RE: Technology in Education

(Hopefully we won't be tarred and feathered for continuing Tuesday's thread ad nauseum, days longer than intended.)

Regarding Ze'ev's reference to technology in the classroom as an inherently solitary activity or one limited to "computer-based learning":

Ahhh! I see the point and I agree entirely and absolutely. When I was developing CBT at the Defense Language Institute I learned that it took most CBT developers 600 hours to produce a single hour of interaction. Thus, CBT was prohibitively expensive and even then only of limited value. I developed data-driven learning activities that only took 10 hours of authoring for each hour of interaction. This "fixed" the cost/benefit ratio but left CBT as still of "limited" value.

My "TIPS" (Technology Implementation Plan for Schools) strategy is based not on CBT principles but on "Performance Support Systems" (PSS). Industry knows PSS as a set of tools that make the actual work on the job more efficient and accurate.

A PSS strategy for using technology in education, then, means you find things that excellent teachers and students are doing in the process of participating in an excellent course. You then see if technology can make those activities more efficient, accurate, high-quality or long-lasting. If so, then you implement the method in your school; if not, you don't.

Doing this, interestingly, leads excellent teachers to discover that activities they WANTED to do with their classes but COULDN'T because of time, cost or effort restrictions--that such activities are now possible because of technology.

Admittedly I've found that several things are absolutely required for such a nirvana to be achieved. First, the school must have ubiquitous technology up to the standards of a multinational corporation. Second, the network resources must be comprehensive (contain 100% of the text and media and database resources). Finally, the tech-support offered to teachers and students must be at the genius-level tempered with many years of experience in teaching, learning, group dynamics, counseling, salesmanship and engineering.

Which returns me to the topic; I am forced to agree with Ze'ev even more completely. It is impossible to count on this happening across the board in California without prohibitively expensive investments in infrastructure and support personnel--al of which will largely lie fallow for several years.

But it IS reasonable for California to promote R&D; into TIPS programs at selected sites. The output of these R&D; programs--online resources and data-driven course management systems--will then be available free of charge to other districts. Then at the local level schools will have the "option" of integrating technology into courses based on proven track records. The only thing lacking, I'm afraid, is "Vision".

Phil