There is a sense of relief and excitement, but also nostalgia as students attend their final lessons and say goodbye to their teachers. Thank-you cards and gifts are swapped and students and staff reminisce about their time spent together in lessons. These scenes around college are representative of this point in any academic year. It is perhaps the one predictable and unchanged part of the year; except this time, it is happening whilst masked and distanced.

The Covid-induced disruption of 2020-21 has been a time when contact with students has been reduced and everything has felt a little detached, but the scenes described above suggest the student-teacher relationships have remained strong. How?

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In September, like in many colleges, my students were taught in bubbles, with half of the class learning online from home and half face-to-face to reduce numbers in the college. Teaching a popular and oversubscribed subject, the novelty of such small classes had many benefits, but they also lacked something. The usual buzz of the classroom was missing, the friendships that are usually forged during the first few lessons were restricted and with social areas being cordoned off to keep them Covid-safe, it meant that other opportunities to mix and build friendships were very limited.

Students and their teachers quickly learned to communicate digitally, and whilst student-to-student relationships and connections were limited, student-teacher relationships were intensified. In some ways, the availability of teachers was increased. Students were given an instant line of communication with teachers through digital means, and student expectations were altered.

Online learning strengthened student-teacher relationships in colleges

During online lessons, those who might normally have remained quiet in the classroom found their voice via the chat function. Digital connections gave students a direct line to their teachers to ask questions, confirm instructions and seek reassurance. Communication in a digital capacity allowed the usual relationships to form and students to feel supported by their teachers.

My concern about how students would emerge from the safety of their digital cocoons and bubbled class groups once local lockdown restrictions were lifted was also expressed by the students themselves. They had become accustomed to the smaller class sizes and felt territorial over their seats and the students in their bubble. As normality resumed and they joined one another in the face-to-face classroom, these concerns diminished and the resilient, adaptable students of 2021 adjusted to the new faces and shared space. They quickly made up for lost time and student relationships blossomed.

One thing that didn’t end was the digital communication. This means of communication was essential during online lessons and contributed hugely to allowing relationships to form in the first instance. It facilitated a sense of normality by the end of the year, but what is the impact now?

For some, the digital option has remained the communication style of choice beyond online/dual-mode lessons. They confirm instructions through messages after lessons, explain absences, ask for support, all digitally. I have taken many things from this academic year: I have developed skills that I never imagined would be necessary. I have also come to realise that some aspects of lockdown teaching should no longer be a priority. Just as quickly as it was introduced, digital communication needs to be phased out to become a secondary rather than primary means of communication between students and teachers.

Digital communication, with all its lockdown uses, also inadvertently promoted extended working hours, the expectation of immediate responses, the unsocial hours of communication and the ability for students to hide behind a screen to avoid face-to-face communication. In a time when teachers are being expected to perform beyond their roles and take on the responsibilities of examiners and potential involvement in appeals processes, it has never been more important to have boundaries and expectations in place to safeguard our wellbeing, workload and professional relationships with our students.

My mission is now the same as it was at the start of the academic year. However, this time, through the promotion of real-time interactions rather than digital communications, it’s the reverse of what we had to promote at the beginning of the year. Rebuilding the students’ confidence in engaging in face-to-face interactions, encouraging them to find their voice in the real classroom just as they did in the virtual classroom. Promoting sociable working hours and asking them to pre-empt questions they want answering, so they can be asked within college hours and to support this amazing cohort to adjust, once again, to the next phase - post-lockdown expectations.

Digital communication was invaluable in creating the teacher-student relationships during lockdown and online learning. Without it, the normality of the leaving scenes described earlier would not have occurred. Undoubtedly, our students will enter a digital world and need the skills to navigate this, but we need to ensure that these digital skills are used in addition to, and not in place of, real-life interactions.

Emily Atkinson teaches at a sixth form college in England