Coronavirus: The pupils who had a head start on virtual learning
- Published
Lucy Robbie is one of thousands of pupils to receive an iPad
When Scottish schools reopen in August, it is expected that most pupils will spend half their time learning at home.
The Scottish government has promised a major investment in laptops and tablets to ensure that can happen.
However, in the Borders every secondary school pupil has already been given an iPad through the council's £16m Inspire Learning scheme. Could this be the shape of things to come for the rest of the country?
Lucy Robbie says she feels fortunate to have the technology which enabled her to keep up with her schoolwork during the lockdown.
"They definitely helped us - not everyone has a computer at home," said the S2 pupil at Selkirk High School.
"We are lucky we have got the iPads so we can definitely do the work."
Lucy said she thought the scheme should be extended
Lucy admitted that the scheme may have had a more mixed response with some pupils.
"There are some people that do more work than others," she said.
"Some of my friends are quite happy to have it - I think others might maybe prefer not to have them."
Her father, Ewen, admitted to being a bit sceptical at first - as a rugby development officer he is usually trying to keep children away from computer screens.
But he said the technology - and the teachers using it - had come into their own while traditional classrooms are out of bounds.
"It has been a kind of blessing in one way or another," he said.
"The process that the teachers have got and the high school has got - it has been fantastic.
"Lucy just gets up in the morning, opens her iPad and gets on with her work."
Selkirk High School students received their kit last year
Both Ewen and Lucy believe the scheme should be expanded across the rest of Scotland.
And they expect this way of working to be part of the "new normal" when the schools return.
"I think we are leading the way. I think others might get iPads soon because they do definitely help with our learning," said Lucy.
"Once you get used to them they are easy to work with."
Richard Willan, principal teacher of technologies and enterprise at Selkirk High, said lockdown had accelerated some of the changes in teaching methods.
Richard Willan said lockdown was in some ways a "great opportunity" to test the technology
"A lot of things we are now doing we were already doing or were already working our way towards," he said.
"In some respects it is a great opportunity for us to really test these applications out and figure out what works and what doesn't."
He said that talking to former colleagues in England about his experience had made them "really jealous".
"The big difference for them is they are trying to set work for students with a massive range of accessibility and devices on different formats," he said.
"We know our students have access to these apps.
"I am not saying everything works perfectly all of the time, but compared to what they're going through this makes our lives so much easier."
The Borders secondary has been shut since March like other Scottish schools
He said this had made for an "easier transition" when lockdown came into force.
"The Inspire Learning project gave us a head start on this - I think we are better prepared than most other regions of the world," he said.
The scheme has already gathered interest across Scotland and beyond.
"They are looking at schools like Selkirk and other schools in the Borders and seeing how this is going," he said.
"I think it will generate a lot of interest in the future and you might see a lot of other regions starting to adopt this kind of framework as well."
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- Published21 May 2020
- Published18 September 2019
