IDEAL Future Work Package 2 Report

33 Some participants describe how negative experiences with technology can lead to staff reverting to traditional approaches and their reluctance to re-engage. This may be associated to risk avoidance whereby rather than learning from mistakes and enhancing practice professionals may decide that this is common practice and not to replicate it again There is a lot of internal resistance to adopting digital solutions if it comes from management and is perceived as an imposition; it is much more successful if the initiative is taken by colleagues. (LV 9 in leadership position) What ended up happening was they ended up putting one or two teachers off … and when someone gets put off using digital l tools, it doesn't come back too quickly like so it's only now we're getting one or two of them back ….. so took nearly four years to get him back around on the side again. I(IE P18) Some pre-service teachers spoke of their reluctance to introduce change or innovation as they are unsure of the school culture and if it would be appropriate. More experienced educators and educational leaders discussed digital transformation and innovation in the broader context of the educational system and schools, that this is not the ‘norm’. In addition those that do introduce change are conscious of not positioning themselves as a way that might be seen as perceiving themselves as experts or telling others how to do their job. There is a need shift culture to perceive change and and practice sharing as positive rather than negative I think it's a microculture and I don't think teachers are given enough….. especially younger teachers are given enough like encouragement to kind of, even if the school is against it, to try it. (IE P15) I suppose, the other big challenge would be they teacher reluctance, you know, hesitance and you know, you always get that challenge like, well, they're not doing this in secondary schools. (IE P 18) I've kind of finding is that individuals are doing their own practice to do from their own room, but people are very self-conscious and don't want to be seen as. Ohh well, I'm showing people good ideas of how this will work. It's just not the culture. I think it's huge part of the problem (IE P23) One interviewee spoke about the impact of other experiences or organisations and how it can help to open mindset. This relates to the earlier theme on context in which many of those who had worked in other sectors or organisations were more open to digital learning It’s very hard to change people's mindset or change what they do if they've never experienced another place. (IE P23) 5.3.6 Wellbeing Those interviewed raised the issue of wellbeing, both student and teacher wellbeing were highlighted as a challenge in the area of digital learning. Concerning student wellbeing online safety was a major issue across all countries, the potential for children to engage with inappropriate people and content. Some interviewees believed their role was to protect students from this and ensure their safety. They are so vulnerable online as well. And a lot of our kids are, it's a lot of where their friendships are. That's they'll tell you their friends are online. You know, they don't have typical friends. The big challenge for us is safety around technology (IE P1) Experience shows that students don't have good skills to handle technology independently - they need to be taught to do it safely. (LV 6 years as school principal and 25 years as educator) But I suppose from our point of view, we're trying to keep them protected and keep them as children for as long as we can, without outside influences that may be either distracting or inappropriate, (IE P29)