Educational Technologyin Context

The Big Picture

What have we learned from the past?

• No technology has all the answers for education.• Computer literacy skills keep changing.• Must match the technology resources and methods

to content area skills that display need for improvement, like reading, writing, and math.

• No single delivery system of computers does it all; you need stand alone computers and networks.

What have we learned from the past?

• Other people besides teachers write curriculum.

• Technology can bring undesirable changes too, like less face to face communication.

• Older technologies can still be useful.• Teachers will always be important

because kids need a counter-balancing human response.

Rationale for Using Technologyin Education

• Motivation• Unique instructional

capabilities• Support for new

instructional approaches• Increased teacher

productivity• Required skills for an

information age

Motivation

• Gaining learner attention

• Engaging the learner through production work

• Increasing perceptions of control

Unique Instructional Capabilities

• Linking learners to information sources

• Helping learners visualize problems and solutions

• Tracking learner progress

• Linking learners to learning tools

Support for New Approaches

• Cooperative learning: small group work• Shared intelligence or distributed intelligence:

ideas that stay in one person’s head are too restrictive

• Problem solving and higher order skills: multimedia and the Internet allow teachers to set complex, long term goals that call for basic skills, motivating students to learn lower level skills at the same time they acquire higher ones

Increased Teacher Productivity

• Freeing time to work with students by helping with production and record keeping tasks such as attendance, grades

• Providing more accurate information more quickly

• Allowing teachers to produce better-looking, more “student-friendly” materials more quickly

The Big Six Skills

• Task definition• Information-seeking strategies• Location and access• Use of information• Synthesis• Evaluation

Required Skills for an Information Age

• Information literacy: the Big Six• Technology literacy: impacts

economic competitiveness• Visual literacy: needed to

interpret, understand, and appreciate the meaning of visual messages and use visual thinking to conceptualize solutions to problems

Trends and Issues Shaping the Use of Technology in Education

• Cultural/Equity• Societal• Educational• Technical

Cultural/Equity Issues and Trends

Economic/Ethnic: lower income schools equals less access to computers, and more minority students in lower income schools

Multicultural: “computer culture is pervasive in society” i.e., computers are everywhere

Gender: technology remains a male-dominated area

Special needs: special devices and methods can allow special needs students equal access to technology but are expensive to obtain and implement.

Societal Issues and Trends

Economic trends:

higher education costs

Political trends:

politicians want lower-cost, more effective education

Social trends: recognition of need for technology literacy but also a growing popular distrust of technology too

Educational Issues and Trends

Directed versus constructivist views:• Directed uses of technology (drill, tutorial) are

proven effective but often considered passe• Constructivist uses are emphasized but little evidence

exists on their effectiveness

Single subject versus interdisciplinary:• Past emphasis on teaching subjects in isolation• Current trend toward integrated curriculum or

merging several subjects into one activity

Technical Issues and Trends

Rapid change:• Technology changes too quickly for teachers to keep

up with new software and hardware on their own• Educators cannot afford most current technology

Complexity:• Teacher training is not keeping up with technology

developments because there is not enough time• Schools lack the infrastructure to keep up with new

technologies due to funding difficulties sometimes

New Challenges and Skills

• Technology skills for all teachers• Staying abreast of local and social attitudes,

including pro- and anti-technology sentiments• Using strategies to ensure equity: every teacher must

acknowledge a personal responsibility to ensure access for economically, disadvantaged, minority, female, and differently-abled students

• Matching integration strategies with needs: analyze which approach is needed and use appropriate technology resources