As you can see in this recent news release, some more districts that deploying 1:1 technology with iPads. While I’m very excited about the fact that some leaders are willing to try and see if this will work, I’m probably more concerned about the lack of deep integration of the technology into the curriculum and overall instructional plan.

                There is no logical way to dispute the fact that effectively integrated technology can make a night and day difference in the lives of individual students and in the overall success of whole districts. My concern is that the people making the decisions to buy the technology have very little, if any, understanding of what it means to do the effective integration.

                It is incredibly rare to see or hear anything about how the teaching, or the teaching environment, will be different once the devices (laptops, iPad, Whiteboards, whatever) are bought and handed out per classroom or per student.

                The real danger here is that schools/districts, many of them with the purest intentions, will be spending money on technology without making any, let alone equal, investments in adjusting the way instruction happens in a technology centric classroom.  These efforts will not be successful and the technology, not the humans, will be blamed. This will continue to sour the view of technology as a tool for reshaping instruction.

                It is my sincere hope that the schools in the article above and many others like them will find some way to be successful even without a good integrated plan. As we used to say back home “Even a blind squirrel finds an acorn ever now-and-again”.