Historical Perspective of Technoethics in Education

Educational Technology, 1994

This paper addresses questions concerning the role of education and technology in a fair and equitable global political and economic system. The education and information professions have worked to design effective learning environments and produce various formats for the delivery of instructional materials. These presentational formats have tried to offer a believable reconstructed reality, but very seldom has anyone debated the consequences of that reconstructed reality on individual lives. Technology can actually be used in several ways to further that inquiry. It can serve as a medium for discourse, as a way to access new information and new ways of thinking about information, and even, through virtual reality, as a simulator of experience. All curriculum materials, delivery systems, and learning environments not only generate content but also refer to ways of thinking and knowing. It would seem that some answers to problems of educational equity could be gained from critical theory and the accompanying recognition of educational technology itself as a social construction. (Contains 13 references.) (BEW)

Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 2007

The various political and technological drivers that are currently prevalent within many educational institutions increasingly encourage educationalists to experiment with tools that promote e-learning. Many then engage in this activity in the belief that this will help in the development of more autonomous, responsible learners. Strategies for the integration of technology are, however, often less well researched. This paper, therefore, explores the relationship between pedagogy, ethics and technology, as three important constructs for the development of an e-learning strategy. It then proposes a framework that will allow future research to define more clearly how each of these concepts overlap, and to identify the impact that they have on each other. As a consequence, the framework provides insight into the mutual dependencies of pedagogy, ethics and technology, with the aim of avoiding ethical risks in developing e-teaching and e-learning.

Critical Education, 2024

This paper provides a theoretical and conceptual analysis of educational technology (Ed-Tech) including its role in the administration and organization of schools, colleges, and universities; teachers' pedagogical practices; and students' learning. During and since the pandemic period, education has relied more heavily than ever on technological tools, products, and servicespedagogical innovations that require novel conceptual, theoretical, and critical perspectives for researchers to engage with. Thus, we employ the term Ed-Tech as a heuristic language to critically interrogate the ways by which the economic logic that underpins commercialized and commodified Ed-Tech continues to shape the sphere of education. This paper focuses on three interrelated concerns surrounding Ed-Tech: sales/privatization; solutions/pedagogy; and surveillance/privacy. A critical examination and discussion of each of these interconnected concepts and concerns reveal overt directions for where Ed-Tech is headed through the conceptualization of inertia, automation, and data. The paper concludes by drawing attention to the need for further empirical research and reflection that address current and future pedagogical practices in relation to the ethical dimensions of educational technologies.

International Journal of Cyber …, 2011

In everyday thinking and discussion, the concepts of technique (technical methods, as in a craft or in scientific research) and technology are often regarded as synonymous. On closer analysis, one realizes that this is not the truth of the matter. On the contrary, the difference in the concepts introduces the ethical viewpoint. Technique, which generally refers to tools, equipment and machines or know-how about their use or control, is an instrument which, as such, does not does not inherently have good or bad qualities. However, the results depend on where and how it is used (Parikka & Rasinen, 1994). Technique becomes technology when it is applied to a certain task. Thus, only technology can be analyzed and observed from ethical viewpoints, which in turn are related to values. For instance, in a technological system, product or service, value statements indicating both negative and positive effects are included.

Education and Information Technologies, 2005

The benefits of classroom computers and associated technologies seem to be an accepted truism with those who question the benefits often dismissed as intractable Luddites. Educational technology has become big business both commercially and academically for today's increasingly high-tech classrooms. Clearly, computers mark changes-permanent changes-in the way everyone lives, learns, works, and interacts globally. Ellul, Norman, and Postman, among others, have focused on the application of a technology and not on the "box" itself. All three have warned that although educators' focus should be on the application, it is the characteristic of technology itself that shapes the future. History is replete with lessons and voices that support these warnings and provide a foundation for reasoned discussions of any technology's Faustian bargains and its often unanticipated uses and consequences. The topic and open debate could not be more crucial or timeless, for how young minds, mental habits, and values are shaped in classrooms around the world affects everyone.

American Journal of Education, 2011

Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 1996

This paper suggests that the subject of school reform and technology in education needs to be considered as a discourse that needs to be 'unpacked' and analyzed from a social, historical, and cultural perspective. Unpacking the historical and current interests in educational reform in light of information and communication technologies is no simple matter. There are two basic challenges. First, we need to analyze the language of change and the context of school reform. Second, the discourse of school reform needs to placed within a context of history and politicaltheory. In the end the paper asks the reader to consider who the ideological 'we' is when we talk about education and technology.

N 1989 THE FILM, DEAD POETS SOCIETY, was released, eventually garnering four Academy Award nominations, winning one for best original screenplay by Tom Schulman as well as several other international awards for best film that year. The film centered on the unorthodox ways in which an English teacher at an elite private all-male high school inspired his students to think for themselves and to develop authentic forms of self-expression. The film climaxed with the suicide of one of the young men whose passion for and achievement in acting ran afoul of his wealthy father's ambition for his son to study at Harvard and become a doctor.

Among the many challenges facing public schooling in the United States is the often irrelevant usage of technology in the classroom in ways that support the textbook and computer industries more than student learning and achievement. This primer reframes the longstanding debate about instructional technology in school classrooms and challenges the reader to think more critically and conscientiously about the fundamental communication and technological processes that mediate learning and ultimately define education. The primer offers educators at all levels a three-dimensional map for exploring the philosophical, pedagogical, and practical uses of technology to serve rather than subvert the public purposes of education in a democracy.