Education and Tech: Furture Visions

In the Article by Larry Cuban at Stanford University titled Appendix E Public School Teachers Using Machines in the Next Decade, he talked about three plausible "futures" of teachers using computers, CD-ROMS, modems, and other telecommunications in their classrooms.

I choose to write about "The spread of computers in schools: confusion over access, use, and innovation. Use of computers as we know have spread through the years. In 1981, according to his article on average there were 125 students per computer; in 1991, there were 18 people per computers. This article was written in 1994, so some of the information is very outdated. Now in schools with computer labs, there are 1 computer per person in the lab. Now with the development of Lap tops and school purchasing them, it will be easier for students to use computers in their classrooms.

His article stated that for those individual students who use computers, they spend on average a little more than one hour a week (or 4 percent of all institutional time) on the computers. For the students who do use the computers it varies greatly on what they might do. I noticed in the school that I was in, the students did computer lab one day a week, probably an hour, where they played educational games or they did research for a report they were doing. Of course I only observed a third grade class.

The Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) study concluded that students from high-income families have far more access to computers in schools than peers from low-income famies. Black students use computers in schools less than white, especiall in elementary schools. Pupils whose native language is not English have even less access to computers. Finally, low-achieving students are less likely to use machines to enhance reasoning and problem solving and more likely to use them for drill and practice.

I feel that if this article was written in 2007 that this assessment would be different. Computers can be adjusted to be in Spanish, French etc, so even if someone is not speaking English, they would be able to write a report or even get into a program that changed English into Spanish. I would like to think that schools have progressed to the place that they had more computers for the students to use. This of course will be the responsibilty of us future teachers to help make this possible.

Ensuring Equality of Educational Opportunity in the Digital Age

In the article "Education and the Urban Society", it states recently, the term digital divide has been used primarily to highlight inequities between various social groups with respect to acquiring computers and accessing the Internet. Given how use of these technologies
has permeated our society, including our nation’s schools, all relevant aspects of the digital divide must be addressed if the spirit of Brown is to be realized.

After reading this article I thought back to my own experience in "digital divide" where in 1986, I started working in an office that used a computer for bookkeeping. This was my first experience with computers. I was given a stack of books and told that I needed to learn how to use the bookkeeping hardware. It took a few calls to the software company, a lot of trial and error, but I did learn how to use it. Then in 1988, I took the first of many computer classes.

Another experience"in digital divide" was experienced by my daughter in her freshman year of high school. She was in advanced classes where the expectation was that work must be done on the computer. I am not sure how many computers were in the high school at that time, but in 1993 we didn't have one. As a single mother it was an expense I didn't feel that we needed. My daughter did an excellent job on her projects, but because they were not done on the computer she was dock a letter grade. In the article it states: "Specifically, these issues pertain to the fact that every student must develop basic technology literacy skills to be afforded the opportunity to become a full participant in our society". I felt her school assumed if a student was in advanced classes that they must have a computer in the home.

Brown vs the Board of education article stated "
Many practicing teachers have experienced a massive infusion of computer
technology into their schools over the past two decades and, as a result,
have reported using it with increased frequency, though not necessarily to
present instruction (Faison, 1996). Thus, they report the need to receive more
training pertaining to how to use it to present instruction." The teachers need more training as the children coming up in our society have either never used a computer or knows them like their right arm. Example my granddaughters ages 9 and 5 years have grown up with computers. The 5 year old has been using a computer since she was 2 years old. She shows me how to play computer games. She does have a friend that is a month older than her, that still doesn't know how to work a computer. This is the difference in their families letting them use the computer. These are both upper middle class homes, but the difference in computer use for the children are very different.

I agree that if families don't have computers it is an unfair advantage over families that do have computers. When I did practicum last spring in a third grade title I school, the class went to the computer lab once a week. From my observation all the children knew how to play games and how to research on the computer. The class had one computer in the classroom which they shared equally.

There is a program that has laptops for $100.00's for low income families. Some of the computers are sent free to third world counties. At this price almost everyone should be able to afford a computer, or schools should be able to get computer for their schools. It is starting to be a disadvantage not to have computer skills in our society.

In the article I feel it sums it up best by saying " In striving to keep the use of computer technology in proper perspective, educators may be best served if they are guided by the following three thoughts: the diverse, powerful features of computer technology should be used to address the diverse, yet unique, learning styles and personal needs of each student; the movement to integrate technology should not supercede the need to teach students
basic reading, mathematics, and writing skills; and, the use of technology
should supplement but not supplant existing sound pedagogical practices and
efforts to increase other measures such as increasing the availability of preschool
instruction and improving parental involvement to improve student
learning."