Thanks for taking the time to outline your approach in Aberdeenshire in such detail Steven - I'm very grateful - and I'm sure anybody else following this thread has been picking up some good ideas too.

Thanks to everybody who has replied to date. I'll just run through a few of my thoughts:

social practice - yes of course this is our underpinning principle for delivery. Unfortunately this virus caught us all on the hop and the 'place where learners are' at the time was in a physical building with one-to-one/small group facilitation. Yes we had pursued ICT Level 2 as a Core Skill but the connection between learning the basics of using IT and engaging in education was never made. How could we have anticipated what was to come? 

contacting learners - again despite our well-intentioned persistence in supporting learners to create email accounts many clearly never check their emails and rely solely on their phones and a (to me) bewildering variety of apps and platforms. Lack of consistency initially slowed implementation of distance learning almost to a halt while we scratched out heads and attempted to upskill ourselves on one or more platforms. (Yes I am from the one nationalised utility supplier generation).

establishing a common approach - impossible. I relate entirely to everybody who has written about the one-to-one initiatives, engendered by our learners different abilities, our own different abilities and our IT department's prejudices. And to be fair 'social practice' was way down the list of priorities for IT teams, way below online security. Whatsapp (used by all our Syrian learners) - out, Zoom - tolerated (just), Microsoft Teams - sat upon and delayed.

health and safety - the idea of simply printing out materials and posting them to learners with an SAE for return was discussed. This would have exposed staff to increased risk of going to and fro the post office and was also based on the presumption that staff had a printer/photocopier at home.

As I stated at the beginning, we grasped the nettle with learners who had laptops and a bit of computer knowledge and have been using Zoom with them (almost exclusively European Intermediate ESOL learners) since the start of April. 'Ignoring' this opportunity would have felt like we were never going to get anywhere with anybody and yes the most vulnerable most marginalised were the ones who got left out by this approach. Mea culpa. Despite some experiments with phone calls, photographing exercises and examining other platforms, the Syrians almost all opted to forego ESOL during Ramadan giving us some 'breathing space' during which I began this thread. Again let me thank all those who have contributed so far.

In conclusion the notion of bridging the digital divide has been on the agenda for a long time now, and unfortunately when the crunch came I certainly was not prepared and nor had I prepared my learners. That said, opportunities to tackle the challenges were almost always confounded by our LA IT policies. Hopefully life will return to some normality soon - meantime this should be a wake up call for everybody involved in education - formal or informal. The vision of learners constructively engaging through a screen has been visualised for years - decades perhaps - but we have not yet come anywhere near to realising this vision. Nevertheless the determination and commitment shown by everybody in this thread (and beyond) is commendable and inspiring.

Best wishes to all and thanks again for all responses to date and any to follow. 

Neil

Thanks for the contribution Laura. I'm aware of Futurelearn and we were directed by D&A College to a slightly different course centered on on-line ESOL tutoring:

https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/online-tutoring

I would recommend this as Laura has recommended her course. I previously used Futurelearn for this course too:

https://www.futurelearn.com/courses/volunteering-with-refugees/

which I also found had many helpful pointers.

Best wishes and thanks again

Neil