Rethinking the tools to foster learning

Last week I wrote about how our R&D Coordinator, Scot Hoffman, and myself are working on a Multimedia Project Guide and Planner for Teachers.  Our aim is to empower the teachers to be able to give students much more choice about the types of media they use to communicate their learning.  All too often, in schools where there is a one-size-fits-all approach to teaching, students are mandated which tool they should use, ending up with cookie-cutter projects where the tool drives what students are doing, rather than the communication goals driving the choice of technology.  In the case of teachers this is also true - when they are limited by the tool they can use to communicate with their class, pedagogy will bend to fit the tool.

In Knowing Knowledge, George Siemens write that "fostering learning requires rethinking the tools used.  Do the tools work in the manner in which people learn?  Do the tools represent how the learners will be functioning in "real life"?

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