According to Postman, something which has to be remembered when discussing ICT is that “Technology has winners and losers’”. While this somewhat confused me at first, I have realised that this statement has a profound lesson to teach me as a teacher. Essentially, that the social impacts of ICT integration need to be considered before ICT is introduced.
A social impact of ICT integration that bothers me particularly is the difficulty of lower socio-economic level students being able to source necessary technology. In my own life I have been very lucky in this regards, so I can only imagine what it feels like to not be able to afford what schools are increasingly seeing as basic technologies. That’s why I feel that in class ICT use should not be based on a student’s own devices, as I feel that this could very easily lead to a “winners and losers” mentality where kids with better tech access get better grades.
Finally, I very strongly believe that classes should not become technology only. All schools should be places where students have the same access to technology as each other. Education results should not rest on who has the most privileged upbringing, but on ability and hard work.
maxborserio 