Since the 1980’s it has been widely argued that technology has the potential to improve the lives of people with learning disabilities. Education, health and social care professionals working with children and young adults with learning disabilities have therefore used a wide range of technologies in order to teach a wide range of skills including basic literacy and numeracy skills, communication and social skills and independent living skills such as shopping and wayfinding. (Seale, 2014; 2022). In contrast, many people with learning disabilities themselves tend to highlight other motivations for using technology such as engaging in leisure pursuits, making friends and finding partners (Martin et al. 2021).

Although technology has the potential to facilitate positive experiences and outcomes for people with learning disabilities, prior to the pandemic, there was evidence that many people with learning disabilities were not experiencing these benefits and were therefore digitally excluded (Normand et al. 2016; Seale & Chadwick, 2017).  The most commonly talked about cause of digital exclusion for people with learning disabilities was a lack of access (Ågren , Kjellberg and Hemmingsson 2020). This lack of access was experienced by people with learning disabilities in a number of ways: not being able to afford to buy the technologies (Sallafranque-St-Louis and Normand 2017); not being assessed by education, health and social care services as requiring technology (Tanis et al. 2012); the technology being too difficult to use because it has not been designed with the needs of people with learning disabilities in mind (Williams and Hennig, 2015) and not being assisted to use technology by those in support roles such as teachers, parents and care workers (Ramsten, Martin, Dag et al. 2019).

During the pandemic, and in particular periods of government imposed ‘lock-downs’,  Internet-enabled devices such as personal computers, laptops, tablets, and Smartphones and applications such as email, Zoom, Facebook and WhatsApp became essential tools because they enabled us to communicate with others, access information or services and engage in leisure, educational and therapeutic activities. However, given that many young  people with learning disabilities were digitally excluded prior to the pandemic, an obvious assumption to make is that they would not be supported to access and use technologies during the pandemic.

In 2020 I conducted a study which aimed to investigate whether and how people with learning disabilities in the UK were being supported to use technologies during the pandemic. I interviewed a range of people who had informal or formal support roles including parents, siblings, education, health and social care professionals, day service and supported living providers and advocacy organisations. In this paper I will focus specifically on the results from interviews conducted with education professionals. I will present case studies of three teachers who took part in the interviews. One teacher works in a further education college teaching students who have severe or profound and multiple learning disabilities (PMLD); one teacher works in a special school as a PMLD teacher in the post-16 unit and one teacher works in further education college teaching cooking, drama and arts to adults with learning disabilities. I will use the framework of ‘possibility-focused support’ (Seale, 2022) to analyse these case studies and explore the practices that the teachers were adopting in order to use technologies to continue providing educational opportunities for young people with learning disabilities. I will discuss the implications of these findings for post pandemic teaching practice in relation to reducing the digital exclusion of young people with learning disabilities and preparing them to engage in the digital world.

The research reported in this paper is part of a larger study reported elsewhere (See Seale, 2020). In that larger study two groups of people who supported people with learning disabilities were interviewed about their role and experiences during the pandemic. The first group were members of self-advocacy organisations, both staff and people with learning disabilities, who were trying to respond to the needs of their members during the pandemic, focusing particularly on their wellbeing. The second group comprised of people who had informal or formal support roles and included parents, siblings, education, health and social care professionals, day service and supported living providers and advocacy organisations. The study used two strategies to recruit participants from the two target groups. Firstly, members of self-advocacy groups who were known to the researchers through their networks were contacted directly via email and invited to participate in the study. For the second group, supporters who had responded to an online questionnaire were invited to take part in a follow up interview (the results of the questionnaire are reported in a separate study, see Seale 2020). Overall, 38 participants agreed to be interviewed, of which 3 were educational professionals. The interviews took place between July and September 2020 and were conducted remotely using a variety of video-conference technologies such as WhatsApp, Skype, and Microsoft Teams. All interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed. The interviews were semi-structured in nature and and questions sought to find out about what technologies were being used during the pandemic, the different purposes that technologies were being used for, the impact of this use on people with learning disabilities, perceptions regarding whether the use of technology had been successful and the factors that contributed to the success or failure of technology use. The interviews were thematically coded using NVivo. Four members of the research team individually identified potential core themes across all the interviews and then a set of five core themes was collectively agreed: Technology Use, Good Support, Problematic Support, Digital Exclusion and Digital Inclusion. Ethical approval to conduct the study was obtained from the Human Research Ethics Committee of the Open University. Key ethical issues addressed in the protocol related to informed consent, anonymity and safeguarding. Easy read versions of the information sheets and consent forms were made available to participants with learning disabilities and, where appropriate, support workers facilitated the processing of the information and articulation of consent.

Before the pandemic, the teachers were using technology in their classes to present information (e.g. whiteboard) or as medium for entertainment (e.g. showing YouTube videos). There was little emphasis on familiarizing students with the devices and Apps that they might have access to at home. This would have implications during the pandemic when the teachers tried to deliver learning opportunities remotely to students. When the teachers described how they initially tried to deliver remote learning opportunities during the early phase of the pandemic, a common response was to use school or college approved tools to upload worksheets and videos (e.g. Google Classroom). This practice was ultimately unsuccessful, because many of the students were more interested in re-establishing social connections with teachers and classmates than accessing worksheets. In addition, very few students or parents had Google accounts or the skills to use them. As the teachers moved away from standard practices and tools in their attempts to address these issues, they developed a practice that can be characterized as ‘possibility-focused’, incorporating elements of creativity and risk management. The teachers were creative in that they were willing to experiment with different technologies and approaches, learning from mistakes and adapting until they found something that worked for their students. They managed risks in that they persuaded their managers of the benefits of their newly formed non-standard technology practices and that they could implement strategies to mitigate any potential risks. The findings from this study have implications for how schools and colleges support the digital inclusion of young people with learning disabilities post pandemic, particularly in relation to empowering teachers to develop a possibility-focused practice.

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