Towards the transformation of learning with ICT

Between 1984 and 1990, while carrying out action research into computer use in my own classroom and later with teachers in the Pupil Autonomy in Learning with Microcomputers project, I became excited by the way in which ICT could change the nature of relationships between teachers and their students. Two changes appeared obvious: ﬁ rst the students’ attention was to varying extents, depending on the activity, shifted away from me, their teacher, to the computer screen; and second, interactive computer-based resources could take over some of the teacher’s traditional function of maintaining students’ levels of motivation for task-completion. The metaphor that best represented this for me was that of a circus performer keeping

a line of plates on sticks spinning by running from one to another and giving each in turn a small spin: teachers did not need to worry about keeping students using computers ‘on task’. There were some obvious implications of these changes. First, it was necessary to explore how teachers could best support this intense student – computer interaction – to determine the critical features of teacher behaviour that would maximise the value of this new tool; and second, it was crucial to examine what exactly was the nature of computer-based tasks – to ask what (if anything) was being learnt rather than assuming that high levels of motivation necessarily equated to intended learning (Davis et al. 1997). Quality in learning, with or without ICT, depends on the nature of the task (activity) and its goal (object). High motivation is an important element of the activity because it can be assumed that the student is focused on completing the computer-based task, but if the task is low level and mundane or, following Wittgenstein’s concept of the ﬂ uidity of discursive, rule- governed behaviour (Burbules and Smith 2005), if the student’s object shifts to speed in task completion rather than learning something by means of task completion,

Inside innovation 35 what is learnt may not constitute quality. Kozma (1991) provided an early analysis

of the particular features of information systems that could support learning: their speed in processing, their ability to proceduralise information (‘operating on symbols according to speciﬁ c rules’), their ability to transform information from one symbol system to another (by changing the form of representation), and their ability to assist novices in building and manipulating mental models ‘so that they are more like those of experts’. From Kozma’s work I came to understand that an important contribution made by some ICT-enabled tasks is in supporting the learner’s ability to understand ‘decontextualised’ concepts in which coming to know is largely an abstract rather than a practical process.

Ridgway and McCusker (2003) adopt a Vygotskian theory of learning and suggest that in a society that is experiencing radical change as a result of ICT, there is a need to ‘map a new cognitive agenda’, since cognitive abilities valued by one culture may

be ‘rendered redundant by a new technology’. They turn Kozma’s features of ICT around and see them as essential components of a new kind of curriculum focused on: ‘the promotion of meta-knowledge; using new representations and symbol systems; and modelling complex processes and problems’ (ibid., p. 312). Their research consists in designing software that supports the development of problem-solving skills. These tasks are intended to assess students’ learning, as a means of promoting their cognitive abilities; they are intended to be used in assessment for learning rather than summative testing. Their software is designed to extend the cognitive abilities of students by letting them manipulate complex data sets that would be very difﬁ cult to work with on paper. For example, they can use a dynamic model (represented on screen with icons and clickable buttons) to explore the implications of manipulating

a number of variables relating to cost, weather, distance and time of year before taking a decision on purchasing a holiday.

This allows students to be set tasks in realistic contexts, using realistic data to address real problems of considerable complexity, using resources and methods that are familiar to professionals working in the relevant ﬁ eld.

(Ridgway and McCusker 2003, p. 327)

The implication of the kind of ICT-based tasks designed by Ridgway and McCusker is that students engage in a different kind of task. This is what Perkins (1993, p. 89) calls an ‘effect with ICT’ in which the user’s cognitive powers are ampliﬁ ed by the use of technology. These kinds of effects are contentious in traditional education systems. They can be seen as giving students assistance which is somehow ‘unfair’ or may prevent them from developing skills needed to complete the task unaided. In England we have seen moves at various times to ban calculators from classrooms and it is still assumed at all levels in our education system that students should not have access to the Internet during examinations. However, Pea sees this as one of the ‘trade offs’ that are necessary in using ICT tools within an activity system characterised by ‘distributed intelligence’. ICT tools can take over part of the cognitive load, in what Perkins calls ‘person plus’, and this challenges us to re-assess the value of what has traditionally been taught and consider making radical changes. When ICT tools

36 Understanding innovation are available, ‘more universal access among learners to participation in complex

thought and activities may be gained at the expense of low-level understanding’ (Pea 1993, p. 74). As Ridgway and McCusker remind us, across all areas of activity human beings now use ICT tools routinely, so designing an education system that includes their use by students is increasingly important. Furthermore, the practices of disciplinary knowledge are changing to incorporate ICT tools that provide new kinds of affordances that extend the mind as well as the body, in McLuhan’s sense (op. cit.). Algebra provides an elegant and time-effi cient set of tools for solving mathematical problems that would otherwise involve extensive, time-consuming calculations, but the number-crunching facilities of computers have changed the nature of mathematicians’ needs. This, in turn, has implications for the kind of mathematical skills that should be part of a twenty-fi rst century curriculum. It is no longer necessary to teach algebra as an essential computational tool, but teaching algebra may remain important in giving students higher-level mathematical understandings. As Ruthven (2002) points out, in the ‘instrumentation’ of mathematics it is important not merely to teach students new routine procedures which incorporate ICT into mathematical problem solving, but to use ICT to assist the development of their cognitive structures. Classroom practices and use of the available tools are an integral part of developing these structures: ‘If tasks are strongly compartmentalised, techniques highly prescribed, and discourses severely restricted, then the mathematical senses and cognitive schemes that students develop will be correspondingly fragmented and infl exible’ (ibid., p. 281). But instrumentation of mathematical activities in classrooms should both aid effi ciency and assist the development of higher-level mental functions because, as Ruthven says, ‘it is widely agreed that teaching and learning should aim to build the coordinated mathematical senses and cognitive structures which constitute the two faces of conceptual understanding’ (ibid., p. 281).

Towards the transformation of learning with ICT