This article reports on a research project in which a digitally based assessment model is being developed for the Pacesetter program. This program, established by the College Board to prepare culturally diverse students for higher education, is built around a curriculum that reflects not only the world that these students come from but also the rapidly evolving technological society that they are expected to participate in.
An examination of the perspectives on teachers, students, technology, and educational goals represented in state technology plans
What if the push for computers and Internet connectivity fails to serve the best interests of humanity? The true believers lobbying for electronic boxes and wires in classrooms may dismiss such thoughts as heretical. However, their zealous praise for the wonders of technology often neglects an essential question: what shall we do with students who resist our brave new media?
In this chapter, we first illustrate several cases of unfulfilled expectation
of educational technology, presenting context factors that may have
contributed to these results. Then we present a few outcomes that are
unintended and even contradictory to the designers' expectations for
students who use a particular type of technological application—the
Integrated Learning System (ILS). We relate these unanticipated results
to factors in the particular learning environment established by the ILS.
In this chapter I provide an
account of efforts to make change happen in the Bellevue (Washington)
school district. The change sought was the integration of technology
with the instructional program.
Equity in access to educational resources faces new challenges in the age of technology, with great disparity in access to educational technology. This article proposes an alternative direction for equity of access to global learning networks as a catalyst for genuine educational reform that upholds civil rights law.
Why computers are used less often in classrooms than in other organizations
Educational technology's place in classroom teachers' thoughts and practices
My intent here is to probe the differences between electronic and traditional printed texts, to examine the ways teachers have and have
not used those electronic forms in their classroom work, and finally to
consider the implications of patterns of use and to suggest some
directions for research and thought about the role of electronic text in
classrooms that might be explored further. A note of caution is in
order here, as well: I will use the term "electronic texts" quite broadly
(more so than is usually the case by those who write of such things)
to include not only the presentation of textual materials via computer
(although those will be important parts of the analysis here), but also
certain other means of presenting nonverbal information—film, video,
and so on. I hope that by so doing, it will be possible to consider
common features and problems in use that have sometimes been
ignored by those who have focused on one approach alone.
Consideration of the computer as just another type of material in classrooms.
A study in which Logo programming was used to teach problem-solving skills to fourth to eighth grade students is described.
The impact of new optical technologies on student learning.
Computers enable us to offer students distinctively alternative paths to certain goals, for instance, graphic representation in the place of verbal statement. Where such alternatives can be implemented, it becomes possible to test their comparative effectiveness with some rigor.
The use of computers in education can be an opportunity for children to surprise themselves and their teachers. The key is to empower the child with tools of self-expression.
At first, new educational technologies engender reactions pro and con. As the new possibilities mature, however, different issues become more clearly defined, the classic problems of education-the responsibilities of teaching, the selection of content, the justification of competing goals, the mundane mechanics of implementation, and the inspiration of unstinting effort.
Numerous efforts in higher education and the schools have aimed to make computing an effective tool serving the entire curriculum by helping to make the diverse fruits of academic culture available to students. Despite such efforts, however, computers have yet to prove very useful substantively in education. More often than not, what happens is that the computer becomes the object of study, not a tool for the study of some subject in depth.
All of the questions addressed by Jefferson County
decision makers fell into one of five categories. Questions in the
categories provided loci both for strategic planning and for the
development of procedures to implement microcomputer education
programs. Curriculum, hardware systems, organization, staff
education, and finance all posed issues that had to be resolved. In the pages which follow, more detailed information on these issues and
ow they were resolved is presented. Since the curricular issues were
fundamental, they influenced decisions on issues in all other
categories. Consequently, instructional choices inevitably began,
mediated, and ended the entire decision chain.
The purpose of this study, is to look more closely, at the issue of
cost and cost-effectiveness of the use of microcomputers for CAl.
The need for some form of computer literacy has come to be accepted as an essential condition of everyday life, now that the computer has insinuated itself into our jobs, our schools, and our homes. As a result, computer-literacy education has become very big business, evidenced by the myriad of computer classes, workshops, and camps available to people of all ages. The purpose of all this training, we are told, is not to make engineers or programmers of everyone; rather, its focus is on a minimal level of instruction that will introduce the masses to the ubiquitous computer and enable them to feel “comfortable," to have “a sense of belonging in a computer-rich society."
At this point in the "computer revolution" one can do little more than speculate concerning the long-term benefits or detriments that may accompany the extensive use of computers in education.
A ha-ha is a sunken fence, invisible from a distance, allowing a tantalizing, unobstructed view of the verdant pastures on the other side, but forming an impenetrable barrier. There is a ha-ha surrounding educational technology. The author's aim in this article is to investigate its nature and to see if anything can, or should, be done about it.
In this short review, I shall attempt an
evaluation of Seymour Papert’s Mindstorms, and the approach to the use of computers in education it embodies.
Intrinsic to my perspective as an early childhood educator is the emphasis given to an organic, developmental view of children and their particular learning styles. This view serves as the context for the discussion that follows and is the link that thematically connects the topics to be discussed: an examination of the different types of programming activities and the variety of software available for these young ages.
No one doubts that computers will play a rapidly increasing role in education. And almost no one doubts that this will be a great boon for students and teachers. But this rush to computerize the classroom has bypassed the basic question: In what areas can computers help and in what areas could the use of computers prove counterproductive? Just what is the proper place of computers in education?
The author discusses computers and the promised revolution in education attendant on the arrival of a promised computer culture. The author wants to expose the utopian fantasies inherent in all talk of computers revolutionizing education and is firmly opposed to the introduction of the computer as a technological device oriented toward changing the very tradition of education.
The author comments on two of Professor Bowers's critical remarks that raise what appear to him as overarching problems of interpretation regarding virtually all philosophically rich proposals for educational reform. The topics embodied in these criticisms are: the sociology of knowledge as a theoretical foundation for antitechnicist educational practice, and the question of whether Western civilization should or should not have a privileged moral status in Western educators' conceptions of their own practice.
A summary of Professor Joseph Weizenbaum’s talk, along with the complete text of "a science fiction fable" written by Professor David Bohm in response to Professor Weizenbaum's presentation.
The process of language learning and some central strategies
for promoting it in the classroom are the subjects of this chapter.
The chapter will relate the primary process of language learning
and the secondary process of language education in terms of natural
human growth and will discuss that growth in terms of developmental stages. It will explore the organization of language education and set forth some major procedures and sequences for developing linguistic power and expressiveness. Following a consideration of talk and small-group process, two fundamental classroom activities, it will conclude with a discussion of the most significant
language learning modes--drama, reading and responding
to literature, and writing.
How can we be so sure that television does not do more educating
than we think?