Response to Roblyer

I've just read the Roblyer and Edwards* article. I like the way they present the historical background of educational technologies and how they categorise them into media, instructional systems, vocational training and computers. I do feel though that the article shows its age already: media now takes place mostly in online contexts and computers are developing rapidly to a place where they will be conduits to the online environment without the need for native software or hard drives etc. The lines are blurring...

The idea of educational technology as a combination of processes and tools is useful to my environment (primary school) as I feel that there is currently a massive bias towards learning about the tools and not enough focus on the process - we are continually "blinded" by wonderful new gadgets without stopping to think about their true value to learning. Indeed, this is probably one of the "big issues" which I will need to confront along with other staff in my school. I think one way to do this would be to refer often to the table on page 11 about rationales for using technology as it goes well beyond the usual one - "it motivates my students".

As for other big issues, I am particularly interested to see that social-constructivism does not make an appearance in the article (probably because of its age): I think that web 2.0 and its implications for social interactions makes it an ideal technology for this approach to pedagogy. to its credit, the article advocates for more research on this issue.

But thing brings up the next and possibly biggest issue of all: the pace of change in technology which seems to be accelerating, means that longitudinal research is very difficult to do, that teacher PD will always struggle to keep up with the tools teachers are expected to use and that school infrastructure will continually be trying to catch up. There is also a "chicken and egg" quandary to tackle around this issue - my school has recently invested in equipment but now has no money for PD in how to use it but for the few self-starters on campus. So we are in danger of having up-to-date equipment languishing in cupboards because only a few know how to use it. There don't seem to be any straight-forward answers to the issues raised by this article.

(*see Roblyer, M. D., & Edwards, J. (2003). Integrating educational technology into teaching (2nd ed.). New Jersey, Ohio: Merrill, Prentice Hall)