Gunilla Jedeskog

ICT in the Classroom: Is Doing More Important than Knowing?

The introduction of ICT in Swedish compulsory schooling and related changes in the curriculum include a greater focus on pupil activity and responsibility. At the same time the role of the teacher is expected to change. What changes are occurring under these ICT-related initiatives? This paper is based on an empirical study of the work with ICT in nine different schools. It points to at least two on-going trends. Firstly, a shifting of focus in education from content to form. Secondly, a dissolution of boundaries in terms of room, time and activity. This makes it even more difficult for teachers to exercise control over the learning process. This has created a situation where “to do” something with the computer seems to be more important than to understand the content in different subjects.

Innovative use of ICT in schools based on the findings in ELFE project

The European e-Learning Forum for Education (ELFE) is a project initiated by the ETUCE (European Trade Union Committee on Education). An important objective of the project has been to study good experiences with implementing the use of ICT in schools. This objective has been broken down in seven operational research questions. Three of these questions will be discussed in this article: (1) What difference does the use of ICT make in schools where ICT is intensively used for instructional/pedagogical purposes? (2) How are the students influenced by this different way of teaching as compared to the traditional classroom education, both individually and as a collective? 3) What factors influence the intensive pedagogical use of ICT? The ELFE study applied a case study approach. Three innovative schools in each of five European countries (Denmark, England, Germany, Norway and Portugal) were purposively selected. Data were collected via questionnaires, interviews, observations and school documents. The findings resulting from the ELFE schools case studies illustrate that the implementation of ICT for teaching and learning may influence the functioning of schools in a number of ways. One can also conclude that students like working with computers and that they have no ‘instrumental’ problems. A number of factors seem to influence the successful implementation of ICT at school level such as a good infrastructure, a clear vision, policy and strategy. A crucial factor is support from national, regional and local authorities, as well as from the school leadership and parents.