A Teacher’s Manifesto on Technology (Doug Johnson)
I first met Doug Johnson in the mid-1990s when I was teaching a seminar on school reform for the Bush Fellows program in Minnesota. He had extensive teaching experience in many districts and, by then, was director of technology for the Mankato (MN) public schools. In that seminar and since, we have had many feisty exchanges over technology in school reform and teacher responses to high-tech devices in schools. He has written often about technology and other subjects. His Blue Skunk blog (http://doug-johnson.squarespace.com/) attracts thousands of readers. One of his postings I had particularly liked because it captures so well how policymakers who decide to buy and deploy technology have little sense of the teacher’s perspective, including those teachers who are enthused about integrating high-tech into daily lessons. Few policymakers who push online instruction, blended schools, and other so-called “disruptive innovations” would applaud this manifesto.
Doug wrote this on December 11, 2005.
Dear Technology Director:
I will enthusiastically embrace technology only when the following conditions have been met:
- Teaching students technology skills is a priority. Until the high-stakes tests and state standards