I think I am sounding like the old guy telling you I have seen this all before.
Last week, I wrote about Chat GPT, which is getting a lot of interest in education. I ended that post saying, “What a great opportunity to not make the mistakes of the past and see technology as a threat, but rather an opportunity for us to rethink how it could add value to our work.”
To go back a few years, I was there for the great calculator debates. I had classes that banned the use of calculators, or restricted the use of calculators, or allowed calculators for certain parts of classes or exams but not others.
And with the growth of technologies this century the immediate impulse to ban technologies has been a common one from school jurisdictions. Hardware like laptops and cell phones have been banned in some areas. And while there are examples of a small number of schools banning wi-fi or the internet completely, there are a number of examples of websites like YouTube being blocked in schools. As new technologies are introduced, for many, the impulse is to do whatever possible to preserve the status quo. As if, we only have to wait out this “iPad trend” and they will disappear, and we will not have to rethink how we engage with the new technologies in a thoughtful way.
This isn’t to say there should never be any limitations on technology in the classroom. There are great reasons why you might want to not have any technology in a particular class or on a particular day, but it is the immediate reaction to ban a tool instead of understanding it, that is troubling. For a profession built on growth and creating new understandings, as the world changes around us, we should always be seeing how these changes could be leveraged in our schools to ensure our classrooms are relevant, connected, and engaging.
So, here we are with ChatGPT.
Quickly, for some the discussions shifted from the emerging power of AI to the need to ban it in schools. One of the first places that came out loudly was New York Public Schools. As Maya Yang writes in the Guardian:
According to the city’s education department, the tool will be forbidden across all devices and networks in New York’s public schools. Jenna Lyle, a department spokesperson, said the decision stems from “concerns about negative impacts on student learning, and concerns regarding the safety and accuracy of contents”.
Now, not to sound cynical, but if we started banning everything where there was a concern over the “accuracy of contents” that might be a bit of an overwhelming proposition.
Rather than trying make technology a forbidden fruit in our schools, we should teach about it. If young people don’t learn about technology at school – where will they learn? Some will learn at home. Most will learn from their friends or explore on their own. Schools have and should continue to step into this space of guiding students with technology use that is age and developmentally appropriate. Just this week, former BC School Superintendent, Geoff Johnson, made an excellent argument (HERE) for increasing media literacy in schools.
I get the natural reaction to ban things we don’t completely understand. We should be careful and thoughtful with technology. And if you think ChatGPT is the last time we are going to have this conversation you are very naïve. There will be another gizmo next year, and one the year after that.
Let’s continue to model for our students the excellent conversations we can have about technology and look for ways that the exciting shifts around us can improve the quality of the experience for everyone in our schools.
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