Les Editeurs d'Education
LEdE
L’association Les Éditeurs d’Éducation, anciennement Savoir Livre, a été fondée en 1985 par Belin, Bordas, Hachette, Hatier, Magnard et Nathan.
ID: 081079938982-82
Lobbying Activity
Response to Online and distance learning in primary and secondary education
11 May 2021
Since years now, publishers who have been developing educational material in both print and online format and therefore, are aware of the difficulties that teachers have been meeting in having to shift education from the classroom to home, even before the pandemic hit Europe. Furthermore, they stepped up during the crisis and helped teachers and schools as much as they could to overcome the difficulties.
However, in France, the Court of Auditors points out that the lack of infrastructure or personal equipment was the main obstacle to ensure pedagogical continuity during the closure of schools. Health crises apart, the ongoing curriculum reform (2018-2022) had already changed some digital habits. In 2020, 30 % of highschool students work with digital textbooks.
It is therefore key that the Recommendation insists on the fact that publishers produce quality educational content adapted for blended education and that it is up to teachers to choose which educational material they want to use when working with pupils. In order to respect this fundamental principle, decision making about content acquisition expenses by public authorities should be made at teacher level, thus making the digital educational content more responsive to the needs of the field. In France, Les Éditeurs d’Éducation collaborate with the edTech sector to promote a basic principle of balanced investment: for each Euro spent in digital equipment, another one should be spent in digital content and another one in teachers training.
Furthermore, when it comes to personalized learning mentioned in the Roadmap, publishers have been developed tools in this direction and will continue doing so. These tools are developed considering the need to fully respect the privacy of both teachers and students.
The roadmap rightly stressed that “It requires a coherent approach by the whole school education system”. Publishers must be part of this approach as they play an important role in providing quality content to teachers and students. We respectfully require to be consulted for the elaboration of this Recommendation.
Please find attached our contribution to the "Etats Généraux du numérique éducatif" organized in November 2020 by the ministry of education.
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