9 Hot EdTech Trends and How They Will Shape Learning

The education technology landscape has never stopped evolving. Educators across the globe have embraced technology in their instruction. From online courses as a stand-alone teaching technique – or a blended learning environment – teachers did their best in delivering the best education they could.

What does the future hold for EdTech? Here are nine EdTech trends that could shape the learning landscape in 2021:

1. Personalization

Learning is customized based on the student’s needs. When education fits what a learner needs, the student becomes more engaged and receptive. They can retain information more. We see that in 2021, more vendors will release features which allow teachers to create personalized learning for students.

2. Small portions

Did you know that the human attention span is smaller than that of a goldfish? In fact, adults can only focus intently on something for up to 20 minutes. This is why students of all ages need only bite-sized learning materials. If you deliver manageable portions or chunks of information, students can digest it and pay attention to what they have to learn. This year, we see a rise in bite-sized learning modules.

3. Gamification

Gamification is not new to online education. Students feel more challenged with a gamified learning environment –regardless of their age. The aim is to have more fun while learning. More and more educators are seen to include gamification in their online instruction, testing it in various ways and applications.

4. P2P Assessment

One of the tested methods of learning is when we can explain it or share it to someone else. A piece of knowledge shared in a group or within peers, all members will be able to know almost the same thing. They can easily assess each other’s performance and help each other reach the same level of knowledge. This peer to peer assessment works when they assess their own level of competence and compare it to other students. This year, more teachers will include students in P2P assessment. Learning vendors will also feature this in their instructional materials.

5. Adaptive learning

Adaptive learning offers students a personalized learning approach until he/she reaches mastery. It is a more in-depth approach to personalized learning, which uses data and analytics to update their learning path. Both learning content and the instruction are adapted in real time.
This technique is not yet considered mainstream, but it is expected this year that there will be more discussions and progress about this topic.

6. Online course degrees

Online Education has been there for a while and has undergone a period of testing. However, degrees gained from online courses are still not the same with those issued by educational institutions. If learning will be established as the same in both university and online course, degrees will have the same importance. Hopefully this year and the next years to come, official degrees can be issued after completion of an online course.

7. Learning platforms

The past year witnessed the rise of cloud-based learning platforms attempting to digitize instruction and coordination in learning models. This coming year, there will be more and more schools adopting these new platforms. There will be a period of testing more personalized learning spaces across traditional school setting.

8. Video-based instruction

2021 will mark the growth of video-based learning, following the surge of videos in the past year. The rise of video carried over into education. Related to the flipped classroom technique, it involves a video of the teacher presenting and explaining the new lesson. Apart from this, social media platform YouTube offers a great variety of educational videos (less than 20 minutes).

9. Projects

Schools encouraging hands-on learning and critical thinking are the main reasons why the role of projects will have more attention. Projects offer a clear platform to seed collaboration in classrooms, in an attempt to counter isolation created by too much screen time.
Efficiency and reliability in the project-based learning space are likely to be pushed by schools in 2021. Clearly, the emphasis on critical thinking and collaboration will not be disregarded.