Teachers shouldn’t feel threatened by technology. Here’s why.
For over a hundred years a classroom has always consisted of a teacher and a room full of students.
Technology has changed everything in the world but it hasn’t been able to make a revolutionary mark on education.
50 years ago over 70% of people in the world were illiterate. That number is currently less than 15%. The change of pace is staggering.
Education has come a long way. From slates to books and from books to laptops. There has been an evolution but not a revolution.
Let us consider for a moment a world that students live in. A world with vast amounts of knowledge is hard to grasp.
People are creating thousands of new websites every hour, uploading 35 hours of video every minute, and watching 2 billion videos every day by the time they leave school an average 22-year-old has over 1000 Facebook friends.
Matters of distance have been trivialized to a point where students are able to connect to thousands of people as if they were in the same room. They consume, produce and communicate information in previously unimaginable ways. They truly are the children of a globalized world.
And where are they heading as they grow up?
The technology at hand has enabled students to make progress better than ever before. However, this has caused many to ponder, is technology hampering or revolutionizing our quality of education? Entrepreneurs and Ed-Tech start-ups have often failed to understand the difference between information and education.
We have the technology to make education easier to understand. But making things easier to understand does not necessarily mean better learning. Learning is a process fundamentally driven by social interaction.
The truth is that technology cannot replace teachers, here’s why
A teacher is not just a person who stands in front of the classroom and delivers information to the students sitting in front of them.
If you think that the fundamental job of the teacher is to transmit information from their heads to their students, then you are right they are obsolete.
I mean you probably imagine a classroom where there is this teacher spewing out facts at a rate which is appropriate for one student, too fast for half of them & too slow for the rest.
Luckily the fundamental job of a teacher is not to deliver information. It is to guide the social process of learning. The job of a teacher is to inspire, to challenge, to excite their students to want to learn.
Yes, they do also explain, demonstrate and show things but fundamentally that is beside the point, the most important thing a teacher does is they make every student feel like they are important and valued.
Thankfully some Ed-Tech startups like CollPoll have realized this and have started to revolutionize education by helping the teacher and the students understand, communicate and express more seamlessly and effectively.
Teachers often complain of not having enough time and rightfully so, with teachers being one of the most overworked as well as underpaid professions.
With teacher's time freed up, they have more time to do things like a mentor and supervise students.
Teachers are positive about the use of Technology in education for its benefits such as increase in student engagement, collaboration and seamless communication among others.
Schools and colleges need to accept technologies that help free up teachers' time, which allows the teacher to spend more time mentoring students.
In Denmark, students can access the internet while taking their exams. They can access any site they like, even Facebook, as long as they don’t message each other or use email.
No, not like this.
In South, Korea schools are switching to digital textbooks so students can study anytime and anywhere with online hours recognized as school attendance.
Software like Google Documents, Gone Google Story Builder to create shared research notes, co-create an essay, or even make videos. TypeWithMe, TitanPad, and other programs allow group members to create a joint document.
Zoom/Skype allows multiple users to engage in a computer-assisted video conference call.
Technology has been accused of isolating the students from their teachers. The above examples are proof that technology when used to solve the right pain points of a teacher and their students can really help the two collaborate like never before.
Technology does not have to isolate and separate students. When used effectively, technology can bring students together in cooperative efforts and deepen students’ learning.
Students are working together in digital spaces. There are so many tools for communicating among students that it is difficult to keep up with them.
These examples point the way to ensuring that tomorrow’s workers, parents, and citizens are more creative problem solvers, better communicators, and lifelong learners.
Final thoughts
Using Tech to make learning a more socially interactive process between teachers and children seamless as well as guiding them about the information available online will be the true Evolution Of Education.
