Goodwin, K. (2016) interviewed just over one thousand
parents in Australia on their children's use of the Internet for
learning. Half were from capital cities, half with primary school age
children and half secondary school. Three quarters of parents said that
Internet at home helped children learn. About half said their children
use the Internet at home for research, watch tutorials and collaborate
with other students.
The research was commissioned by NBN Co, an Australian government
owned company set up to provide a national broadband network. NBN Co
obviously have an interest in talking up the value of digital technology
for education. In particular the interview questions appear to have
been designed to support the assertion that
high speed broadband
is needed at home to provide video for education. No questions appear
to have been asked about the need to provide Internet for students
outside the home.
It should be noted that NBN Co is providing
high speed broadband,
which is far in excess of the speed required just for educational
video. The ABS (2015) notes that the OECD definition of broadband used
by the Australian government is 256kbps. In contrast the minimum speed
being offered by NBN Co. is 20 Mbps, more than seventy five times the
OECD minimum and many times the speed required for educational video.
NBN Co. is only providing fixed broadband for homes and small
businesses, it is not providing mobile wireless data, as used by smart
phones and tablet computers outside the home. Mobile devices equipped
with 3G and 4G wireless modems might render NBCo's multi-billion dollar
fiber and fixed wireless network obsolete before it can be completed.
For comparison, Pegrum, Oakley and Faulkner (2013) report on the
adoption of mobile devices in ten Western Australian non-government
schools in 2011. iPads were most popular, followed by iPod Touches (a
small tablet device) and iPhones. Lower level classes had shared devices
in the classroom, while older students each had their own device.
M-learning, was still being integrated into the teaching.
Pegrum, Oakley and Faulkner (2013) identify professional development
(PD) for teachers in the educational use of computers as a major need.
One program set up to provide PD is the CSER Digital Technologies MOOC
(Falkner, Vivian & Falkner, 2015). This is a series of free on-line
courses from the University of Adelaide to teach about the new
Australian Digital Technologies curriculum. The course is initially
being offered for teaching in Kindergarten to year six (K-6) but is
being expanded to cover later years.
Teaching digital technology to teachers on-line is
challenging. (Falkner, Vivian & Falkner, p. 66, 2015) note that the
average Australian primary teacher is a 42 year old generalist
(secondary teachers are a few years older). These teachers are likely to
have had minimal exposure to computers in their teacher training.
Teachers are reportedly working 46 hours per week and 8 to 9 days a year
on PD. Asking teachers to spend extra time to use IT to learn to use IT
to teach IT is a challenge. CSER prepared seven MOOC Modules:
- Introduction
- Data – Patterns & Play
- Data - Representation
- Digital Systems
- Information Systems
- Algorithms & Programming
- Visual Programming
Falkner, Vivian an Falkner (p. 68, 2015) report that the first
offering of the course had 1378 enrolled, 438 of who did not engage in
the course and 99 completed. This is a 7.2% completion rate (10.5% of
those encouraging), which is reasonable for a MOOC. The same course,
offered with a tutor as a conventional e-learning course may be expected
to have a much higher completion rate.
References
Russell Waldron also pointed out the Digital Technologies Curriculum students will have a different approach to assignments, including group work. These students will be familiar with using online document creation tools, including assigning attribution for group work. The students skills for working this way will likely exceed that of their university teachers. 
