Today we started with the article “iPads vs Teachers – Why Technology is Winning” – this article bothered me for a number of reasons. The title in itself is polarizing and implies it has to be one or the other. My initial gut reaction was shock and anger. How could a piece of technology replace someone that has trained for years to become a teacher and that has a genuine interest in working with students? Not to mention how little evidence there is to support the efficacy of iPads over other approaches to improve student learning. There are so many things wrong with this concept of iPads replacing teachers, it’s ridiculous. Is an iPad going to teach empathy or how to work with manipulatives? Maybe the iPad will help the kids tie their shoes or teach restitution?

Then I began to wonder who David Sirota is and where is he getting his information from? It turns out that Mr. Sirota is a liberal political commentator and radio host. His 2006 book “Hostile Takeover” is about how corporate interests are driving the U.S. policy. Fair enough – his views may be a little biased and his article seems to have left out some important details. Where are the teachers in this conversation? Why were there significant teacher layoffs in the states? Is that directly linked to the purchase in technology?

There are certainly many issues both with the idea of technology replacing teachers and people taking an anti-technology stand point. What is the goal here and who’s really benefiting? The push for every child to have their own laptop never happened, so why are iPads going to be different? I feel the conversations have to happen and they need to be made transparent. I don’t believe there’s a one-shot panacea that’s going to reform the system. It’s going to take community with the end goal being education and what’s best for the students, not what’s best for business.

On that note and thoughts on community, Sandy and I have managed to overcome a couple big challenges in our developing of The ICT Sub Hub. We’ve decided to make three separate sub-pages with different surveys so we could distinguish information on elementary, middle and high schools. The surveys were easy to embed, but I don’t think the spreadsheets can be. I’ve set it so they are viewable to anyone accessing the link through the website. I’ve also created a forum and embedded that into our website in hopes that it will serve as a means to foster community and communication. In regards to the resources, I’ve tried to share and comment on some of the many sources we’ve seen during the 10 Minutes of Fame / mentioned in class. It’s an ongoing process, but I feel the project is really starting to take shape. I’ve recently been in contact with the technology teacher at one of the schools I was staffed and he’s happy to share his resources and share his thoughts. The conversation is beginning! There is a community that supports this, and I’m feeling optimistic we’ll be able to contribute.