Comments on PolivkaVox: Innovation in educational technology. Why not?

Brian, I know this is belated, but I truly found t...

2010-02-05T16:20:10.181-05:00

Brian, I know this is belated, but I truly found this to be an enlightening post. I guess I'd never thought of it, but in spite of all that we attempt to do to focus on better learning outcomes, many of us teachers do still see ourselves more as content area experts, and at times this is at the sacrifice of becoming experts in learning (particularly in the post-secondary realm).
Education, in practice, is loathe to practice anything outside of the status quo. Part of it is due to the aforementioned reason, and part of it is the apathy toward anything new. Every new proposition is met with staunch resistance. Every time a new best practice is proposed teachers have the immediate response that they have already seen it and that they need not change because the pendulum will swing the opposite way again soon. If I had a penny for every time I've heard that over the years I certainly wouldn't need to be a teacher any longer and could retire to somewhere warmer than Michigan! As you mentioned though, the failure on the part of many new propositions plays into this pendulum effect and the overall aversion to anything new.
Another part I feel plays into the slow uptake of anything new in education, particularly when it comes to technology, is the continued existence of the old guard. I suspect that in the coming years with the baby boomers increasingly going into retirement that we will see a pretty significant change in educational practices. I cannot say whether this will be for the better or not, but I do imagine that the face of our schools will be quite different. That said, unlike in any other field, we teachers have spent our entire lives indoctrinated into this system, and the teaching methods our own teachers have provided a latent model for us that is hard to overcome and will continue to lend to the relatively slow change.
Lastly, I wanted to comment on educational technology as a whole. After having spoken to the slow uptake of technology in the classroom, I must admit that I am not all to certain that this is a bad thing. In my experience, many teachers who use technology do so incorrectly. It is oftentimes viewed as a replacement for good instruction and at best a crutch. In practice, I feel it rarely does anything to bolster the students' learning. Certainly, they may be more interested in what is going on so by proxy they may learn more, but the activities themselves rarely are of true value. One of my colleagues once said that if you can't teach when the power goes out then you're not really teaching. I try to keep this in mind each and every time I bring technology into the classroom. I do think, though, that with the changing of the times we will quickly see more beneficial usage of ed tech in the classroom.

Chris, I agree completely with the "forced ma...

2009-09-20T15:29:16.774-04:00

Chris, I agree completely with the "forced march" efforts of the past. Again, I think this happened because those in education, in this case perhaps IT leaders, tended to think about moving content or communicating, not about learning. Learning in a group environment is complex and exciting, and takes thought and planning and understanding to do it well. I remember CTOs thinking iTunes University was all anyone needed for online learning... because it suited their own learning styles.

Keith, I think you put your finger on a key issue. In business, people who figure out ways to delight customers get promoted to top jobs. In higher education, they get marginalized. We need to find way to reward teaching/learning excellence.

Great comments! Thanks.

Thanks, Brian - this is great. I agree that one o...

2009-09-12T15:24:38.440-04:00

Thanks, Brian - this is great.
I agree that one of the issues is that higher education is made up of subject matter experts. Let me add another potential factor: the lack of impact that great teaching has on either the academic's career or the success of the institution, as a whole. Teaching - whether in the classroom or online - is not how academics or universities "move-up" in the world. (And, strangely, rewards for teaching are decreasing - relative to research - not increasing, despite the mass (undergraduate) higher education model we now operate.) Consequently, there is little incentive in place to invest time and resources in new, innovative uses of technology.
Also . . . the "seamstress" you refer to is not likely going to be the subject matter expert. So, we have then a need to introduce a fundamentally different division of labour into the institution; one that decreases the jurisdiction and authority of the lone academic (SME). While that doesn't sound all that difficult, academics (like anyone else) are not likely to give up any territory without a fight.
Keith

Good thoughts. Also wonder if there are negative...

2009-09-11T19:46:43.655-04:00

Good thoughts.

Also wonder if there are negative impacts on the rate of uptake by educators who have been burned by technologies false promises in the past? Can imagine how often they have been asked to adopt terrible technology solutions in the last 10 years that didn't pan out.

Blackboard is a good example to look at. It may have been a good idea and great at first but it is still a sad dinosaur when it comes to really fluid web 2.0 type solutions. There are too many professors who find it confusing and too many students who think it has a terrible user experience because of the more consumer focused solutions that they use on a daily basis.

Thoughts?