Barriers to the effective use of technology in education

Top of the list is digital literacy (JISC, 2011). Students are only the most important of three key groups which also includes parents and educators, in that order of importance (Fleming, 2011). Young students are digital natives, born into a post-internet culture supersaturated with digital content which they navigate skillfully with a range of devices and applications (Prensky, 2001). 

Given that the first really successful home PC - the Commodore 64 - was released in 1982 (Computer History Museum, 2006), it’s only 30 years since the advent of mass digital culture. It could be argued that many parents and educators have witnessed, though barely participated in, this paradigmatic shift.  

Thus we are left with a significant disparity in digital literacy; a Tech skills shortage in two of the three key groups involved in education. 

Take Twitter. The majority of schools and colleges tweet regularly from a number of their departments but it’s equally hard to find one where the proportion of parents, and indeed colleagues, following the tweets exceeds those that don’t know how to(Britland, 2012). Many lack even the confidence to acquire such soft Tech skills. 

Consider more specialist EdTech. A typical interactive whiteboard costs £1500.00, that’s without the desktop and projector needed to run and display it. A sound investment with the potential to reinvigorate teaching and learning across a range of disciplines. But if the educator does not know how, or refuses, to operate it then it’s no better than an expensive blackboard. 

Even if the colleague does know how to use their Promethean(Go Education, 2014), the work and effort required to create and adapt learning resources, often built up over decades, is so daunting as to almost defeat the motivation to attempt it. Without the time to assemble suitable content - a rare commodity in busy teaching and research faculties - the potential of the technology goes completely unrealised (Casal and Nielsen, 2014).   

It’s not just expertise that presents a barrier to digital literacy; as always in modern capitalist societies, scarcity economics plays its invidious role. For example, fully one fifth of secondary school pupils are eligible for pupil premium funding which is meant to correct economic disparity, including the lack of digital capital (Lord, Easby and Evans, 2013). 

In practice, this rarely happens as schools chase targets using measurable strategies such as data-tracking and intervention to justify pupil premium expenditure. It’s just too difficult, and therefore risky, to track the impact of buying an impoverished child an iPad. Without home access to WiFi and a tablet, or similar device, to use the internet, the individual is subject to the huge limitation of digital illiteracy(Lord, Easby and Evans, 2013). 

In HE, funding is available for digital equipment for students who can prove learning needs, such as dyslexia (Gov.uk, 2014), but what hardship funding there is cannot correct the digital impoverishment suffered by one tenth of students. For technology in education to be effective, it must be effective for everyone. Tackling digital illiteracy ought to be the first priority(Lord, Easby and Evans, 2013). 

Britland, M., 2012. Social media for schools: a guide to twitter, facebook and pinterest. Guardian.co.uk  Teacher network Teachers blog. [blog]  26 July. Available at:<  http://www.theguardian.com/teacher-network/2012/jul/26/social-media-teacher-guide> [Accessed 07 December 2014].

Casal, C. and Nielsen, L., 2014. Fear is not an option when it comes to social media in schools: The Casal Operating System [blog] 24 September. Available at: <http://thecasalos.blogspot.co.uk/2014/09/fear-is-not-option-when-it-comes-to.html> [Accessed 07 December 2014]

Computer History Museum, 2006. Timeline of computer history. [online] Available at: < http://www.computerhistory.org/timeline/?category=cmptr#top> [Accessed 07 December 2014]

Fleming, R., 2011. The 5 factors which affect school performance. The Education blog [online]24 July, Available at< http://blogs.msdn.com/b/education/archive/2011/07/25/the-5-factors-which-affect-school-performance.aspx> [Accessed 05 December 2014].

Go Education, 2014. Promethean ActivBoard 378 PRO 78". [online] Available at:

 http://www.goeducation.co.uk/Promethean-ActivBoard-378-PRO-p/IWB-PRO-AB378Pro.htm?gclid=CjwKEAiAt4mlBRDXwt_m9ICU4DcSJAAS_X0WhiR5K8SAZ7yem7wdjUm30gObKpD1o1r_JJQUzlC18hoCo9Tw_wcB [Accessed 07 December 2014]

Gov.uk, 2014. Diabled Students Allowances (DSAs). [online] Available at:< https://www.gov.uk/disabled-students-allowances-dsas/what-youll-get> [Accessed 07 December 2014].

JISC, 2011. Digital literacy.Cardiff University [online] Available at :< http://digidol.cardiff.ac.uk/information-literacy/> [Accessed 07 December 2014]

Lord, A., Easby, J., and Evans, H. 2013. Pupils not claiming Free School Meals. Research Report [pdf] London: Department for Education. Available at:< https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/266339/DFE-RR319.pdf>[Accessed 7 December 2014]

Prensky, M., 2001. Digital natives, digital immigrants.[pdf] On the Horizon. MCB University Press, 9(5).Available at: < http://www.marcprensky.com/writing/Prensky%20-%20Digital%20Natives,%20Digital%20Immigrants%20-%20Part1.pdf>[Accessed 07 December 2014]