Coronavirus in UAE: Disease outbreak boosts online teaching in UAE

Education is fundamental to any economy and any change in routine system can invite challenges. However, combining smart education using the internet, interactive learning sessions will make communication effective, which the UAE is embracing by adapting technologies in the virtual classroom and this is the best time to leverage it.
The well planned policies of the nation to re-skill teachers will now be effective as most schools will adopt online, offline or combination of both. Many leading brands are offering free services to ensure the education sector is supported as children cope up with change in their routine schedules.
"A lot of institutes are deploying remote management tools to monitor and manage virtual classroom. However, synchronous learning will take some time to be embraced like with any new technologies," said Rohit Bhargava, Practice Head - Cloud & Security, Cloud Box Technologies.
Amidst the current precautionary circumstances occurring in the UAE and across the globe as a result of coronavirus, it is important for not only students, but also teachers to continuously grow and learn. 
Teacherly - an online platform - supports over 80 schools across Europe and the Middle East with around 6,000 teachers and 20,000 students.
Atif Mahmood, founder and chief executive officer, Teacherly, said: "We understand the urgent need to create lessons and have them ready for students beforehand, our platform was created with the intention of helping teachers across the globe to reduce time and stress for teachers based on lesson planning. By accessing our pre-created templates, teachers will be able to create lessons in a much more efficient manner, with all the resources and tools already embedded into the platform."
The suspension of classes for four weeks presents a tremendous opportunity for education technologies to prove their value. UAE schools are among the most advanced in the world in their usage of technology and many already utilise tablet-based learning, digital classroom, online coursework and other cutting-edge technologies.
That being said, with closure of schools, parents see the primary challenge now being the lack of human to human, face to face interaction. Everything related to distance learning at present is based on apps that don't actually enable the set-up of virtual classrooms. 
Savio Tovar Dias, senior director - sales engineering, Avaya International, said: "We have been closely engaging with some of the largest schools in the UAE. This company offers Avaya Spaces, for free, to all school. This collaboration platforms empowers institutions to conduct virtual classrooms, and enables staff and students to set up virtual study groups, share presentations, videos, files and other content. We believe this will be of particular benefit to GCSC and A-Level and other final year students who could potentially be impacted by the disruption so close to their exams."
MDS experts work virtually with schools to assist in creating a remote teaching and learning workflow. "We show teachers how to utilise the built-in tools and features on iPad to create and share learning resources, how to enable students to collaborate virtually, and how to mark students work and track their progress remotely. Our aim is to empower schools to make the most of the technology tools they have invested in, and to continue seeing benefits of such technology in the long run," said Roger Kakhia, executive vice-president, MidEast Data Systems UAE (MDS UAE)
"Many Apple Distinguished Schools have already been adopting blended learning instructional strategies to introduce new concepts and assign homework. This is made possible by using tools such as Schoolwork app, which is a tool for teachers to create and manage lessons and assignments. It takes a certain level of readiness for a school to be able to take the teaching and learning experience fully online. A clear course structure, effective technology tools, and timely professional development are key areas to consider. However, in this phase, we encourage schools to be agile and flexible in their approach."  
Emma Hannon, director of Digital and Innovative Learning, The Sheikh Zayed Private Academies, said:  "As an Apple Distinguished School, with an already well-developed mobile learning technology environment, we have been able to deal swiftly and effectively with developing an online learning experience for our students while schools are closed. Our students already use a wide variety of apps and software on their iPad in school, and our teachers are well-versed in how to harness this technology to support student progress and engagement outside the classroom. Using interactive and adaptive applications and software will allow us to ensure that we can keep in contact with our students and offer support and guidance." 
 sandhya@khaleejtimes.com
 
 

Sandhya D'Mello

sandhya@khaleejtimes.com