SEK Future Learning Model (FLM) is the result of a renewed look at the Intelligent Classroom, based on our experiences of online learning and teaching over the past year. During the months of lockdown, in which we have put into practice a distance education model, we have been able to learn from new methodological formats, from using new tools and new ways of learning and interaction between the different members of our Community.
The FLM takes into account the impact of this experience on the future and redefines the purpose of the school as a “place” in order to develop a much broader concept of learning that serves the needs of our students today and in the future.
We saw a need to create motivating and enriched learning flows that use face-to-face or digital formats depending on the pedagogical purpose they pursue, in either physical or virtual spaces, that allow us to create personal development experiences for each student.
To further explore these and aspects of our approach to education, SEK Education Group set up a Think-Action Tank on 30 May that concluded work on 30 June presenting an initial learning model. Groups of teachers from all SEK Schools are working to progressively implement it as of this school year.
The model also highlights the meeting points between the Intelligent Classroom, the IB and ACE Learning Principles (NEASC).
The SEK Future Learning Model outlines the general guidelines to consider for the design of practices that have an impact on learning.
Essential elements of the Future Learning Model
The elements of the Future Learning Model offer a robust and flexible structure for quality learning and teaching, within the framework of the Intelligent Classroom.
Our primary goal is to ensure a seamless and quality learning process during this new school year, offering a teaching and learning model according to the academic, social and emotional needs of each student.
Our priority will be to seek to offer the maximum possible in-person learning for all our students, putting in place our health and safety protocols, which you can consult here.
At SEK Education Group, we are constantly up to date with the official guidelines and instructions from the public authorities on which our schools depend. Therefore, we follow the most beneficial guidelines for our students’ learning.
If there is a case of COVID-19 at one of our schools, the health and educational authorities will be informed to determine the best way to proceed and the measures to be taken in order to protect the safety of our entire community. However, in whatever circumstances the school is prepared to ensure, immediately, the seamless continuity of the academic process remotely.
The SEK educational model is based on the following principles:
Our main objective is to ensure the continuity of each student’s learning process, as well as their balanced social and emotional development.
The current situation is also an opportunity to continue developing the principles that characterise our educational model:
In the event that a transition has to be made to an online learning for these stages, the bond between teachers and children will be forged, maintained and strengthened, since relationships are an essential component of learning at these ages. In addition, we will seek to help families deal with this difficult moment through proposed meaningful activities, providing materials and resources and ensuring constant emotional support.
The stage tutors and coordinators will be in permanent communication with families. If it is necessary to shift to online learning, teachers will upload onto the SEK Blogsphere and the MySEK Digital Diary videos made especially for children and suggestions for activities that families can carry out in a simple way, using both materials and resources they have at home, such as a series of resources that the school will provide and send to each student, through a SEK home-learning box.
Students from ages 3 to 6 will continue their learning process within the framework of the IB Primary Years Programme, through video lessons recorded by teachers, following the flipped learning method, as well as a series of suggestions for activities and learning experiences that children can do asynchronously. In addition, each group will also have daily assemblies, where teachers and children will meet to talk, explore learning content and keep in touch, thus strengthening close bonds that are so necessary at these ages.
The objective for this stage in the event we need to shift to online learning will be to continue with inquiry-based learning, within the framework of the IB Primary Years Programme. In order to do this, students will take part in synchronous online learning experiences, connecting with their classmates and teachers. They will also be provided with asynchronous experiences, following the instructions from their teachers, and using different resources developed specifically for this purpose.
In addition, they will use of a series of resources that the school will provide them through a SEK home-learning box. These materials will help them take part in the learning experiences led by teachers in the online lessons and they will have the opportunity to apply their learning in a specific way, thus reinforcing meaningful learning.
Students will be able to continue exploring the ideas and units of inquiry through very diverse learning experiences, just as they do in their face-to-face lessons. Teachers will share resources, content, and instructions through the SEK Blogosphere and Microsoft Teams, where they will post videos, activities, and web resources.
Learning will take place with the support of the MySEK platform, which contains the following applications for managing distance learning:
If years 1 to 4 of Secondary School have to shift to online or blended learning students will continue with their IB Middle Years Programme, made up of eight subject groups that foster a varied and balanced learning experience.
If it is necessary to offer a blended or fully online model, we will implement the online learning protocols put into practice last year, now improved thanks to the feedback given by our entire community through surveys and focus groups. We will continue to use our MySEK platform, featuring the following applications for distance learning management:
Each teacher will be able to determine the use of other resources and platforms to create motivating and diverse learning environments.
Our prime objective at this stage is to maintain continuity in students’ teaching and learning process and give them a first-class preparation for them to be admitted to the best universities in the world.
If it is necessary to offer a blended or fully online model, we will implement the online learning protocols put into practice last year, now improved thanks to the feedback given by our entire community through surveys and focus groups. We will continue to use our MySEK platform, featuring the following applications for distance learning management:
Each teacher will be able to determine the use of other resources and platforms to create motivating and diverse learning environments.
The experience of last year’s Diploma Programme exams caused concern for our students and their families. Despite having been an experience with many uncertainties, SEK Schools are extremely happy with the outstanding results that our students finally obtained, which are the best in the history of our schools. We are confident that, in this new school year, we can continue to offer a quality learning experience that will best prepare each of our students to meet the demands of the 2021 IB exams. Currently, the IB has not released any statements regarding plans for the forthcoming exams, but we hope that they can go ahead normally in May 2021. We are keeping up to date with any communications and news from the IB.
With the aim of continuing to offer a quality educational experience to our Diploma Programme students while safeguarding their health and safety, we are in contact with the authorities to establish and respect the official guidelines for teaching and learning that best meet the needs of our students.
If it is necessary to offer a blended or fully online model, we will implement the online learning protocols put into practice last year, now improved thanks to the feedback given by our entire community through surveys and focus groups. We will continue to use our MySEK platform, featuring the following applications for distance learning management:
Each teacher will be able to determine the use of other resources and platforms to create motivating and diverse learning environments.
Assessment throughout the different stages is a continuous and holistic process and takes into account the student’s learning progress in all academic areas.
At SEK Schools we implement an Evidence for Learning approach, with an emphasis on the acquisition and development of skills, not just marks. We strengthen the feedback that is given to students and we offer specific information on what the next steps are in their learning process.
The protocols and systems have been implemented so that all the coordinators, tutors and teachers responsible for the different academic areas collect the necessary evidence for learning to assess the attainment of the stage objectives and conclude with a final assessment. This assessment is done both by teachers and students themselves, in addition to incorporating elements of reflection among peers.
Feedback plays a crucial role in the context of online learning. We leverage technological resources to facilitate constant communication between teachers and students. Teachers use a variety of strategies, such as recording videos to deliver general responses to students or recording voice notes to comment on individual assignments. Students also collaborate to identify work and tasks that best demonstrate their learning. In this way, there is ample evidence to be able to draw conclusions regarding each student’s learning process.
Many families have asked us why we manage the online learning experience in a certain way and, also, about online behaviour of students.
Allow us to share with you some online teaching and behavioural principles:
Our strategic lines include creating spaces for Professional Learning and Collaborative Planning (AP&PC), to improve learning and teaching, through commitment and professional belonging, and the development of teachers’ skills and capacities. The ongoing and continuous training of our teachers is one of the keys to the success of the SEK Educational System.
The use of technology, for the personalisation and enrichment of our educational model, is also one of its pillars. Therefore, our teachers are perfectly prepared to work with platforms and applications such as Microsoft Office 365, MySEK, our blogosphere, ManageBac, BlinkLearning, Symbaloo or Smart Learning Suite, among many others. This was a decisive factor in adapting 100% of the face-to-face lessons to online distance learning in an agile and efficient way last year.
Professional inquiry
As learners, teachers carry out Professional Inquiries, a self-directed and collaborative research and action process, through which they explore a significant problem or issue in context.
Teachers determine what aspects they want to work on, or problems they need to solve, and they ask about their students’ learning and educational practices. Through these inquiries, they seek an answer or solution to the question they are exploring, which results in micro-innovation.
The Professional Inquiries of SEK teachers should explore how to implement the elements of the SEK Future Learning Model over the different stages and education programmes and take into account the different learning modalities or scenarios (online, face-to-face, distance, hybrid).
You will be able to consult a small sample of the academic activity in this section
In this document you will find the results of some workshops and focus groups that we carried out with students, families and teachers with the aim of evaluating and continuing to perfect our learning model.
We are very happy with what the school has done to adapt and maintain a high level of teaching for our three daughters. The speed with which everything was organised in the first lockdown is also worth mentioning.
Together we have created a great community, it is no longer just our children’s’ school
The My SEK platform meant that students collaborated fluidly with classmates and teachers. We have found on this platform everything necessary to be able to follow the studies of children.
For the future it is important that we always stay united and connected
I would highlight as factors that were key to educational success during lockdown as learning capacity, motivation, teamwork, commitment and digital competence
Blending face-to-face and online teaching is great, it affords flexibility and gives us the best of both worlds in a single global teaching strategy. I think it prepares our children, not for the future, but to a current reality for which many young people and adults are not prepared yet
We have learnt that the system used by SEK is special and different from others, this is what makes our school unique. All its techniques, methods and resources have contributed a great deal to the way we are and how we work
What sets us apart now is the ability to adapt quickly to the new situation, to not fall prey to despair at the new circumstances and continue to give our best.
We were very lucky and have benefited greatly from the fact that SEK was already very well prepared with platforms, technologies, communications, digital adaptation of students and teachers, which has meant that from the first day of this crisis, all students and teachers were able to continue working almost as if they were still physically at school.
Our daughters have not had their school work or learning slowed down for a single day.
And this is thanks to the right decisions and great work of SEK Group over the years.
Thank you to all the teachers, and to the school in general, for the excellent work you are doing.
It is a privilege that, in these difficult circumstances, our daughters can continue to benefit from continuity in their school development.
This situation, and how they are facing it, is going to make them – us – much stronger and it is going to help us all to value more what we have and recognise the value of many things that until now we had taken for granted.
Firstly, I’d like to thank you very much for the work that the school is doing so that our children can continue with the school rhythm.
Congratulations, because not all schools are doing it this way and the result is not the same, children have kept up the rhythm of school life and that routine and attitude will allow them to continue learning even if they can go back to finish the year at school.
Thank you.
First of all we want to thank SEK for your excellent management and all of your teachers for teaching the classes, paying attention to and following up on our children.
They are helping, not just in continuing their education but also psychologically so they don’t feel abandoned, lying around the house all day, it helps them have a routine and to be able to think of other things other than this situation and what they have had to experience so young.
We really feel situations like these help us see what a good school we have sent them to.
We are very proud of the high attendance of students in online classes.
They are taking part in and making the most of tutorials to help with any queries they have and at the same time, keeping up with the work assigned to them.
We are trying to keep a certain rhythm for each subject’s syllabus.
This week we have done different activities like on the Science Bits platform for Physics and Chemistry and Biology, exercises on the Industrial Revolution in the Individuals and Societies subject, commentary on texts for Language and Maths problems.
They have also worked on different tasks in their language classes, or have inquired about their favourite musician in Music.
On behalf of all the students, we would like to start by thanking the entire school team, who responded to the problem immediately and managed to ensure that there was no interruption in our learning, making an incredibly quick transition to online education.
We would like to congratulate all the teachers.
You have adapted the way you teach, giving your all for our education to continue unchecked in this situation, which requires a huge amount of work that you have done perfectly. We want you to know that this effort is already showing results, the students remain focused, working every day, with the same enthusiasm and interest that we had before.
Just as we applaud the doctors and healthcare staff for all their efforts, you also deserve our applause and our thanks, for relentlessly facing all the problems that arise and for solving them so effectively.
I can only congratulate you on how well you have responded as a school to this exceptional situation and how well everything is working, since the last day of school on Wednesday.
We are aware that, if this works, it is because everyone is working very hard and doing overtime and that is appreciated … we value all the efforts you are making, that everything is working, and that if something doesn’t work it is because it is live, this has never happened before.
We are part of an extended family, the SEK family, and let’s hope we know how to be supportive, understanding and can step up to face this difficult situation together.
Take care of yourselves, because we want to see you all healthy and strong when we go back to school!