ICTs and Pedagogy

, it is daily struggle of teachers and administrators coming to me with computer programs and websites that guarantee student growth and engagement – a “Box of Magic,” if you will. Most of these products cannot provide peer-reviewed research that demonstrates the basis for the design of their products

e-O'Hagan onmia mutantur nos et mutamur in illis Resume

And yet, if your school district has an “ill” there is a vendor ready to sell you a “cure”.

Quite frankly I found the SAMR-model, as it was presented, to be over simplistic and even trivial.

The idea that technology not only affects the quality and efficiency of tasks but also changes the conditions for communication, interaction and learning,

There are, for instance, studies showing the decreased reading abilities among Swedish children can be tied to an increase in computer use

Computer-based games and virtual worlds provide opportunities for learners to be immersed in situations in which they can experience and get close to phenomena and processes

This immersion helps them develop tacit/implicit understanding and intuitions about such phenomena and processes as they think about choices, take action, and see the impact of their decisions in a meaningful context.

It is difficult to get the integration of games and learning right.

until these contingencies harden into technological necessities and become nearly unchangeable in future generations. There’s an old story that is basically true: Ordinary Roman carts were constructed to match the width of Imperial Roman war chariots because it was easier to follow the ruts in the road left by the war chariots. The chariots were sized to accommodate the width of two large war horses, which translates into our English measurement as a width of 4′ 8.5″. Roads throughout the vast Roman empire were built to this spec. When the legions of Rome marched into Britain, they constructed long distance imperial roads 4′ 8.5″ wide. When the English started building tramways, they used the same width so the same horse carriages could be used. And when they started building railways with horseless carriages, naturally the rails were 4′ 8.5″ wide. Imported laborers from the British Isles built the first railways in the Americas using the same tools and jigs they were used to. Fast forward to the US Space shuttle, which is built in parts around the country and assembled in Florida. Because the two large solid fuel rocket engines on the side of the launch Shuttle were sent by railroad from Utah, and that line transversed a tunnel not much wider than the standard track, the rockets themselves could not be much wider than 4′ 8.5.”

“So, a major Space Shuttle design feature of what is arguably the world’s most advanced transportation system was determined over two thousand years ago by the width of two horses’ arse.” More or less, this is how technology constrains itself over time.

In addition to the primary drive of preordained development (force #1), and in addition to the escapable influences of technological history (force #2), there is society’s collective free will in shaping the technium (force #3).