Day 28: Ubiquitous, Seamless and Embedded

Respond: Should technology drive curriculum, or vice versa?

 

     This is the wrong question. I believe our tech director has got the right idea: at ASW technology needs to be ubiquitous, seamless and embedded in our teaching and the students' learning. It's not a matter of one driving the other. We have a curriculum of which technology skills and digital citizenship are part and at the same time the seamless integration of technology enables our students to communicate and collaborate, to critically seek and learn new information, and to gain knowledge through the creation of media projects. 
     Is is self-evident that our curriculum changes as technology plays a more and more important role in the lives of our students, but it remains equally important to understand that technology should be a means to an end and that end is learning. 
     If I look at this in a more concrete classroom situation, for example, I would say that in my classes language acquisition remains the firm priority, but I can see that technology has enabled my students to learn the language in many new and more efficient ways, and this is definitely an added bonus. The easy availability of target language material, the many apps that help them practice vocabulary, the ease with which they can record themselves and listen to each other, the possibility of creating media products in the target language, all of this has found its way into my classroom, and indirectly into my curriculum. Students still learn the same language, but they learn it in a more exciting and direct way.
    When something new appears, it is up to me to evaluate its usefulness and the place it can have in the curriculum, even if it fundamentally changes the game. There often is a place for these new things, but it may not be obvious and I won't know for sure until we try it out in class. 
     Technology and the curriculum need to move forward hand in hand, if we want our students to succeed in the 21st century world. Technology is ubiquitous and seamlessly embedded in our daily lives, so why should it be different at school?


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