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Revolutions
Reconsidered: Technology and Learning for a New Century
Len Simutis
Director, Eisenhower National Clearinghouse
The Ohio State University,
USA
There has been considerable enthusiasm
and significant investments for computing and networking to support
teaching and learning in our nation's schools. There are, however, even
greater changes occurring outside of schools--in homes, workplaces and
other community settings--to provide high speed, mobile and portable
access to electronic learning and information resources. As a
consequence, fundamental changes in the relationships between teachers
and students and access to learning resources are occurring. Some of
these changes are already being seen as threatening to K-12 teachers and
university faculty. As the pace of technological change increases, more
teachers and faculty are likely to become resistant to the changing
nature of access, formats and uses of learning resources in settings
outside of traditional classrooms where high bandwidth is pervasive in a
world driven by an information economy.
Analysis of other technological
revolutions shows a pattern of reaction ranging from mild skepticism and
wariness to virulent opposition to adopting new technologies. Then
follows a period of acquiescence and acceptance, and finally full
integration of new technologies into everyday life, with all the social,
cultural and economic transformations necessary to do so. This
presentation will explore the implications of these previous
technological revolutions for teachers and faculty working to make
effective uses of new information technologies, and will identify some
of the key decision points they will face in efforts to fully accomplish
the fundamental changes in learning that the information revolution will
make possible.
Bio:
Len Simutis is Director, Eisenhower
National Clearinghouse for Mathematics and
Science Education (ENC) at The Ohio State University.
He joined Ohio State in 1992 when
ENC was created with funding from the U.S. Department of
Education. From 1990 to 1992, he served as Interim Director
of the Ohio Library and Information Network (OhioLINK) while on
leave from Miami University in Oxford,
Ohio. From 1984 to 1990 he served as Dean
of the Graduate School and Research and Special Assistant to the
Provost for Academic Information Systems
at Miami University, and Professor of
American Studies and Geography. At Miami, he was a member of the
faculty team that received the 1992
EDUCOM award for software in the social sciences.
From 1971 to 1984 he was a member of the faculty, chair, and assistant
and associate dean in Environmental and Urban Studies at Virginia
Tech. While at irginia Tech he was
one of the first six faculty appointed to
the Academy of Teaching Excellence.
He has recently completed six years of
service with the Ohio Humanities
Council, with the last two years as chair,
and has served on the technology advisory
committees of the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM),
the National Endowment for the Humanities, and the Federation of State
Humanities Councils. Currently, he serves as chair of the NEKIA
Governing Board, and co-chair of the GEM Governing Board.
He has an A. B. from the University of
Illinois, and an M. A. and Ph. D. from the University of Minnesota.
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