In TOI, I just came across a description of what are known as "smart classes" in many of our new schools.
"Class notes are now emailed to students, there are graphic calculators and Microsoft Excel spreadsheets. Homework assignments are posted online. All of this is designed to make teaching more interactive with videoconferencing and live broadcasting. As for chalks and dusters, forget it".
The word "smart", "technology enabled" has such a mesmerizing & hypnotic effect on our minds now-a-days that under its spell we are left with no choice but to regard as "revolutionary" anything prefixed with these labels.
We all want to be smart. That is a hard problem. So, lets get our teaching tools to be "smart". That is an easier problems. "smart" teaching tools can just be bought off the shelf. This solution does something wonderful. It gives us the impression that we have solved the earlier 'hard' problem - "we all want to be smart". Just because we operate "smart" devices somehow its meant to make us smart goes the belief. Its like the touch of Midas. Anything touched by 'smart' technology becomes 'smart' too.
Schools do not adopt these technologies because of any pedagogic merit. They do it in order to distinguish their schools from other schools. They do it to attract clinetele. The clientele believes in the Midas touch.
Really I do not understand how video conferencing can make classes more interactive. My own sense & experience tells me that it in fact makes it less so. How can an attempt to replicate 'face-to-face' teaching be more effective than 'face-to-face' teaching itself. In any case, isn't it the teacher who has to make a class interactive. How can the delivery medium make it so?
Using emails, spread-sheets, graphic calculators, online assignments is all fine but to pretend that they are in some ways a route forward to great teaching is to get entrapped by the Midas touch.
Web casting is a great replacement for students who cannot attend live lectures. Distance learning never had a more potent tool in its arsenal. Its a great tool also for non-formal learning. It may also be a great tool to access experts for lectures. However, we should not mistake it as a tool for classroom teaching.
Technology is a tool. Like any tool it has to be used where required.
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