Multimedia Knowledge and Culture Production: On the Possibility of a Critical and Ethical Pedagogy Resulting From the Current Push for Technology in the Classroom

Abstract

Demands for standardization and accountability as systemic cures for perceived ills in the education system are paralleled by a public and private sector promotion of technology integration as one pedagogical solution. The general critique of education and of technology in society has developed as two related yet separate threads in critical inquiry and discussion. As electronic forms of media and communication are becoming pervasive in society in general, solutions to long-standing educational dilemmas that mirror problems in society at large need to develop from grounded theories for educational practice that embrace technological forms of information, knowledge, and culture production. This needs to be done to reverse the historical trend of education as an institution first adopting and then adapting technological forms to purposes of replicating status quo culture and social relationships. Despite the claims of many to the contrary, new technology may not make any difference in education. Individual attainment and achievement through technological efficiency may prove meaningless in a world pressed to reconcile problems that move diverse societies closer together rather than farther apart. Hope, meaning, belonging, and what has been termed the pedagogy of possibility are posited as an ethical foundation for advancing the integration of technology into education for an equitable, democratic, and different future.

Get full access to this article

View all access options for this article.

References

Apple, M. W. (1986). Teachers and texts. New York: Routledge and Kegan Paul.

Apple, M. W. (1997). The new technology: Is it part of the solution or part of the problem in education? In G. E. Hawisher & C. L. Selfe (Eds.), Literacy, technology, and society. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Bourdieu, P. , & Passeron, L. (1990). Reproduction in education, society, and culture. Newbury Park, CA: Sage.

Bromely, H. , & Shutkin, D. (1999, April). Refusing to choose: Dilemmas of dissenting technology educators. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting, Montreal, Canada.

Cognition and Technology Group at Vanderbilt . (1999). Technology for teaching and learning with understanding: A primer. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.

Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New York: McMillan.

Ellul, J. (1964). The technological society. New York: Vintage.

Freire, P. (1998). Pedagogy of freedom. Lanham, MD: Rowman &Littlefield.

Gagne, R. (1985). The conditions of learning. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.

10.

Giroux, H. (1983). Theory and resistance in education: A pedagogy for the opposition. London: Heinemann.

11.

Hong, N. S. , & Jonassen, D. H. (1999, April). Predictors of well-structured and ill-structured problem solving in a project-based learning environment. Paper presented at the American Educational Research Association Annual Meeting, Montreal, Canada.

12.

Kanpol, B. (1998). Critical pedagogy for beginning teachers: The movement from despair to hope. Journal of Critical Pedagogy [Online], 3(1). Available: http://www.lib.wmc.edu/pub/jcp/%20issueII-1/kanpol.html.

13.

Kellner, D. (1997). Media literacies and critical pedagogy in a multicultural society [Online course materials for Education, Technology and Society]. University of California, Los Angeles, Graduate School of Education and Information. Available: http://www.gseis/ucla.edu/courses/ed253a/newDK/medlit.htm

14.

Kirkpatrick, H. , & Cuban, L. (1998). Computers make kids smarter—right? Technos Quarterly, 7(2) [Online]. Available:http://technos.net/journal/volume7/2cuban.htm

15.

McLaren, P. (1995). Critical pedagogy and predatory culture. New York: Routledge.

16.

McLuhan, M. (1964). Understanding media: The extensions of man. New York: Signet.

17.

Molnar, A. (1996, September 18). Giving kids the business. Education Week [Online]. Available: http://www.edweek.com/ew/vol-16/03molnar.h16

18.

Oppenheimer, T. (1997, July). The computer delusion. Atlantic Monthly [Online]. Available: http://theatlantic.com/issues/97jul/computer.htm

19.

Pearl, A. , & Knight, T. (1999). The democratic classroom, theory to inform practice. Cresskill, NJ: Hampton Press.

20.

Thorndike, E. L. (1913). Educational psychology. New York: Teachers College Press.

21.

Toffler, A. (Ed.). (1974). Learning for tomorrow. New York: Vintage.

22.

Tripp, D. (1992). Critical theory and educational research. Issues in Educational Research, 2(1), 13-23.

23.

Vygotsky, L. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes ( M. Cole , V. John-Steiner , S. Scribner , & E. Souberman , Eds.). Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.