Samen jonge leden werven! 10-04-23

Use of ICT in schoolsby professional teachersand the role of teacher unions

Bert Imminga The Netherlands

About teacher union AOb (General Education Union):• Biggest Dutch union for Education

• In total 80.000 members– 30.000 working in primary education

– 20.000 working pre-vocational + Senior general secondary education + Pre-university education

– 10.000 working in secondary vocational education

– 4000 working in higher professional education

– No activities in University’s; Other members: working elsewhere or not working

About AOb and its vision(2):

• AOb helps teachers: labour- /workingconditions also about content of teacher work: learning + teaching + learning of teachers + professional

development of teachers + use of ICT in schools

• AOb has an opinion about Education and: – “What is a professional school?”– “What is a professional teacher?” – “What is a competent teacher?”In general, but we should also have an opinion in relation to the use of ICT

About Bert Imminga:• Member of the board of AOb (2 days/week)

• Working in school (3 days/week)– Secondary vocational education:

• Basic vocational training• Professional vocational training• Middle management training

• My school:– has 18.000 students– Age of students: 15 and higher– new buildings– many computers in many classrooms and electronic

learning environments

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

About the Dutch approach (1):• Government Education policy:

. Decentralisation and deregulation

. Schools are lump-sum financed by the Government

. Promotion of autonomy of schoolmanagement

. Government is guarding quality by inspections

and demands evaluations

•Management of school is responsible for;. implementation of ICT-tools. life long learning of teachers. improvement of learning process

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

About the Dutch approach (2):Schoolmanagement is in charge

– Of the money;– Of the methods and the tools

Teachers are complaining:

– They want more influence about organising their work:

– 20 years ago: top-down approach of Government

– Now: top-down approach of schoolmanagement

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

About the Dutch approach (3):• New Law is coming about good management in

schools: schoolmanagement has to take care of enough professional space of the teacher.

• AOb wanted this Law and wants aprofessional charter in every schoolto describe terms of professionalism and professional space of teachers

• What is professional space of the teacher?: influence in the school of the teacher on: the concept and the practice of the policy about quality and education in the school.

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Professional space of the teacher:

•Teacher should have influence on policy about use of ICT in school

•Teacher is responsible for quality of learning and teaching, also with use of ICT

•Teacher can only be responsible if there is influence

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Professional space in boundaries

1: in collaboration with other teachers make policy about professional space

2: in collaboration with management practice professional space

3: in collaboration between teachers and management make rules about subjects of professionalism and influence on policy

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

professional charter

•Professional Space + the boundarieswill be specified in a professional charter

•There will be government-inspectionsabout the development of professional space for teachers

•A professional teacher has not only right’s, also duties (eg: live long learning, also on pedagogical opportunities of use of ICT)

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Tasks of professional teachers: •Prepare pupils for the future

with modern tools

•So the challenges are:• understand pupils (they use ICT and learn from it

and participate in internet-communities)

• know the future (possibilities of ICT-use)

• in control of 21st century (digital) competences (for improvement of learning

process)

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Learning and teaching in the future:

• Information (teachers pupils)

•Communication (teachers teachers)

also (teachers pupils)

New:•Collaboration (learning with teamwork between

teachers-teachers and pupils-pupils andteachers-pupils; all content is on internet in 10 years)

•Contribuation (pupils contribute to the learning-proces and learn not only in school, but also in internet-communities)

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Role of the teacher:

•Teacher is not owner of knowledge; pupil has many scources of knowledge (democratisation of knowledge); teacher has to stimulate creativity

•Use of ICT:• Learn about ICT: how does computer work

• Learn with ICT: reading on computer instead of book (no improvement of learning process)

New:

• Learn through ICT: teacher - pupil communication by Personal Digital Assistant about tasks for pupil concerning open scource, wikipedia, while pupil is somewhere else (possible improvement, depending of teacher)

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Be prepared for the future:

• ECDL=European digital driving licence– Digitalisation of the office (computer, word, excel, pp)– No pedagogical / instructional purpose

• EPICT = pedagogical ICT licence– Only 7 European country’s (D, Gr, It, H, Nor, UK, Icel)

– Should be many more country’s– All teacher unions should demand for EPICT (ask your

government and EU-commission and etuce).– www.epict.org

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Role of teacher unions (1):

• Focus on content of work of teachers (what is good teaching? pedagogical / instructional)

Focus not only on working conditionsAsk schools to formulate vision on ICT

• Fight for influence of teachers on ICT-policy in the school;

bottom-up is better than top-down;Stimulate collaboration in school; good

teaching is teamwork

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Role of teacher unions (2):

• Most important is relation teacher – pupil• so fight against people who want computers instead of

teachers• they don’t understand pupils / future• they don’t understand the learning-process (you can

teach them)

• Tell teachers to prepare for the future• Go talk to teachers who refuse to learn • and teach them about pedagogical use of ICT for

improving the learning process• because they don’t understand pupils / future

Use of ICT in schools 13-09-09

Role of teacher unions (3):

• Ask your Government:• to support projects that focus on pedagogical use of

ICT in education; implementation of EPICT;• To facilitate exchange of good practice

• Learn yourself as teacher union:• Formulate a vision on the use of ICT in schools• With the help of teachers and experts • Create platforms for exchange of good practice• Evaluate the effectiveness of your policy on

stimulating the improvement of the learning process by ICT

Samen jonge leden werven! 10-04-23