“This weekend, our preschool teachers created another video for the students \u2013 just saying hi and checking everyone was ok at home. Each teacher has their own Microsoft Stream channel, and the feedback from the kids and parents is amazing: “Hi, teacher! How are you? I remember you so well!”<\/p>\n
Nuno Moutinho, CEO of Portuguese private school group Escolaglobal, is talking about his institute\u2019s move to remote learning during the COVID-19 lockdown \u2013 and how a digital transformation project that began back in 2015 had given them a welcome head start.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur TeK.escolaglobal project has helped us become a digital-first school,\u201d explains Moutinho. \u201cIt\u2019s a one-to-one solution that everyone now uses day-to-day, and we even got a 98% satisfaction response from parents after just one year of implementation \u2013 so it was easy to adapt when the time came.\u201d<\/p>\n
Escolaglobal moved to a fully remote-learning model on March 11th 2020 without any complications, a week before the government\u2019s school lockdown took effect. An achievement that STEAM coordinator, Diogo Da Silva, is proud of.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn 24 hours, we had a full digital plan in place so that teaching could continue remotely the next day,\u201d he says. \u201cOf course, we couldn\u2019t have known the Tek.escolaglobal project would prepare us specifically for this. But we were already using these tools, so we were ready when the time came.\u201d<\/p>\n
And it wasn\u2019t just virtual lessons Escolaglobal had in mind, as the new infrastructure also provided a platform for students to easily share videos and communicate during the lockdown \u2013 helping to emulate the everyday social life that this school holds close to its heart.<\/p>\n
First founded in 1979, Escolaglobal is a group of private schools located in three towns of Santa Maria da Feira, in Portugal, that offers students an interconnected education from nursery all the way through to university.<\/p>\n
\u201cOur motto is: from cradle to university,\u201d says Moutinho. \u201cStudents learn with us from 4-months all the way to 18. We really get to know each student individually and they get to know us \u2013 it\u2019s like a family.\u201d<\/p>\n
The school takes a\u00a0\u00a0holistic approach to knowledge, which pushes them to keep innovating and looking for new tools and ideas that will help them stand out from other schools.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor us, the students always come first,\u201d he adds. \u201cIn 2015, we had some of the highest standardized test scores in the country, but we didn\u2019t feel like our students were 100% happy \u2013 we needed to offer more of the skills that would help prepare them for the future.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cSo, we decided to move to a digital-first way of teaching with a Microsoft 365 one-to-one solution.\u201d<\/p>\n
By 2020, Microsoft 365 had been fully embraced by Escolaglobal \u2013 transforming the daily lives of both students and teachers.<\/p>\n
Microsoft Teams is now the school\u2019s main communication channel, allowing students to easily collaborate and submit projects, and teachers to grade assignments and answer questions.<\/p>\n
OneNote ClassNotebook and Microsoft Forms have also become popular tools amongst teachers, replacing the need for paper worksheets and tests with a more interactive platform that helps the entire class learn together.<\/p>\n
\u201cTeachers can be suspicious of using new technology in the classroom,\u201d explains Diogo Azeredo, responsible for teacher training. \u201cBut since introducing these tools, there\u2019s been much more interest and a willingness to experiment with new things.<\/p>\n
\u201cFor instance, I\u2019ve seen teachers replacing their whiteboard with OneNote, so whatever they write is instantly shared to the students\u2019 laptops \u2013 making it easier to discuss the exercise together.\u201d<\/p>\n
Parents too are on board with the new approach and how technology has been integrated into the school. One such innovation is Escolaglobal\u2019s flipped learning model, where teachers create bespoke video content about an upcoming subject and make it available for students to watch via Microsoft Stream before class \u2013 enabling them to learn at their own pace.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis approach helps teachers focus on each student\u2019s specific needs during class,\u201d says Da Silva. \u201cWe now have a dedicated team creating a library of these videos, which has really helped us support everyone throughout the school closures.\u201d<\/p>\n
With student and staff safety in mind, Escolaglobal decided to get ahead of the COVID-19 lockdown and move to a fully-online schedule through Microsoft 365.<\/p>\n
\u201cAll of our students had Windows 10 laptops and were already using these tools every day,\u201d says Moutinho. \u201cMicrosoft Teams became the new digital classroom and the Teams\u2019 calendar was particularly useful to make sure everyone had up-to-date schedules at all times.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Moutinho and his team, it wasn\u2019t just about classes continuing seamlessly. The school also wanted to be sure that students were coping with these new changes, both from a social and emotional view. This formed part of Escolaglobal\u2019s SEL project, which was essential to maintain the students\u2019 wellbeing, in this new paradigm.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe made sure teachers were reaching out and talking to the families too as these changes can be hard \u2013 especially for the younger ages, as they can have deep connections with their educators and teachers,\u201d Da Silva explains.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe scheduled daily activities through Teams that got everyone moving, even during the Easter holidays. Students could record themselves and their family exercising and send it via Flipgrid \u2013 it was great as it felt like we had our own social network.\u201d<\/p>\n
As COVID-19 lockdown measures begin to ease, Escolaglobal is adapting to a new normal, which over the coming weeks and months will include a blended learning approach as schools slowly begin to reopen and prepare students for their final exams.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe next school year will be different for sure, but we are prepared for that,\u201d says Moutinho. \u201cSome days they will be at home, some days at school \u2013 it can work both ways and everyone is very comfortable with either.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a time when schools across Portugal and the world have been asked to find a remote learning solution, it\u2019s clear that Escolaglobal\u2019s investment in technology has helped them provide a fast and effective response \u2013 making sure that every student still has access to a high-quality education, whether in the classroom or at their kitchen table.<\/p>\n
\u201cThese last months have proven that remote learning is not only possible \u2013 it works,\u201d he adds. \u201cIt\u2019s a digital step education was always going to take, and we\u2019re just glad we had the infrastructure in place to make it happen.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
“This weekend, our preschool teachers created another video for the students \u2013 just saying hi and checking everyone was ok at home. Each teacher has their own Microsoft Stream channel, and the feedback from the kids and parents is amazing: “Hi, teacher! How are you? I remember you so well!” Nuno Moutinho, CEO of Portuguese […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":372,"featured_media":347310,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1804],"class_list":["post-347307","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-customer-stories-en","specials-work-productivity-en","verticalIndustries-education-en","stories-how-can-i-work-anywhere-and-everywhere","stories-working-from-everywhere-en","businessPriorities-digital-transformation"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347307"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/372"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=347307"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347307\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":368243,"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/347307\/revisions\/368243"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/347310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=347307"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pulse.microsoft.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=347307"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}