Learn how technology can help support education by creating humane learning environments that help us focus on the most valuable resource of all – people.
At the beginning of the UK’s new academic year, a PebblePad team from Customer Success, Business Development and Product attended ALT Conference 2024. We joined in conversations with the learning technology network, discussing developments in learning technologies and theory.
As well as meeting our current university partners and making new connections, it was fascinating to talk to and hear how PebblePad is supporting the learning journey as well as teaching across different discipline areas. For instance, our digital learning platform helps support:
- Engineering students reflecting on their learning at the University of Leeds
- Students on placement within Teacher Education at York St John University Health
- Students enrolled in profession programmes at the University of Plymouth.
Keynote insights
The environment was the ideal setting for exploring this year’s conference themes, too – ‘doing, reflecting, improving, collaborating’ – which are closely aligned with PebblePad’s own values. During the conference introduction, the audience was asked:
“What’s your prediction for the coming year in edtech?”
The main word cloud trends included economic challenges, AI, digital assessment, personalisation, accessibility and inclusion. Accessibility is of particular importance to PebblePad as our eportfolio platform has been built based on WCAG’s four principles of accessibility.
Educating humanely
ALT-C 24’s opening keynote was given by the US-based teacher, speaker and podcaster, Chris Friend, who introduced what he called ‘Humane Technology. This is tech – including learning technologies – designed to empower people to develop their own agency.
Friend explained that by designing technology around human needs instead of technical specifications, we can empower people to restore the connection, participation and presence so crucial to personal development and the collaborative learning journey.
In control
Ultimately, Friend hoped that we’d all take a key takeaway away from his keynote: “For education to be truly successful, it needs to help students see their learning and development as self-motivated, self-determined and intrinsically rewarding,” he explained.
“We do that by putting students at the centre of all our work and our decisions – by bringing them into the experience at all steps in the process and critically, putting them in control of their own learning … giving students the ability to learn the way they want, using the tools that work for them while respecting their autonomy and privacy.”
Learning technologies are designed to support this student centred learning approach, helping students to become independent learners, make investments in their own progress and take personal responsibility for their learning. For instance, PebblePad’s eportfolio platform enables students to navigate, reflect on and make sense of their curricular and extracurricular activity at every step of their learning journey.
Student views
Echoing Chris Friend’s talk, we then heard from a panel of students from the University of Leeds and Edge Hill University, chaired by Megan Kime, the Leeds’s Director of Digital Education. The students shared their experiences and thoughts about the benefits of technology in their learning.
This included an interesting discussion about AI with Connor Gibson, a student at Edge Hill University, who said the benefit of AI was not asking it to write an essay – but ‘prompting AI to prompt me back … to further improve what I do’.
Finally, it was inspiring to hear from Josie Batley, an Art and Design student at the University of Leeds. She told the convention about how PebblePad has supported her to structure her content for programmatic assessment as well as provide a place for the Batley to make sense of her learning.
Welcoming spaces
As the event came to a close, we realised that the ALT-C conference echoes PebblePad’s own community. Each year, the event always has a warm and enthusiastic community of learning technologies professionals, encouraging learning from one another through collaboration and the exchanging of ideas and practice.
Like many of ALT-C’s attendees, we believe when it comes to preparing students for the future, how they learn is as important as what they learn. This means providing students with a single platform where they can reflect on their learning, achievements and experiences – and plan for future success across their entire learning journey.
- We’d just like to offer our congratulations to this year’s amazing ALT Award winners!
