Digital Learning in the workplace.

Ask yourself, what is learning as opposed to practice? I think learning is when you expand your knowledge on a topic or subject, it is studying, memorising and becoming familiar with information that you didn’t know beforehand, practice however, is a more intense form of learning. It is when you put your learning to the test. It is all well and good for me to work through open badge after open badge and take in the information, but if I do not alter my practice to embrace the new information I have accumulated, then it is pointless to work on them in the first place. Practice is when you test your learning. 

These differences have improved my motivation to continue to develop my digital skills. The changes that I have already been able to make to my practice as a result of the open badges I have achieved have been effective and rewarding. I have changed some of the paperwork I complete with my service users and in turn this has allowed me to provide a more effective level of care for them which meets the Health and Social Care Standards and improves the quality of care in our setting. I have made changes to the way I communicate with service users and have in turn made it easier for them to communicate with me in a way they feel comfortable with. The fact that the more I learn online, the better I can improve my practice is very appealing and has really motivated me to keep ploughing forward with my open badges and to expand my learning as much as possible.  

I believe that the workforce should be enabled to take full advantage of the huge range of learning opportunities afforded by digital learning. There are many advantages to digital learning as opposed to traditional learning. For a start, it’s much easier to access and accommodate for most people. Learning style is something that varies for each individual; digital learning can be adapted to suit everyone using it. The most obvious benefit to me is that digital learning, such as OB is accessible 24 hours a day, some people find it easier to study or learn in the evenings due to work or family commitments, some people may prefer to work during the night, or in the afternoon, with digital learning there are no restrictions, there are no opening or closing times, you can learn at whichever time suits you.

Digital learning is also a great way to promote self-directed learning, this is something that I honestly think you all need to try, it is empowering and offers a great sense of achievement, self-directed learning is basically when you’re not directed by a teacher or working with classmates. It is when you take full and complete responsibility for your research, study, analysis, evaluation and recordings.

The last point I want to highlight regarding the benefits of digital learning, is the fact that it brings familiarity with technology, which is one of the main points of its existence is it not? We need to strive to bring our world out of the dark ages and embrace technology for the saviour that it is. Connect us with each other at the click of a button, digitally tracked progress that we can share with anyone anywhere with a simple link. The learning opportunities via digital learning are vast and I wholeheartedly agree that workplaces should be encouraging their staff to embrace it, it simplifies learning for staff, it simplifies overseeing of learning by managers, it collates your achievements and sorts them neatly together ready to be shared. It should be an employee right to have access to digital learning and therefore companies should be encouraged to provide this, this can be in as simple a form as offering the use of company laptops or tablets to those who don’t have personal access, it should at least entail the company providing the details of programs such as Open Badge to allow staff to take control of their own learning. They could display information around the premises, or send emails including links to digital learning portals to their employees, it doesn’t have to be complicated or costly to enable your workforce to take advantage of online learning opportunities. 

Will a digitally capable workforce improve the lies of service users? Of course it will. There are over 200 roles in my place of work. I have one of them. I have made significant changes in the last week to my practice due to my digital learning. The changes I have made have improved the quality of care my service users receive from me. Now imagine all 200 people embraced digital learning and made positive changes like I have. The quality of care would keep on rising and it would significantly improve and enrich the lives of our service users. Who would not want that to happen?

A digitally capable workforce prevents practice from being stuck in one era. It allows progression, change and improvement on a constant basis. Taking your staff out with the norm and showing them new ways of providing quality care would improve many aspects of the workplace and of the service as a whole.

A digitally capable workforce is ultimately required for many other reasons, we live in a world run by technology as it is, this is only going to continue to spread throughout all aspects of life, being tech savvy is soon going to be a requirement in any field of work. Each upcoming generation is more and more tech savvy, my 4-year-old can operate an iPad with ease, so in 10 years’ time, everyone around us will be digitally capable, do we really want to be in the minority who are not?

And its not just the digital capabilities of others we have to worry about, the world itself is slowly evolving. Even simplicities such as currency are slowly morphing into digital alternatives, we need to be able to keep up with these changes, we need to be able to keep our service users comfortable with the way things are working, how can we support them with digital change if we are blind to it ourselves? Being digitally capable enables us to support them to become familiar with technology and remain familiar with the forever occurring changes and improvements. The learning I have embraced so far has already allowed me to offer opportunities - such as ease of communication – to service users, this opportunity may well have passed me by had I not become aware of the alternatives via digital learning.

At the moment there are too many people who avoid all things technological, this is a personal choice but a damaging one.

For example, say you are a care assistant in a nursing home, a resident asks you to accommodate a facetime session with a relative so they can see their face and her their voice. However, you ‘don’t do technology’ so have no idea how to help.

Or say you work in activities, and you have a new resident who is non verbal due to a stroke, you need to find out how to meet their social care needs, but you don’t know how to communicate with them and you won’t look alternative methods of communication up online because you ‘don’t do technology’.

Being comfortable with technology or not, already divides the workforce in many settings, but this is something that we must strive to conquer. Basic technological ability is vital and should be mandatory in every workplace.