Critical reflections on the benefits of ICT in education by Sonia Livingstone 2012

The article provides a critical reflection on the benefits of ICT in education; it has outlined challenges of ICT provision in learning environments at school and at home. It discusses the present state of ICT provision, with the focus on British schools. The article noted that with government policies in recent years to provide internet access for every children and every school, with industry supporting diverse digital education initiatives, and with families gaining internet access at home, much rides on the claim that digital technologies will be as important in the 21st century. The article also discussed how traditional learning outcome could be enhanced as well as the impediments to establishing the benefits of ICT in education. However, this quote in the article got me thinking,

“Yeah, it’s IT, that’s what it’s called, and you go, you have about ten computers in a big computer room and you work in groups to do like stuff on the computer. They let you go on the internet but it has to be educational stuff you look up and all that. That’s boring but we don’t listen to that and we look up what we want when the teacher’s not looking. (Angie, 9)”

However according to Wellington (2004, p. 33) as referenced in the article, claimed that there are ‘inherent difficulties in evaluating the effect of any learning intervention and attributed it to the cause-effect relationships in education. These difficulties are here to stay.’ In addition, the article identified 3 problems to take notes.

1.      The problem with the literature being conceptual and methodological

2.      The problem with policy-related and practical

3.      The problem of Intriguing

The article identified various studies that indicated that increased internet use raised subsequent achievement in reading; though not in mathematics high-achieving children get more from gaining internet access than low-achieving children.

Another study found that home access to a computer and/or the internet is positively associated with levels of educational attainment at both KS3 and KS4. Further analysis by these researchers showed that internet access plays a greater role than computer access although, as the researchers also caution.

Nonetheless, the findings do suggest that the lesser likelihood of home access to a computer or, especially, the internet among teenagers from poorer families may contribute to the explanation of why they tend to make less progress from KS3 to KS4.

This paper examines these two issues, asking, first, does the evidence support the claim that ICT enhances learning and, second, what is meant by learning, and how are expectations of learning changing?

In conclusion, Schooling in the digital age is a complex, compromised and often contradictory affair […but] this is not to say technology cannot act as a focus for improvement. (Selwyn, 2011, p. 136)

Livingstone distinguishes three forms of critique relevant to grand claims made for the new technologies, asking in essence; what’s really going on, how can this be explained, and how could things be otherwise.