Friday 20 February 2009

The use of technology at my college

These are the three statements that my college includes in its mission statement:

Collaboration to deliver learning
Innovation to develop learning
Imagination to foster learning

Innovation is not seen as a way to deliver learning, but to develop it. This seems to be based on the idea that learners benefit from having tools and opportunities that allow them to create- develop- their own learning.
Yet this is not always what is done. In my department there have been several technological changes:
- the introduction of projectors
- computers in every classroom
- laptops for every student in certain rooms
- wireless connection for students' laptops
- the college moodle
But are these used to develop learning?
This is what I have noticed so far:
- computers and projectors are used for presentations to support lectures or for student presentations
- the moodle is used as a repository of information; wiki and fora are not used
- laptops + wireless connection are used to get students to research topics (retrieve information) in class

While all this looks quite new and 'trendy' it is just a way of doing the usual old things, (i.e. basically delivering information through lectures and data) in a new way. But everybody is still teaching in the old way. The technology hasn't changed anything, so there hasn't been innovation but just minor changes. These may have introduced an element of stress as if it doesn't work (or where there are restrictions imposed by the college restrictions on Internet) lesson plans fall apart. This is why many tutors say that technology is disruptive and just masks some bad teachers' inability to teach.

What is needed to is a good deal of funds to introduce training more time for professional development and possibly some innovators amongst those who make decisions and write the syllabuses.

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