with Image courtesy of larrycuban.wordpress.com Co-authored by Ashley Breton & Sam Kirk The Great Media Debate on the link between media and learning has been going on for decades. This now-famous feud started with an article written by Richard Clark in the early ’80s titled Reconsidering Research on Learning from Media (1983), where he argues “that media do not influence learning under any conditions” (p. 445). Instead, “media are mere vehicles that deliver instruction but do not influence student achievement any more than the truck that delivers our groceries causes changes in our nutrition” (Clark, 1983, p. 445). Several years later, Robert Kozma, with his Learning with Media (1991) article, challenged Clark’s claim that only instructional methods affect learning and not the medium, stating that “learning with media is a continuous, reciprocal interaction” (p. 182), between the...

  Jesse Stommel is a documentary filmmaker, professor, and founder of the Digital Pedagogy Lab and Hybrid Pedagogy. Stommel’s background in English lends itself to his teaching and research interests of higher education pedagogy, critical digital pedagogy, ungrading and assessment, composition, new media, public humanities, scholarly publishing, games and game-making, horror, science fiction, and queer theory. You can find his website here.  Stommel’s work is about open education, open pedagogy, critical pedagogy , and radical pedagogy. He insists that issues of social justice and democracy are not distinct from the act of teaching and learning. His contributions shine a light on compassion and inclusion in education. He is not a fan of “best practice” or “scaffolding”. You can find some of his keynotes and lectures here.  Stommel states that ...

The last two weeks has been perfect for me to better understand the history of education and technology. This week, reading chapter 11 Connectivism, framed many changes our organization went through in the 2010’s and provided a richer context and a wider view of what was happening in the field of ESL and education. In Canada, many language schools started to see much more regulation through TESL Canada, the Centre for Canadian Language Benchmarks, and the Private Career Training Institutions Agency which later became the Private Training Institutions Branch under the provincial government. This meant that more stringent regulations regarding lesson delivery, content, assessment, and teacher qualifications were implemented. Looking back now it does look a little like the wild west. I was witness to the introduction of innovative technology such as smartboards as well as a push for more...

From the outset of this book, I have tried to take my time and imagine myself as an experienced teacher working in 1995. How would I have tried to experience the innovative technology of the time and incorporate it in my classes in a meaningful way? Would I have clung to the idea that I was a sage on a stage, or would I have relinquished some of the control gracefully for a more student-centered approach to my lessons?  “Use the things you know and use them well.” stated Clare Thomson in Between the Chapters episode 3. To paraphrase, if you try to use technology that you are not confident with, the students will notice that, and it will not turn out as successfully as you had hoped. These ideas resonated with me during this time of crisis learning. Moving from face-to-face lessons to online learning and then finally to hybrid learning, I have realized that I need to take it...