IT in Schools

1
IT in Schools
2
Topics

• The Possibilities
• The Change
• Across districts, schools
• Within schools
• Hardware
• Software
• Humanware
• The Progress
• The Road ahead

3
The Possibility

• Extend the school boundaries
• Paradigm Shift teacher-centred to
  student-centred
• Project-based learning
• Problem-based learning
• Promote Interaction and Communication
• Technologise education
• Presentation
• Learn IT versus Learn to use IT

4
The change

• Across districts, schools
• Edupark Shenzhen and Hong Kong
• http//www2.fed.cuhk.edu.hk/ITED/AppOfComp/Present
  /edupark.ppt
• A cautionary note of Web-based collaborative
  learning The experience of Edupark.
• Active World USA and Hong Kong
  http//www.activeworlds.com
• ??? Pathfinder http//pathfinder.ntntc.edu.tw/
• ??? Educity http//www.educities.edu.tw/
• Webquest
• http//www.webquest.org
• http//course.fed.cuhk.edu.hk/community/webquest/

5
The Change in Schools

• Hardware
• Software
• Humanware
• School practice
• Teaching practice
• Student expectation
• Parent expectation

6
Hardware Change

• Computer Availability
• Network (broadband or dialup)
• Others video projectors,..
• Easiest to accomplish

7
Hardware Change We must not confuse the presence
of "sound and fury" - cables, monitors or
Internet "drops" - with real change. We must not
assume that dozens of hours on the Internet will
enhance student literacy, improve inferential
reasoning or replace older information
technologies such as books. We cannot expect that
laptops will transform students into better
writers simply by virtue of possession. Real
change requires much more than the purchase of
good equipment. change and progress -- not all
change is for the good even good ideas can
flounder and innovations founder, according to
Fullan, when implementation plans ignore school
realities. High on his list of realities would be
the factors combining to frustrate or derail most
change efforts. Jamie McKenzie (1999). Beware
the Shallow Waters! The Dangers of Ignoring
History and the Research on Change in Schools.
From Now On The Educational Technology Journal
Vol 8No 9June1999
8
Education or Technology?
When schools put the cart before the horse,
spending most of their money on equipment and
networking rather than professional development,
program development, technical support and the
total cost of ownership, (van Dam, 1999), they
are likely to wake up with little to show for
their hefty investment.




9
Software

• Student Administrative System, e.g. WebCT
  http//www.cuhk.edu.hk/wbt/webctce/demo.htm
• MMLC
• Computer-assisted Learning Systems
• Simulation
• WWW

10
Humanware

• Administrators
• Teachers
• Students
• Parents

11
Administrators

• Promote IT versus resistant to IT
• IT Coordinators
• Attitude towards IT in Ed hardware or humanware
• Their IT knowledge
• What do school administrators use the Internet
  for
• look-up -- not many. Or better yet, not
  enough to provide leadership. James Cisek.
  Looking in the MirrorAn Educator's houghts on
  Education. TECHNOS Quarterly For Education and
  Technology Vol. 10, No. 2, Summer 2001

12
Teachers

• Daily Press
• Realities
• Role Change
• School Culture

13
Teachers Daily Press

• the need to take care of moment to moment
  classroom pressures -- a obstacle
• It creates
• enforces a short term perspective and an emphasis
  upon coping
• isolates teachers from dialogue with colleagues
• exhausts them - leaving little left for special
  efforts and sprints
• limits opportunities for reflection
• makes them dependent upon what they already know
  and prone to following routines

14

• Subjective Realities
• "the typical situation of teachers is fixity."
• "there is little room for change" and "when
  change is imposed from outside, it is bitterly
  resented."
• "there is a strong tendency for people to adjust
  to the 'near occasion' of change by changing as
  little as possible." (pp. 35-36)

• Objective Realities
• materials and/or equipment
• teaching and/or learning strategies
• belief systems

Many schools have spent their entire technology
budget on hardware and infrastructure. The most
successful implementations will devote major
funding to professional development designed to
help staff modify their teaching strategies,
learning strategies and belief systems
15
Change of Teachers Role

• Paradigm Shift from Teacher-centred to
  Student-centred
• From knowledge provider to facilitator

16
School Culture
???????????????,????????????????,????????????,????
??????
17
Students

• Active Learning and collaboration expected
• There are twice as many interactions in front of
  the computer compared with other activities. Most
  of this interaction is concerned with
  problem-solving, and there are hardly any
  interactions which do not concern the task
  (Svensson, 2000).
• Learn generic knowledge as well as
  subject-specific knowledge
• Authentic learning environment -- motivated

18
Parents

• Agree with the new learning paradigm?

19
On Change

• Buying lots of equipment without addressing the
  daily press is a dangerous strategy. Making
  robust use of networked computers requires many
  demanding changes from teachers that they are
  unlikely to welcome or embrace unless the
  district has provided some relief from the daily
  press

20
Basic Principles to Guide Change Efforts

• requires a focus on a purpose likely to win broad
  acceptance.
• promise outcomes and benefits that match the
  daily realities, concerns and desires of the
  staff.
• Teachers want to know how this venture will
  improve student performance.
• We too often network because it is the thing to
  do. Teachers usually look askance at such
  efforts.
• demands the cultivation and engagement of the key
  stakeholders within the school community,
  especially the classroom teachers.
• involves a strategic and balanced deployment of
  resources professional development, technical
  support
• necessitates time away from the daily press of
  teaching.

McKenzie, 2000
21
The Progress
????????????????(2000?12??2001?8?) Mckenzie, J.
(1999). Beware the Shallow Waters The Dangers of
Ignoring History and the Research on Change in
Schools. http//www.fno.org/jun99/teach.html
22
Key Foci in the ITEd initiatives (HK)

• ICT infrastructure (access and connectivity)
• schools with a high studentcomputer ratio
• good connectivity
• Resource support both human and funding supports
  to schools for ITEd coordination and for building
  up teamwork in school level IT activities

• teacher enablement.
• all teachers basic level of technical
  competence by 2001
• most teachers able to develop multimedia
  resources
• small portion fluent in network administration
  and technically highly competent in IT.

23
Access and connectivity (HK)

• many more teachers' own computers
• students either own their computers or are
  allowed to use the computers,
• most of these computers are connected to
  Internet.
• One video projector has become the dominant
  peripheral in schools.
• Pilot schools have an exceptionally high
  availability of hardware and peripherals.
• the situation of hardware and resources planning
  in other schools was found to be quite
  homogeneous, indicating the modeling effect of
  the pilot schools in this area is limited.

24
In USA

• 37 percent of classrooms not connected to the
  Internet (Education Week, 2001, 51)
• Ratio of students to Internet-connected computer,
  estimated to be about 8 to 1 (Education Week,
  2001, 49).
• imply that the typical student is able to access
  the Internet no more than one period per day.
• the average student used school computers one
  hour or less per week versus five hours of home
  computer usage.
• Among those who attended so-called high-tech
  schools, only 23 percent used computers at least
  five hours per week in school (Harris
  Interactive, 2001, 4). This may not be a serious
  problem for students in that only 7 percent said
  computer use was extremely important to how well
  they do in school (Harris Interactive, 2001, 14).

25
Teacher Enablement

• the most preferred mode of training is workshops
  and demonstrations and the least preferred mode
  is conferences and seminars.
• Over 70 of the teachers indicate that their use
  of computers in teaching is mainly preparing
  teaching notes and course materials.
• Many teachers are keen to learn to communicate
  with students over email, but not many feel the
  need to learn Internet for collaborative work
  with other schools.

26

• Most teachers are able to master word processing,
  spreadsheet, presentation software and Internet
  usage skills and regarded them as most important.
  
• On the other hand, most teachers are less
  familiar with advanced multimedia and web site
  design and regard them as least important.
• From the teachers' perspective, it is
  questionable whether the advanced technical IT
  skills are important to teaching and learning.
• Most teacher development courses were conducted
  in a traditional didactic mode of training,
• Not find the sensitivity of pedagogy or the
  promotion of different ways of using IT in
  different subjects.

27
Teacher Use Technology in USA

• Teachers actually employ computers very little in
  day-to-day practice.
• A NetDay survey (2001) indicating that only 20
  percent of teachers used the Internet to
  communicate with parents and only 18 percent
  posted lesson plans online.
• For those who have Internet access, 60 spent
  less than 30 minutes online each day (which is
  less than the average user).
• Those least professionally engaged
• more transmission-oriented in their teaching
  philosophy
• far less likely to use computers in
  learner-centered ways

28

• Schwab and Foa (2001) summed it up well There
  are still many more thousands of teachers who,
  while they know how to do word processing or even
  search the Internet, dont have the slightest
  clue how to truly integrate technology into their
  teaching. The problem for educators nationwide is
  how to scale up effective training to reach tens
  of thousands of teachers quickly.

Michael Molenda and Michael Sullivan Technology
in Education The Boom Is Behind Us. TECHNOS
Quarterly For Education and Technology Vol. 10,
No. 3, Fall 2001
29
Teacher Spectrum in a school

• Early adopters 25
• Late adopters 40 - 60 (reluctant and
  resistant)
• In between 20 - 40 (welcome new technology,
  but expect answers.)

McKenzie,J.(1999). Strategic Deployment of
Hardware to Maximize Readiness, Staff Use and
Student Achievement. From Now On, the Educational
Technology Journal. Vol 8 No 8 May.WWW document
30
Note on Late Adopters

• what works for pioneers does not work for the
  later group,
• they want proof of results before they use,
• they have little tolerance for change and
  unwilling to shift time tested behaviour,
• they expect a complete package, a total solution
  which is user friendly, complete and
  well-supported.

31
Students (USA)

• Spent much more time and effort focusing on
  technology-related skills than exploring
  meaningful content (Moss, 2000)
• Teachers viewed the environment as teaching and
  learning with technology, but students viewed it
  as learning about technology (Lundeberg, 1997).

32
HK Students

• Experience from Edupark Low motivation if no
  incentives
• Examination oriented
• Assessment

33
Paradigm Shift (HK)

• The analysis of school documents and plans shows
  that schools do not fully grasp this message, nor
  do they have a good understanding of the meaning
  of developing lifelong learning abilities in
  students.
• The most popular aim for implementing IT, as
  reflected in the school plans, was to use ICT as
  a tool to enhance the ability of teachers to
  present information effectively/interestingly.
• There is a lack of interest in the school aim to
  develop students information skills for IT.

34

• most popular activities in schools are those
  using ICT as an expository tool for the teacher,
• Many schools regard IT in education as an effort
  to technologize education - simply replacing
  chalk and board by multimedia presentations/animat
  ions.

35
the implementation did not make any noticeable
progress in terms of its impact on teaching and
learning in achieving the governments vision of
developing in our students the attitude and
capability for independent life-long learning
and hence become more motivated, inquisitive and
creative learners (Education and Manpower
Bureau, 1998). In fact, the lack of noticeable
progress in achieving these goals can be
attributed to the fact that the 5-year Strategy
documents description of paradigm shift was
rather amorphous and the strategies employed in
the implementation were in fact implicitly much
more supportive of expository modes of teaching
than other modes of pedagogy.
Agree?
36
The government should also make serious efforts
to communicate to school principals, teachers,
parents and other members of the education
community an appropriate understanding of the
goal and nature of this initiative, that this
should go in tandem with the curriculum reform
that the government is trying to bring about and
that the process requires a fundamental change in
the role of the teacher and the learner. The
government machinery has been very effective in
promoting the technologizing of education. It
would be very desirable that it now shifts its
focus to promote the technology supported
re-engineering of education.
Agree?
37
In fact, this study reveals that how far
computers and internet access are distributed and
made available for students are much more
important for supporting learning activities that
aim to develop students lifelong learning
abilities.
38
In terms of curriculum resources, the emphasis
should move away from the introduction and
sharing of expository demonstration materials
closely mirroring the textbooks to the
introduction of resources that are well-grounded
on sound cognitive/educational research. Teachers
should be discouraged from spending time on the
production of demonstration/expository materials
to putting their efforts on learning about
computer supported tools and environments that
help to extend the kinds of learning activities
available to students or to help students to
learn concepts and skills that would otherwise be
inaccessible.
Agree?
39
The Road Ahead

• Improve computer and Internet access?
• Curriculum Reform?
• Convey the concept of Paradigm Shift to wider
  public?
• Teacher IT competency?
• Student IT competency?

40
Teachers IT Competency Levels

• Purpose Use IT in classroom or software
  developers?
• Content appropriate? Should be revised?

41
IT in Education The Road Ahead

• The New 5-year strategy

42
References
??? Pathfinder http//pathfinder.ntntc.edu.tw/ ???
Educity http//www.educities.edu.tw/ ???, ???
(2001). ?????????????. ????????????????.
???????? The American Social History Project
http//www.ashp.cuny.edu/ The Learning Web
Curriculum Projects Using the Internet
http//www.esu3.k12.ne.us/institute/tech.html WebQ
uests - Triton/Patterns - Fall Symposium 98
http//projects.edtech.sandi.net/staffdev/tpfs98/
James Cisek. Looking in the MirrorAn Educator's
houghts on Education. TECHNOS Quarterly For
Education and Technology Vol. 10, No. 2, Summer
2001 Lundeberg, M. A., Coballes-Vega, C.,
Standiford, S. N., Langer, L., Dibble, K.
(1997). We thing theyre learning beliefs,
practices, and reflections of two teachers using
project-based learning. Journal of Computing in
childhood education, 81, 59-81. Mckenzie, J.
(1999). Beware the Shallow Waters The Dangers of
Ignoring History and the Research on Change in
Schools. http//www.fno.org/jun99/teach.html Mcken
zie, J. (2000). Making Good Change Happen. From
Now On The Educational Technology Journal Vol
9No 10June2000. Michael Molenda and Michael
Sullivan Technology in Education The Boom Is
Behind Us. TECHNOS Quarterly For Education and
Technology Vol. 10, No. 3, Fall 2001 Moss, D.M.
(2000). Bringing together technology and
students Examining the use of technology in a
project-based class. Svensson, A. (2000).
Computers in school socially isolating or a tool
to promote collaboration. Journal of Educational
Computing Research, 22(4), 437-453.