on the challenges of emerging technologies and education
Tomorrow morning I am participating in (what I hope to be) a really engaging online discussion on emerging technologies and education. There should be about a dozen participants in this discussion with a mix of technologists and educators that are doing really interesting stuff in their environments with technology. This conversation is part of the SICTAS work that we are engaged in and I hope we get some really valuable insights into where technology is going and where there may be opportunities in education with those technologies. One of the challenges for this type of discussion seems to be the levels of comfort with technologies across the education sector. There is no doubt that there is an increasing number of educators doing fantastic stuff with technologies in their classrooms and achieving great results with it. As with many other areas of society though, there is also a large portion of the sector not engaged with technology but in many cases, wanting to be. When we talk about emerging or new technologies to these different groups, we can often be talking about quite different technologies. To some, the types of concepts in, or services we refer to as Web 2.0 are challenging enough or are very new. To others, mashing up electronic whiteboards and virtual worlds is mainstream. So it is with interest that I am looking forward to the release of the first Horizon.au report. The Horizon.au Project
will produce a report focusing on emerging technology and its applications for education in Australia and New Zealand.This project aims to identify emerging technologies and classify them around their 'time to adoption horizon'. From the preview available on the website, this is how it's going to look over the next few years:
Time-to-Adoption: One year or Less * Virtual Worlds / Immersive Environments * Cloud-Based Applications * Social Bookmarking * Alternatives to Copyright (originally Creative Commons Licensing) Time-to-Adoption: Two to Three Years * Geolocation * Alternative Input Devices * Open Education and Courseware * Seamless Logon Integration Time-to-Adoption: Four to Five Years * Deep Tagging (originally Tagging Within Rich Media) * Next-Generation Mobile (originally Integrated Ubiquitous Technologies) * Lifestreams (originally Life Portfolios) * Flexible Screen TechnologiesFor some of us, some of these technologies may already be quite embedded in our practice or thinking however one of the great challenges for reports such as the Horizon.au report is to consider the sector more broadly. The Horizon.au project goes on to list challenges facing the sector and lists a number of critical challenges including:
- security, policies etc limiting access to information, collaboration etc.
- technology skills of educators in relation to students
- evidence of the efficacy of new technologies being a barrier to experimentation
- broadband availability
