Driving Questions for a 1:1 Environment
How is technology creating massive paradigm shifts in education? How do we adapt? How much do we adapt to trends in society? How much of a role do we have in shaping the future of education?
I use the word could in the title believing that things will absolutely be different, but things always seem to move at a slower pace in education. One question to ask is whether that is always a bad thing? Does education need to mirror what is happening in society? Do students need to use all the new devices to be able to compete in the brave new world? or are the varied critical skills they learn to make them more well rounded, creative, deep thinking individuals the key? For a school looking to implement a 1:1 device program we are collectively and individually asking a lot of these types of questions.
At a recent staff meeting a number of teachers on our staff brought up some really valuable and important questions regarding the role of technology in our classrooms and in our lives. Concerns around privacy, effective use of devices, the implications of technology on our teaching and on student learning and engagement spurred deeper conversations. All these things are not necessarily new questions, but what was new was a sense of urgency around the idea that education could change drastically and dramatically in the coming decade to the point where we might not recognize it.
It is becoming harder for educators to keep the outside world out. One teacher mentioned that they cannot compete with the production value of many of the lessons on the web. Our department often utilizes John Green's Crash Course Series, the Khan Academy, iTunesU, TED Talks and recently we have been introduced to The Big History Project which is an amazing online series of videos and activities that take students virtually around the world. Where do we balance this with our own teaching environment? Are we becoming managers and collectors of pieces of lessons from around the web? Would it be more efficient for teachers to pull from a huge bank of these superlessons? Will they become more standardized? What are the dangers associated with doing this? Importantly, where does the student fit in all of this?
With these questions in mind, I asked my grade 12 class during a "reading experiment" what they thought. I set up a simple reading activity that was done using any device students had (half the class was using iPads, the other half various kinds of laptops). I posted a PDF reading on Moodle, then each student worked in a "Digital Notebook" using a GAPPS document to record their thoughts. The students added me to their notebook and we went from there.
As a sidebar I spoke about how the role of the teacher can change, in that Google Docs allows teachers to be a part of a students homework if they want. In the past we would send students away at 3pm and expect work done at 8am, with little or no monitoring, assistance or input. Email changed that a bit. But Google Apps has done something very different. A teacher can pop in at 11pm (when most students seem to like to work on homework) and see where everyone is at, answer any questions or just observe the work unfolding. You know who is doing what, when and how. There are hundreds of side issues and conversations to be had about this (as teachers do we always want to be "working"? how do we manage student expectations of our time? what should we be expecting students to do at home? how do we build effective and purposeful learning activities for outside of the classroom? do students get frozen by having teachers dropping in on them while they work on their homework? Definitely a thousand cans of worms)
Back to the Reading Experiment. I asked a few students to use traditional methods (book and paper), some mixed modes (reading on an iPad and taking notes on paper or vice versa), and some to use tools they thought worked best for them. Some went to Evernote instead of Google Docs, some copied the article into their digital notebook so they didn't have to keep switching screens on their iPad or laptop. It was another interesting series of on the go mini evolutions.
My driving question is what is the quality of this type of methodology for students? and for teachers? Is it more efficient? Is the learning deep and critical? Would it be simpler to not use the devices? How do we manage 27 different approaches to one article reading? Should we? Basically, why integrate technology?
A few observations:
One thing that has changed in the last couple of years is that it seems that most students in my classes are comfortable consuming information on digital devices. It was not long ago that everyone lamented the demise of paper and books, whereas now many students can read a 20 page academic journal article on their phone or iPod.
The collaborative learning environment fostered by google docs is intensely transformative, but the environment needs to be created, supported and shaped by the teacher so that it really works.
Some students still really prefer traditional ways of reading and taking notes. But notions of traditional are changing. iPads are so easy to use that they blend into the background much more than clunky laptops. As teachers we need to really manage all the distractions (email, texting, entertainment, etc) that are housed on a single device. Oddly there was a lot of criticism of iPads because they did not multitask as easily as some devices. That is good. Students and Teachers are not good at multitasking.
A lingering area of concern: are we promoting abstract thinking and creation enough in a society that demands these skills in most fields? This leads us to questions about how we assess, what we evaluate and fundamentally how we are structuring each lesson and each day. More questions for another day...