2023-07-30 01:43:38
Photo: Press.
The participation of teachers in training on technology and programming “went from 6,000 to more than 60,000 per year” since the end of 2021 in Argentina, where they are working “in the direction of the proposals” of the UNESCO global report presented this week and which urged countries to establish their own conditions for the design, use and evaluation of Technology in Education, said the Secretary of Education, Silvina Gvirtz.
In the same line, Leandro Folgarpresident of the center for educational innovation with digital technologies of the Uruguayan state Ceibal -a “success story” highlighted by Unesco-, reflected in dialogue with Télam on the contributions of the report and denied that the United Nations organization has indicated to prohibit the use of cell phones in schools.
In addition, he specified that “The key in digital technologies is the same as always for education: intentionality and pedagogical action of the adult trained for these purposes and containment of the educational community of these technologies for learning”.
“This report is global, it has an impact in all countries, it is an incentive to continue with the type of policies that we are implementing and it highlights the importance of guaranteeing equal access and ending the digital divide, which is enormous. In Argentina we are working in the direction of the proposals made by Unesco”, he assured Télam GvirtzPhD in Education from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA) and professor at the National University of San Martín (Unsam).
Silvina Gvirtz, Secretary of Education / Photo: Press.
“The report confirms that this is a ‘perpetual marathon’, a job that Uruguay has been doing for 16 years and even so, the challenges we see ahead are great,” added Folgar, who also directs the Ceibal Foundation, has a master’s degree in Technology , Innovation and Education awarded by Harvard University and participated in the panel of experts during the launch in Montevideo.
“This report is global, it has an impact in all countries, it is an incentive to continue with the type of policies we are implementing and it highlights the importance of guaranteeing equal access and ending the digital divide” Silvina Gvirtz
The document “reinforces that the digital divide is not one, but at least three: access to devices, use of devices, and quality of use of devices and connectivity. In addition, content production and digital teaching talent available to students,” he added.
Technologies for education “are many and have been used for a long time”clarified the expert, who mentioned among them the graphic interface such as the blackboard, the planning sheets and the desks for two students.
and pointed out that today the emphasis is on digital technologies and “there is an overemphasis on screens, when there are also many other technologies that can be used in favor of learning such as sensors, drones, 3D printers, cutting routers, multisensors for experiments and projects; and they need trained teachers who can leverage them.”
National Permanent Training Program “Our School”
In Argentina, since the relaunch of the National Permanent Training Program Our School, in October 2021, technology and programming trainingand the proposal of the National Institute for Teacher Training (INFoD) on education and technology and ICT use at school. Starting in 2023, training in artificial intelligence was added.
“Since the relaunch to date we have 178,728 teachers in proposals on technology and programming. From 6,000 teachers per year it went to 65,900, and now the number has doubled, and enrollment is still missing for the last quarter of the year,” Gvirtz graphed. .
They also work on the access to connectivity and delivery of devicesand in guaranteeing that boys and girls are trained as intelligent consumers and as producers of new technology, “something with which we must move forward strongly in the next period”, pointed out the official.
By 2015, 5,320,000 computers had been delivered “one by one” with the Connect Equality program, but “this policy was discontinued between 2016 and 2019, and it was resumed with this government,” he recalled.
Currently, in Argentina they delivered more than 1,000,000 computers and more than 68% of state-run public schools are connectedhe assured.
Between 2020 and 2023, the ministry delivered 45 million books printed at the primary level, which also “are technology,” said Gvirtz, who announced that next week the ministry will announce the results of the surveys carried out in parallel to the Learn Tests that account, among other issues, of how they use the technology students and teachers.
Leandro Folgar, president of the center for educational innovation with digital technologies of the Uruguayan state Ceibal / Photo: Press.
Ceibal Innovation Center
In Uruguay, Ceibal deals with connectivity in schools, the logistics of device delivery, repair during its life cycle, recovery for final disposal in an environmentally sustainable manner, providing platforms, creating content and train teachers, among other key tasks.
In 2020, Ceibal went from being a “plan” started in 2009 to an innovation center that provides a comprehensive service for digital transformation and self-determinationand currently “100% of the students in Uruguay’s public education system receive the Ceibal device and have access to high-speed broadband connectivity from schools,” Folgar said.
The presentation of the Unesco report for the first time in a Spanish-speaking country “has to do with the evolution of Ceibal as a state policy, which transcends governmentsin what it means to make the future equitably distributed in each educational community in Uruguay”, he added.
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The report highlights the importance of protecting rights in the use of technology in the #education so that digital resources are NEVER above learning outcomes. pic.twitter.com/e90UAh5Bf3
— UNESCO in Spanish ????️ #Education #Science #Culture (@UNESCO_es) July 26, 2023
The report examined the educational challenges to which the appropriate use of technology can offer solutions, but recognized that many of them can be detrimental, within the framework of the 2030 Agenda of the Sustainable Development Goals.
The study included “very different” countries such as those that do not have access to electricity in all schools and those that use facial recognition to take attendanceindicated Folgar and clarified that hyperconnected countries prohibit cell phones in schools does not imply that they should not be used anymore.
The report warned that technology “can have a detrimental effect if used inappropriately or excessively”and that data from large-scale international assessments suggest “a negative relationship between excessive use of ICT and student achievement.”
“Unesco did not say that cell phones should be banned in education”Folgar maintained and pointed out that “the active screen is a distractor of attention like so many others, and it is one of the issues that a teacher has to manage in the classroom.”
In Argentina, more than 68% of state-managed public schools are connected.
The type of device and its use in education “is mediated” by the pedagogical proposal and curriculum
The type of device and its use in education “is highly mediated by what is proposed in the pedagogical proposal and in the national curriculum,” explained Leandro Folgar, an expert in Technology, Innovation and Education who was part of the launch of the Unesco report. that was done this week in Montevideo.
What should be taken into account to incorporate technology in education? Is its application the same at all educational levels?
“At an early age, the use of screens is something that has to be reduced to the minimum possible for specific spaces, we have to prioritize dialogue and reading experiences,” he told Télam Folgar, who chairs Ceibal, the educational innovation center with digital technologies of the Uruguayan state.
The expert explained that at the primary level “fundamentals of the use of devices are created and it is possible to understand what and how a computer can be used, where media literacy and multimodal languages begin to be important.”
“It is not only necessary to understand that there is a language that we use in the country and a second language that is taught, but a third language that is the language of computers and the media, which must be handled,” he added.
Likewise, the concepts of “digital citizenship” come later when the character of that student is being formed a little more.
“Using the computer as a means of production, project creation, exploration and inquiry”, recommended the specialist and explained that “the type of device and use is highly mediated by what is proposed in the pedagogical proposal and in the national curriculum “.
In turn, he stressed that “what can be done with a computer and with a cell phone is significantly different.”
Although Ceibal’s proposal does not work with cell phones, but with computers, they do not prohibit their use because they consider that they are one more device for searching for information, checking news, and allow connection with others, so it has its place. in the learning cycle.
“It may not be the best device to produce documents to interact with a teacher or create an audiovisual project, but each has its place in the educational continuum,” he explained.
On the other hand, regarding the phenomenon of artificial intelligence (AI), he said that “it is one more technology, which brings the challenge of basic literacy.” And he stressed that “neither the adult population nor the students know what they are talking about when they talk about AI” because “it is neither intelligence nor artificial” but rather “they are probabilistic statistical models used to simulate certain human capacities”.
“First we have to generate a level of basic training in the entire population to understand what we are talking about, not to be afraid of it and then to be able to take advantage of this technology in favor of their life project,” Folgar described.
However, he assessed that artificial intelligence is one of the exponential technologies that “is going to have many effects on productivity, education and learning.”
“But the only and best way to incorporate it is by generating the skills and training so that people, education professionals, can use it to generate more and better learning for our future generations,” he concluded.
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