Digital Learning, Real Classrooms: Insights from Implementation Research in Ghana. Working Paper

Abstract

The use of education technology (EdTech) has been widely recognised as a potential catalyst for improving learning outcomes, including in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) where access to quality education remains challenging. However, care must be taken in the implementation, as the selected tools, resources and application have a large bearing on the effectiveness of the EdTech. UNESCO's 2023 Global Education Monitoring Report, for example, finds that adoption of EdTech varies across countries, based on socioeconomic conditions, teacher readiness and national income levels. Many interventions, even those that are evidence based and well designed, often encounter significant challenges in successful deployment in real-world settings. Similarly, an intervention may be deemed ineffective in cases where the problem actually only stems from the implementation rather than the intervention itself. It is therefore important in analysis to distinguish between the design of the intervention and its implementation. Implementation research examines how educational programmes operate in practice, identifies facilitators and barriers to success, and determines how to adapt tools for diverse and resource-constrained contexts. Unlike impact evaluations, which focus primarily on measuring performance outcomes, implementation research investigates the processes of implementation -- providing insights into how programmes function, for whom and under what conditions. To help in describing the purpose of this paper, it is useful to note what this kind of research is not: implementation research is not an efficacy trial to select appropriate interventions; it is not an ex-post study of the implementation; and it is not monitoring and evaluation (M&E) of the implementation. In this paper, the authors outline how implementation research was incorporated into the piloting of the Learning Passport (LP) -- a digital platform that has been deployed in classrooms in 47 countries across the globe -- in Ghana in 2023. The LP pilot included implementation research to assess the platform's effectiveness within the infrastructural and pedagogical context of primary schools in Accra. It allowed for rapid course correction during implementation and highlighted insights informing strategies for in-school digital learning, both in Ghana and in similar LMIC contexts. [This paper was published in partnership with UNICEF Ghana.]