Education's New Slippery SlopeThis past Friday, I was fortunate enough to have had a dinner with a friend who happens to be the I.T. guy for a M & A Firm in Buffalo, New York. After several brief minutes of catch-up, we found ourselves exchanging ideas about the future and technology (I would only begin to realize later how much of a geek I have become). Now, I have read Friedman's book, The World is Flat, and have been teaching the concepts of outsourcing to my economics classes for several years. Remarkably, I was taken by surprise when my friend informed me that as a corporation, they are finding it more economically efficient to outsource the use of technologies. Having lost several I.Q. points from the classroom to the dinner, I asked him why? He explained that the software and hardware services being provided in the private sector are in a constant state of innovation. Simply, it would be ill-advised for a corporation to invest human resources as well as financial resources into certain systems , knowing very well that another company will be launching a beta version within months. Remarkably, this struck me like a bolt of lighting and I began to see what I viewed as a serious hurdle education will have to overcome.
Being a part of the public sector, we often find ourselves chasing the private sector. In this particular case, I began to see educational technology in a different light. If the private sector is finding it difficult to keep up with the ever changing world of technology, how is education, with it's limited resources, going to provide students with a cutting edge learning environment? From there, I began to question how teachers, who are immigrants in this era of technology, are going to be able to take these technologies and bring them into their classrooms for their students? How are educators, with limited knowledge of the capabilities of these technologies, and limited time, going to buy into their uses, knowing very well, the energies they expend on learning these new tools, will only lead to a continuous struggle to stay on top of the ever changing world of technology? Furthermore, from a management end, how can administrators within a district, looking to optimize their instructional staff, avoid waisting their financial and human resources learning technologies that are quickly becoming antiquated?
I have recently been experimenting with Web 2.0 technologies in my own classes, and have had positive feedback from the students. I am seeing first hand, the value these tools add to the learning environment and student motivation. However, having had these results, and recognizing the need to continuously stay on top of the technology coming into the market, thanks to blogs such as techcrunch, I have developed a fear that we have opened up an institutional Pandora's box. My fear is the diligent teacher, seeking to provide their students with cutting edge tools, will fight a never ending battle. Currently, there is no systematic means in which to learn these technologies. There is no mechanism in place that filters out the new technologies in a manner that efficiently determines what should and should not be used. What is current and effective today, will soon be outdated, as new generations of technologies change the web. This has created a very slippery slope for the classroom teacher and the district administrator.
This structural flaw may actually become the biggest priority districts tackle in their plans to implement these tools. Like the private sector, the I.T. structure in education may need to redesign itself, to include a technology manager with significant instructional background, whose role is to study the market, and marry the technological innovations with pedagogy. This job may play as important a role in the future of education, as the I.T. specialist plays in private sector technology management. I also believe the market will need to develop a service for education that creates a short cut in this process. Whether it is google, microsoft, or some twenty-something techno-superfreak, there needs to be service providers that allow districts to outsource these very difficult questions.
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ou know I'm an advocate.....at times crazy over what we need to do and how to make it happen. There are several thoughts. First, we need to change how we do staff development as we know it. I still believe there are a need for "conference days" to present pedagogical changes in our district. With respect to making others aware, there are some incredible resouces I have just come across that we can "professionally borrow and adapt" in the form of powerpoint presentations from a blog "the Fischbowl".
I was stunned at the quality and the message that would be hard for anyone to argue with. I have already downloaded these presentations. They can be placed on our common drive and ask departments to take a department meeting to view them. That will take care of awareness.
With respect to blogging. For those just beginning, there is a step-by-step powerpoint that teachers could follow. That too can and should be on a common drive.
Next, it the notion of meeting the needs of our students. If you do see the presentations from the Fischbowl on "Did you know" and "What If", the imperative will be clear. Teachers are intelligent and in this profession for a reason. The need will become obvious.
In other reading this week, there is another Commission that has been at work. "The National Center on Educatio and the Economy". They had published a resport at the end of the 90's looking at what schools and the business community need to do to function in the world we live in. They are about to release a report that will outline the needs for success in a global economy. I am very interested in see that the report documents and recommends. I think that may become a platform for Iroquois, if not New York State to begin a conversation.
Lastly, while hypothetical, check out the presentation I sent you "2020". Is it time for us to tackle a strategic planning committee to look at what we need to do in order to prepare students for 2020? Why is 2020 "the year"? In September, incoming kindergarteners around the country will graduate in the year 2020. If we are to truly reform schools and teach students in the educational system "differently", does it not make sense to begin at the very beginning with the next generation?
I leave you with those thoughts.
You know I'm an advocate.....at times crazy over what we need to do and how to make it happen. There are several thoughts. First, we need to change how we do staff development as we know it. I still believe there are a need for "conference days" to present pedagogical changes in our district. With respect to making others aware, there are some incredible resouces I have just come across that we can "professionally borrow and adapt" in the form of powerpoint presentations from a blog "the Fischbowl".
I was stunned at the quality and the message that would be hard for anyone to argue with. I have already downloaded these presentations. They can be placed on our common drive and ask departments to take a department meeting to view them. That will take care of awareness.
With respect to blogging. For those just beginning, there is a step-by-step powerpoint that teachers could follow. That too can and should be on a common drive.
Next, it the notion of meeting the needs of our students. If you do see the presentations from the Fischbowl on "Did you know" and "What If", the imperative will be clear. Teachers are intelligent and in this profession for a reason. The need will become obvious.
In other reading this week, there is another Commission that has been at work. "The National Center on Educatio and the Economy". They had published a resport at the end of the 90's looking at what schools and the business community need to do to function in the world we live in. They are about to release a report that will outline the needs for success in a global economy. I am very interested in see that the report documents and recommends. I think that may become a platform for Iroquois, if not New York State to begin a conversation.
Lastly, while hypothetical, check out the presentation I sent you "2020". Is it time for us to tackle a strategic planning committee to look at what we need to do in order to prepare students for 2020? Why is 2020 "the year"? In September, incoming kindergarteners around the country will graduate in the year 2020. If we are to truly reform schools and teach students in the educational system "differently", does it not make sense to begin at the very beginning with the next generation?
I leave you with those thoughts.
I completley agree; technology is advancing at such a fast speed everyday. It is hard to keep up. It sounds like you really now what you are doing though and that you are really utilizing the internet in a great way.
- www.pleezhelp.blogspot.com
Mr. Aroune
I agree with your thoughts because I feel that technology can be useful and can help us all in more ways then ever before. I also feel, however, that technology can be quite dangerous and could lure us to places that are so dark and grim that we could tap into the great unknown and could eventually corrupt our minds and our ways of life. I feel as a student that we should use technology most of the time but not resort our efforts to all of the time. I think within time we will be more able to understand it's power that it holds on us and could eventually become safer users in these technologies.
While the technologies we use may change at breakneck speed, the principles of learner-centered instruction are fairly constant. Educators don't need to keep up with every new knick-knack and gadget, they need to keep on designing learning experiences that keep students on their toes.
I am not sure of how much of this brave new ever evolving is essential. I think it is all interesting and I am willing to admit that new technologies often can be extended into educational environments in unexpected ways. Humans are creative that way.
My point is that if we have informal tech gatekeepers everywhere. Some have the knack for predicting how some new app will be taken up. Like a good stock picker, they exercise as much art as judgment in doing so. Others are just pushing the next new new thing in whatever echosphere they happen to be shouting into. Don't we just need to get more reliable gatekeepers to help us keep up?
For example, I know my students need to get better at summarizing information. How much new technology do we need to develop this skill? Pencil, paper, talk, lecture, and guided practice seem to do the trick. Why do I need MindMaps in a lab connected to the larger community in order to teach students how to summarize? I only use a new tech tool when it is demonstrably better than what my experience tells me is more at hand, cheaper, and adequate. Apply Occam's razor to this thorny issue, let the simplest technology rule the roost and I believe we will alleviate some of the distress. This doesn't reduce the responsibility teachers have to carry around their toolbox with a proper set of good tools necessary to do the job of helping students learn. The tool box can't have everything in it. If it does, then you are no longer nimble and that is fatal to student learning.
This came up in my nephew's school district. Someone at the district asked "What programs should we be teaching the children to use?" My brother-in-law is a manager at Oracle, and his response was, "They don't need to learn 'a program' they need to learn how to use the computer/programs." Basically, he thought "What difference does it make if they learn PowerPoint in elementary school when it will be out of date by the time they graduate?" He rightly pointed out that they have to have facility with computers in general, not a particular program. This is a skill I think, in general, we are better at developing in the U.S. but the recent emphasis on standardized tests, and memorization may put this in greater danger than anything else because students are being taught there is only one right answer, instead of that there are good answers, better answers, and sometimes a bunch of different answers that are of equal value. E.g. do you use the menu bar, or hot keys when you edit? Do you hot-key the menu (Alt-F, etc.) Does it really matter what way you do it? The answer is, probably not. What matters is what works for you. I think if we expose students to different computer interfaces (metaphors), they will be more comfortable wherever they are.
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