Zhao, Y. & Frank, K. (2003). Factors affecting technology uses in schools: An ecological perspective. American Educational Research Journal, 40(4), 807-840.
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The incorporation of technology into everyday teaching practice cannot be assured by simply making technology available to teachers. In some situations, teachers readily embrace new technology and use it to their advantage, and to the advantage of their students, but in other situations the same is not true. In the end, it appears that a multitude of factors determine whether new technologies are used or not. This begs the question: how can these factors be described and replicated if they can act both for and against the incorporation of technology?
To help find answers, Yong Zhao and Kenneth Frank sought to apply a framework which accurately describes how competing factors ultimately determine whether new technologies are incorporated by teachers or not. The authors turned to an aquatic ecosystem to find such a framework, and liken the ‘invasion’ of new technologies to being similar to the spreading of zebra mussels in the Great Lakes. In this framework, they define schools as being ecosystems (like lakes) being that they consist of multiple, interrelated factors which influence their inhabitants. Both biotic (living) and abiotic (nonliving) factors are described in these ecosystems and the interplay of these factors. As with any ecosystem, schools consist of niches that species can inhabit which allows for a diversity of residents. These species constantly influence each other but can, under certain conditions, achieve homeostasis where species type and niches remain relatively consistent. Teachers represent the keystone species in this ecosystem, and their presence influences the entire system and are, concomitantly, influenced by the system.
Zhao and Frank contend that computer uses represent invading species, which have the potential to disrupt the existing equilibrium and lead to a new equilibrium, providing that the invasion is successful. The introduction of an invading species, like the introduction of technology, does not in any way guarantee that the invasion will be successful. In the Great Lakes, nutrient levels, dispersal means, competition and other factors all act in concert to influence invaders which may ultimately die, adapt over time to their new environment to occupy a niche, or replace the species that already occupied a niche. The authors identify two factors that largely influence the incorporation of computer uses; the nature of the uses and teachers’ assessment of those uses. This is akin to how in natural systems invaders have different qualities and how they interact with endemic species.
With this framework, the authors set out to quantitatively and qualitatively assess how computer uses are incorporated into schools. They surveyed the teachers of four school districts to determine the degree to which technologies are currently being used and then how computers are used in these districts. Throughout their analysis, they repeatedly apply their ecosystem model to evaluate the degree to which it encapsulates the incorporation process. The authors ultimately found that the framework is useful in describing how technology is incorporated, or not, into everyday teaching practice. They are quick to warn, however, that the framework may not accurately describe all of the interrelationships of the ‘ecosystem’ and that further work is necessary. Fittingly, they close with the suggestion that an evolutionary approach to computer use policy is needed, rather than a revolutionary approach.
Dr. Zhao’s more recent work on transformative technologies draws on the ecological framework discussed above.