The future of remote learning still holds significant potential in preparing students for future careers by leveraging advanced technologies, fostering flexibility and accessibility, promoting lifelong learning, facilitating global collaboration, emphasizing soft skills, personalizing learning experiences, integrating industry partnerships, and ensuring ethical and responsible use of technology. A , and many institutions continue to expand their online offerings with many institutions at least offering some part of their learning online.
By embracing these opportunities and addressing challenges proactively, remote learning can play a vital role in equipping students with the knowledge, skills and mindset needed to thrive in a rapidly evolving job market. With jobs moving away from the bricks-and-mortar workplace, tomorrow's job opportunities will have fewer physical and geographical restrictions, so if you you can also learn anywhere in the world.
Here's how remote learning integrates into this evolution, by enforcing these things:
Remote learning provides flexibility in scheduling and accessibility to educational resources, allowing students to balance learning with other commitments such as work or family responsibilities. This flexibility mirrors the dynamic nature of many future careers, where adaptability and time management are essential skills. It also allows people who may otherwise not be able to attend a traditional institution in person the same opportunity to learn.
Remote learning requires students to navigate various digital platforms, tools and resources, fostering digital literacy and technological proficiency. These skills are increasingly vital in virtually every industry, as technology continues to transform the way we work and communicate.
Remote learning often encourages self-directed learning, where students take greater responsibility for their education, set learning goals, and manage their progress independently. This cultivates autonomy and self-motivation, qualities highly valued in the modern workplace, where employees are expected to take initiative and drive their own professional development.
Remote learning platforms facilitate collaboration and interaction among students from diverse cultural backgrounds and geographical locations. Engaging with peers from around the world fosters a global perspective, cultural competence, and cross-cultural communication skills, essential for success in an increasingly interconnected and globalized workforce.
While remote, students often participate in group projects, discussions and virtual teamwork exercises, honing their collaboration and communication skills in digital environments. These skills are invaluable in many careers, where collaboration across distributed teams and effective virtual communication are becoming increasingly common.
Remote learning activities often emphasize problem-solving, critical thinking and analytical skills as students engage with complex challenges and real-world scenarios. These cognitive skills are essential for navigating uncertainty and innovation in future careers, where the ability to analyze information, think critically and propose creative solutions is highly prized.
Remote learning exposes students to a variety of digital tools, software and online platforms, helping them adapt to rapidly changing technologies and industries. By staying abreast of emerging trends and mastering new tools, students develop a mindset of lifelong learning and adaptability, crucial for success in careers that continually evolve.
Remote learning platforms often provide opportunities for students to connect with industry professionals, mentors and alumni networks, expanding their professional network and gaining insights into potential career paths. Building relationships with professionals in their field of interest can open doors to internships, job opportunities and career guidance, facilitating a smoother transition from education to employment.
The future of remote learning is poised to undergo significant transformations driven by technological advancements, evolving educational paradigms and societal shifts. Here are just some key trends that may shape the future of remote learning…
As we move forward, we're likely to see a blend of traditional classroom instruction and remote learning, known as hybrid learning. This model offers flexibility for both students and educators, allowing them to leverage the benefits of in-person interaction while also harnessing the advantages of remote technologies for convenience, accessibility and personalized learning experiences.
VR and AR technologies are expected to play a more prominent role in remote learning, offering immersive and interactive experiences that simulate real-world environments. These technologies can transport students to historical sites, enable hands-on experiments in science labs, and facilitate collaborative problem-solving activities, enhancing engagement and understanding.
AI-powered tools can analyze vast amounts of data to personalize learning experiences, identify individual strengths and weaknesses, and offer targeted interventions. Adaptive learning platforms can adjust the pace, content and instructional methods based on each student's learning preferences and performance, optimizing learning outcomes and promoting mastery of concepts.
With attention spans decreasing and the demand for just-in-time learning increasing, microlearning—delivering content in small, digestible chunks—is gaining popularity. Microlearning modules, delivered through mobile devices and online platforms, enable learners to access relevant information quickly, retain knowledge more effectively, and apply it immediately in real-world contexts.
Gamification elements such as badges, leaderboards and rewards can enhance motivation, engagement and retention in remote learning environments. Interactive content, such as simulations, quizzes and branching scenarios, not only makes learning more enjoyable but also facilitates active participation, critical thinking and skill development.
Remote learning platforms will continue to integrate social learning features such as discussion forums, group projects and peer feedback mechanisms. Collaboration tools like video conferencing, instant messaging and shared document editing enable synchronous and asynchronous communication, fostering interaction, teamwork and community building among students and educators.
The collection and analysis of learning analytics data will enable educators and administrators to gain insights into student progress, engagement levels and learning preferences. By leveraging data-driven decision-making processes, institutions can identify areas for improvement, personalize interventions and optimize instructional strategies to enhance student success and retention rates.
As remote learning becomes more prevalent, it's crucial to address issues of access, digital literacy, and socioeconomic disparities. Efforts to bridge the digital divide, provide equitable access to technology and resources, and create inclusive learning environments for diverse populations will be essential in shaping the future of remote learning.
In summary, by leveraging the opportunities provided by remote learning, students, job seekers and career changers can develop the skills and competencies needed to thrive in a dynamic and rapidly changing job market.
Read more in our blog post 'The advantages of online distance learning'.
Watching films can be a great way for people to learn English. We all have our favourite movie moments and, even as passive viewers, they're probably teaching you more than you realise. Here's a selection of our favourite scenes, along with the reasons why they're educational as well as entertaining.
Why does progression seem to slow down as an English learner moves from beginner to more advanced skills?
When presenting at ELT conferences, I often ask the audience – typically teachers and school administrators – “When you left home today, to start your journey here, did you know where you were going?” The audience invariably responds with a laugh and says yes, of course. I then ask, “Did you know roughly when you would arrive at your destination?” Again the answer is, of course, yes. “But what about your students on their English learning journey? Can they say the same?” At this point, the laughter stops.
All too often English learners find themselves without a clear picture of the journey they are embarking on and the steps they will need to take to achieve their goals. We all share a fundamental need for orientation, and in a world of mobile phone GPS we take it for granted. Questions such as: Where am I? Where am I going? When will I get there? are answered instantly at the touch of a screen. If you’re driving along a motorway, you get a mileage sign every three miles.
When they stop appearing regularly we soon feel uneasy. How often do English language learners see mileage signs counting down to their learning goal? Do they even have a specific goal?
The key thing about GPS is that it’s very precise. You can see your start point, where you are heading and tell, to the mile or kilometer, how long your journey will be. You can also get an estimated time of arrival to the minute. As Mike Mayor mentioned in his post about what it means to be fluent, the same can’t be said for understanding and measuring English proficiency. For several decades, the ELL industry got by with the terms ‘beginner’, ‘elementary’, ‘pre-intermediate’ and ‘advanced’ – even though there was no definition of what they meant, where they started and where they ended.
The CEFR has become widely accepted as a measure of English proficiency, bringing an element of shared understanding of what it means to be at a particular level in English. However, the wide bands that make up the CEFR can result in a situation where learners start a course of study as B1 and, when they end the course, they are still within the B1 band. That doesn’t necessarily mean that their English skills haven’t improved – they might have developed substantially – but it’s just that the measurement system isn’t granular enough to pick up these improvements in proficiency.
So here’s the first weakness in our English language GPS and one that’s well on the way to being remedied with the Global Scale of English (GSE). Because the GSE measures proficiency on a 10-90 scale across each of the four skills, students using assessment tools reporting on the GSE are able to see incremental progress in their skills even within a CEFR level. So we have the map for an English language GPS to be able to track location and plot the journey to the end goal.
When it comes to pinpointing how long it’s going to take to reach that goal, we need to factor in the fact that the amount of effort it takes to improve your English increases as you become more proficient. Although the bands in the CEFR are approximately the same width, the law of diminishing returns means that the better your English is to begin with, the harder it is to make further progress – and the harder it is to feel that progress is being made.
That’s why many an English language-learning journey gets abandoned on the intermediate plateau. With no sense of progression or a tangible, achievable goal on the horizon, the learner can become disoriented and demoralised.
To draw another travel analogy, when you climb 100 meters up a mountain at 5,000 meters above sea level the effort required is greater than when you climb 100 meters of gentle slope down in the foothills. It’s exactly the same 100 meter distance, it’s just that those hundred 100 meters require progressively more effort the higher up you are, and the steeper the slope. So, how do we keep learners motivated as they pass through the intermediate plateau?
We have a number of tools available to keep learners on track as they start to experience the law of diminishing returns. We can show every bit of progress they are making using tools that capture incremental improvements in ability. We can also provide new content that challenges the learner in a way that’s realistic.
Setting unrealistic expectations and promising outcomes that aren’t deliverable is hugely demotivating for the learner. It also has a negative impact on teachers – it’s hard to feel job satisfaction when your students are feeling increasingly frustrated by their apparent lack of progress.
Big data is providing a growing bank of information. In the long term this will deliver a much more precise estimate of effort required to reach higher levels of proficiency, even down to a recommendation of the hours required to go from A to B and how those hours are best invested. That way, learners and teachers alike would be able to see where they are now, where they want to be and a path to get there. It’s a fully functioning English language learning GPS system, if you like.
It's 6 AM on a Monday morning. Ms. Lopez wakes up early to prepare for the day ahead. She spends the morning reviewing lesson plans, making sure everything is ready for her students. By lunchtime, she is preparing for the afternoon, grabbing a quick bite between classes... but it doesn’t stop there. The school day finishes but Ms. Lopez stays late marking assignments. Finally, on Sunday night, she sits at her kitchen table, surrounded by papers, course books and lesson plans.
Does this sound familiar? You are not alone.
In 2024, app research found that76% of teachers spend at least one hour of their personal time on lesson planning each week, with 43% spending more than three hours. This is a lot of time that could be spent on other important tasks. Teachers need a solution that helps them plan lessons fast, is connected to their course books and is built by learning experts.
