Current Understanding of TEL

Technology Enhanced Learning?

Understanding of TEL

Probably best understood contrasted to its opposite? Which would presumably technology detracted learning. Which probably means reading twitter instead of a book.

Actually, I'm not sure that's true. So let's take a pitch at 'the careful selection and use of particular technologies in order to support learning activities'

For a given definition of 'technology' - pencil and paper are technologies, and so arguably is language. Humanity is practically defined by technology assisted learning. However, I'm assuming that this isn't the focus of this course, and we're probably using 'technology' here to refer to 'digital' or 'online'.

Experience of TEL

I've exprienced the online fire safety training programme at work. This is, I suspect, not really technology assisted learning, but rather a cost saving measure, meaning I don't have to leave my desk, and they university doesn't have to provide me with sandwiches and somebody to read a powerpoint to me. I think TEL can be done better, and for better reasons that 'it's cheaper'.

I could, and have, used a blog to support my reflective thinking in the past - as writing is a necessary part of getting my ideas straight and introducing some clarity. Things that have been written on my research blog in a relatively early form have made their way into published articles. I've gotten use to blogging (although if you check Surveillance and Identity, its been spares recently, as I've been writing in a much more traditional form). I've found the blog useful for reaching a different audience to academic papers, for promoting my work, and building a profile.

I'm in love with open educational material. I love Kahn academy, Openculture.org, TED, itunes U etc. There's just so much stuff out there, some of it from very, very high quality producers. Hell, I even believe there are times when it would be suitable for a student to quote wikipedia in an essay.

Thinking about it, I do so much of my research through a technological medium, that drawing a clear line around 'technology assisted learning' is as difficult as if I counted paper and pen as a technology. It's been years since I accessed a journal article in paper form. I use twitter, in part, to follow academics and practitioners in a range of fields.

If the intended learning outcomes for this course are:

• Make informed decisions about the use of TEL when planning and designing courses
• Identify personal development requirements for the use of TEL approaches in teaching practice
• Plan for using TEL methods to support students
• Contribute to discussions about the future of TEL within the University

Then I'm quite happy with that. The informed decision part is vital. The technology has to be tied into the teaching. For me that's probably going to mean that it has to be tied into teaching theory. When I was doing my A-levels, a teacher asked us to cut up a worksheet and stick it in our books. It was a pointless exercise, more suitable for a junior school class. You could imagine the same problem with getting a class to put something on a wiki - unless your intention was to work on 1) understanding the idea and philosophy behing a wiki and assuming that you can only do this if you have participated in some way, or 2) the practical skills of editing a wiki, with the assuming that the best way to do this is have a go, make mistakes, and figure it out with feedback.

As to identifying personal development requirements - that's probably going to be an interface between the developing understanding of best practice in education from the rest of this course with a hands-on experience of applicable and useful technologies.

I think the final learning outcome is very important. Universities feel like they are going to be changing over the not to distant future. There is so much information available online, that the traditional monopoloy over disciplinary information that secure the university is fading - I have a sneaking suspiscion that whatever form 'the university' ends up in, that technology is going to play a part.