Re-imagining Blended Learning. An Experience-Led Approach to Accelerate Student Future Skills Development

ABSTRACT

This paper argues that the changes to education and the workplace, brought about by the use of blended learning and working during the Pandemic, can accelerate the development of students digital skills. Adopting the EU definition of blended learning, the paper shows that a tripartite understanding of blended learning between schools, industry and policymakers is needed to secure sustainability and transferability of digital skills from school to the workplace. The challenges and opportunities of a European digital literacy programme, the Digital Schools Awards, are offered as a way to consolidate the development of digital literacy across Europe so that the experiences of blended learning and teaching during the Pandemic can be harnessed and advanced. To be sustainable, blended learning must appeal to students and their teachers’ pedagogical and curricular needs. The paper, therefore, promotes a continuum approach to blended learning where a range of developmental and progressive strategies are suggested. Then, a rationale for future work and skills is presented that draws on this continuum to support blended learning and working as a lifelong practice. A multistakeholder, peer to peer approach to the future of learning and skills development will, we argue, positively impact the way 21st-century citizens can educate, learn and work at a cross-cultural, multi-societal and institution level. © 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG.