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BBC’s lockdown educational programming is way better than the dull fare of yesteryear

Associate professor in Media Production, Birmingham City University

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Schools are closed and parents face the dreaded task of homeschooling while juggling work and domestic responsibilities. Hoping to help, the BBC is airing several hours of educational programming each day throughout the lockdown for both primary and secondary school students.

As someone from the baby boomer generation, born in the mid-1960s, the BBC’s Schools programming was the only thing you could watch in the morning if you were off school sick. I remember it was pretty dull stuff, probably not helped by our small black and white rental TV set.

Education programming was a mainstay of the morning television schedule from the 1960s until the late 1980s when daytime TV as we understand it today began. Special broadcasts for schools began on BBC radio as early as 1924 and moved to television in 1957. Schools broadcasting was one of the few BBC programming departments, along with children’s, to have several senior female staff , at a time when women were under-represented across the broadcaster. Mary Somerville was the first director of schools broadcasting, appointed in 1929.

Why education programmes matter

The BBC’s current initiative to broadcast education programmes is a timely revival. Education is a pillar of the BBC’s public service remit to inform, educate and entertain, devised by Lord Reith , the first director general of the BBC. It is also a clever way of repurposing existing content in a manner that is both public spirited and economically expedient. The venture plays well politically at a time when the future of the BBC is under scrutiny, with discussions around the level of the licence fee underway.

Much of the schools content that will be broadcast on children’s channel CBBC and on BBC Two in the next few weeks was produced during the first lockdown last year by the BBC Bitesize team and was originally available online only – something the press releases around the initiative have failed to highlight.

Ironically, broadcasting the shows on the “old media” of TV is what is new. This choice is also democratic, however. There is a stark digital divide in this country, which the pandemic has exposed. An estimated 140,000 UK families with young children do not have a TV, while over a million children have no home access to a computer or tablet.

This is a win-win situation for the BBC, since far fewer children have no access to a terrestrial television than lack a good broadband connection or different devices that can access the internet at any one time. Meanwhile, the sensible scheduling of content with different time slots for each age group means there are no conflicting broadcasts.

Getting the lessons right

The key to successful educational programming is getting the tone right and making it fun. The BBC’s early experiments into schooling the nation did not always succeed because the overly academic content sometimes failed to engage children.

Programming for the current generation of both primary and secondary children has to be pitched in a way that makes it compete for their attention against the likes of social media and streamed content. Sampling some of the programmes, I was struck by the bright colours of the simple sets, which instantly (and cost-effectively) gave a feeling of positivity. This was combined with energetic, diverse, cheery presenters who were constantly enthusiastic, with a permanent smile on their faces no matter what the subject matter was.

There was singing and dancing to reinforce learning points, and lots of animations that were as colourful as the studio. Including actual teachers lent credibility, and inserts from well-known presenters and celebrities in their own homes reading stories or responding to challenges, added a touch of showbiz glamour. The Celebrity Supply Teacher slot at 10am was a highlight and will feature lockdown heroes like footballer Marcus Rashford giving a sports lesson or interior designer Laurence Llewelyn Bowen giving art lessons.

What made the viewing experience particularly cohesive was the flow of the programmes, with the content carefully curated between the core and secondary lessons. For example, a history lesson covering ancient Egyptian pyramids referred to earlier discussions of three-dimensional shapes from the episode’s maths lesson.

It was well-produced, and while it might lack the high-tech graphics and fast-paced action of computer games, it was a lot more fun and interesting to watch than the schools programming of my youth.

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Is Online Learning Effective?

A new report found that the heavy dependence on technology during the pandemic caused “staggering” education inequality. What was your experience?

By Natalie Proulx

During the coronavirus pandemic, many schools moved classes online. Was your school one of them? If so, what was it like to attend school online? Did you enjoy it? Did it work for you?

In “ Dependence on Tech Caused ‘Staggering’ Education Inequality, U.N. Agency Says ,” Natasha Singer writes:

In early 2020, as the coronavirus spread, schools around the world abruptly halted in-person education. To many governments and parents, moving classes online seemed the obvious stopgap solution. In the United States, school districts scrambled to secure digital devices for students. Almost overnight, videoconferencing software like Zoom became the main platform teachers used to deliver real-time instruction to students at home. Now a report from UNESCO , the United Nations’ educational and cultural organization, says that overreliance on remote learning technology during the pandemic led to “staggering” education inequality around the world. It was, according to a 655-page report that UNESCO released on Wednesday, a worldwide “ed-tech tragedy.” The report, from UNESCO’s Future of Education division, is likely to add fuel to the debate over how governments and local school districts handled pandemic restrictions, and whether it would have been better for some countries to reopen schools for in-person instruction sooner. The UNESCO researchers argued in the report that “unprecedented” dependence on technology — intended to ensure that children could continue their schooling — worsened disparities and learning loss for hundreds of millions of students around the world, including in Kenya, Brazil, Britain and the United States. The promotion of remote online learning as the primary solution for pandemic schooling also hindered public discussion of more equitable, lower-tech alternatives, such as regularly providing schoolwork packets for every student, delivering school lessons by radio or television — and reopening schools sooner for in-person classes, the researchers said. “Available evidence strongly indicates that the bright spots of the ed-tech experiences during the pandemic, while important and deserving of attention, were vastly eclipsed by failure,” the UNESCO report said. The UNESCO researchers recommended that education officials prioritize in-person instruction with teachers, not online platforms, as the primary driver of student learning. And they encouraged schools to ensure that emerging technologies like A.I. chatbots concretely benefited students before introducing them for educational use. Education and industry experts welcomed the report, saying more research on the effects of pandemic learning was needed. “The report’s conclusion — that societies must be vigilant about the ways digital tools are reshaping education — is incredibly important,” said Paul Lekas, the head of global public policy for the Software & Information Industry Association, a group whose members include Amazon, Apple and Google. “There are lots of lessons that can be learned from how digital education occurred during the pandemic and ways in which to lessen the digital divide. ” Jean-Claude Brizard, the chief executive of Digital Promise, a nonprofit education group that has received funding from Google, HP and Verizon, acknowledged that “technology is not a cure-all.” But he also said that while school systems were largely unprepared for the pandemic, online education tools helped foster “more individualized, enhanced learning experiences as schools shifted to virtual classrooms.” ​Education International, an umbrella organization for about 380 teachers’ unions and 32 million teachers worldwide, said the UNESCO report underlined the importance of in-person, face-to-face teaching. “The report tells us definitively what we already know to be true, a place called school matters,” said Haldis Holst, the group’s deputy general secretary. “Education is not transactional nor is it simply content delivery. It is relational. It is social. It is human at its core.”

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Schools urged to talk about upskirting and sextortion

Schools are to be encouraged to teach young people about topics like upskirting, downblousing, cyberflashing and sextortion, MLAs have heard.

An official from the Council for the Curriculum, Examinations and Assessment (CCEA) told a Stormont committee that teachers were "crying out" for relationships and sex education (RSE) teaching materials.

Roisin Radcliffe from CCEA told assembly members that there were "units coming out on upskirting, downblousing, cyberflashing and sextortion".

CCEA provides online resources and lessons for schools on Relationships and Sex Education (RSE).

Schools given sex education class delivery guidance

Upskirting and cyber-flashing laws come into effect, 'false information campaign' about sex education.

"We're not telling everybody 'go out and have sex,' that is not the case," she said.

"I think everybody thinks they're talking about sex all the time but most of the young people we meet are interested in the relationships and how to talk to someone," she said.

"That's how basic it is.

"They don't know how to talk to each other."

Ms Radcliffe told MLAs about other units: "We've perimenopause, menopause, masculinity and the influence of positive role models."

Police in Northern Ireland can now charge people with upskirting, downblousing and cyberflashing after changes to the law .

MLAs on Stormont's Education Committee have started an inquiry into the provision of relationship and sex education in schools in Northern Ireland.

They heard from a number of witnesses about RSE on Wednesday.

CCEA recently removed guidance to primary schools that children could become aware that they were transgender "between the ages of three and five" from their RSE Hub.

Teachers 'crying out' for sex education resources

Ms Radcliffe told MLAs that teachers were "crying out" for tailored support to teach RSE.

She said that CCEA was also working with Cinemagic to provide schools with short films on the topics of consent and period dignity.

But the Sinn Féin MLA, Cathy Mason, questioned whether support and training for teachers would accompany the resources.

"There's a difference in a teacher being given the resource and actually having the confidence to deliver that resource," she said.

MLAs also heard that religious beliefs should not affect "scientifically accurate information" taught to pupils in RSE.

They were, though, told that changes to RSE to include teaching pupils about abortion provoked "nervousness" and "concern" among some teachers.

Post-primary schools in Northern Ireland are now required to teach pupils about access to abortion and prevention of early pregnancy in RSE.

The chief commissioner of the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission (NIHRC), Alyson Kilpatrick, was also among those questioned by MLAs.

She was asked a question by DUP MLA Cheryl Brownlee about how different religious beliefs were acknowledged within RSE.

"The scientifically accurate information that's given should not differ depending on the religious belief," Ms Kilpatrick replied.

"What may differ is their attitude to, for example, abortion, attitude to prevention of early pregnancy on faith grounds.

"But it shouldn't affect the scientifically accurate information that's given to children.

"That's going to be the same whether it's a Muslim family, a Christian family, a Jewish family."

Previous research from the NIHRC suggested that some schools in Northern Ireland were teaching pupils that homosexuality was wrong .

Ms Kilpatrick said that research had also found there was "no consistency" across schools in the teaching of RSE.

Ms Brownlee's DUP colleague David Brooks MLA, however, said RSE could veer "into elements of morality and faith that are usually set in the home".

The UUP MLA, Robbie Butler, said that some "young people have suffered horrendously" because RSE had not been handled well in some schools.

'Shoehorned into a school curriculum'

Principal of Lisneal College in Londonderry, Michael Allen said feedback from teachers and some young people shows that relationship and sex education (RSE) teaching materials does not meet their needs.

Mr Allen said Stormont’s support and advice on RSE to schools “is not where it should be”.

“There is a feeling amongst educators that where society needs to address something, it is shoe-horned into a school curriculum,” he said.

“Often many components of RSE policy comes down to ethical and moral debate and dilemma, and that should not just be shoehorned into schools to deal with without the proper support and without the proper staff training.

“We shouldn’t really be seen as the easy vehicle to perhaps address many of the issues - we seem to have forgotten that parents want to play a large role in the education of their children around these issues and that should not be bypassed.”