If we were really serious about educational technology
November 22, 2010
70 Comments
If we were really serious about educational technology, we would… [here are 10 to get you started]
- show students how to edit their privacy settings and use groups in Facebook instead of banning online social networks because they’re ‘dangerous’ and/or ‘frivolous’;
- teach students to understand and contribute to the online information commons rather than ‘just saying no’ to Wikipedia;
- put a robust digital learning device into every student’s hands (or let them bring and use their own) instead of pretending that we live in a pencil, notebook paper, and ring binder world;
photo © 2006 Michael Surran | more info (via: Wylio)integrate digital learning and teaching tools into subject-specific preservice methods courses rather than marginalizing instructional technology as a separate course;
- understand the true risk of students encountering online predators and make policy accordingly instead of succumbing to scare tactics by the media, politicians, law enforcement, computer security vendors, and others;
- find out the exact percentage of our schools’ families that don’t have broadband Internet access at home rather than treating the amorphous ‘digital divide’ as a reason not to assign any homework that involves use of the Internet;
- treat seriously and own personally the task of becoming proficient with the digital tools that are transforming everything instead of nonchalantly chuckling about how little we as educators know about computers;
- recognize the power and potential (and limitations) of online learning rather than blithely assuming that it can’t be as good as face-to-face instruction;
- tap into and utilize the technological interest and knowledge of students instead of pretending that they have nothing to contribute;
- better educate and train school administrators rather than continuing to turn out new leaders that know virtually nothing about creating, facilitating, and/or sustaining 21st century learning environments;
- and so on…
What else could we add to the list?
If we were really serious about [educational technology issue], we would [?] instead of [?].
It’s almost 2011. Isn’t it time for us to get serious about educational technology?
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Teach students design and use-ability skills to develop programs. Right now companies are terrible at developing useable software for their employees. It’s slow and hard to use. We can develop all kinds of great interfaces for games and applications for fun, but nobody takes software seriously at companies. Schools need to give students the skills they’ll need in the workplace – very few employees I know use powerpoint or give presentations as often as you’d assume they do. Yes, everyone needs better public speaking skills – I agree with that. I would also say schools need to get students thinking about what people need from tech outside of the schools, instead of trying to develop some photo app, students could maybe develop apps that would be useful for companies or for other uses that haven’t been thought of for productivity.
I agree with the whole message but I have one question. How am I supposed to do all this when I can’t even get my students onto a computer to do research, type up an assignment, create a prezi or write on a blog? We have 8 working computers in a lab we share with 7 other classrooms. I am hesitant to do anything with technology as I can’t guarantee students the time to do the work in school hours. It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s that it is physically impossible. Until we invest into technology for our schools and stop trying to build curriculum around 1950′s principles we are never going to see a change. Add more technoloy based units we are told, how when I can’t get my students on to the technology?