Scenario One:
It wasn’t all that long ago that I finally got around to getting a [new cool tool]. It really was a revelation. I purchased it to replace something I’d been using for quite awhile, but the expanded capabilities it represented had a profound influence on me in two ways: it greatly increased and made more powerful the main purpose of the original technology. But, more importantly, it began to reveal a myriad of ways in which its capabilities could be used for behaviors and experiences of which I hadn’t even thought…
Scenario Two:
It wasn’t all that long ago that I finally got around to getting a [new cool tool]. It was a little constricting when compared to what I normally used, but I was willing to forgive those limitations due to some important advantages. But, over time, I found it was slowly impacting my behavior in two ways. I was using the new device much more often – it was beginning to completely replace my normal device. But even more important, I was tending to abandon my attention to and interest in the sorts of things my previous device easily supported, but it didn’t. It was, in fact, affecting how much I attended to things I knew to be important…
The “new cool tool” in each of the above scenarios is, in fact, the
same device – a smart phone. The difference in outcomes, of course, is in what
other technology the device tended to replace. In the first instance, it
replaced an ordinary cell phone. In the second case, it was displacing a
computer.
An ordinary phone is actually quite powerful,
allowing its user to connect, in real time, to almost anyone with a similar
device anywhere in the world. But a smart phone brings with it a huge collection
of bonus capabilities. Connections to other people can be through voice, text,
image, even video, and delivered in real time or in formats consumable at any
other time. Besides connections to people, it provides access to masses of
information, delivered in easily consumable and easy-to-manage pieces through
simple and intuitive applications. All of this from a device that fits into your
pocket, and works almost anywhere in the world. Of course, with the exception of the “fits into your pocket” part, a computer can do all of that as well. What a computer lacks in portability and ease of use, it gains in quality of delivery, increased versatility, more powerful user interfaces, and simple real estate. That “real estate” isn’t just the size of the screen (though that’s very important as well). It’s the scope and size of the things a computer can access. A smart phone’s apps generally reside on the device, helping to slice up the outside world into pieces the small screen and limited processing power can digest. A computer’s very complex and versatile operating system (and equally powerful browser) provides the ability for it to support and deliver a mass of capabilities living elsewhere on the so-called cloud – from office tools to content and learning management – without any help from an installed application, and any need to reduce its size and complexity. The “easily consumable and easy-to-manage pieces” of smart phone information is, in fact, a restriction, which profoundly impacts the behaviors and expectations of its users, and the possible outcomes from its use.
We’re ready to look at what all this looks like to the learner,
educator, and education technology coordinator. A regular theme of mine is that
the selection of a technology can have profound implications for how we teach
(pedagogy), as well as why we teach (hoped-for outcomes). Previously we looked
at human behaviors (“doing vs. watching”), and compared devices to those
behaviors. Since a smart phone tends to replace technologies we already use, we
need to measure how it changes existing behaviors: how it impacts the manner in
which a student interacts with the learning process, and how it impacts the
scope and sequence of a teacher’s instructional practice. This discussion could
also be applied to any device running a cell phone operating system, including
personal digital assistants (PDA’s – iPods are an example), and “slate” devices
such as the iPad.
To make our analysis somewhat better embedded in our instructional
interests, we’ll select an arbitrary assignment, a critical analysis of an
online resource, a YouTube video.
Since an ordinary cell phone wouldn’t actually support such an activity, replacing it with a smart phone (or similar device) would immediately open up a new world of possibilities – students would be able to view the video, read comments made about it, and access support materials relating to the content of the video, alone, and on their own time. In addition, the smart phone would provide a platform through which students could text remarks about the video directly to their peers, as well as the teacher. They could even contribute these remarks to a thread hosted online through any of a dozen social networking platforms, thereby making the assignment more collaborative. This is the “…myriad of ways in which the technology could be used for [new] behaviors and experiences…”
Now, let’s see what happens to this activity when the smart phone is used to replace a computer. As you might guess, since the computer can, in fact, do everything the smart phone can do and more, the impact in this case is restrictive. Watching a video on a very small screen limits the detail and impact that a computer screen or larger display might deliver (though an iPad-like device would improve that). Computer-savvy students would surely miss the ability to read comments and reference materials in real time as the video played. But the most important restriction would be in the mode and manner in which the student actually did his analysis. With no traditional keyboard and no access to true word processing, the writing process native to a smart device is “Twitter-friendly,” encouraging small amounts of text with no formatting. Writing a several-page analysis of the video on a smart phone (even an iPad) would be unthinkable. The process of collaborating between peers would be similarly limited.
Of course, our mistake is in assuming that “…the smart phone is used to replace a computer.” It can’t, so, for this assignment, we would be wrong in selecting this technology. But the larger problem is well illustrated by Scenario Two above. When we purchase a device, or acquire a technology for classroom use, we spend hours trying to figure out how to induce it to do what we can already do elsewhere. In this case, the device really isn’t up to the task, and our increased use results in a change in the way in which we consume information, and even more important, how we communicate information to others. It’s the old adage, “To a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” To a smart phone, everything looks like a Tweet.
In the world of consumer technologies, this is unfortunate, but otherwise probably not that interesting. For a social studies teacher teaching the subtleties of human thinking, or a language arts teacher teaching the entire range of human expression, the presence and overuse of this technology gives them yet another barrier to their instructional goals. There are dozens of appropriate applications for such devices, and the fact that they are becoming ubiquitous is an exciting prospect for teachers who want to encourage their students to be connected and interactive with the world of peers, experts and information, at any time and from anywhere. If the devices are supplied by students, super, you’ve leveraged new capabilities you didn’t have before. But more likely the school will have to supply them. I’m already hearing from school tech coordinators that they intend to stop buying computers and focus on iPads. Before running into the arms of a very seductive new technology, one should look long and hard at the sorts of things you want your students to do and learn, and pick the tool best suited for as many of them as you can.
It may very well be that these technologies will expand and improve, changing this discussion. But we already have devices which cover our needs as educators to support large, in-depth, complex and subtle learning activities for our students. The impact of the presence of small, low-power devices on educational practice will be positive depending on how, for what – and most importantly, in place of what – we choose to use them. Our enthusiasm for them should not decide for us what and how we want our students to learn.
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