Irresponsibles teaching with ICT ?

SPEAKER: Ludo (Marc Alier) - Software Engineering Profesor @ UPC Barcelona & Lead Developer Moodle Wiki 

I remember back in high school attending to the chemical scientific lab. It was a special place where we had to be careful when touching and operating equipment without knowing the instructions on how to use it and the security cautions. Even the smell was ominous.. In that lab, the chemistry teacher was in control, and we (students) all knew that he/she knew all there's to know about those  vases, pipes, funny spiral things and recipients with acids, bases, salts and other unidentified substances. My favorite warning sign was on that special well to wash the eyes in case of accident.

But the ICT lab... Oh man, that's another story. The same sciences teacher was in charge of the room where we had the few computers that the catalan education department had send. This was back in 1989. And who really was in charge of the computers where my friend Rafa and I.

Has this changed much over the years? Does the average teacher who somehow uses ICT in his courses have more knowledge about computers, networks, software than my sciences teacher?

In my opinion teachers who whish/want/need to use ICT in education need to be as much competent in the use of the tools they use as my sciences teacher was inside the chemical lab.    We all know that when somebody uses ICT without knowing what's going on there are several risks at stake: loss of time and valuable information, virus infections, misconfiguration of equipment or even hardware damage, leaks of personal and sensible data, exposure to untrusted people on the net... you name it.

Computers and the net are not something to be afraid of. I love the use of things like blogs, wikis, social networks (even the crappy SL thing ;-) ) and I pity those who live in a powerpoint world. But both the teachers and the students need to know what is behind every ICT tool they use, what's really happening when they click the mouse and what are the consequences.

Kids need to understand what's behind the magical ICT tools they use on a daily basis. Don't forget the companies who sell ringtones and phone background, and other scams that pray on teenagers who view technology as something magical that simply works.

But can we wish for the kids to learn this knowledge if the teachers do not have it. I say that ICT competence has to become a basic skill for any teacher who may happen to be close to a student and a computer at the same moment. Otherwise we will have a bunch of  irresponsibles teaching with ICT.

Comments

[florence meichel]

I feel so closed with this point of vue ! Yes we really have lot of responsability : technologies are not magical...just some tool...that's what we make whith these tools which has value...or NOT...everyone has to think about his ethical values, his sense of live, his rights : we could become the senses of the machine...is that what we want ?

http://video.google.com/videosearch?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=kevin%20kelly&um=1&sa=N&tab=wv#

[florence meichel]

Sorry not the good one ! :-(

http://video.google.com/videosearch?ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&sourceid=navclient&gfns=1&q=kevin%20kelly&um=1&sa=N&tab=wv#

[Ludo (marc alier)]

The teacher using ICT in front of the students, sets an example on how is it done. Like a father while driving a car does. To use a computer implies a resposability of doing it propertly.
Why I am saying that ? Any ideas?

[florence meichel]

Really Sorry !

http://fr.youtube.com/watch?v=J132shgIiuY

[Gabriel Kent]

I think the questions from this post stem from the cold-start problem: how do we do x when we need some y but y requires some x?

This problem is prominent in Economics and typically the best case studies involve a free market (freedom to act in one's own interest) and a bit of time to adjust.

The freest possible market is important because it allows the market to react faster and more fluid (empirically).

The bit of pain, er, adjustment is simply a universal law, nature does not begin in an ideal space-time (configuration), its always happening here and now and evolves from that.

[Steli Efti]

It all comes back to being authentic. If you can't walk the talk, nobody will follow. Especially not kids. If you don't understand and love something, how can you expect your students to do so? It's the same old "do what I say, not as I do" thing. Never works. Never will. But that's the tough part about teaching people. It's easy to understand something and to tell others what to do. It's though to do it yourself.