TECHNOLOGY IN TEACHING RESEARCH IN PRACTICE
Key questions teachers need to be asking before they embrace EdTech
Teachers and trainers must learn to interrogate the usefulness, or otherwise, of new technologies to ensure that they really do support and enhance teaching and learning. Roy Halpin examines the issues.
Are we there yet? It’s a familiar question from the back seats of our cars. It’s also, perhaps, a question relevant in the evolution of pedagogy to involve and incorporate the use of digital tools. Are we there yet..? Nearly? Maybe? Two other questions we’ve recently found ourselves asking in the context of EdTech are ‘who is in charge here?’ and, more surprisingly, ‘where are all the teachers?’ Technology does not exist in a vacuum but is socially constructed, uneven, contested, contradictory, participatory and deeply entwined with everyday life. It is intensely political. It is defined by complex interactions between social actors and their context. At a recent further education
conference at a local university, two days were spent immersed in exciting, stimulating discussion with big-name vendors, university contacts, IT teams and learning technologists. But there
were very few end-users (FE teachers) in the room. Plenty of discussion ensued about the possibilities of the platform, the latest additions to the toolbox, and the difficulties of getting practitioners in FE (and higher education) to engage with these wonders. In essence, however, the conversations
were mostly about how digital tools could be sold to teachers and lecturers, and how they could be encouraged to change their behaviours, and those of their students, to fit the new technology. Technological determinism is alive and well.
Allied to this is what we might call
architectural determinism – the layout of a room, the location and number of screens and whiteboards – as determined by architects, designers, managers or estates teams. But rarely by those who spend most time in these teaching spaces. This is a worrying omission. In this monetised and scrutinised age, decisions about the use of technology in teaching and learning are not neutral: “Educational technology needs to be understood as a profoundly political affair – a site of constant conflict and a struggle between different interests and groups.” (Selwyn, 2016. p. 94). To a certain extent it’s up to teachers to engage and to ask questions when new tools, ideas or products come into view. We can be positive and embrace change, but also be wary of committing limited time and resource. Pertinent questions might include:
REFERENCES
• Coe, R. (2013). Improving education: a triumph of hope over experience. Durham University: Centre for Evaluation and Monitoring.
bit.ly/CoeImprovingEducation
• Education and Endowment Foundation. (2020). Teaching and Learning Toolkit.
bit.ly/TeachingAndLearningToolkit
• ETF. (2018). Digital Teaching Professional Framework.
bit.ly/ETFDigitalFramework
16 ISSUE 39 • SPRING 2020 inTUITION
• Jisc. (2018). What is digital capability?
bit.ly/JiscBuildingDigitalCapability • Kirschner, P. A., & De Bruyckere, P. (2017). The myths of the digital native and the multitasker. Teaching and Teacher Education, 67, 135-142.
bit.ly/MythsDigitalNative
• Reynolds, C. (2018). Digital Hiatus: Symbolic violence in an online social learning network for master’s level students at a UK University (Doctoral Thesis). University of Huddersfield.
bit.ly/ReynoldsDigitalHiatus
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