{"id":137,"date":"2024-09-07T21:44:48","date_gmt":"2024-09-08T04:44:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/?p=137"},"modified":"2024-11-23T12:31:29","modified_gmt":"2024-11-23T20:31:29","slug":"old-habits-and-new-tools-how-traditional-practices-and-ai-challenge-innovation-in-education","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/old-habits-and-new-tools-how-traditional-practices-and-ai-challenge-innovation-in-education\/","title":{"rendered":"Old Habits and New Tools: How Traditional Practices and AI Challenge Innovation in Education."},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Published by Weri Gadou on September 7th, 2024<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In my experience as a former elementary school teacher, I observed firsthand one of the challenges described in 25 Years of Ed Tech<\/em>: \u201cIt has often been noted that when a new technology arrives, it tends to be used in old ways before its unique characteristics are recognized\u201d (Weller, 2020, p. 64). When we were introduced to the platform FreshGrade in 2018, it was designed to revolutionize students’ engagement and portfolio building. The platform had the potential of providing a more holistic view of the student, shifting the focus beyond academic grades to encompass a broader range of skills, progress, and personal growth. It was also supposed to enable meaningful exchanges between students and their parents. However, its transformative possibilities were often overshadowed by traditional usage. Instead of fully embracing its interactive features, many of us reverted to familiar practices, primarily by having students take pictures of their marked assignments and uploading them to the platform. This process was time-consuming and didn\u2019t add much value beyond traditional methods. Some teachers who were more open to experimenting with the platform found it more beneficial, but many of us reverted to old habits. This situation illustrates Weller\u2019s point that new technologies are often not fully embraced at first, as we naturally fall back on what we already know.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A lesson from Weller’s that contradicts current practices is the notion that Web 2.0 communities \u201ctend to be democratic, based on a bottom-up approach and socially oriented\u201d (Weller, 2020, p. 93). In other words, communities where content generation and engagement are largely driven by users themselves in a seemingly open and democratic manner. However, in today\u2019s landscape, especially with the rise of AI-driven content, I find this notion of democracy increasingly compromised. AI algorithms now curate and generate content based on what users follow, creating personalized “echo chambers” that limit exposure to diverse perspectives. This shift reflects a form of control over shared information, where the content we engage with is tailored and, in many cases, filtered without our active choice. In my experience as a teacher, this undermines the idea of open, democratic knowledge-sharing that Web 2.0 once promised. It creates a dynamic where learners are subtly guided by algorithms rather than engaging in organic, community-driven learning experiences.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Reference:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Weller, M. (2020). 25 years of ed tech<\/em>. Athabasca University Press.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Published by Weri Gadou on September 7th, 2024 In my experience as a former elementary school teacher, I observed firsthand one of the challenges described in 25 Years of Ed Tech: \u201cIt has often been noted that when a new technology arrives, it tends to be used in old ways before its unique characteristics are […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":319,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-137","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-lrnt523","has-post-thumbnail"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/319"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=137"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":191,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/137\/revisions\/191"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=137"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=137"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/malat-webspace.royalroads.ca\/rru300\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=137"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}