Teaching the teachers: Getting the most out of ICT in the classroom
How do we expect teachers who didn’t grow up with technology to teach with it effectively? An expert from UGent has been investigating how ICT can best be used in Flanders’ schools
OK, computers
But if teachers have to teach children how to use technology and also have to use technology to teach them other subjects, like maths or geography, what is the situation regarding the education of teachers? How do they learn not only to use information and communications technology (ICT), but to teach it?
Dr Jo Tondeur of the educational studies department of Ghent University carries out research into ICT integration in schools, as well as the interplay between ICT innovations and professional development. On the one hand, he helps teachers keep up with the shape-shifting world of digital technology. On the other, he monitors the difference that makes to what’s going on in the classroom.
“First, it might be important to make clear what we mean when we talk about ICT,” Tondeur advises. “Do we mean computers, interactive whiteboards, specific hardware or software, applications for social media? It’s difficult to talk about ICT as a single fact or construct.”
In one of his studies he discovered three main types of ICT use in primary education in Flanders: as a search tool, like looking for information on the internet; to teach pupils technical skills, such as the use of a keyboard and mouse or how to insert a picture in a Word file; and as a learning tool, to practise certain types of knowledge and skills.
So, he says, it’s important that we take a multi-dimensional approach when we look at integration of technology in the classroom.
Another factor is the personal beliefs of the individual teacher, whether their pedagogical view is student-centred or a more traditional teacher-centred one. Different belief systems lead to different ways of using ICT. Pupil-centred teachers are open to all uses, while teacher-centred teachers are less likely to take up technology as an information tool because of the direct relationship between the pupil and the device and the freedom it offers. But they are keen on using it to develop knowledge and skills.
The digital divide
You also have to consider the role of the school and its characteristics, says Tondeur. “What we’ve found, for instance, is that schools with a good ICT policy plan or a positive attitude about ICT in general are using it more often in the classroom,” he says.
It’s important not only to have an ICT plan but that it be a plan developed in consultation with teachers, he emphasises. “Sometimes teachers are not even aware of what it consists of,” he says. “It’s important that they are partners in development of the policy, that they’re aware of the school’s vision and how it’s related to their beliefs about good education, who is involved in the development of policy and which strategies they are using to implement the plan.”
Access to ICT isn’t the problem. The problem is how to effectively use it
One problem schools have to face is the digital divide – some children have all sorts of devices available to them at home, others do not.
“Children who don’t have access at home make up about 2% of the pupils in education in Flanders,” he says. “So 98% of children in Flanders have access to computers at home. But those 2% are still a problem.”
In terms of the digital divide, “Access to ICT isn’t the biggest problem in Flanders. The biggest problem is how to effectively use it,” he says. “How to look up information on the internet, for example. What I often see is that children are given a question, and they look it up on the internet. They copy and paste information from the first hit and that’s it. The school can play an important role there.”
For that to happen, though, teachers need to be up to speed themselves. And it turns out that one of the best ways of achieving this is a version of the low-tech classic style of teaching surgical operations: see one, do one, teach one. Teacher Design Teams are, as the name suggests, a way for teachers to collaborate so that everyone achieves the highest level of competence.
“The good thing about Teacher Design Teams is that it’s a group of two or more teachers – or teacher educators or pre-service teachers – working together and learning how to use new technology in education, but at the same time making curriculum materials, lesson plans and projects,” Tondeur explains. “At the end of that sort of professional development, they’ve learned a lot, but it’s also related to their practical work.”
Most future teachers now are what we call digital natives
“We often use the ADDIE model, which stands for Analyse – what do I need to develop; Decide – how to use technology and which technology to use; Develop the course; Implement it and Evaluate it – come together in the design group and discuss the results.”
It’s a bottom-up approach. The members of the team decide for themselves how often they come together, either face to face or online, and they develop materials together. Tondeur: “I think with the support of an expert or coach, this can be a very interesting way to look at professional development.”
Tondeur’s research is not only highly regarded, with more than 2,100 citations in scholarly journals since 2010, it’s also in many ways pioneering. Instead of simply describing the conditions like a landscape artist, he and his department are plotting the route future travellers will take. One of the main topics of his research at the moment is pre-service teachers and teacher education.
“Most future teachers now are what we call digital natives,” he says, “who grew up using technology as a matter of course. That doesn’t mean they know how to use ICT in education, of course, because they may have missed out on good examples in their own education. I believe pre-service training can help them, but the evidence shows that new teachers often don’t know how to use ICT in the classrooms. They’re required to do it, but they haven’t been shown how.”
Elements in balance
The key, he says, is to achieve three things: technical, pedagogical and content knowledge. Like the four humours of Aristotle, the body can only be healthy when all the elements are in balance, which is not always the case.
“Teacher training institutions often have the technological knowledge, but they don’t know how to link it to pedagogical knowledge and content knowledge,” he explains. “What we did in one of our studies was to look for good strategies to help teacher education institutions understand these three elements.
In a lot of teacher education institutions, ICT is absent
“We saw that we needed to provide clearer role models, give the time to reflect about the role of ICT in education, which is often not the case, and teach student teachers how to collaborate to design technology-rich lessons. And we need to provide feedback, which is also missing in our teacher educators.”
According to Tondeur, what we’re seeing now in Flanders is that teachers realise it’s not enough just to have a course about technical skills; they want a more integrated approach. “But in a lot of education institutions, ICT is absent because teacher educators aren’t ready to integrate ICT in their own teaching.”
Institutions, he says, are starting to realise this and trying to develop a new course about the educational use of technology, where you combine technological knowledge and pedagogical knowledge. “But what’s missing then is content knowledge: how ICT can be used for specific courses.”
It may sound like an avalanche of learning that’s being asked of new teachers and their own teachers alike, but there’s still room, Tondeur assures, for turning off the computer and going back to old-fashioned methods.
“This comes back to the three key elements, where the technical part is also paper and pen, not only digital technology. We need to help teachers develop an understanding of when to use which technology in specific content areas with specific pedagogical goals.
“If we can help by using teacher design teams, that’s a good start. And they might realise that sometimes it’s better not to use technology but paper and pencils. Or the blackboard instead of the interactive whiteboard.”
Photo (c) Hero Images/Corbis
