Week 8: Being a lion, not a lamb ---Educational Technology needs a new image

Technology applies current knowledge for some useful purpose. It uses evolving knowledge to adapt and improve the system to which the knowledge applies. Using technology, teachers can create environments in which students actively engage in cognitive partnerships (Hooper & Rieber, 1995).

In Hooper & Rieber's article "Teaching with Technology", they emphasized the importance of using technology in today's classrooms so as to optimize the class‘ engagement as well as efficiency. Then pointed out a melancholy phenomenon that although education has witnessed a multitude of both technology and innovation over the past 50 years, the educational system has scarcely changed during that time. But what about the before-and-after within the 50 years of the hospital OR room or the dentist's office?

old classroom

new classroom

old O.R. room

new O.R. room

old dentist's office

new dentist's office

If you walk slower than others, you will fall behind, regardless that you are walking forward. As we can see from the pictures. Compared to the vintage classroom, today's classroom has fancy chair-table sets and new type of "blackboard". This new form of multimedia took place of the traditional blackboard, helps the teaching in terms of time saving and clarity in display. However, are we satisfied with it? Is this enough that we can accept the change within 50 years' development, compared with the huge differences of O.R. room and the dentist's office?

I believe it's a big "No". Then how can teaching with technology facilitate deeper, more meaningful, cognitive processing? Effective technology-based teaching is more likely the result of teachers' abilities to design lessons based upon robust instructional principles than of the technology per se (Savenye, Davidson, & Smith, 1991). Hooper & Rieber then draw a conclusion that guidance for designing effective technology-based classrooms should be grounded in the literature on effective pedagogy in general.

Three principles to guide effective teaching:

Principle 1: Effective learners actively process lesson content.
Principle 2: Presenting information from multiple perspectives increases the durability of instruction.
Principle 3: Effective instruction should build upon students knowledge and experiences and be grounded in meaningful contexts.

Idea and product technologies must be united and teachers must venture beyond Familiarization and Utilization and into the Integration, Reorientation, and Evolution phases of technology use, all of which might contribute to the effectivity.

Educational Technology, should be acting as a king of lion, leverage the teaching to a higher level, rather than being a lamb, always led by a shepherd.

Reference:

Hooper, S., Rieber, L. (1995). Teaching with Technology, In A.C., Ornstein (Ed.), Teaching: Theory into Practice, (pp.154-170). Needham Heights, MA: Allyn and Bacon.