Confusing Technology Integration with Instructional Reform « Larry Cuban on S... - 0 views
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Many teachers and principals have said repeatedly to the point of the words being cliched: “integrating technology is not about technology, it is about learning.” Yet those who buy and deploy new technologies continue to seek “educational uses” for the electronic devices.
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Brendan Murphy on 29 Aug 10Buy the technology you need not educational technology
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The instructional focus shifts from being teacher-centered to being learner-centered…. Traditional verbal activities are gradually replaced by authentic hands-on-inquiry related to a problem….”
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These two reasons, technocentrism and pedagogical dogmatism, Harris argues, explain why for decades, enthusiastic policymakers, researchers, and practitioners have confused technology integration (involving the perennial conflict of content vs. skills) with technology as an instrument for pedagogical reform (moving from teacher-centered to learner-centered instruction).
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Since most technology designers do not understand effective teaching (or are not designing something for teaching purposes), they often focus on making content more appealing or easier to access instead of creating a technology that causes students to more deeply engage mentally with content.
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When I did my doctoral research, I found that just bringing in technology and showing teachers how it worked did not change pedagogy. I believe that if you want to change pedagogy to a more constructivist approach, you need to tackle this head on and not make it part of some technology project.