems, as well as ‘live sections’ that display grades, upcoming assignments, timetables and other information and encourage participation before, during and after different activities. Access to information and course materials anytime, anywhere. A way of communicating with students and guiding them through their work giving them assistance, focus and reinforcement.

As shown in a study published by McGraw-Hill Education, students prefer digital learning to traditional learning. According to the study, 81% think digital learning technology is helping them improve their grades, and 71% say digital course materials have increased their engagement. The clear majority of students believe that digital learning technology has benefited their schoolwork by encouraging concept retention and improving grades, and that more than half (53%) of students feel much more motivated in classrooms that incorporate such tools.

Towards a new university student experience

Increasingly, students want higher education institutions to provide them with a personalised and individualised experience. They expect the same level of interaction and experience offered by consumer brands such as Amazon and Netflix. To respond to these needs, leaders at universities, business schools and other education institutions are beginning to see a connection between the student and the consumer, and how digital transformation is necessary to meet the demands and aspirations of today’s students.

Consequently, students no longer want to be treated uniformly and anonymously, but are looking for tailored notifications and suggestions, customized to their own interests, as well as a perfect experience. They want to be seen, heard and appreciated, as well as receive attention that is specific to them. According to the Connected Student Report, 90% of students want universities to interact with them as frequently as possible, using email, tailored communications and notifications, as well as other means. Around 40% say they would prefer more individualised communications, and 25% say they would like a more personalised university experience in general.

For a higher level of success, digital solutions must include procedures that encourage reciprocity and interaction, thereby increasing knowledge retention and avoiding monotony. It is essential to ensure that students apply what they have learned to solve problems, practice decision-making and skills development in a safe environment where their understanding can be tested.

At the same time, digital solutions can lead to improvements in educational institutions to operate more efficiently in capturing new students, in ensuring the performance of students along their journey and also in maintaining contact with alumni. In addition, they serve as a digital basis for 360-degree monitoring of the educational process. An integrated platform that allows students to customise their university experience from start to finish.

Some examples of the benefits are:

Collaboration and cooperation: experiences, work and projects can be shared, facilitating engagement and joint learning.
Autonomy and flexibility: there are a variety of methods through which information can be obtained, as well as sufficient freedom for their own organisation and planning. (Asynchronous education)
Interactivity and communication: Students can connect and talk to their peers, greatly enhancing their ability to communicate and learn. Even student-teacher conversation can take place outside the classroom.

Gamification in education

Gamification is one of the educational innovation techniques that has provoked most interest and success in recent years. It is a method that consists of introducing game aspects and dynamics into the teaching and learning process. Examples include ‘scoreboards’ that record students’ scores in various activities, ‘badges’ that are awarded to students when they reach certain learning milestones, and the use of applications that allow multiple-choice tests to be transformed into interactive competitions.

Let’s imagine an immersive narrative (initial motivation) in which we find ourselves on a deserted island and, in order to survive, we have to go through different levels, challenges and obstacles. There are many elements and strategies that we can incorporate into the island to encourage motivation, reinforcement, various stimuli and a greater sense of involvement. For example, through interesting and fun activities for students to work on concepts and exercise the basic skills that the subject is intended to promote. As you explore the island you earn small rewards that give access to badges and levels; all achievements will be added to a scoreboard (increased participation, continuous reinforcement and short-term motivation). In addition, a help or hints option can be included in which students can ask for assistance from both the teacher and other students (social immediacy). Within each challenge or activity there may be the possibility for students to choose different options or routes, i.e. depending on their choice, they may reach one outcome or another. For each completed task, quality and immediate feedback can be received in order to learn beyond mistakes. The experience can also encourage group work and systems of competition between teams (team-based learning).

This immersive experience can be part of any academic subject and for students of different ages, from different levels of school to university, postgraduate courses, etc. It all depends on the narrative, the approach, the design concept, the catalysts, etc. that are applied in each case. A way to exceed the mastery of the concepts of a subject and to discover and intensify fundamental values of personality and teamwork.

Therefore, we can conclude that the education sector has undergone a significant digital transformation, encouraging both students and academic institutions to become more engaged, creative, and entrepreneurial. Learners and educators have discovered new and imaginative methods to organize their educational activities as a result of recent changes and adjustments during the pandemic. There is now a much easier access to electronic tools, and technology has resulted in a variety of platforms, equipment, systems, networks, and applications. Digital transformation is necessary to meet the demands and aspirations of today’s students, who are increasingly seeking a personalized and individualized experience and concepts such as gamification can further improve student performance and motivation while also making a topic more enjoyable.

20/06/2022/by Patricia Wiggett

Employees, Engagement, Learning

L&D Today: Digital Learning for the Zoomed Out Professional

No matter what the job is most workers and employees will need to go through training, learning and development in some form at some point. It will vary drastically between sectors amongst other factors but generally it can be split into three distinct categories: mandatory (for example, health and safety or IT security), career related (project management), and personal development (communication and presentation skills). In the corporate world learning has received more pronounced attention (and subsequently investment in many cases) from executive and people teams in recent years, especially as demand for learning opportunities builds with each new generation entering the workforce, and with more readily available opportunities to demonstrate upskilling across your career. Scan the careers section on LinkedIn and you will spot ‘learning’ playing an integral role in many organisations EVP, or just being an essential compliance piece for effective employees.

However along with demand, expectations are also growing. Organisations are eager to stay relevant and keep their employee experience offering innovative, but so often people keep circling back to LMS platforms with no personalisation or personality. You can only reinvent the same content or processes so many times, and L&D professionals today find themselves in a battle for people’s attention in a world that has had to move so many events and strategies entirely online. Equipped with all the benefits of technology, but perhaps still facing a delay until we can have face-to-face sessions again, how can we reinvigorate and enable L&D to ensure participation, commitment, and engagement?

Video is King?

Video has long been the first step for online learning settings, and it is particularly useful when virtually replicating what otherwise would be happening in a classroom based or face to face environment. Quick videos suit the attention span of today’s learner, and conferencing helps encourage connecting and collaborating across locations. There are plenty of advantages that video content can bring to the professional world. It has the potential to be delivered at any time often on any device, it can be made bite sized, it can be made collaborative, autonomous, virtual, the possibilities only grow with technological advancements. But in the same breath, so does video exhaustion. Zoom has seen a growth from 10 million meeting participants per day to over 300 million per day since the start of January 2020. It has been used for everything from virtual coffee mornings to delivering webinars. Whilst the online move was vital for the events space and has shown great lengths of creativity behind L&D, even by the second month of lockdown many were feeling saturated, facing webinar overload, and most concerningly worrying about the potential impact on career progression and stagnation over time.

Video undoubtedly does enable more dynamic content production, but it doesn’t always allow for inter-personal or spontaneous moments that develop naturally in person and this has been noticed profoundly since lockdown. Conferencing and video both have a tendency to fall flat when it comes to personal and professional development. Individuals are lacking the communication and collaboration required to thrive, develop, and pick up those soft skills from being immersed in a physical environment with others. It can feel hard for people to feel like they’re progressing, learning, or on track with their development when it’s just them and their screen all day every day, they’re having to prove their skills and aptitude purely online. This is where a balance between technology and human interaction becomes important. There are plenty of digital solutions to connect A to B or carry messaging. To support people’s innate drive for relatedness, autonomy, mastery and purpose any implemented technology needs to facilitate experiences that address and interpret the core needs of the people involved.

People need more of a hook with compelling content in order to build engagement and commitment to the learning path.

Not Just Playing Games

A 2019 survey found that 83% of the respondents receiving gamified training felt motivated, versus only 28% for those undertaking non-gamified training. When gamified elements were added to training, boredom dropped to 10%. And although integrating gamification into training or L&D isn’t new: right now, there is a great opportunity to delve further into its possibilities.

Think about traditionally content heavy training: we have all been faced with reading through pages upon pages of health and safety, corporate rules and regulation training that is often difficult to absorb. Translating this content into a virtual gamified experience has been show to be a particularly effective approach for helping to deliver consistent experiences in a way that employees can ‘digest’ easily, interpret

Feeling Inspired?

That said, hesitations around gamifying experiences is understandable, particularly when trying to deliver essential or meaningful training, such as how to improve communication or diversity awareness. But gamification doesn’t always just make something fun. It can be a stimulating element for ensuring learning transfer, through more meaningful recognition techniques, visualising progress, or simply by integrating levels or tutorials to help people find their feet on a new course. In the absence of face to face training, simulation and scenario-based training can be a great substitute, especially with the advent of more affordable technologies such as Virtual Reality. Applicable for more practical roles when you’re not yet able to put skills to the test in reality, like practising beauty treatments or developing trade related skills safely. This kind of immersive approach can be used for this by putting people in realistic, but safe situations – just like you would in a role play in face to face training, but without the nervous laughs and self-consciousness. When considering VR, research shows that the added movement associated with being able to move your head and even arms can increase a participant’s feeling of empathy during the experience, which can make a huge difference for people in customer facing positions. Or as part of recreating or simulating everyday experiences within a virtual environment, participants can create avatars to explore content, courses and locations, in a much more direct way.

Once you lift the experience from the classroom, the opportunities and approaches are endless. So whether it’s recreating a training event on a group video call, developing and providing a gamified experience or a virtual world: the common denominator in what will make each approach successful is the focus on making it an engaging experience, made accessible to potentially all employees irrespective of location. It might not be a full replacement for everyone being in a room together, but it’s certainly one step closer, and a way that training, L&D can be provided more naturally. Still providing something insightful, engaging and valuable yet is capable of evolving with changing circumstances and requirements. And not forgetting, providing an element of fun along the way!

29/10/2020/by Lara Jones

Engagement, Learning

L&D Today: Enhancing Higher Education

The university experience hangs in the balance with students paying more than ever before to continue their higher education, during a time where they may not even be able to move to the city where their university is based. What effect does it have on the university-student relationship to have such formative years move entirely online? For starters, the pressure is on for educators to provide value and sustain student interest and engagement levels, and to tackle somewhat unexpected challenges.

Sarah, a lecturer from Newcastle University, says: “the key thing we noticed when we switched to online teaching at the start of lockdown was the lack of engagement online with students, this was surprising considering how they’re typically so comfortable online and on their phones.” She and her colleagues found students reluctant to partake in dialogue and discussions, with few willing to even use instant messaging or chat functions, even more hesitant to turn on their cameras in seminars and tutorials. Overall, during lockdown, they discovered the students were generally uncomfortable fully engaging in sessions. While she originally figured she would be battling IT issues and stuck on imaginative content creation, Sarah has found herself spending more time thinking of how to simply inspire debate and conversation while addressing these new needs, behaviours and confidence levels.

It strikes a noticeable and perhaps surprising difference between the webinar-mania from the professional world over the last year, compared to the awkwardness of students using the same platforms for learning when technology is arguably their strength.

In her online classes at the end of the 2019/20 academic year, Sarah tested and found success in readjusting the session format into panel discussions where students could listen in and observe academics and specialists break down and analyse key topics. It’s helped take the pressure off students and prioritised absorbing and understanding the course, over the focus on whether someone has turned their camera on or not. Nevertheless, it still leaves the teams facilitating learning and nurturing students concerned about how to ensure engagement with online content for this coming academic year. Universities have a vital role in fostering curiosity, innovation, and creativity. If students are switching off, we need to understand why. Here is where matching the flexibility and accessibility of technology with a deeper understanding of audiences and their motivations can really help boost the connection in learning.

Gen Z audiences, for example, are known to expect instant communication and feedback. From friends and parents but also educators too. Is current heightened connectivity also providing increased feedback and understanding of their performance and progress? When Stanford University ran an informal survey on how students felt sharing video during lectures, two-thirds of respondents reported they have been in a situation where they felt uncomfortable having their camera on in class. When asked why, respondents said they were self-conscious about being seen in class, weren’t in private spaces and/or didn’t want to show their current living situations. Lockdown arguably blurred lines between professional, school, and home life for everyone, and we mustn’t forget that university students’ living situations are often going to reflect where they are emotionally, financially, and personally. So how can we balance professors needing to know their students are ‘present’ and students needing to feel comfortable or like their space hasn’t been invaded?

Maybe the answers lie in reinventing the environment instead of replicating the traditional. A new learning environment should mean a new look into innovative approaches to spark interest, participation, curiosity and commitment. It can sound scary and resource intensive at first, but it can be something as simple as integration of Twitter threads for bursts of insightful information in a way that relates to the audience to help tap into the concept of microlearning. Particularly vital during a time where distractions are constant and attention spans are significantly shorter, the expectation to learn primarily from reading long blocks of information may soon be a thing of the past. Or, it could be something more captivating to make the learning experience more meaningful for students. Inclusion of game like elements such as immediate feedback, visualised progress and staggered learning across levels (i.e. have you understood X before moving onto Y?), are ways to enhance the online learning experiences. Various studies [Tan and Singh (2017) and Glowacki, Kriukova and Avshenyuk (2018)] have been carried out over the years in the field of gamification in higher education by using gamified tools such as Kahoot, with many specifying its effectiveness for learning transfer, boosted motivation and overall engagement.

Adding gamification or game elements is a great example of how taking advantage of technology can help to boost more meaningful learning in a way that’s fun and novel, yet also insightful and informative for students. Boundaries can be pushed further with other innovative approaches, utilising artificial intelligence aided virtual assistants or virtual, immersive environments. All of these approaches represent a look into how the near future of learning in higher education is developing, particularly as younger generations are in constant search of and desire for new and exciting experiences.

19/10/2020/by Lara Jones

Engagement, Learning

L&D Today: Change in the Classroom

This is part of a series – check out part 1 here

Schools have long followed the most traditional approach to learning and potentially struggled the most when it came to lockdown learning. With a dramatic range of learning needs, ages and attention spans, examinations, and home situations, it has been hard to deliver lessons with the same consistency and rigour over a screen or via a platform. Helen, a Chemistry teacher from North London, says the COVID-19 lockdown turned her world upside down from one day to the next.

“In a school, not all teachers are following the exact same schedule, facing the same challenges, addressing the same needs, or even required to deliver materials the same way. So, when we moved to remote learning, those different circumstances suddenly became even more accentuated.” Because the immediacy of the lockdown, Helen and her colleagues faced a scramble to work out how to balance teaching in terms of prioritising age groups in need of more personalised tutoring across MS Teams, and in terms of who had more availability. “Sometimes this meant everyone doing less, sometimes it meant people without caring responsibilities taking on more than their share. It was almost unavoidable.” Lesson materials were uploaded and shared, homework was returned, the practicalities of teaching and learning continued, but something she genuinely noticed and felt hard to replicate was the pastoral care – both for students and staff.

On paper, the move to more online learning could be great. By the day younger generations are increasingly familiar with and adept at technology. There is ample potential for bringing learning to the screen. One study showed learners recall more when using virtual teaching methods than with traditional methods, a comparative study of the same core content but through different mediums, which proved a 76% increase in learning effectiveness. With this in mind, going virtual shouldn’t mean a drop in attainment, but of course the theory is not always the case in reality.

As we have seen, schools were an area of society that were never going to stay ‘closed’ forever and though reopening has its share of challenges, we wonder how technology could assist in the teaching and learning ecosystem of the future.

Firstly, teachers and schools would argue there is more to their role than just delivering learning. In the move to screen time learning, the biggest missing piece for them became the complexity in sustaining pastoral care – for students and colleagues alike. Pastoral care can feel juxtaposed online, especially when so much can be noticed by watching students in the classroom, picking up on individual moods and behaviours. A significant part of pastoral care is the support network between teachers and co-workers within schools. Grabbing each other for a quick word in between classes, comparing notes and building a better picture of what works and what doesn’t. Coming out of lockdown, Helen says that she came to really value how everyone managed to sustain that teamwork in order to create more flexibility for each other.

Could schools take a page from the corporate world’s book and adopt team catch ups, incorporating more teamwork and collaboration into the day? Easier said than done though as teachers are renown for having barely any time in the day already, adding another call or meeting maybe wouldn’t be the best use of their time when they may feel stretched or that their focus is needed for curriculum creativity and innovative ways to capture student’s attention. However, the way to navigate that issue, is to design solutions with the teacher’s needs and schedule in mind. Digital platforms can centralise easy and instant creation and sharing of learning materials, that teachers can then adapt in delivery to the needs of the students. The experience can then be enhanced though, by including elements that will support the teacher’s working day. Features that facilitate immediate feedback, flag good news to the wider team, and enable recognition can provide automated motivation boosts during a day where they may not get an actual thank you for their dedication. Within the same platform, messaging can connect colleagues interested in or working on similar areas to improve collaboration or provide functionalities that enable teachers to ‘raise their hand’ for an offline conversation about a concern they may have regarding work, materials or safeguarding. By using personalised, digital solutions a fragmented day becomes streamline.

Asking for help or getting recognition could be sped up for instantaneous responses, and all the effort needed to “connect the dots” becomes less labour intensive, so teachers could then spend less time on frantic creative content creation, and more time on the personalised, pastoral care that technology can’t exactly step in and help with. Innovation doesn’t need to result in overhaul, but we won’t necessarily enhance the learning experience by just moving materials online or creating video content for classrooms. Real change comes by understanding your audience, and identifying where connections can be made, where they struggle, and how to enable small improvements for huge steps forward. A bit like every great teacher we’ve ever known.

05/10/2020/by Manuel Alvarez

Employees, Engagement, Learning

L&D Today: Me, My Screen & I

Approaches to learning and development (L&D) are constantly evolving in keeping with evolving tools and expectations. Although before the events of this year, educators and knowledge professionals arguably, at least felt more able to control, influence and grow with the changes. 94% of L&D professionals have recently reported they have had to change their L&D strategy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, and another 59% thought their organisation’s adoption of digital learning was immature given the developments. L&D have had some advantages in their court for a while; technological tools and platforms opened up doors for sharing information immediately and internationally, for creating more dynamic materials, and for creating different paths for learners to follow that suit their own personal approaches and needs.

But L&D spans a huge area and depending on your focus you’ll no doubt be facing a myriad of different yet equally complex challenges today. Perhaps the biggest shared one though, being how to engage your audience. An audience who you now predominantly have to access via a screen. The pressure is on to keep materials relevant and interesting yet easy to digest, that learners can take away with them and apply in their everyday lives once they shut their laptops.

For a while, people responsible for L&D have needed to get even more creative in how they reach their audiences, who are becoming even more overwhelmed, distracted, and unfulfilled in their relationship with learning. Gen Z smartphone users unlock their devices on average 79 times a day. Office workers are interrupted every 11 minutes. Only 26% of employees strongly agree they learn or do something interesting each day. But, actually, it would be wrong to regard these as hinderances to the learning process. Gen Z may be untethered and online, but they are also an incredibly passionate and aware generation. Office workers may be short on time, but bite sized learning is proven to lead to 20% better knowledge retention. The circumstances of the last few months, although initially a shock, could now be the call to action for schools, organisations, and companies to enhance their offering – whether for the remote student, remote employee or apprentice – in order to appeal to what the modern learner is looking to attain from the experience. We are all looking at opportunities to react in order to pull audiences back in, nurture commitment to courses, and improve learning transfer rates.

Join us over the next few weeks as we take a closer look at the current state of education, learning and development, understanding recent experiences and assessing new approaches across 3 distinct areas: classroom based learning, higher education, and workplace development.

INTERESTED IN L&D?

22/09/2020/by Manuel Alvarez