Points from Saba's Article

Three Interesting Points from “An Introduction to Distance Education and eLearning” (Saba, 2008)

1. I was particularly interested in the Stanford study by Chu and Schramm and the fact that they did not find any statistically significant differences between learning from television and learning from classroom teaching. At first I figured that this was because the studies were from 1967 and 1975, before the advent of online learning. However, I was then surprised to read that Johnson et al. came to the same conclusion when comparing learning outcomes from online and face to face courses in the year 2000. I seem to prefer a combination of online and face to face instruction, but it’s interesting to know that an online student could take the same class from thousands of miles away and still receive an education that would not be considered “significantly different”.

2. I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that Sesame Street gave children clear learning advantages when compared with children who were not exposed to the show. Where have all of those entertaining educational shows gone??? Don’t get me wrong- I know that there are still quite a few quality shows out there, but it seems like they are outnumbered by awful programs that are not educational at all, such as the Teletubbies, The Wiggles, SpongeBob, Caillou, Bratz, Hannah Montana, High School Musical, etc. In fact, I would go as far as saying that some of these shows are detrimental to a child’s education! It seems like shows today are designed to sell toys, clothes, and name brand backpacks! Unfortunately, these are the shows that children seem to prefer. I can’t tell you how many of my third graders were obsessed with High School Musical and Hannah Montana. Do these shows really set good examples for children? Most of the characters and themes seem very superficial, shallow, materialistic, and guided by social pressure to be “cool”. Okay- I have to change the subject now because just thinking about this is making me nauseous…

3. Allen Greenspan’s commentary on the synergy among new technologies was most interesting to me. It’s true that knowledge is becoming readily accessible and more affordable than ever before. I think that Toffler makes a good point when he compares the Technological Revolution to the Industrial Revolution, and I also agree with his ideas about mass education and the “covert curriculum”. (Actually, his comments reminded me of a book I read once called Dumbing Us Down by John Taylor Gatto.) This article makes it very clear that change is imminent, fast-approaching, and critical to the health of our educational system. Technology will play an influential role in education reform and when used correctly, will improve the way we live, work, teach, and learn. However, my concern is that technology is not being used to its potential where it is needed most- in our elementary schools.

First of all, many schools do not have the resources to adopt cutting edge technologies and have fallen far behind when compared to advances in the business/economic sector. We sell all of these wonderful little gadgets (iPhones, Blackberries, PDAs, etc.) but still can’t get our classrooms up to date. I’ve read about Smartboards, NEO Keyboards, and other hardware, but you just don’t see this type of hardware in the average classroom. In addition, teachers may not have the necessary training and skills to integrate and teach with these technologies on a daily basis.

Meanwhile, I have found that some groups and teachers that HAVE embraced technology (edHelper, teachervision.com, a million others) but are using it in a way that might actually stifle learning. Some sites are inundated with ads and simply have too much low quality information to sift through! Others may provide ready-made worksheets, offer “cute” projects, and teacher-centered lessons that aren’t necessarily teaching children how to think. If we continue to promote passive learning, how will these children ever be capable of solving future problems? Saba stated that many schools have resisted change and are merely providing “status-quo practices with more expensive means” when it comes to technology use. I also believe that technology should be used to cultivate “problem solving, decision making, and creative thinking.” There are other technological resources (such as WebQuest, National Geographic Xpeditions, Discovery Education) that do promote meaningful learning based on educational psychology. But at this time, most public schools are not empowered or equipped to support innovative reform and cannot meet the demands of our rapidly changing technological society.

And finally, many K-12 teachers either do not have the technological skills or time necessary to design meaningful, theory-based instruction in the first place, or are just too busy trying to implement the out-dated curriculum handed down to them from above, which may or may not be based in research and best practices. Sometimes I just feel like policy makers are not close enough to the classroom to be making some of these decisions about how children should learn. I understand the need to provide consistency among schools, but there has got to be a better way to do this.

I suppose this is why I decided to pursue a Master’s in Educational Technology… I am eager to learn more about new software systems and instructional systems that could potentially revive our antiquated public education system.