Got Tools? Got Tech? Got Training? Got Wires, or Ubiquitous Computing?
Bonnie Bracey
There is a lot of talking going on in educational circles, about the ways in which teachers teach, and the problems of technology. The real problem is that many teachers have not been trained to use technology as a tool. As we claim that so many schools are wired, many people know that there are schools which have a wire, to someplace in the school but no real infrastructure that reaches to the classroom. Even if the schools have wires, or wireless technology, there must be a period in which teachers are , as most professionals would be, given the opportunity to learn to use media as a tool.
"Today, we are in the middle of a new revolution in both technology and culture; a revolution in which our children are often in the vanguard. For they are the first generation that is truly "growing up digital." Of course, interactive media for young people is not entirely new. Since the first video games were introduced more than two decades ago, the digital content industry has experienced enormous growth in size and technological sophistication. There has been a transformation of use of the media .
In recent years, the Internet, more affordable home computing and a host of other digital game and formats have helped make the use of such interactive media a dominant activity of modern childhood.
Education Week has a wonderful report entitled, " The New Divides" that introduces the fact that the new digital divide is no longer just one wide gap between computer haves and have nots. Rather, it is a series of divides. In their report, they share research that show many types of students are not getting the high tech experience that they need. Education Week, http://www.edweek.org/ " The New Divides".
The report says, "To fully understand todayıs digital inequities, educators and policymakers must look beyond the machines. But rather than one single gaping divide, what the nationıs schools are grappling with is more a set of divides, cutting in different directions."
Media education, media literacy for communication should enable people to gain an understanding for the way the media act and operate in society. Therefore media education for teachers must mean that we learn how the media works, and that we can interpret the offered media messages and values in their context. The use of media should aim at empowering all citizens in our society and also ensure that people with special needs as well as the social and economically disadvantaged have access to it.
The Kaiser Family Foundationıs recent report found that children today are immersed in media. Their lives are increasingly devoted to video game playing,browsing the Internet and conversing in chat rooms. oWe know that children spend more time using media than they do in school, or spending time with family or friends. So we have a powerful incentive to understand how such a pervasive experience affects their development.
Therefore, it is imperative that teachers be aware of the Internet and convergent ways of using media, ways to construct learning using media and be proficient users of technology as a tool.
It is not the computer or covergence technology resource that teaches the child. It is the way in which technology is used as a tool in creating a learning landscape. It is not so important what the platform is ( the kind of computer) or the kinds of tools, as it is to have the new ways of thinking, transformational ideas about teaching and learning.
No matter how many tech people there are in the school, and even if there is a lab, the teachers need to be more than familiar, in uses of media so that they are just about fearless in its use.
I am also always amazed when teachers are told, as I was, in my last classroom experience, as a lab teacher, that the testing was the most important subject and then if there is time they can "play" with technology. Play?
There is nothing like the human touch in education, as George Lucas often says. He further says," Traditional education can be extremely isolating--the curriculum is often abstract and not relevant to real life, teachers and students don't connect with resources and experts outside of the classroom, and schools operate as if they were separate from their communities "Project-based learning, student teams working cooperatively, students connecting with passionate experts, and broader forms of assessment can dramatically improve student learning. New digital multimedia and telecommunications can support these practices and engage our students. And well-prepared educators are critical. (http://www.glef.org)
In contrast, technology dramatically alters the pace of instruction. Students may move as quickly as they can using computers to assist them with basic instruction or progress more slowly to use technologies to explore a topic in depth.ı
As more and more technology is introduced, guiding students through a wider range of knowledge is made easier. Inforamtion is more available to the students, and teachers assume the responsibility for helping them better organize it and look at it in alternate ways.
Learning is a Process
Teachers must be allowed to explore the vision of of possibilities with the use of technology, with a guide, on the side, but also,as a personal learning experience And as a tool, to keep records, organize lessons, and to communicate with other teachers to share projects and ideas. . The social dimension of learning is possible and too often, the people who are the critics of technology, do not have recent , or regular, or no classroom experience to understand all of the components of the interaction that goes on in the classroom, and the politics of the school site, the school board, the state, and the national vision , as they are interpreted by the educational leadership in the school.
The kind of use of technology that creates transformational change must have support at the school level. The administrators, and specialists, should also be understanding of the use of technology and the new ways of learning.
Educational Technology:Media for Inquiry, Communication, Construction, and Expression http://www.lis.uiuc.edu/%7Echip/pubs/taxonomy/index.html
