Episode 43: Remote Learning That Matters with Jason Black, Program Director at Black River Innovation Campus
The concept of remote learning isn't new. People have been homeschooling and doing distance learning for years and years already. But the impact of Covid has caused a significant number of people to turn to remote learning rather quickly, although getting used to this style of learning will likely take some time. Fortunately, there are people like Black River Innovation Campus's Program Director, Jason Black, doing their due diligence to simplify the transition process in a meaningful way.
Jason has a unique mix of skills: a teacher in the classroom; a subject-matter expert on early-stage tech entrepreneurship; and an author. Both of his parents were educators working in colleges as well, so moving into that industry was organic for him. In his own words, he "eats, breathes, and sleeps higher education."
Digital literacy
Despite all the data we have about how the abrupt transition to remote learning has impacted students over the past year, there are still complications for a lot of different types of learners from the flipped classroom, the online classroom, and the traditional classroom. As educational approaches pivot on both the teaching and learning sides, we need to have a firm understanding of where learners are, such as understanding if students have the proper technology available to stay engaged.
A critical change to the direction in which online education is heading is that people will be working first, then learning (referred to as learning workers).
While we pivot away from this idea of technology as equivalency or a compensated approach early on, we can also start focusing on critical learning skills such as how we start to engage learners at each level, because the digital literacy equivalency is different at each level of each stage of the learning careers.
The ultimate goal is figuring out how we engage with them when teaching technology in a way that might not necessarily have to use technology first. The idea is that we are using the technology to further our abilities to complete a task or solve a problem. If we take those things away temporarily, we have a good opportunity to see if that technology is being used for the right purpose.
Learning styles, explained
'Learning workers' are the people that are working but want to learn to upskill themselves or upgrade themselves. They're also called adult learners. For them, technology is a great medium because they've made a voluntary decision to learn something, as they think that learning a particular skill will help them get a better job, a pay raise, or whatever they think is relevant to their career growth. When you look, on the other hand, at K-12 education or even higher education, most of these students are not really voluntary learners. They're involuntary learners or forced learners because parents are telling them that they should learn.
Working remotely can be a challenge for learners, especially if they're unmotivated. In a remote classroom, the teacher typically doesn't see the distractions a student has, which oftentimes is their phone. Even some of the most motivated students can become less motivated because of all of the distractions. On the flip side, one could argue that the technology is reflective of the same scenarios experienced in more traditional environments. After all, we've all been in a class and seen people with their heads down, not really paying attention. That could be the same thing as turning off your screen when you're working remotely.
At the end of the day, remote learning is only as engaging and exciting as the instructor makes it. The main challenge is translating that classroom content into an online format. When you teach in front of somebody, it's a lot more interactive, but when you're teaching remotely, you have to add additional interactive tools. Not all teachers have access to those tools or even know what tools to use, so the pivoting process can take a bit of time.
The phrase that tends to be thrown around is to "teach them where they are." Even in the online space, people like to use that phrase. And it's part of how Jason approaches all of his teaching—he needs to understand the person and what they are facing, especially during an objectively difficult year.
Lessons in and out of the classroom
The past year was difficult due to Covid of course, which itself is another learning obstacle. In addition to students and teachers catching Covid, the teacher role has changed, in that a teacher may have to develop ideas that maintain a baseline level of hope and engagement. Students not only need to feel empowered so that they can overcome some of the real-world issues outside of the classroom to stay on track in their learning journey, but administrators have to identify the need for flexibility to make sure they're serving students in the best way over time. The great part about all of this is that students and administrators alike can learn from one another. That's one of the lessons we're learning coming out the other end of Covid—we really need to know our neighbors better.
There's a lot of great opportunity for the future of education right now, but there needs to be some rethinking about what the educational institution is and what it's meant to be. It shouldn’t look at itself as an individualized, competitive environment where the institution can't see outside of the walls of its campus. That's a repetition of what we've seen over every cycle, whether it's a disruption that came from the original introduction of online education, or whether it was the disruption that came from the credentials environment. There are always going to be these things that come through and need to be addressed, but the schools that will survive and remain sustainable are the ones that are willing to change to match their learners.
That's really all it comes down to; having a renewed focus on appreciating your instructors, understanding your environment, and supporting your learners. If you can do that well, and have a strong reputation in your community, there's a lot of success to come.
Connect with Jason Black on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasondblack/
Learn more about Black River Innovation Campus here: https://bricvt.org/
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