Reverse the point of view

[Shishirgano9]

In France, the first experiments around school computing date back to the 1960s. The question asked at the time still underlies most digital educational policies today. It can be summed up as follows: what can we do with these techniques in schools?

The question seems strange. It assumes that these truemoney database information and communication processing techniques necessarily have an interest for teaching. It is strange because it says nothing about the purpose of digital uses. These uncertainties are very uncomfortable for teachers. For 30 years, national plans have followed one another. They articulate with more or less success equipment, resources and teacher training. More equipment than resources, and more resources than teacher training.

Concretely, the education system is teeming with interesting initiatives, without this logic of bottom-up innovation translating into large-scale uses with good guarantees of educational effectiveness. At the same time, students and teachers arrive at school with a smartphone in their pocket. It is not only a personal, powerful, connected and nomadic device that enters the school, it is new habits, new activities, new behaviors and new expectations.

This is why it seems that we may not be looking in the right direction. We should probably ask ourselves what we can do with digital technology in schools. But we must also ask ourselves what digital technology does to schools. How does it put pressure on them , as it transforms society? In short, we need to reverse the initial question.