Authentic Learning for the Digital Generation

Realising the potential of technology in the classroom

Angela McFarlane

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2014
• ISBN:
  9781317745600
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Didattica
• Subtopic: Didattica generale

Why should we use technology to support learning?

Where does the responsibility lie to prepare young people to be active and successful cybercitizens?

Can we go on confiscating pupils' smartphones indefinitely?

Authentic Learning for the Digital Generation is a vital examination of young people's use of personal devices, online creative communities and digital gaming. It calls into question the idea of the 'digital native' and shows clearly that the majority of young users need help and support in order to benefit from the rich learning potential of personal, mobile and online technology use.

Written by a leading authority on the role of digital technologies in education, it looks in detail at the practice and implications of learning using personal devices, collaborative online spaces, learning platforms, user generated content and digital games. In particular, approaches to solving problems, building knowledge, manipulating data and creating texts are examined. It offers clear strategies, a vision for what effects on learning we might reasonably expect when children are given access to different types of technology, and explores the challenges of managing these practices in the classroom.

Authentic Learning for the Digital Generation offers careful analysis at a time when there is much discussion about young people emerging from school unprepared for the world of work and often struggling to manage their personal relationships as they are exposed to strong content and harsh criticism online. It considers what we know of childhood experience in a digital world and offers ways in which schools and teachers can embrace the opportunity presented by ubiquitous ownership of connected, digital devices to enrich and deepen learning.

Chapter 1 The digital learning landscape

DOI: 10.4324/9781315794808-1

Where are we now?

The long-anticipated era of ubiquitous computing has finally arrived. Predicted, lauded and longed for, the day when every learner can have a powerful computing device in their hand is here, but the reality does not look exactly like the vision set out from the early 1970s when personal computers first appeared. That the device is an evolution of the phone, and designed first to communicate then to consume content and services, is not what educational technologists were imagining in the era of the ‘teaching machine’. The ‘smartphone’ is a remarkable amalgam of the phone, computer, camera and television, which is not quite like any of them, and yet is more than all four together. It is, finally, cheap enough, and with service plans that are manageable enough, that few think twice before acquiring them for, or at least passing them on to, their children, although the precise age at which this is appropriate is disputed.

The smartphone sits at one end of a spectrum of multifunctional, connected devices designed to be personal to one user and carried with them wherever they choose to take them. At the other end of the mobile spectrum is the notebook or laptop computer, which has all the functions of a desktop computer in a more compact form. Along the spectrum sits a range of devices with a mixture of attributes of the two ends and some of their own. Somewhere in the middle sit devices with touchscreens, larger than phones and usually with a different operating system to personal computers, broadly these are described as ‘tablets’. Together these are the mobile devices that have changed the way society uses digital technologies, and arguably the fabric of society itself, through the impact on how we communicate with and thus relate to each other. These devices and the networks they support are changing the way we learn and also carry the potential to change the way we teach (McFarlane, 2003, 2010).

School models of technology adoption tend to lag behind those in wider society in developed countries. For the most part learners have better access to technology at home than in school. Schools in many OECD countries installed computer rooms with fixed machines attached to wired networks in the 1980s and 1990s. In most schools these remain and continue to have a use where large and complex software applications are used and/or internet access requires bandwidth that wireless technology cannot support. These are increasingly supplemented with sets of mobile devices. Given the limitations of the installed base in schools it seems logical that schools would look to a mixed economy where they provide the specialist applications and peripherals, and support the few who do not have their own devices, but that the norm is for learners to bring and use their own personal, mobile devices to support their learning.

However, another thing that educational technologists did not predict was that schools would be quite so hostile to these personal devices. And why should that be so? There can be no doubt that connectivity – and these devices are built to be constantly connected – is highly disruptive. For one thing it brings the outside world into school in an unprecedented way. Even 10 years ago the idea that parent and child would be able to communicate at any given point in the school (and work) day was novel. Now it is commonplace to have a colleague answer a mobile in a work context because it is their child calling or texting. A powerful, personal device is empowering and can be both hypnotic and somewhat addictive (as in the compulsive checking of email and social media). You are in constant possession of it and it connects you to the world; the norm is to have it switched on at all times. Being active on your social media account, and receptive to the posts others make, is a 24/7 expectation. You are always available to those you know in this world, and if you do not protect your contact information or do not understand or use security settings judiciously, to everyone else as well. Not all of the consequences of this widespread and constant connectivity are positive; cyberbullying is rampant and a majority of teenage girls have been exposed unwillingly to online porn (Horvath et al., 2013).

In the classroom, whether it is using a search engine to find additional information relevant to the lesson, or a camera to capture and then share an image of a difficult moment in classroom management, there is potential to use these devices for purposes that challenge the teacher's authority and disrupt the lesson even when that use is a legitimate extension to the individual's own learning. Certainly this potential is enough to see many schools place a blanket ban on mobile device use in school, and in some cases on bringing one onto the premises. It even sees schools that provide students with personal devices setting up a policy and written agreement that curtails use of them in school to only that clearly sanctioned by a teacher. So it seems there is an uneasy relationship between school and personal technology that at worst sees the school as somewhat beleaguered by an onslaught of technology-wielding children.

This is both sad and troubling. Sad because when used well, digital technologies do have the potential to enrich and transform our lives and are doing so in many spheres. Troubling because unless adults embrace the use of these technologies by the young, and guide and steward their use of them, we leave them ‘adrift on a sea of meaning’ (Sanger, 1997) and that sea is a far more stormy one than any of us could perhaps have imagined in the calmer days when Sanger was worrying about access to TV, video and microcomputers. Moreover, where schools fully understand the power of digital technology to support learning and develop a culture and practice that can harness that power, learners benefit from a powerful personalised experience that helps prepare them for an economically and socially rewarding adult life.

Understanding the power of digital technology to support learning

It is too easy to become either mesmerised or blasé when confronted with the myriad functions of a twenty-first-century mobile device. In place of a range of devices that did one thing and only one thing, we now have in our pockets or bags a device that does something more with each iteration. At the time of writing the latest feature being used to sell hardware and services is streaming live television to your phone or tablet. You can watch wherever you are (or to be precise wherever you have adequate wireless or phone network coverage) and you can even join in. Broadcast media regularly request audience members to send them messages through a variety of instant channels, which they then edit and use in the broadcast within minutes. Indeed it is not even necessary to contact them directly. Anyone can broadcast text and images through a microblog; news media outlets constantly scan the cybersphere for breaking stories. If you witness an incident you can be on the next TV news telling your version and available on their website, possibly in perpetuity. Citizen journalism is all the rage.

Given this dazzling potential for every individual to access and create powerful content it is perhaps unsurprising that we may feel the skills and knowledge we have from a more traditional setting no longer have any relevance. Indeed there are many techno-romantics only too ready to insist this is the case and to claim that the best option is to leave the young to teach themselves using technology and for teachers especially to get out of the way (Prensky, 2001, 2012). This then fuels a backlash and feeds into policies that call for a ‘back to basics’ approach and regular testing of traditional skills and knowledge to hold the school system accountable for improvements in education standards. This dichotomy is unhelpful when it comes to reasoned debate about the shape and nature of a desirable school curriculum or what the role of technology in that curriculum should be. In reality much that we know about learning, communicating, creating knowledge and sharing it, remains valid in the face of connected digital technologies. Recognising this and adapting effective practice to new contexts is at the heart of understanding how digital technologies can best support effective teaching and meaningful, authentic learning. It also helps to have a clearly articulated view of what authentic learning is and what the outcomes of successful learning will look like. The ability to access text with confidence remains a pre-requisite of digital literacy, and it remains pretty handy to be numerate even if only to understand your energy and tax bills!

As well as opportunities there are new challenges in educating learners who are constantly connected. With powerful access to one another through social media, and the opportunity for anonymity, it is more important that ever to instil a strong ethical and moral sense in the young. Without respect for one another as fellow human spirits it seems too many of us are drawn to behaviours that would be unthinkable in a face-to-face context and embrace anonymity to cover our worst excesses. It seems Dostoyevsky was right when he suggested that we are drawn to the dark side when we think we can get away with it.

The challenge for schools

After billions of pounds of investment, endless evaluation and reams of policy documents it seems that the precise role of technology in schools remains unclear. A school achieving outstanding results in terms of test scores may or may not be using digital technology at the heart of its curriculum and culture. After more than 40 years of debate on what effective technology supported learning and pedagogy should be there are still no simple and clear answers in this complex and nuanced debate. What is clear is that there remains a substantial gap between what effective technology-supported learning and pedagogy could be and what happens in the majority of schools. The digital landscape confronting teachers, teacher educators, policy makers, designers and those who would sell products and services to education is something of a minefield, or as Fullan and Donnelly (2013) call it, a swamp.

Fullan and Donnelly identify three main areas of failure of technology programmes to support innovation in schools beyond those involved in intensive projects: pedagogy, system change and technology. Having well-designed, robust technology that is a delight to use is essential and all too often this is not the case in schools where there may be underinvestment in the infrastructure, technical support and training. It is also useful to have a theoretical framework against which to evaluate how that technology use might then impact on learning and therefore the fit with the desired pedagogical models. One place to start is to look at what digital devices do best and consider how that functionality might support teaching and learning.

What do digital devices do best?

Responding to the user

There is no doubt that at the heart of the addictive nature of digital devices is that when you interact with them, you get feedback. You touch, speak to, gesture or shake the device and something happens. First attempts may be somewhat random, but persistence is usually rewarded and gradually you work out how to do a few basic things. This is the basis for the claim that these devices have an intuitive design – you can work out how to make it work, at least at entry level. Moreover having done so there is some consistency across devices and applications so that initial learning can be useful more widely. And the reason you can do this is that your trial and error learning is not blind, but supported by responses, visual, audio or haptic, designed to prompt and guide you and serve as a reminder when you next come to the device. Moreover, the major providers have converged on a few basic similarities in how the devices all work (buttons, menus, ‘windows’, icons and so on) so that once you have mastered one, you can quickly make a start on the next. Indeed, so similar are these interfaces that legal battles for claimed infringements of copyright are common.

The use of tablets, with their touchscreens, by very young children is a recent and growing phenomenon. The Zero to Eight report (Rideout, 2013) suggests half the children in that age group in the US have experience of using one. Certainly the touchscreen interface is proving very easy for young children to use and can support them to carry out activities they might struggle with in other contexts. Studies of the effects of giving very young children aids to increase the control of their actions, for example by enhancing their motor skills, are not new and research is ongoing into the effects of tablet use. As yet there are no conclusive results, and as always there are enthusiasts and those with reservations. That said there are pre-schools that are making very effective use of tablets as part of a varied experience that still incorporates structured and unstructured play in real-world multi-sensory contexts such as the a trip to the park or an afternoon of finger painting!

Of course good use of feedback to support novices goes way beyond simply learning to operate the device itself. The principle of feedback as support for the user to learn to use a device, service or application is inherent to the technology interface. Modern operating systems offer a user experience that de facto supports learning. This aspect of device and software design has been widely exploited to create experiences that can help new and novice users in a range of settings, many of which are not thought of first and foremost as designed learning environments. Much maligned not least due to the high profile of those with violent and otherwise pornographic content and the claimed addictive nature of the play experience, computer games in fact offer excellent examples of interactions designed to help us learn (Gee, 2003) through clues and feedback on our choices and behaviours.

It should be no surprise that digital devices offering users meaningful feedback support efficient learning. The role of feedback to support learning, primarily in the form of formative assessment, is well documented (Black and Wiliam, 1998 and see Association for Achievement and Improvement through Assessment – www.aaia.org.uk). Simple algorithms can be programmed to offer effective formative feedback during a learning task, especially one designed to offer an opportunity for trial and error or practice-based learning. Take for example the simple comparison of two children grappling with a sheet of sums, one with and one without feedback as they go. In the first scenario, each time they give an answer to a problem, they are told whether the answer is correct or not. In the second, they get no response and do not know at the end of the exercise if they have mastered the skill they have been practising, or even made any improvement. Indeed at worst they have simply rehearsed a misconception about addition that they had at the start. Which child is likely to have had the more effective learning experience?

And of course the feedback offered by a well-designed program may not stop at simply marking the answers as you go. It may be that you cannot enter an incorrect answer and must get it right before proceeding, or if you enter more than one or two incorrect answers you are told the right one, and possibly shown how it was achieved. Automated feedback to support closed tasks such as performin...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Dedication
• Halftitle Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Pag
• Contents
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• Abbreviations
• Introduction
• 1 The digital learning landscape
• 2 Devices and desires
• 3 Public spaces
• 4 Collaborative places
• 5 Solving problems, building knowledge
• 6 User-generated content
• 7 Games and play
• 8 Thinking about writing
• 9 Manipulating data, seeing patterns
• 10 Looking to the horizon
• Index