Sod the Technology, Show Me the Learning!
I had a bit of a rant on a mailing list yesterday when I saw a request from an Australian School 
Administrator who was asking to visit a 1:1 school to see something in action for the first time. I am amazed that MLC Melbourne embarked on the journey of 1:1 learning over 25 years ago and we still want to see what kids using laptops “looks like” so we might have a trial! My Advice? Go look at a picture! I mean it. Visiting a 1:1 school is like visiting an IKEA store and thinking that the mock up room is going to look exactly like that in your appartment or house. It isn’t! It is about context.
I had a short, online conversation with David Warlick about this on the Learning 2.0 08 Ning. David mentions the need to have some artifacts of what 21st Century Learning looks like. I am looking forward to carrying this conversation with David a lot further when we catch up in Hong Kong in September. In the meantime, I really think that we need to think about these artifacts and try to get our heads around how we can show all stakeholders what we are trying to do to shift schools to places of genuine, engaged, authentic, 21st Century Learning.
Filed under: Appropriate Hardware for Education | Tagged: edtech, learning, LSA_Paul
Hi Paul.
I absolutely agree with what David Warlick said about having exemplar artifacts and student work. I think that it is very easy for people heavily involved in technology and the intensive edubloggers’ world to forget that there are many, many administrators and teachers out there who are really just thinking of getting a foot on the bottom rung of the technology ladder.
It is sometimes frustrating to those of us who are a few (or many) more rungs further up that ladder that it is taking so long for these issues to enter the consciousness of so many administrators and serving teachers .. as you say, it’s not as if laptop schools are some recently unveiled novelty.
Such is the slow and laborious nature of change for human beings ….but I do think we are coming to a threshold point in the process when things are going to start accelerating even more rapidly and this is the time when later adopters are going to need even more scaffolding and encouragement to make the transition. Because they’ve missed out on much of the early development and relatively more gradual evolution in ed tech, it probably seems even more alien and exclusive to them than it would have if they’d got involved earlier.
It’s also worth reminding ourselves that it’s not just about technology though, it’s also about the significant impact on learning, classroom dynamics, relationship and curricula when you create technology-enabled classrooms. These changes are threatening and disorienting for many educators and they need to be supported to make fundamental changes to the way they have always done things.
Great line about IKEA - hits the nail on the head with a big thwack!!!