(Week 2) Does Technology force classes to be more student centred?

In the second class, as Lorayne was given her critique of the presentations on student vs teacher centered approaches, she made a comment about how she thought some of the groups got off-topic by talking too much about technology.  I thought this critique was interesting because, in my view, technology is one of the main drivers for why classes have become more student-centered so, as such, it shouldn't be excluded from the discussion.  In this post, I would like to reflect more about technology's role within the classroom and how it has played a pivotal role in changing the dynamics of today's classrooms.

It is no secret that we are living in a knowledge-based society where students have instant access to events that are happening around the world.  As such, learning is no longer confined to the four walls of the classroom or an event that has to happen at the same place or the same time.  To be successful in school, students need to have the ability to seek out information over the Internet, synthesize it, and then based on this information, produce new information. Students need to actively participate in classes, to be creative and use their high order thinking skills to complete tasks.  Because teachers are no longer the delivers of content, their role in the classroom has changed to more of observers and/or co-learners.

Teachers, as mentors, are still needed to be present in the classrooms to help students to think critically, to gain knowledge, draw conclusions and make informed decisions based on the knowledge they track down via multiple sources including online materials.  The challenge for teachers today is to help students make sense of this overload of information that is available via cyberspace. Because of these changing roles, teachers have to evolve their practice by creating new learning environments that are able to leverage the Web and tap into the natural ways in which students learn.  Part of the answer is to move towards more collaborative, student-centered learning which puts students in control of their own learning and allows them to use the information that they have gathered outside of class in productive ways.

Lorayne's feedback was able to help me better reflect on the differences between teacher and student-centered approaches and the role technology plays in transforming content delivery in today's classrooms.