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4 responses to “Oi, teacher, leave them iPods alone!”: “NASUWT asks children to leave the future at home”

1. 

   ourman

   January 4, 2008 at 1:22 pm

   That’s all very smart but what happens when they are stolen or when the teacher needs to teach something unrelated to technology?

2. 

   Adam

   January 4, 2008 at 3:05 pm

   On the “unrelated to technology” front, surely it’s a fallacy that technology is only relevant to education when you’re teaching about technology?

   All of these tools could be of use in multiple subjects.

   Theft, and bullying-related theft in particular, is a different issue, but just banning the tools seems to be a head-in-the-sand approach.

3. 

   Antony Mayfield

   January 4, 2008 at 4:29 pm

   Head in the sand as the tide comes in – argh!

   Have a look at Edu Blogs’ examples of technology being used in all aspects of education: from Flickr photos for Art History and creative writing to virtual worlds for visualising how databases work – it’s thrilling to see the innovation in education at all levels and across all disciplines at the moment.

4. 

   Ewan McIntosh

   January 4, 2008 at 7:00 pm

   As the points have already been made, I’ll not hesitate to repeat them: technology is, in the hands of a good teacher, rarely taught or talked about, merely used to make possible what was not possible before or to enhance what was slow or boring. It can also be used to make processes easier so that deeper learning rather than learning by doing processes can take place.

   I know that most of my school day was taken up by process rather than thought (do, rather than think), and see technology as the liberator here. Not, though, unless young people can bring in and share what they have in their pockets because the State will never have enough resources or training to supply and concentrate on one limited suite of technology that suits it and the traditionalists holding the State up.