Student and Lecturer Reflections on Merging the Physical and Digital Classroom with a ‘Tech and Tactile’ Approach

This paper shares reflective accounts of a ‘tech and tactile’ approach to HE delivery from the lecturer and student perspectives whilst studying the BA (Hons) Early Childhood Studies and BA (Hons) Early Childhood Studies with Early Years Teacher Status courses.
The ‘tech and tactile’ approach combines gamification, playful pedagogy, digital, creative and tactile methods of facilitating learning. Every task has a concurrent physical and digital counterpart, or the digital and physical tasks are purposefully sequenced.
The paper shares examples of practice coupled with reflections that convey by using the approach students are not sedentary or attached to their device. Sessions have digital and physical elements embedded which has enabled attendance and engagement to be magnified. Furthermore, multiple learning styles, preferences and needs have been differentiated for. The approach allows choice for students per subject content, individual context/need and their digital literacy.
The outcomes of the paper identify that the approach is well-received by students who also acknowledge the value of the tacit, multi-modal and self-referent nature of using it.
The paper proposes a cyclical approach to planning and recommends reflective questions for lecturers which are transferable across disciplines to re-create and upscale the approach.
This is a timely opportunity to share, as Higher Education Institutes continue to commit to blended or hybrid approaches and institutes seek to increasingly merge their physical and digital classroom post-pandemic.