The 1800s with Computers: Curriculum with Technology or Technologically-responsive Curriculum?

Scenario 1: 1960 (or really any year since the invention of textbooks)
"Welcome to class. Open your textbooks to page 203. Here are your reading questions for this chapter. They are due by the end of class."

Scenario 2: 2017
"Welcome to class. Log in to Google Classroom to access your assigned reading and the reading questions for this chapter. They are due by the end of class."

Have things really changed?

The education system as a whole is slow to change. That's probably the kindest way I can put it. When the whole 1-to-1 devices push came around, everyone thought it was revolutionary. Our schools will never be the same. The flying cars and jetpacks have arrived!

But...that never really happened, or at least not in the majority of our schools.

Yes, students have computers now, but why?  For the most part, students all have to read the same thing, they all have to take the same tests, and they all are supposed to learn at the same pace. We don't need computers to make this type of education happen because this is how it's always been.

The measure of technology integration in our school system is currently based on classrooms. Do students have devices in front of them? Is there work digital?

I want to push for a different measure of technology integration in our school system that's based on the curriculum, not the classroom.

True technology integration has to happen on a different level than "How are we using the technology?" True technology integration happens when educators and all parties involved start asking, "How are we responding to technology?" And this question, though subtle in the difference of wording, makes all the difference. If we are really developing technologically-responsive curriculum, we should be thinking about a few major questions.

1. Can students Google this?

I'm not saying facts aren't important. I'm just saying they aren't the most important aspect of education anymore. You won't get hired because you've memorized every number in pi; you'll get hired because you can actually use pi to actually figure things out. Nobody cares if you know it off the top of your head. A technologically-responsive curriculum de-emphasizes, "What information do you remember?" and prioritizes, "What can you do with information?"

My rule of thumb is that if a student cheats on a quiz by Googling the answer, I change the question, because no matter how hard I want to fight it, I'm not going to change the reality of the digital age.

2. Do all students need to be doing the same thing?

Why do we have students read the exact same thing and do the exact same test, project, essay, etc.? Back in the day, it was because that was the only option. The text was in the textbook and nowhere else, but that's not how things work today. We have access to more texts than we could possibly read in a lifetime, and yet for most of our classrooms, we require that all students read the same thing. 

I'm not saying it's a terrible thing to have your class all read an article together. What I am saying is that we have the opportunity and access with technology to promote choice, inquiry, and research skills in ways that wasn't available before computers made their way into schools. My question is, could we be utilizing that more?

3. How often are we asking students to be creative?

The jobs for tomorrow don't exist yet. We can say "College and Career Readiness" all we want, but if we are only preparing students for the jobs that already exist, we aren't truly preparing students for the future. Students need a creative spirit to really prepare themselves for the tasks, situations, and problems of the future. Without creativity, we won't have problem-solvers; we won't be creating students who can find new solutions to the problems we haven't even understood yet. 

The best employees, entrepreneurs, and change-makers of the future are the ones who know how to do more than just follow the rules. They are the ones who don't just follow expectations. If our curriculum only asks for them to learn the content, are we teaching them to make a difference, even just to survive, in our technology-laden future?

4.  Are we encouraging students to fail?

Most of our systems are designed to penalize failure. Many of our grade books still hold against students the mistakes they made at the beginning of the trimester. Most of the time when students fail, we have to move on (whether that's due to the linear nature of pacing guides or simply because we just have so many targets to cover in a term). We preach all the time that students should embrace mistakes as learning experiences, but our words contradict our curriculum. 

How are we building space for students to fail, and fail hard, in our curriculum? Not only does that develop true understanding of content, but it also prepares students for the future. People who don't know how to fail well are people who don't know how to handle adversity, and in a start-up culture, people who don't know how to fail will never be successful. 

Step one does need to be just getting devices in classrooms and to get students comfortable with them. If you are there, be proud that you've taken that first step. You've already conquered that fear that holds a lot of our education system back. Now, start asking questions. I have found that when I am engaged in a more technologically-responsive pedagogy, not only do my students learn more, but I enjoy teaching more. 

So, ask questions. Be creative. Think about the future. 

We all want our students to be successful, and for that truly happen, we need to start asking hard questions about how we prepare them in our schools.