Content is not king?

Jeff Jarvis challenges the perception that content and distribution are not king and claims that conversation is. I have been following a series of bloggers who appear frustrated with the money schools spend on commercial resources (i.e., books). For some reason, perhaps because I write books, such comments generate in me a need to respond. Maybe this need stems from a sense of guilt. However, it is also seems possible I see the issue from a different perspective.

I have absolutely no quarrel with the notion that “the conversation” is important. Conversation, discussion, interaction, etc. are great ways to encourage the learner to think, process, integrate, etc. However, the quest of some to bring the process of education down to certain “basics can become self-promoting. In such discussions, it seems possible “others” are trying to tell the learner” what is best for him/her. In fact, as an “adult learner” I often prefer to purchase a book and not have to listen to the comments of potential teachers who may have a different agenda than my own. I can interact with the ideas of the author and I can use the Internet to locate “free” humans with opinions to test my personal opinions and stimulate my thinking through discussion. In a way, a book and a teacher are both resources intended to assist and stimulate the learner. Just for sake of argment, doesn’t it seem as accurate to claim that both free content and free conversation are available online?

I would propose a different perspective. I agree that there is a reasonable quantity of useful online and hard copy information. Information is also present in the form of content experts and in life experiences. What both good authors and good teachers do is locate and organize quality information and encourage learners to “process” this information and generate personal knowledge. In this effort, the “face to face” teachers has the opportunity to respond to students rather than having to anticipate what issues, misunderstandings, needs, etc. students may have. In most cases, the “face to face” teacher does not have the time to continually develop the background and review the potential information sources an author must consider. The author takes the risk of expending this time hoping that whatever product (a book, video, multimedia product) is generated will be regarded to be of sufficient quality to attract a reasonable number of purchases. It is a very competitive process. In fact, it is a competitive process I must engage in as an author that I do not have to engage in as a teacher. My teaching job is not constantly in jeopardy because another individual decides he or she is willing to engage in some form of competitive process for the students who might consider enrolling in the courses I teach (sounds something like vouchers).

It is easy to make “commercial” sound like a bad thing. It is true – I make some money writing a textbook. But, to be fair, I also get paid to be a teacher. Perhaps I see writing to teach and talking to teach to be more similar than others do.

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Is Tech In Schools a Fad?

The Milwaukee Sentinel has what appears to be a “back to school” series on “Is Tech in School a Fad?”

The short answer appears to be – it is too early to tell.

Research results are mixed. But most studies conclude that for computers and other technology to have much effect on student performance, a number of conditions are necessary: Teachers have to be technologically adept; classroom assignments have to allow for exploration; and curricula have to abandon breadth for depth.

Although schools have made changes in some of those areas, particularly increasing teachers’ technical proficiency, the predominant uses of computers remain word processing, heavily filtered Internet searches and the occasional PowerPoint presentation. In addition, with pressure rising to improve test scores, more schools have embraced skill-drilling software that contributes little to long-term student learning, observers say

Among the issues raised is the frequent observation that actual student use is less than one might expect given the increase in access to technology.

I must add this. My next door neighbor (actually the kid living on the next farm down the gravel road) and high school friend was Lowell Monke. We have pretty much gone separate ways since heading off to college. Lowell is interested in ed tech too –

For Lowell Monke, an assistant education professor at Wittenberg University in Ohio and former advanced technology teacher, the lack of results and questionable uses of technology have destined them to become another educational fad.

For an extended comment by Dr. Monke see – The human touch. How ironic is that?

Anyway, article two in the series Critics say popular PowerPoint pushes students toward ‘infomercials’. Now don’t get me started, blog entries are supposed to be brief.

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College Is A Chance To Hang Out With Smart People – And Other Justifications for College Life

My university starts the Fall semester today. I love this time of year. People who are lucky enough to have jobs doing what I do have something uniquely positive – we are allowed to experience an annual return to youthful enthusiasm. No matter what the age of your body, each year brings the opportunity take on new challenges and to do so in the company of many others on similar journeys.

I find myself caught between what I think are some of true benefits of the “college experience” and trends that may be moving us in a different direction. The ideal for me is a full-time face-to-face experience. I regret that tuition costs require that some students must water down the experience with a heavy work schedule or attend part time. Despite my commitment to instructional technology, I am not willing to argue the equivalence of distance education. I think what students or parents pay for is an environment. The environment is as much a function of the diversity and capabilities of the other students as it is of the instructors. Class time is a small part of the experience and the curriculum is much broader than those topics listed by instructors.

If you are lucky enough to be “full time” and “live”, I hope you appreciate the experience. I do.

Welcome back!

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Just Use It – Justifying Why I Don’t Read the Manual

I came across an article in techLearning (Mary Burns) arguing that teacher technology inservice should be based on a “just use it” rather than a skills training approach. The article was an argument against lengthy experiences in which educators learn the features of PowerPoint, BlackBoard (or whatever) even when an attempt is made to link this training to practical classroom applications.

The author lists several arguments explaining the limitations of a skills training approach:

  • technology rather than the curriculum becomes the focus
  • in order to meet the needs of each individual too many features are presented overloading everyone
  • skills approaches unintentionally focus on the expertise of the trainer rather than the skills of the learners

    • The author advocates minimal training, projects involving groups of teachers, and training individual teachers in skills that they pass on to group members (kind of cooperative learning for teachers).

    As I read this article, I was evaluating some of the premises by way of personalization (Note: I hope other people do this. If not, I must be very egocentric.) Anyway, my institution has made a massive change in the way techology works on our campus by integrating all kinds of things through PeopleSoft software. I have heard all kinds of very negative things about this new system and was probably prepared to become frustrated, angry, etc. I decided to ignore the request that all faculty members attend a training session and just log on (I hope the connection to the Burns article now makes some sense). I did have some difficulty initially – I had thrown away the email providing my password. I tried the old trick of having the system send you your password by email but this did not work and I did become frustrated for a little while (it turned out the department secretary included the wrong email for me when enrolling department members – the “old trick” assumes the system has your email address). However, I eventually was able to connect and seemed to find a way to do lots of interesting things. Poking around to see what worked was fun. I must admit I was doing this without any pressure to get a specific task accomplished and not everyone would be willing to spend time in this fashion.

    Promoting “Don’t Read the Manual” – My version of “Just Do It” (Note – I am just making this up so evaluate my reasoning carefully).

  • Playing is an active form of learning. If you are willing to play with technology, you create your own understanding. Good technology does not break. If it does, blame the technology!
  • Experience generalizes. Developers are allowed to use good ideas they have observed elsewhere and do. What worked before or what should be the case often is!
  • When I run into a wall, I do use the manual. This is inefficient in the specific case, but being inefficient in a few cases may be better than being efficient more times than necessary!
  • I sometimes do try to learn everything. I sometimes read the manual after I already know how software works. I did say sometimes. Thoroughness may be applied after I am convinced an application is really cool and I want to explore what more I might do with it. The details make more sense when I already know how something works and have experience doing productive things (a way to avoid working memory overload and a way to provide a context for learning).

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    Instructional Designer or Instructional Technologist

    I am having a professional identity crisis. So, in the spirit of being helpful, I am going to write about my uncertainty. I imagine this to be something like the approach psychology instructors take when they bring individuals who have suffered from various psychopathologies into class. Perhaps everyone learns and everyone benefits when brave individuals explain their uncertainties.

    I think this issue developed when my institution initiated a graduate program called Instructional Design and Technology. I was involved in getting this program started because of my interest in the application of technology in education. The program prepares individuals for a variety of roles in education and industry including those individuals taking positions as K-12 coordinators/facilitators ??? an area of personal interest. As the program developed, individuals hired, and courses developed, I became more and more aware of the importance of ???instructional design??? in instructional design and technology programs. I was not completely na??ve when beginning this venture. I had books by Dick and Carey and Gagne on my shelf. I had friends who worked at Florida State and Indiana. However, I must admit I could not force my way through these books or imagine myself teaching what these folks taught – the nuances of competing design models bored me to death and attempts to prescribe/establish learning conditions seemed very basic in relationship to the research topics I studied and taught about as an educational psychologist. Despite my long-term interest in research on the applications of technology and commitment to the development of K-12 teachers??? capacity to use technology in classrooms, such things were not what I knew or was interested in knowing. So – I have been thinking about what various individuals who work in programs associated with educational applications of technology do – what topics interest them, what topics are emphasized in their teaching, etc.

    Such issues have been ???working??? in the back of my brain for several years and have again been brought to the surface by a book I have been reading. A friend (Mike Royer) recently edited a book entitled ???The Cognitive Revolution in Educational Psychology??? (2005). What caught my attention was that the book contained a chapter on ???Instructional Design??? (Marcy Driscoll and Kerry Bruner) and a chapter on ???Instructional Technology??? (Wiley, Sanchez & Moher). Just paging through the two chapters was enough to confirm my expectations; I must be an instructional technologist and not an instructional designer. I recognized the topics in the instructional technology chapter and had read nearly all of the primary sources. The ???movement from transmission to active learning???, intelligent tutoring systems, simulation environments, project based learning ??? the topics were things that interested me, I knew about, and I acted on in my own projects and writing. The topics in Marcy???s chapter were also familiar ??? design models, Gagne (Marcy was a long-time collaborator), conditions of learning, etc. However, I could claim nothing more than awareness.

    I thought it was interesting that Marcy seemed to recognize the issue I am raising here. In the beginning paragraphs of her chapter, she notes that the book contains two chapters dealing with technology ??? Instructional Design and Instructional Technology. She makes an effort to define the scope of the field she intended to cover, but did not make clear how her definition of what instructional designers do could be differentiated from what instructional technologists do. According to the description, instructional designers do important and practical things. The focus is ???on the application of learning principles in the systematic process for designing instruction??? ??? sounds good to me.

    So, I am still confused and searching. There must be folks who study questions of this nature. Maybe there have been attempts to cluster individuals or identify citation probabilities. Maybe individuals should simply be asked to identify their affiliation and explain the basis for this identification. Maybe an instructional designer could do needs analyses and create objectives for various professional roles. What do classroom teachers need to learn in order to become more proficient? What do those who create instructional materials need to know? How do these skills and knowledge overlap with what designers vs. technologists teach?

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