D’you know, I’m not convinced by ICT suites in schools, are you?
It seems to me that putting masses of bulky ICT kit in a room and then expecting teachers to book their use of the room, is a bit out-dated and not really conducive to 21st Century learning, what do you think?
I’ve met some teachers who argue that its good to have a room with all the kit in if you want to teach ICT to a class of 30 kids; after all you don’t want all that large equipment clogging up a classroom that’s also used for everything else from Art to games on a wet playtime!
Sometimes, though, it seems to be a case of ‘out of sight, out of mind’, if you don’t see it, you don’t think about it and you don’t think about using it. This would seem to be true for learners as well as teachers; if the learners don’t see the ICT kit in a classroom, they don’t think about using it in a lesson.
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Tags: ICT Suite, Information and communication technologies in education
I have to agree. I think the time of the standard ICT suite is probably now in a shelf life scenario. I can see the need for soem areas where soem detailed stuff like DTP, Photoshop and the like can be done, but I think the larning environments of the furture will be full of personally owned/loaned mobile devices that may be a descendant of the itouch/Ipad etc.
I understand what you’re saying, but surely what is actually needed is this: a variety of configurations so that people can use what’s appropriate. In some cases that will mean students having access to two or three computers in the classroom, or a bank of laptops. At other times it will mean a whole class in a computer room learning how to do X. In some cases that will mean two or three pupils getting together around a l;aptop to discuss their project. In some cases it will mean one person on their own teaching themselves how to do X, or doing their work.
Basically what I’m saying is that I don’t agree that any one-size-fits-all approach ever works.
I think what I’m trying to do is to break the pattern of thinking that focuses upon ‘computer rooms’ or ‘ICT suites’ in schools. It seems to be an approach that regards computers as somehow separate from what goes on in the classroom. I feel that educational technology should be an integral part of learning and teaching; it should, therefore, be available for use by learners as individuals, in groups or as a class whenever and wherever appropriate. Making the technology available only if it is booked, timetabled or available only to a small number at a time, doesn’t seem to be the way forward to me. I’d also like to see learning made accessible, via technology, to learners who cannot physically be present but who could still benefit and contribute to the lesson.
Basically I agree that a one-size-fits-all approach is not a good idea; it restricts flexibility, stifles innovation and rarely leads to good practice. I think, though, that the ‘computer room’ approach has been a ‘one-size-fits-all’ approach, in that an overwhelming number of secondary schools and numerous primaries seem to have adopted it. I feel now that the limitations of this approach are being experienced and perhaps moreso because there are alternative approaches.
You mention one alternative approach in your comment; a bank of laptops. Yet even where a school has a bank, or banks, of laptops, these usually have to be booked or trimetabled. Inevitably there will be booking clashes,timetable issues or technical glitches and learners miss out.
Then, as you say, we could have computers distributed two or three in a classroom. But, as you and I know (or is it just me being cynical?), those computers are probably ones that two or three years ago were in the computer suite but were redundant when the suite was updated and they were put in the classrooms as it would be a ‘crime’ to dispose of them! All of which does not mean that they are useless but it is likely that they are old, slow (sounds like myself), struggle to run modern software and possibly cannot connect to the school’s network. Of course what pupil, or teacher, is going to want to use ‘castoffs’ when they likely have better devices at home?
To me, a school’s computer room should contain the servers, the routers, the cables, the storage, the on/off switch and not much else. The actual educational (and admin) tech would be in the hands of the users (pupils and staff) and be available to use however, whenever and wherever they want to use it. Now at first that may sound like just another one-size-fits-all approach, I don’t think it is but if it is, then I hope it is at least a flexible one and I see each of the cases you mention in your comment (whole class use, small group use, and individual use) being accommodated in this model.
What I’m interested in is not so much the infrastructure and how things are set up, it’s more the educational uses of the technology. Yet what used to frustrate me, and I’m sure it still frustrates teachers and pupils, is when the educational possibilities couldn’t be implemented because of restrictions in the infrastructure or setup of the technology. I do sincerely hope that nowadays we can build more flexibility into our ICT provision so that more educational possibilities can be realised and explored.
Let me back-pedal a little. Elsewhere in this blog I have said that we (i.e. schools) need to work with what we’ve got. I realise that most schools will have a computer room(s) and/or a distributed network and will need to work with these. The emphasis, though, should be on the educational approaches we explore and adopt, rather than the kit or infrastructure we have. It will be, I feel, the successes acchieved by those approaches and, indeed, the limitations imposed upon them that will help determine what kit and what structures we implement for the future.
So there you go, Terry, thank you for your comment. As I always find when I read your articles and your comments, you lead me to explore further my own thoughts and ideas. That must be the mark of a great educationalist.