Thoughts on "Object Lessons: Towards and Educational Theroy of Technology"

The paper: Object Lessons: Towards an Educational Theory of Technology provides some insight into the motivations and agendas of the “education” software creators and why we have the problem today of implementing such technology in our classes.

Castell, Bryson, and Jenson initially state:
“New ‘partnerships’ of designers and developers committed to technology for its own sake now create products for the ‘education marketplace’ with little or no experience of, or interest in, underlying educational goals…”

I couldn’t agree more with this statement when one considers what we had before such technology was available, and still have, textbooks. Very frequently authors of new textbooks would jockey for position to be first published and produce educational atrocities of literature with little regard to the readers, curriculum, and teachers. How many expensive textbooks sit on shelves never opened and never used. The focus of these authors and publishers is money and notoriety rather than educational content. Little did they realize that their name quickly became synonymous with poor work and shallow insight. These textbooks were filled with educational jargon and produced without due diligence on content or pedagogy.

Technology and textbooks created in this manner of “boiler plate” templates will never work as useful and efficient tools to education, but as students and teachers we seemed to be destined to suffer these administrative burdens to find the real diamonds in the rough, the real tools that not only work but are useable by all.

Technology in schools seem to be a Trojan horse where students and staff must endure the hidden agendas of technological introduced in education. “Universities are not simply undergoing a technological transformation. Beneath that change and camouflaged by it, lies another: the commercialization of higher education. For here as elsewhere technology is but a vehicle and a disarming disguise.”

Arguably technology is resourceful, motivating, and stimulating but it also must be intuitive to encourage students and teachers to effectively apply. So why is it that many teachers do not use technology to its maximum ability? Castell, Bryson, and Jenson consider a users comfort, familiarity, time and resources as reasons why and provide examples of “integrated learning systems” (ILS) and “E-Learning environments” as tools to support teachers.

I feel ILS is cold without the human factor required in education. It seems more of a means to ensure quality control and standardization neither of which have much to do with effective education; however, I do agree that standardization has a place as long as it does not hinder creativity and the teachable moment. Quality control on the other hand is an industrial method to fabricate and produce identical units for public consumption. Human beings cannot be measure on such scale.

E-Learning is also limited in the ability of face-to-face contact. My experience with WebCT is horrible. I found it a completely non-user friendly program and full of technical inadequacies that are counter-intuitive to the user. I would also argue that with programs such as WebCT there is another agenda that has nothing to do with educational content. Castell, et all, state that “WebCT has partnered with major textbook publishers to create online versions of high-use texts, eliminating in one easy and seductive step the need for any faculty involvement in designing university based courses.” I would tend to believe that the Publisher definition of “high-use texts” is solely based on sales, and nothing to do with content or effective education.

It does seem that public schools have become a “charitable arm of technology industries” and “like all technologies, they (technologies) are ultimately developed in the interests of industrial and corporate profits, and seldom in the name of greater community participation or creative autonomy.”

Caste, et all, offer an interesting point of view that I do hold much of the same opinion. I would like to consider further their “Computers for Lunch” process further to determine if what they have “created” really works.

This was a refreshing read. Something for which I am glad to see that others have noticed what I have noticed and feel is a slow, subtle, poisonous, and dangerous involvement of corporate industrial influence in our public education.

Ian