Professional Learning and Technology

Our research explores the ways in which accessible technologies can be harnessed to improve professional learning for frontline workers in health and education, often in challenging circumstances. Our research aims to strengthen professional networks and improve professional practices and outcomes.

We are interested in how technologies—particularly accessible technologies, readily available at low cost—can enhance professional learning for educators and health care workers, for example by:

• Contributing to the wellbeing of frontline health and education workers, and of the communities they support.
• Enabling frontline workers to develop and share innovative responses to the challenges they face, including over-crowded and under-resourced health centres and classrooms.
• Developing collaborative professional learning communities.

Our research emphasises the social practices, contexts, and purposes which frame the use of technologies—including digital tools—for professional learning. We use a variety of theoretical lenses through which to interrogate professional practice where technologies are used to create, access, or assess professional learning opportunities in health and education.

Publications

Community Help for Inclusive Learning and Development (CHILD): A Study of How Mobile Phones Were Used to Recruit and Equip Community Volunteers to Support Children’s Learning During Covid-19 School Closures in Zimbabwe. (2021-02-04)
Power, Tom; Buckler, Alison; Ebubedike, Margaret; Tengenesha, Martha; Jama, Mbuso; Ndlovu, America; Mukoyi, Jane; Ndou, Mashudu and Mubaira, Simbarashe

Sustainable English Language Teacher Development at Scale: Lessons from Bangladesh (2019)
Eyres, Ian; McCormick, Robert and Power, Tom eds.
ISBN : 978-1-3500-4347-3 | Publisher : Bloomsbury Academic | Published : London

An Evaluation of Computer Aided Learning (BRAC-CAL) in Secondary Schools in Bangladesh. (2017-08)
Power, Tom; Babu, Rasel and Chowdhury, Tanjeeba
Pasha, Altamas ed.
Research Monograph Series
Publisher : BRAC Research and Evaluation Division | Published : Dhaka, Bangladesh

A Quasi-Experimental Study of the Classroom Practices of English Language Teachers and the English Language Proficiency of Students, in Primary and Secondary Schools in Bangladesh (2017-09-01)
Power, Tom; McCormick, Robert and Asbeek-Brusse, Elsbeth
English in Action (EIA), Dhaka, Bangladesh.