Educational technology has been a lifeline for schools over the past two years.
Not only did it facilitate the shift to remote learning, enabling teachers to host virtual or pre-recorded lessons and give students access to valuable resources, but it also helped ensure that communication remained effective between staff, students and parents.
And, even now that teaching and learning has returned to the physical classroom, edtech is still proving to be a lifeline for many: not only when it comes to delivering the curriculum, but in supporting students with their mental health.
We all know of the statistics that point to a gradual rise in mental health conditions in young people as a result of the pandemic. It’s here that edtech can lend a helping hand, whether it’s assisting teachers to identify wellbeing issues among their students or helping them to intervene more quickly and provide pupils experiencing mental health difficulties with some relief.
Graeme Wright, subject leader for music at Chilton Trinity School in Bridgwater, has found that Microsoft Education Insights, a software-based tool that provides live analytics of student progress and activity within their classes, has helped his school to better uncover wellbeing issues among students.
“We can see what time, day or night, students are accessing work and the intensity at which they are working,” says Wright.
“Engagement can be a trigger that helps to identify whether or not a student is experiencing mental health or wellbeing difficulties. This enables us to intervene more effectively, almost on a real-time basis.”
Andy Perryer, digital learning adviser at Cognita, a global private schools group that owns and operates schools throughout the UK and globally, has also seen the value in Microsoft Insights. The group use the tool in a number of schools to help teachers to gain meaningful insight into how students are feeling and engaging in the classroom.
“There is the ‘reflect’ tool that allows students to give a very brief snapshot of how they are feeling throughout the day using emojis, which then can stand to build a picture over time,” explains Perryer.
“Similarly, insights into assignments show when and whether students submit, and the data is presented graphically to inform teachers of how their students are engaging with the work.
“From that, interventions can be made to best support students who might be struggling to complete on time or to find underlying issues that can be positively addressed.”
Wright’s school has also embraced Microsoft Power BI, a tool that allows teachers to create a deep and informative analysis of school data. In Chilton Trinity’s case, the software is used to analyse the behaviour pattern of students, enabling it to quickly address key areas of concern.
“A student in my group was going through a topic that was triggering past traumas, and we collaborated on trying to unpick that and discovered that these past traumas were essentially unhealed,” says Wright. “We managed to put together strategies to help them feel more comfortable and, since then, their behaviour and confidence have managed to grow.”
The use of technology isn’t just helping Chilton Trinity and Cognita schools to better identify and respond to wellbeing issues, though. Both Wright and Perryer suggest that it’s also given children - particularly those that would struggle to ask for help on a one-to-one basis - a chance to be heard.
“Technology gives students the opportunity to have a voice,” says Wright. “One of my favourites is Microsoft Forms, which lets me survey my tutor group on how they are feeling. I capture the voice of every single person in very interesting ways.
“There are a lot of kids here that will not go to the safeguarding office, as there’s a sort of stigma to be seen to get help. That’s also being removed by the fact that they’re able to access self-help material through Microsoft Teams.”
Similarly, Perryer says that many Cognita schools are using a one-to-one device with Lightspeed classroom management software installed, which ensures that teachers can pick up on signs of distress in any student, including those that wouldn’t typically speak out.
“It’s a safeguarding monitoring tool that constantly tracks online usage, performs high profile search terms such as suicide or harm, and notifies staff of who and what is being looked at,” says Perryer.
“Designated safeguarding leads (DSLs) in school also get high-level reports of digital activity in their school so they know where the trends are and when students are online, which leads to how best to support their wellbeing.
“All of these insights are collated for staff in a way that needs no filtering or reordering. It’s the important data presented straight away that saves teachers the time to gather and organise, as the artificial intelligence (AI) does it all for them.”
At Cognita, the use of technology like AI is the number one tool for identifying wellbeing issues among their students, Perryer adds.
“If a student is searching for something late at night about harm or something else, then teachers are notified the next day so that positive support can be offered,” he says. “If the AI wasn’t there, the school would never know about a student’s cry for help or other wellbeing issues.”
Many might argue that technology is already overused in schools, particularly now that children have returned to face-to-face learning. Some may even claim that it contributes to the mental health difficulties being experienced by some students, however, for many, it’s providing a much-needed lifeline.
Wright believes that, when it comes to wellbeing, schools are not technology-focused enough.
“As educators, I feel we have a duty to evolve with the modern expectations around society and work. Our young people will be expected to integrate their smartphones into how they live and work. It is vital, therefore, that we teach our children, through positive experiences, that smartphones [can be] excellent tools for learning, instead of just seeing them as social distractions,” he says.
Perryer, too, believes that technology is playing an important role in helping to identify and relieve wellbeing issues among students.
“In any scenario, pre-pandemic, it’s how we use the technology that should define whether it should be used or not,” he says. “Technology needs to be used to transform learning, to give students the ability to create something otherwise impossible without the use of technology.”
Carly Page is a freelance journalist
Find out more about how Microsoft devices can help every student achieve their potential at microsoft.com/education
