December 1997 — Features
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Instructional Technology: Pedagogy for the Future
Summary. Learning and classroom focus moves our analysis of instructional technology from a series of points along a line to windows in an array. As in our consideration of enactive classroom learning to explain the failure of certain IT applications applied at incorrect points along our slope, we can now possibly recognize success and failure as a factor of placing the correct IT in the most appropriate window. Unlike the previous paradigm, however, using IT applications in less-effective windows is not a violation of the paradigm.
Paradigm Three: Presenting Student Learning
The final construct centers on the modes for presenting student learning in the classroom. Examine Figure 5.
Educators accept the notion that children in earlier grades are best taught using concrete examples -- not entirely, but primarily. Piaget would further offer that until children reach the age of 11 or 12, they are unprepared cognitively to grasp abstract ideas as their primary vehicle for their learning.[2] As they mature physically, they also mature cognitively; they are progressively more able to deal with abstractions in learning. Letís take a closer look at the unique way in which these technologies gather in Figure 6.
IT Applications. Consistent with the Piagetian theme of formal operations, IT use follows a pattern of convergence at the top-right focus of the graph -- where age and abstraction form a peak representing the most sophisticated learning. This paradigm seems to offer a view of certain technologies as migrations toward enhanced learning rather than as points along a slope or even windows of opportunity.
The ITs employing technology for the primary purpose of presentation are represented by flat lines depicting their immediate and continued value to learning at any age -- although at varying, and typically lower, degrees of abstraction. However, this values d'es not push the learner to new heights as do technologies that focus on the strengths of personal interactions and shared experiences. Conferencing, video material and the Internet are rich in these experiences and, as Figure 6 vividly depicts, can grow with learners as they mature their thinking processes from the concrete to the abstract.
IT Misapplications. Figure 6 also provides a rationale for serious shortcomings in the application of some instructional technologies in the classroom.
