Can HP do what SmartBoard can’t and actually make teachers want to use tech in the classroom?
Tech in schools is hard. My own (anecdotal) experience tells me that very few teachers actually use their SmartBoards; certainly none of the teachers I know go out of their way to plan their lesson around something that might fail. We can attribute the success of SmartBoards in NY classrooms primarily to marketing, not actual teacher participation.
This is clearly just the beginning of what is going to no doubt be a deluge of educational software available for Apple’s tablet platform.
Recently, a job recruiter called me and asked me a question I couldn’t answer. I admitted to her that I didn’t know the answer off the top of my head, but I offered instead to give her the Google string I’d search for to find the answer in under 3 seconds.
She was not impressed.
So continues the debate about whether or not it’s more important that you have the knowledge or know the most effective way to get the knowledge. Knowing how to get answers you don’t have is effective problem solving.
So then the question becomes, is that a skill you can foster in school? Teachers have tried for a long time: teaching kids how to find info in libraries is about knowing which physical space to go to to maximize the chances of finding what you’re looking for. Online search is the same way: some people are better at it than others and there’s no reason you can’t teach kids how to better use search to enhance their education.
The long term concern over the instant gratification of search is a valid one, however. Where’s the balance?
It’s no Entourage eDGe, but it does at least have its letter capitalization in all the right places. Intel knows a bit about making machines that can withstand a beating and by all accounts, this marks the first classroom-centric laptop that isn’t hideously ugly. I mean, it’s ugly, but not hideously so.
This is one of the more interesting education reform policies I’ve seen in a while. “Skipping grades” in the US used to be a lot more common: my mother graduated high school two years early, but by the time I was in high school it doing that was practically unheard of. This isn’t exactly the same, but if a student has the aptitude and the knowledge, why hold them back?
My graduate program, ECT at NYU, spends a lot of time thinking about how social learning and gaming can improve education. The problem is that a lot of the smaller programs fail to catch on because they lack funding from people like the Gates Foundation and Intel. How do we get more people in on the great things going on in educational technology?
Other manufacturers take note: accessibility options need to be taken more seriously.
I’ll be the first to admit that I didn’t think the organizations representing the disabled had a case here (due to the Kindle possessing text-to-speech for all its books), but that’s why I’m not a lawyer! Turns out that while the books can be read out loud, the menus cannot, making it extremely difficult to navigate and use for the blind. So until Amazon adds that functionality, they can’t expand on campus trials of the Kindle DX. Very interesting, indeed.
I’m torn. On one hand, I understand the desire for dedicated faculty as stated by this article but on the other I have to admit that some of the best professors I’ve had in undergrad and grad school were the ones who worked full time and taught part time.
There’s an old saying that goes “Those who can, do. Those who can’t, teach.” I hardly think this is 100% accurate, but I’ve always appreciate the view of someone working in the field we’re learning about alongside the view of a professor who may take and present things on a more conceptual level. Working in the field you’re teaching forces you to keep in the back of your mind the business end of whatever you’re teaching, and that’s nudging can have a marked effect on how you teach your subject.
Have you had better experiences with teachers who also worked in their chosen fields while they taught? I’d be eager to hear about other people’s experiences.
This is a great internal debate about the ‘openness’ of open education and what that really means.
Thanks to Adrienne for sharing this!
