The introduction of cloud services in the classroom can aid teacher collaboration and communication, as well as improve classroom resource accessibility
In recent years, schools have become heavily reliant on technology to galvanise education and assist teachers within the classroom, especially as time plays an important factor for teachers being able to plan and run lessons efficiently.
With devices such as projectors, interactive displays, tablets, and monitors being vital to running schools seamlessly, collaboration and communication across the school network are key to ensuring a robust end result.
New technologies enable easier direct communication
The introduction of cloud services in the classroom can aid this process by presenting teachers with the unique opportunity to explore and enhance collaboration between classrooms and departments. Whilst previously teachers had to call or email one another, new technologies enable them to easily direct message each other with urgent tasks or notices.
The widespread use of cloud services within schools will allow senior leadership teams to create an open environment for teachers to share their knowledge but also support one another during the school day.
Integrating these technologies enables IT managers to monitor all devices within a school, even across governing trusts. For example, IT managers can analyse power consumption, share messages and files between classrooms, and monitor device performance to highlight potential issues on a particular device.
The benefits of cloud services are endless, with platforms allowing for increased security and direct compatibility with SSO (single-sign-on) services, such as Microsoft 365 and Google Classroom.
The question remains: how do senior leadership teams and IT managers utilise cloud services to enhance cross-department collaboration and communication within schools?
Enabling a collaborative workspace
Aside from sharing materials, cloud service platforms can also enhance and support internal communications, both generally between all staff and more directly between subject departments -helping senior leadership staff and pastoral care deliver urgent messages to students at the same time.
For instance, many schools can utilise this system to deliver safety messages and alerts when fire alarm tests are about to happen, displaying the time the fire alarm tests are due and a site map highlighting the fire assembly point.
Typically, the management of cloud services is the responsibility of the IT managers, but teachers can now become more involved in the process by helping to personalise their cloud system services.
Once schools have onboarded their cloud services solution, they can choose different management systems and personalised settings to create a collaborative and open environment between both teachers and departments. These systems can connect classrooms via the cloud, enabling teachers to share files and lesson plans easily through their cloud storage platforms.
Teachers can share files and lesson plans easily through their cloud storage platforms
Teachers can easily and securely access both shared and private materials via their cloud accounts, allowing them to share presentations, worksheets, lesson plans and additional support across networks. This becomes more significant in the case of teacher absences; with these technologies installed within classrooms, substitute teachers can easily pick up from absent teachers and ensure there is little to no disruption for students.
The immediacy of these instant messages can support teachers during lessons both on a safety basis, for fire alarms, and on a pastoral basis should an issue arise with students in a classroom. Creating a more collaborative environment within schools is one-way senior leadership teams can ease teachers’ workload and enable a more supportive atmosphere for all staff.
Building secure platforms for learning
The introduction of file sharing and direct messaging with cloud services does highlight some security concerns for both teachers and IT managers. However, with the multitude of security solutions included in cloud service platforms, schools can easily secure their devices.
Tools such as single sign-on, multi-factor authentication (MFA), and only signing into one device at a time can control how many users are logging into multiple devices, ensuring devices in use are used by the username owner only.
More recently, premium interactive displays have come fitted with NFC card readers, allowing teachers and staff to sign in automatically by scanning their account cards. Whilst this also helps prevent security issues of multiple devices being in use at once, this also prevents students from using interactive displays without teachers’ permission and supervision.
By enabling increased security and additional authentication, users cannot use technologies onboarded with cloud services without signing into their user platform. This added layer of security helps IT managers to effectively manage and secure all devices within their network, preventing viruses and malware from becoming an issue on a school’s network.
The future of digital education
As the future of education becomes increasingly digital, the advancement of consumer and business technologies will continue to drive the evolution of ed-tech devices and their integration within schools.
Likewise, teachers are facing increasingly intense workloads, making it crucial for leadership teams and IT managers to provide support through the implementation of new devices. As a result, teachers should act now to leverage these platforms for supportive and connected networks within the classroom in order to provide the best possible educational experience for students.
Cloud services offer collaborative environments and streamline communications between teachers, departments and senior leadership teams, strengthening the school network and signifying that the platform is the future of internal school collaborations.
This piece was written and provided by Chris Mellowship, Senior Technical Sales Manager at BenQ UK.
