IDEAL Future Work Package 2 Report

20 Figure 6: Respondents by level of Education Section 5: Results Despite inconsistencies between countries with regard to digital learning policies, implementation plans and areas of focus there was significant consistency between countries in the themes and narratives that emerged from the interviews. The context regarding respondents use and beliefs of technology was homogenous across partner countries. In addition the reported challenges and skills needs were also uniform. Participants between countries also reported similar approaches to leading digital learning and encouraging innovation within their contexts. This section will describe the themes emerging as a result of the analysis. 5.1 Context In the interviews participants were asked to describe their journey into teaching and their beliefs about technology in education. Within the survey Interestingly the majority of respondents (65%) had more than fifteen years’ experience in education with almost two thirds of respondents having more than one career outside of teaching, these ranged from sales, medicine, technology and administration. In the interviews, several of the participants had transitioned into teaching from other contexts, careers or experiences ranging from industry or international experiences. They all initially studied in a discipline other than education. All of those coming from other areas, spoke of the interest in making a difference and working with children and contributing to society. Well, I went into teaching kind of later in life and I was about I was 29. I was working previously to that I was working in a software company and I liked my job. But I always kind of wanted to be a teacher at the back of my mind, so. I went back. And trained for that at a later stage. As I said because I just wanted to make a difference, I just wanted to help children, especially children with learning difficulties. (IE P13) Participants expressed mixed beliefs about the technology in education, the majority had conflicting beliefs and identified the need to balance technology integration into the classroom. But I think we should embrace technology but also be mindful of where we're going with it. That's so important like. You know, we just because it's new and you know we just need to take a you know just to take stock and make sure we're doing the right thing (IE P9) “ The digital tool is essential, it is unavoidable. I don’t see how we can teach today without integrating it into our teaching. ….. Nevertheless, I have more and more reservations, there, over the last four or five years, about what is deconstructed in learning, by making too many uses of digital. …., I think we 0% 5% 10% 15% 20% 25% 30% 35% 40% 45% Early years education (0-5) Primary education (5-12) Second level (12-18) Level of education respondents work in