Classrooms in this era are undergoing a fast
transformation into new learning environments that are greatly cooperative, flexible,
and configurable. Large lecture halls with sloped floors and fixed seats and
classrooms with immovable podiums and tablet-arm chairs are going the way of
the mimeograph as colleges and universities redesign learning spaces to provide
new instructional models, driven by a generation of the digital age students
and students who now expect interactive, learner-centered instruction.
There’s no arguing that technology
plays an important role in education. Most of students are using personal
computers, tablets and even smartphones to research and complete assignments,
communicate with each other and with teachers about their courses and sometimes
collaborate on school projects. But that still leaves plenty of room for
disagreement on whether technology should play a major role in the classroom
itself—that is, whether teachers should rely on digital tools for a significant
portion of their classroom instruction.
On one level, the question boils
down to how best to take advantage of classroom time.
Some see a great opportunity for
teachers to expand their students’ horizons by drawing on the vast resources of
the Internet to supplement classroom lectures and discussion. And computers can
help individualize instruction, which some people see as a way to help ensure
that every student is getting the most out of being in school, without either
being held back by the slower pace of others in the class or getting lost as
the class zooms ahead.
But others think there’s a danger
that using technology in the classroom diminishes the teacher’s role. The
Internet is a great source of information, these people say, but teachers
should use classroom time to focus on teaching their students how to process
that information by reflecting deliberately on how it changes their view of the
world.
To thrive in a digital world,
students need to learn how to sort through unlimited information sources.
Schools need to arm them with the skepticism and critical thinking they need to
do that. And that requires that schools embrace digital devices as learning
tools.
Using technology, students are still
learning to think for themselves and along with others, but they’re also
learning in ways they couldn’t before.
In English class, students are no
longer just handing work in to an audience of one: the teacher. They are
publishing work for the world to see on digital platforms. In science
classrooms, technology allows students to do virtual dissections and gain
access to world-class resources and experts, like astronauts from the National
Aeronautics and Space Administration who participate in the Teaching From Space
program. In math class, all students no longer have to be working on the same
problem at the same time. Instead, they can view individually appropriate
videos, which they can re-watch, slow down or fast forward, and take
assessments to show what they know, when they are ready.
Going
further
Using simple and free tools, with
the guidance of teachers to ensure they are on task and interacting safely,
students can do more than old-school information consumption and regurgitation.
A traditional social-studies class studying their community might read the
textbook, listen to a lecture, discuss, and answer questions at the end of the
chapter. In a “bring your own device” class, students can access primary
sources such as public records, photos, journals, speech recordings or
newspaper clippings—with guidance from teachers on searching for images and on
copyright laws and permissions. They can see how the community has changed over
time with any number of free online tools or by using videoconferencing to
interview residents in real time.
These students also are able to use
what they’ve learned in creative new ways. For example, they might make
interactive maps or photos. Click on a place in the community, and it comes to
life. And they can publish their work on social-media sites such as blogs,
Facebook pages and Twitter and get relevant, real-world feedback.
There’s more deep thought happening
here than there is without technology, not less. It’s faster-paced, but that’s
the world these students are preparing for. Which way would you prefer your
child to learn?
Teachers
in charge
Using digital devices in the
classroom doesn’t mean students are texting friends, chatting on the phone in
class or using devices to cheat. Just as they were able to manage a traditional
classroom where students might be passing notes, staring out the window or
looking at their neighbor’s answers on a test, teachers are finding the best
ways to manage students using digital devices.
Indeed, teachers are incorporating
students’ love of texting into instruction. They are using texting tools to
invite students to have conversations about what they learned in class that day
and to post their reflections on student-response platforms. With these
techniques, all voices are captured, and class time is spent discussing student
input rather than collecting it. Teachers who are tapping into students’ love
of texting are helping their students increase their literacy skills, too.
Numerous studies have shown that the more children text, the more literate they
become.
Of course, proper training and
support for teachers from school administrators are essential for technology to
work in the classroom.
We know that any connected device
provides access to information, resources and experts far beyond what a school
building could ever offer students. Why would we limit learning possibilities
by not fully taking advantage of that?
Technology is changing education,
but the most important interaction in the classroom will remain the
face-to-face interaction between teachers and students. This personal interaction
has been at the heart of teaching students how to think since the time of
Socrates, and technology—in the classroom—often interferes with that education,
rather than enhancing it.
There is no question that technology
has increased students’ access to knowledge. But that has only amplified the
importance of discernment, analysis, and skepticism about all of this new
content—in other words, critical thinking. Finding relevant and accurate
currents in an ocean of often useless or misleading Internet content is a
persistent problem.
Bringing technology into the
classroom doesn’t solve that problem; it only brings it into the classroom. In
fact, it is a distraction from the real solution: teachers taking the time to
help students learn to process and think. In doing so, teachers help students
see how the same information can be useful or useless, depending on the context
or the problem they wish to solve. The Internet has fostered the disaggregation
of information. Teachers help students integrate.
The hard part is not learning new
facts, but rather seeing how those facts alter what we already know. Facts
students learn on their phones can help them see the world in a new way, but
only because they were taught how to reflect on what they have learned.
Slow
down
Civilization and democracy need
contemplation, mindfulness and focus. Tablets and computers are designed to be
interactive, and sidetrack us from deeper thinking. The distractions of a
student’s iPad are virtually irresistible. Teaching is hard enough without
those distractions, and classrooms should be a sanctuary of focus. Children
need a place to learn mental stillness, deliberation, critical thinking and
human empathy.
Slow thinking is harder to learn
when computers answer questions immediately. We can teach students a better way
to learn by telling them: Close your iPad and think about the new information
you’ve absorbed, write the key argument in your own words; swap with your
neighbor, write a rebuttal, discuss and finally reconsider your original
assumptions about this topic.
The most important thing a teacher
does in the classroom is to be an intellectual role model. Great teachers show
how to pause and ponder new questions. Teachers demonstrate what smart people
do: They ask better questions; they analyze; and mostly, they stop and think.
For our democracy to thrive, we need classrooms full of teachers who can say,
“That is a great question. You have changed my mind.”
Invest
at home
I am not advocating a complete ban
on technology any more than we should ban all books or other educational
resources. Digital devices provide many benefits; however, access to more
knowledge hasn't made us smarter. In the same way that more TV channels haven't
made us better informed and more exercise equipment hasn’t made us fitter, we
don’t need more technology in the classroom.
If we are going to go to the trouble
of assembling people face-to-face, then we need to leverage the distinct
advantages of personal contact. Children would be best served by equal access
to a laptop outside the classroom (bridging this digital divide is a very real
educational problem), and then the emphasis when assembled in classrooms can be
on reflection, teamwork, play and thinking.
In classrooms, students mostly need
integrators, motivators, cognitive coaches and intellectual role models, who
can show students what it means to be smart. Computers can teach us much about
human knowledge, but they can’t teach us how to be human. Our phones are not
really smart, and they can’t teach us how to be smart.
All sources
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