Hairdressing student goes to great lengths to excel online

When the Covid-19 outbreak hit in March, Women’s Hairdressing Level 2 student, Lisa*, began learning from home. Self-isolating due to health reasons, Lisa worked with her tutor, Angela Scott, to adapt the course for online learning and transform the way they worked.

Life at college

Prior to the pandemic, Lisa attended Keighley College weekly part-time, in order to achieve her Women’s Hairdressing Certificate.

Lisa said: “Each Wednesday, I would go to college from 2.30pm-9pm for a combination of theoretical and practical learning. Both sessions complemented each other, as we would first study the theory with my tutor, Margaret, and then put it into practice afterwards. I would always enjoy going to college, my tutors and course friends were always very encouraging and supportive.”

Dynamic digital learning

During the pandemic, Lisa was self-isolating and was required to do all learning from home.

Lisa commented: “I was initially feeling anxious about completing the course from home and often contemplated freezing the course. However, my tutor Angela assessed my situation and decided on special measures that could be implemented for me during lockdown.

“Both Margaret and Angela allowed me to complete my theory at my own pace and adapted the delivery of the course to suit my personal commitments, such as hospital visits.

“My practical assessments were completed twice a week during one-to-one recorded sessions with Angela. The outcome of these assessments was amazing; I was able to regularly ask questions to aid my learning. I was worried about losing my confidence from not being in a classroom environment, but the tailored sessions with Angela significantly grew my hair-cutting confidence.”

Angela Scott, hairdressing tutor, said: “Lisa has flourished working digitally. She was initially extremely nervous, however I made sure to set up regular group calls so she always felt included. The one-to-one video teaching has been great for her, allowing her to set her own learning goals to suit her abilities and timescales.”

The new normal

With many students now learning digitally, Angela has implemented a range of online activities into the course.

Angela added: “It was inspiring to see how many of my students adapted well to online learning. I would plan all of Lisa’s assessments, allowing her to keep on track of her work and complete tasks independently.

“Moving forward, I am going to continue using Google Classroom and Google Hangouts, as these platforms are great for communicating with students, linking to industry websites and additional training. I am also going to implement additional home study activities, such as encouraging students to submit photos of their work online.”

Lisa said: “Angela has completely transformed the course and has constantly gone the extra mile to ensure I would progress while working from home. She has run many online tutorials just for me, while other students in the class attended college to do practical sessions.

“Angela has enabled me to complete all of my theory and practical work digitally with recorded video evidence, meaning I don’t have to go back into college. I’m really proud of my efforts during this difficult period and I am incredibly thankful to Angela for supporting me throughout.”

*This is not the student’s real name as they wished to remain anonymous.