Jazzperous™

I am asking myself though if this wish to work more with IT and technology can be applied to a certain kind of teachers. Earlier today I listened to a couple of presentations organized by Dreamhack and the audience were all men, mostly young men like myself. The teachers attending the conference were mostly men as well, which is quite interesting since teaching by tradition is a women's profession. Does this mean we could narrow it all down and state that teachers who want to use technology and IT in the classroom are mostly men? Well, the majority are men but there are also quite few female teachers who are or want to us IT more than they do at the moment, which is great. Also, it seems to be a question of generations. Younger teacher are much more familiarized with technology and obviously more eager to use it compared to older generations. 

However, I sense there is a problem in the Swedish schools today and it's not about generations or gender - it's about seeing the value and possibilities and for doing that, it doesn't matter what teacher you are. It would help, though, if you are not afraid of trying new things and willing to spend some time to learn. Apart from that it only takes a bit of effort and a positive attitude, but unfortunately this is where it all fails. Most teachers I have met aren't willing to sacrifice this extra time and energy they think (sic!) they need in order to start teaching with the help of technology and this is by all means sad. To me it's unbelievable that a school that educates people for the future simply lacks the motivation to also be the future and lead the way into the future. In a way teachers today are using the same old methods and pedagogy that was used hundreds of years ago and from what I have come to understand, it is not working as well as it should. Our unwillingness to find and use alternative ways of teaching affects our students negatively - we can't teach students born in the 20th and 21st century while the school and educational system haven't developed their activities since the 19th century! 

Ultimately teachers are educating those who will inherit and govern the world in only a few years time. Today technology is such a great part of our daily lives that it can't be ignored forever. Students need to turn elsewhere in order to learn more about these things since school ever so often fail to provide them with the right knowledge. This is not the way to do it and it should be the other way round. Our job is to educate and prepare for a life in the future and we should do whatever we can do also join our students into the future, and also lead the way. In order to succeed doing this we all need to read up, exploring, using, discovering and educate ourselves. It's each and every school's obligation to see that it happens.

It's time to move on. The time of chalkboards are over. Way over. 

((tag: Teaching, Education, Technology))