Education Service Digital Learning Strategy
North Ayrshire Council · 18 March 2025
Back to Cabinet — 18 March 2025 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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NORTH AYRSHIRE COUNCIL 18 March 2025 Cabinet (Education) Title: Education Service Digital Learning Strategy Purpose: To update Cabinet on the Education Directorate’s 2-18 Digital Learning Strategy. Recommendation: That Cabinet: a) Notes the content of the report b) Endorses the ambitions within the new Digital Learning Strategy 1. Executive Summary 1.1 Recognising the importance of the effective use of digital technologies and approaches in highly effective learning and teaching, NAC Education Directorate has launched a 2- 18 Digital Learning Strategy to support the development of our learners’ digital skills in learning, life and work. 1.2 The strategy ensures a level of consistency across all educational establishments in NAC and promotes continuous improvement in staff digital skills as well as learners’ skills. 1.3 The strategy becomes part of the effective quality improvement framework used to evaluate educational provision and outcomes across all NAC schools and EY centres. 2. Background 2.1 The Digital Learning Strategy complements the Council’s Digital Strategy “Digital North Ayrshire” which reflects the needs and ambitions of North Ayrshire, including our renewed priorities and principles, focus and actions and importantly, how this aligned with the Scottish Government’s 2021 National Digital Strategy “A Changing Nation: How Scotland Will Thrive in a Digital World”. 2.2 Consistent with all of the above, the Education Directorate’s priority is to use digital technology to build innovative and creative approaches that will contribute to the wide range of approaches to raise attainment and reduce the poverty-related attainment gap for learners in our schools and Early Years establishments.
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Digital Learning 2.3 Our children and young people will only get the most out of digital technology when it is skilfully deployed by staff to support their learning. It is vital therefore that our educators have the skills, confidence and knowledge to know when and how digital technology can be deployed effectively. 2.4 Professional digital learning can be accessed independently by practitioners through online training, is shared across establishments by practitioners and is also delivered by the Digital Development Officer from the Professional Learning Academy (PLA). 2.5 Education establishments across North Ayrshire have independently evolved approaches to digital learning with varying levels of expertise across our workforce. Similarly, a range of apps and tools are being utilised at establishment level to engage learners and families in digital learning. 2.6 Overall, the skills of our practitioners across all educational establishments are varied, and many of the PLA courses delivered or interventions provided are done through request or linked to an educator’s own professional learning. 2.7 In this respect, it is worth highlighting that the updated Standards for Full Registration from the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) include expectations on all registered teachers of digital competence. This is referred to and acknowledged in the new 2-18 NAC Digital Learning Strategy. Digital provision of curriculum delivery 2.8 The importance of our learners being able to use a variety of digital technologies and possessing a range of digital skills in today's increasingly digitised world is clear. As a result, there is now a wide consensus that digital technology should receive a more prominent role in curriculum delivery. 2.9 The use of digital technology in our own educational establishments helps to support the delivery of the curriculum and can be a feature of highly effective learning experiences for children and young people. 2.10 In Secondary, one example is @SWConnects, an online teaching and learning programme across the four Local Authorities of the South West Educational Improvement Collaborative (SWEIC) providing Senior Phase learners (predominantly in S6) with the opportunity to study mainly a range of Advanced Highers. It is worth noting that the @SWConnects programme was shortlisted in 2024 for two UK awards: the Digital Impact Award in Local Government Councils (receiving runner-up and highly recommended status) and the Digital Transformation in Local Councils Award which resulted in @SWConnects winning the award). 2.11 In Primary, one example is for the enhanced delivery of Gaelic Medium Education (GME) where staff and learners access a range of GME curriculum opportunities and learning through e-Sgoil (an online digital platform of lessons in Gaelic).
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Learning, Teaching and Assessment 2.11 Common areas of good practice emerging at both national level and in NAC educational establishments are teachers’ creative use of digital technologies to enhance learning and teaching, learners’ growing independence in using digital technologies as part of their learning experiences and use of digital technologies to provide appropriate and relevant support for learning. 2.12 It is worth noting that across all recently inspected NAC establishments and schools there has been good practice highlighted in the use of digital technology and the development of learners’ digital skills. NAC schools’ rating for “Learning, Teaching and Assessment” places us as 5th in Scotland which highlights the strong performances overall in this area, including the use of digital technology and digital skills development in our children and young people. 2.13 The Education Quality Improvement Team, working with school and EY senior leaders, will update the Quality Improvement Framework and school review guidance to incorporate the Digital Learning Strategy for future improvement work across schools and EY centres. NAC Digital Learning Improvement Activity – Digital Learning Strategy 2.14 A NAC Education Service Improvement Group was established in March 2023 to take forward a review of the digital learning across North Ayrshire and build upon the work undertaken by the strategic review of ICT completed in 2023. The group consists of highly experienced practitioners from across all sectors who are responsible for delivery of the curriculum from 2-18. 2.15 The aims of the strategy are as follows: • develop learners’ digital skills and prepare them for life in an increasingly complex world; • ensure that our practitioners are able to use a range of digital technologies confidently and appropriately to deliver exciting, supportive, relevant and engaging learning experiences; • support our establishments in achieving “very good” or “excellent” grades in HMIe inspections which will impact on our learners’ attainment. 2.16 There are four main areas within the strategy as outlined below: i. the vision and aims of the strategy (linked to high quality learning experiences for all children and young people in NAC) ii. the digital skills our children and young people need for learning, life and work (progression tables for each skill) iii. the digital skills our practitioners require to ensure our learners’ digital needs are met (progression tables for each skill) iv. tools and training, as well as examples of good practice at local and national levels 2.17 Following extensive consultation across NAC schools and EY centres and with key colleagues in other Local Authorities and at national level, the new strategy was launched on 6 March 2025 to senior school and EY leaders, with feedback activity
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planned for December 2025 and expansion of the good practice section from January – June 2026. 2.18 An overview of the strategy is included in Appendix 1 which highlights the four main areas of the strategy. The expectation is that all educational establishments will adopt the strategy from session 2025-26 onwards as part of their raising attainment approaches. 2.19 While the main focus of the strategy is on children and young people within a school or EY setting, we recognise that other partners will contribute to its delivery. For example, Community Learning and Development colleagues will deliver a range of opportunities both within schools and communities. One of these is the ‘Cyber Explorers’ programme currently being delivered in both settings. This is a national programme offering young people the chance to expand their computing knowledge and learn cyber resilience skills, as well as gain accredited qualifications. 3. Proposals 3.1 It is proposed that Cabinet: a) Notes the content of the report b) Endorses the ambitions within the new Digital Learning Strategy
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4. Implications/Socio-economic Duty Financial 4.1 None. Human Resources 4.2 None. Legal 4.3 None. Equality/Socio-economic 4.4 The strategy sets out clearly the expectations of all staff in educational establishments and the skills for practitioners and learners, thus supporting increased parity of educational experience from the ages of 2-18 in NAC schools and EY centres. Climate Change and Carbon 4.5 This will support our long-term climate change ambitions through helping to equip learners with digital skills which will enable flexible working patterns in the future. Key Priorities 4.6 NAC Council Plan 2023-28: Wellbeing: To transition to a wellbeing economy, delivering prosperity, wellbeing and resilience for local people: • Improving educational attainment and achievement and closing the attainment gap • Developing the Young Workforce and ensuring positive destinations for school leavers This work relates to the following priorities in the Education Service Plan 2023-26: • Improvement in attainment and achievement, particularly in literacy and numeracy • Closing the attainment gap between the most and least disadvantaged children and young people. Community Wealth Building 4.7 The Digital Learning Strategy will support our children and young people in North Ayrshire with high-quality and relevant digital skills which in turn will help to enable them to move into positive destinations. 5. Consultation 5.1 There is a robust Quality Improvement Framework in place to support schools to evaluate and analyse their performance and plan future improvements. This quality improvement process features regular evaluative visits to schools by Senior Officers.
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These visits feature evidence-based, challenging discussions to explore how schools are using the analysis of their attainment as a mechanism to inform targets for improvement. Furthermore, as part of our annual review process, we have consulted staff across the service on the improvement priorities for the coming session, and schools have in turn engaged with their school communities on their own priorities for improvement. Andrew McClelland Head of Service (Education) For further information please contact Kathleen McCormick, Executive Manager, on 01294 324443. Background Papers 1 – Extracts from the Digital Learning Strategy
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Appendix 1 – NAC Education Directorate Digital Learning Strategy – extracts 1. Landing page: 2. Roles and responsibilities section (detail provided for each staff member):
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3. Learner Digital Skills – landing page: 4. Learners Digital Skills – interaction page:
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5. Tools and training section – use of AI in education – landing page: