For Week One’s topic on online participation and digital literacies, my team and I went through a scenario in which the person is facing feelings of anxiety while dealing with online interaction. During our discussion, a group member pointed out that we educators often experience these feelings too, especially when we are expected to know how to use digital tools during teaching.
I thought to myself, huh. This rings a bell! I proceeded to look for a specific video clip by Sofia Vergara on Modern Family (source: https://www.facebook.com/reel/289789156268686):
In this video, Sofia conveys her frustration when she was perceived as one who is dim-witted and embarrassing, just because her English is not good as her Spanish.
I feel that this is the perfect analogy for our struggle in educational technology, when feelings are concerned. We feel frustrated that we cannot convey exactly what we want to do in class, and that we are seen by our students who is not good at their job; someone who lacks expertise in the subject-matter, just because we struggle in the medium. Driving on the constructivist approach and my own experience, I think we face these feelings as we expect our students to perceive us as the “more knowledgable other” and a role model in class. With this idea in mind, I started to explore why we perceive these feelings as educators, and how to overcome them.
Firstly, I found an online article that does touch on this topic, from the teacher’s perspective. Among other reasons, Hyndman (2018) attributes our struggle to use technology as “not all teachers ‘believe’ in using technology”. This is rather interesting, since most of us who joined ONL241 are thought to be ‘believers’, but we still go through the same challenges as everyone else.
In fact, I looked into several papers and found one that provides a much more academic take on this issue. Ardıç (2021) is of view that having a positive opinion and attitude on using educational technology, as well as high confidence in using these tools would have a greater impact on our students. Voila, I have found my answer!
All in all, I believe it’s important for us to acknowledge and accept these feelings as part and parcel of our journey to become educators that embrace technology.
References:
- Ardıç, M. A. (2021). Three Internal Barriers to Technology Integration in Education: Opinion, Attitude and Self-Confidence. Shanlax International Journal of Education, 9(1), 81-96. https://doi.org/10.34293/education.v9iS1-May.4004
- Hyndman, B. (2018). Ten reasons teachers can struggle to use technology in the classroom. The Conversation. https://theconversation.com/ten-reasons-teachers-can-struggle-to-use-technology-in-the-classroom-101114
