New book on integrating technology: The Learning Edge: What Technology Can Do to Educate All Children
December 7, 2011 at 8:13 am 5 comments
I liked this review of the new book by Bain & Weston, in that it’s referencing Seymour Papert’s explanation for what happened to Logo. Rather than becoming something to think with, Logo became something to be taught. That shift of focus from tool to goal led to Logo’s downfall, because that raises the question, “Well, if we add this learning goal, what has to go? The curriculum is already packed!” That’s a zero-sum game. But if instead, the question is, “What can we teach better or differently with the tool?” then we’re about increasing and improving learning, not pushing something out.
Technology in education has increased exponentially over the past years, but has it really impacted student achievement? If so, why standardized tests such as PISA or TIMMS don’t reflect this? Technology adoption by itself is not enough to ensure improvement on students, this seems to be very clear nowadays. So what makes the difference? The approach proposed by Dr. Bain and Dr. Weston changes the paradigm. It’s not about acess, it’s about use of technology. It’s not about substituting books for digital content, but empowering teachers on what they do before, in and after the classroom. How effective feedback and practices can be scaled through technology. Technology becomes the tool, not the end. The book is very approachable and easy to read, with great examples that really help illustrate the theory and implementation. This is a must read, I strongly recommend it to anyone interested in educational reform and how to implement such reform.
Entry filed under: Uncategorized. Tags: educational technology, Logo, Papert.
5 Comments Add your own
Leave a reply to gasstationwithoutpumps Cancel reply
Trackback this post | Subscribe to the comments via RSS Feed
1. Alan Kay | December 7, 2011 at 8:29 am
This sounds a bit wrong-headed, and so I went to Amazon to buy the book, but saw it was $32.80!
Is it really worth this? (Rudimentarily trying out crowd sourcing here …)
Cheers,
Alan
2. Amy Bruckman | December 7, 2011 at 10:23 am
I’m not sure I buy this argument. Transfer is hard. Most of studies of using programming to enhance learning of something else have failed. We could have a long conversation about whether those studies were done right, but it makes sense intuitively–yes, teaching X through programming takes more time than just teaching X.
More importantly, I think this is selling computation short. It is important in itself. And in terms of what we can eliminate in the curriculum to make room for computing… I don’t think candidates are too hard to come by if you really think about it. If you focus on what they are actually going to do with that knowledge in their lives and how other things will build off of it in an important way, then I think half the curriculum is optional!
3. gasstationwithoutpumps | December 7, 2011 at 11:43 am
I’m not sure I agree with Alan and Amy here. Even if your goal is to teach computer science, too much focus on teaching the language can detract from teaching the concepts.
I’m working on a project to get bioinformatics into high school biology. There is no course more over-stuffed with “essential” material than AP bio, so adding bioinformatics to the mix is not going to fly if it is taught as a goal. I believe, however, that teaching with bioinformatics tools can make the biology easier to teach, and that is the explicit goal of our project.
4. Mark Guzdial | December 7, 2011 at 12:28 pm
Yes, that’s closer to what I meant. I’m sorry that I wasn’t clear enough in the original post.
I see the argument as being one for contextualized computing education. Absolutely, computer science is worth knowing for itself. Is it so valuable that we should teach it to everyone? Hard to argue that for everybody. Is computer science useful in supporting other learning (e.g., visualization in mathematics; modeling and simulation in physics and biology; data management in business, etc.)? ABSOLUTELY, and now it’s easier to argue for teaching it to everyone. When you do teach CS like that, you want to relate it to why it’s useful. If you just argue “You should know swap() because it’s good for you,” nobody buys it.
I agree with Amy — transfer just doesn’t happen. As for what can be removed — future post…
5. Edupocalypse Now: Removing the BS from the BS « Computing Education Blog | December 8, 2011 at 9:14 am
[…] That’s what Amy Bruckman was referencing (I think) when she talked about all the candidate school topics to remove so that computing could have a place. Aaron’s point is well-taken about the high price of […]