UK schools use emojis to teach Shakespeare

Growing numbers of teachers in the UK are using emojis to help children engage with Shakespeare’s work as the expressive icons can help pupils connect with the subject they are learning. Some teachers say the emoji language has something to bring to the 21st century classroom.
“I’ve just taught A Midsummer Night’s Dream and when we’ve read a bit of the scene, they summarise it in two main emojis and then have to explain it,” Charlotte Hodgson, an English teacher at Avonbourne College in Bournemouth told TES, which originally reported the story.

She said everyone in her department used emojis and that they had helped her students engage with Shakespeare. “The emojis are not used by themselves — there is always some kind of verbal or written explanation that then allows you to check pupils’ literacy, writing skills or speech skills,” she said. “The emojis just give them a starting point that they understand.” Hodgson said that symbols can help pupils link ideas and can lead to higher understanding, engagement and learning.

Luca Kuhlman, a modern foreign languages teacher at a Stockton secondary school, said that with emojis, students do not have to translate everything into English when learning another language.

“Wherever possible, I take out the English words in a text and replace them with an emoji, so they associate the French with an image rather than with an English translation,” he said. “If you can eliminate as much English as possible, they don’t need much explanation.” He added that he was careful not to overuse them.

The educational benefits of the colourful icons are yet to convince some. Clare Sealy, head teacher of London’s St Matthias School, is against using emojis to teach. “As educators, we have not a single minute to waste teaching trivia, such as emojis. How can we help disadvantaged children gain the sort of powerful knowledge that children in, say, the top public schools have? Not by devoting precious curriculum time to the detritus of youth sub-culture. That would be fiddling while Rome burns,” she said.