Bloomsbury Education is a British educational institution based in South Korea. They employ world-class educators who teach courses that follow the International Baccalaureate^® (IB) program. The school operates branches on Jeju Island and in Seoul.

“Bloomsbury Education specialises in preparing students for their IB diplomas, A-Levels, and IGSCEs,” says Kim Junghwan, CEO of Bloomsbury Education. “We have successfully sent many of our students to prestigious universities and elite private institutions in Korea and abroad.”

As part of their ongoing efforts to improve their hybrid educational content delivery and classroom interaction, Bloomsbury Education wanted to transition from traditional whiteboards to smart boards at its Jeju school.

Given that their students plan to join the workforce in the near future, Bloomsbury Education wanted to prepare them by using interactive technology to develop their 21st-century skills and competencies. To do this, the school needed a solution that could provide active learning opportunities in the classroom. Active learning, as opposed to passive learning that relies on lectures and memorisation, encourages students to develop their critical thinking skills through data analysis, debate, and other activities. These are valuable as 21st-century skills are less likely to be automated. 

Bloomsbury Education didn’t just need an in-person solution either: they wanted one that could accommodate remote learning as well in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Ideally, this solution would not only help bridge the distance between school-based teachers and home-based students but would also help create as many active learning opportunities as possible.

Teachers at Bloomsbury Education found that the BenQ Board Pro and Master helped them transition to a more interactive teaching and learning style that better engaged their students, as well as one that provided hybrid functionality.

“The BenQ Board is an extremely helpful tool and innovative product, which has helped me in every single lecture and lesson to not only present, but use pop-up learning materials, annotate, analyse, and mark homework as well as essays and other such things taught in lessons,” Nash says. He adds that he was able to easily use multimedia sources such as YouTube with the BenQ Board during lessons.

Mathematics teacher Kim Sumin says that with the BenQ Board, she’s able to quickly access her teaching materials: “With the BenQ Board, I can use NFC to load my personal settings and teaching materials from my cloud storage account.”

The BenQ Board also helped teachers and students overcome the distance learning challenges brought about by the pandemic. Bloomsbury Education initially tried to use interactive displays from other brands but found that the BenQ Board’s compatibility with various video conferencing apps, and support for cloud whiteboarding, made hybrid lessons easier to deliver.

“When students were unable to attend classes due to COVID-19,” says Nash, “we taught online classes using the BenQ Board, supporting the cloud, whereby students could access the lessons remotely from their homes. This not only helped with the safety issue but also encouraged the teaching and the learning. This is something that not only the teachers and students found helpful, but also the parents.”

Since installing the BenQ Board Pro and Master in their school, Bloomsbury Education has found that students are more engaged with lessons than before. 

“Using the BenQ Board has helped our classes run more smoothly so students are able to concentrate better,” says Kim. Her students, including Gang Seungjin, agree. “After using the BenQ Board, I feel like I can concentrate better and understand lessons more,” he says.

Kim says she also found the BenQ Board’s voice-assisted functionality useful in class. The BenQ Board Pro and Master have a remote control with a built-in mic. Kim says she uses this mic along with Naver to quickly and easily search for information online with voice assistance. 

The BenQ Board also helps create a healthier classroom for both students and teachers with ClassroomCare^®. “It has smart eye care technologies so my eyes are protected even when I’m next to the board,” Kim says. “And since its screen…is germ-resistant, my students and I can use the BenQ Board without worry.”