Technology as an impetus for improving education

Sinclair, Kimberly

Friesen, S.  (2011). Hands on vs. hands up: Technology enabled knowledge building in high school.  Canada Education.  Retrieved from http://www.cea-ace.ca

            Beginning with a disclaimer is not how you usually begin a one of these, but  I just wanted to add, up front that, although the message of this article doesn't contain any ground-breaking insights (or, at least, shouldn't, at this point in the course), it still inspired me by reaffirming that, in the end, you can blame the surrounding circumstances as to why modern education is challenging or, we as educators can vow to change the direction of teaching (from "teaching to the test" to collaborative and learner-centered) from the inside out, accepting no excuses. That said, please excuse my bit of soap boxing at the end, as I was getting worked up there; thanks!

           This article examines the nature of incorporating technology into instructional activities for high school students and endeavors to determine under what circumstances the use of technology proves most effective for student learning. The author notes that, although adolescents are overwhelmingly familiar interacting with technology for entertainment and recreational purposes, teenagers still need to be explicitly instructed on how to use these tools for the purpose of knowledge creation. Friesan advocates for two major take-aways educators should glean from this: first, that instruction must be designed so that it is of genuine interest to students, and, secondly, that digital technology is only a learning benefit when it adds something new, involving higher-order thinking tasks. In the first instance, instructors can work towards making learning more engaging to students by designing activities that incorporate elements of what students are most innately interested in: socialization and “play". In the second situation, teachers must ensure that the use of technology brings an added dimension of benefit to learning, since lower-order thinking activities that use technology present no advantage over ding the same activity without technology. Fortunately, both approaches can be addressed by incorporating many available Web 2.0 tools that, by their nature, encourage collaboration through social networking opportunities, use engaging audio-visual features, and readily facilitate higher-order thinking skills.

            Ultimately, the author concludes that high school instruction should be more about facilitating collaborative learning communities that draw from diverse strengths to actively construct knowledge and work towards common goals, and less about separate individuals memorizing pre-crafted, discrete packets of information. The largest obstacle to accomplishing this lies with renovating educators’ content delivery approach, so that instructional methods and tools coincide with the more Constructivist, collaborative learning methods previously described. Unfortunately, many of us in the education field have witnessed as, for years, school districts implement changes resulting in more teacher-lead “teach to the test” instruction, which stands sorely in opposition to the views championed in this article. The saving grace of this scenario, however, is the reminder of the immense impact that individual instructors continue to possess, since they are the ones on the “front lines” interacting daily with students. It seems that, although blame has been assigned—albeit perhaps rightfully—to state and federal funding cuts, lagging economic trends, and district administrators for many years, the bottom line is that the onus of reversing these trends lies with teachers, period. Rather than continuing to regret choices made beyond teachers’ control, educators must work to design and deliver instruction that is engaging and collaborative—and only after this has proven to result in improved learner outcomes will administrators and law makers pay attention and acknowledge the new direction that education demands.