Technology for learning; technology for teaching
Education is not the filling of a pail, but the lighting of a fire.If you ask 'why use technology in learning?' You get a lot of obvious and interesting answers e.g.:
--W.B. Yeats
- the right tool for the job: twenty first century learners must use twenty first century tools,
- the explosion of information in every subject area means teacher telling the kids how it is is less valuable than previously
- lifelong learning. More than ever education is about learning to (re-and un-)learn, to adapt, to make decisions.
- the knowledge economy: the skills kids (and not just kids) are going to need are handling the masses of information they are subject to.
- the range of stimulating media and activities available through technology
- personalisation: the ability to fashion your own route through content when and as it suits you
- collaboration may not necessarily be easier online, but it can be more multifaceted, involve more people and go on over a longer hours, days even weeks.
Why? Because it's fun.
Most teachers would characterise these as being solitary, remote activities best done at home or in the Learning Centre/ITC suite/information commons or whatever the institution calls the place that learners can access the internet. Interaction between learners in these real and virtual spaces may sweeten the pill, but the tasks aren't seen primarily as collaborative.
Overseeing net-research isn't part of the teacher's role. To return to Yeats, you're unlikely to light the educational fire while the students are variously checking their email, looking at wikipedia and messaging their friends.
So what is it that teachers do and where might technology fit in? Teachers are typically engaged in (off the topic of my head);
- assessment
- control/management of learner behaviour
- 'modeling' behaviours, attitudes and values
- selecting what will be learned, in which ways, for how long, in which contexts and to what ends
- giving feedback on performance/learning
- enthusing, cajoling, entertaining, challenging
- 'making it real': giving context to learning
This is partly to do with a scarcity of technology in the classroom: there is usually only one computer (if that) which the teacher controls. But this isn't the case when it comes to homework, in which solitary 'research and report' use of the internet remains the most common technological scenario.
It's not too difficult to come up with a reasonable list of reasons for teachers not to use technology:
- it's hard to keep up with pace of change
- lack of institutional support (technical, pedagogic, even legal)
- hard to find acceptable models of assessment that align with e.g. use of web2.0 tools,
- inevitable technical glitches
- long track record of failed 'elearning' projects,
- supervising online interaction extends teachers' hours which isn't reflected in current working arrangements
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