While reading a blog today on Classroom20.com I came across an entry that wondered why education is so behind in adopting technology. Here was my reply:
We’re behind because we can be!
I hate to say it, but think about it. We all could find an almost unlimited number of teachers who have no use for technology, and who use no more than may be required for reporting of grades or attendance. The result? Same as always; some kids pass, some kids fail, the teacher keeps the students for the semester or the year, sends them on ready or not, gets paid on a regular basis, secure in a tenured position. On the other hand, the results for teachers using technology? Some kids pass, some kids fail, the teacher keeps the students for the semester or the year, sends them on ready or not, gets paid on a regular basis, and marches toward retirement. Oh yes, I forgot, the teachers who are using the latest technology to help their students are working much harder (but that can’t be reflected in pay or anything more than the intrinsic knowledge of a job well done).
Our problem is not the lack of technology adoption. Our problem is not a lack of caring or commitment to kids. Our problem is the 100 year old institution of “School” that for some reason we hold so sacred.
By using technology could our students learn any subject more quickly? By applying what we know from brain research and by actually benefitting from the billions of dollars spent over the years on professional development and computer hardware and software, shouldn’t we be able to cause learning to occur more rapidly and effectively? You bet! But the system won’t let Maria out of Algebra I until she has served her time; it won’t let John out of US History, no matter how much the technology we serve him with sparks learning, interest and a passion for the subject. He still has to serve his time in the class. It’s a joke. He knows it, and deep down, if we think about it, we all know it.
Why should John or Maria or their teachers rush to use technology? The system doesn’t really care about their learning.
School was not set up to help individuals learn at higher levels. School was set up like an assembly line, a reflection of the best thinking of the day, but it’s woefully rusted out in the 21st century.
Why don’t we free the future for our learners? Why don’t we free the future so that we can be the educators who spark, kindle, ignite and fan the fire of learning with all the marvelous tools at our disposal?
When will we understand that “School reform” of any type, no matter how well intentioned, and individual student achievement, are mutually exclusive terms? We simply cannot both strengthen SCHOOLS AND empower each of our children to learn at high levels. That’s not to say there aren’t schools doing better and better things for kids, but let’s look at the facts, let’s examine the data.
Who wants better schools? I sure don’t! What I want are learning opportunities for every child in this country that are mass customized to their interests and needs. This is the 21st century! We CAN do that today. We have the tools, we just don’t have a system to allow it. I’m not arguing that we close down our schools; not at all. I’m just saying that those buildings are just one of dozens of apps on a student’s “learning iPod”.
It’s time to claim the 21st century and its opportunities for learning for our children!
Tags: 21st Century
Dear Tom,
I read your article on 21st Century Schools. Not all teachers feel that technology is the best method for teaching basic or higher order skills. I personally like using technology in the classroom but there are resources to consider and how each student is able to learn.
My daughter had a third grade teacher that was trying to teach the students how to do PowerPoint with only one computer in the classroom. Given her learning disability, I would have been happier if the teacher focused on basic instruction on expository writing rather than creating a learning task was very challenging. As a teacher, I felt the assignment was not very feasible since there was not enough time for all the students to type in their information and insert their pictures.
The schools I work in are very fast paced so technology is usually used for bigger projects that incorporate word processing, charts and researching the internet. For older students, webquests have been made available. Overall, I believe that technology is important for 21st Century Schools but should not be the main method for teaching students. What are your thoughts?
Sincerely,
Mrs. Smith
Dear Lori,
Thanks so much for reading the post and for commenting on it. I can certainly understand where you are coming from! As a matter of fact, I was talking to my own daughter about this last night when we had dinner together. She’s not in third grade, but is a second grade teacher. She shares many of the same frustrations that you mentioned, but from the teacher’s perspective.
I certainly don’t think technology is “the” answer, and actually I don’t think it is “an” answer. Rather, I think it is one of many tools that should be ready to be used – when appropriate! I had to laugh, or maybe groan, at the thought that a teacher would think that trying to teach a room full of wiggly third graders how to “do” PowerPoint on one computer was a good use of time, or truly valuable. It almost sounds like fulfilling a requirement that had to be checked off. Your comment about the fact that the time could have been better spent focusing on expository writing seems to ring true.
My conviction is that students must be encouraged and allowed to use the available tools and technologies in task-appropriate and learning-activity appropriate ways. What you described seems to be neither. I can almost hear the exasperation in the teacher’s voice when her 4th grade teacher colleague next year laments that the students didn’t know how to use PowerPoint, and this year’s teacher sighs that “Well, she certainly taught them!”
I finished a great book last month called What Would Google Do? One of the principles was “Do what you do best, and outsource the rest.” I’d have trouble thinking that a teacher showing 3rd graders how to do PPt could be anyone’s best. The teacher probably would have preferred to be doing something else, instead.
I also was challenged by your last paragraph, concerning reserving (my word) technology for the bigger projects. I would encourage you to rethink the notion. Ten years ago, “technology” in the classroom was pretty much limited to computers at stations and reserved for the sorts of uses you mentioned. I think helping students of any age understand how to use any technology appropriately is the key. I am amazed, for instance by what learning can be accomplished through use of cell phones, and iPods and digital cameras and the new breed of small inexpensive video cameras. Studying clouds in class? What if students were keeping personal cloud “diaries” or phases of the moon, or types of trees, or . . . on and on. Technology should never be the goal. I prefer to think of it as just part of the “platform” on which the teacher scaffolds learning.
Thanks again for your comments. I hope you will feel free to post some more. It also encourages me to post some more blogs!
Tom