Canada: Factors Contributing to Teachers' Successful Implementation of Information Technology

Canada: Factors Contributing to Teachers' Successful Implementation of

Information Technology

Colette Granger Mary Leigh Morbey Heather Lotherington

Ron Owston Herb Wideman

York University Faculty of Education

4700 Keele St Toronto, Ontario, Canada

M3J 1P3

Presented at the Annual Meeting of the American Educational Research Association

April 4, 2002

Abstract

Given the enormous changes currently being wrought in the landscape of education, by both the expanding advance of information and communications technologies (ICT) and increased demands for their widespread application and integration, it has become increasingly important for those involved in teaching and learning to examine successful ICT implementations, with the aim of understanding precisely what makes them successful. In this study, an analysis of data from qualitative case studies of four Canadian schools makes it possible to address the basic question of what educators perceive as the factors that contribute most to successful ICT implementation in schools. The data, from interviews with teachers, principals, teacher-librarians, and technical support personnel, were coded for environmental factors, individual characteristics, and ways of learning. Little relationship was found between successful use of information technology in schools and (1) individuals’ teaching experience or (2) their experience as users of ICT. Further findings suggest that while formal education has little direct impact on teaching practice, informal ICT education (such as “just-in-time” learning, undertaken on the job and with colleagues) is seen as most influential. Finally, supportive relationships among teachers, a commitment to pedagogically sound implementation of new technologies, and principals who encourage teachers to engage in their own learning are viewed as some of the most influential factors in the facilitation of professional development, and innovative classroom practice, with respect to ICT.

AERA – SITES 7/Canada: factors in ICT implementation 1

Introduction

Information technologies have rapidly become an important feature of Canada’s educational landscape. Across the country, in 1999, the most recent year for which statistics are available,1 there was on average one computer for every nine elementary students. For students in lower secondary and upper secondary schools2 the computer/pupil ratios were 1:8 and 1:7 respectively. Although ratios varied somewhat among the ten provinces, none reported a ratio higher than 1:15 (Nova Scotia, elementary level), and at the upper secondary level ratios were as low as 1:5 (Manitoba) or 1:6 (Prince Edward Island, Ontario). Additional figures indicate that a significant majority of Canadian schools were “online” with respect to Internet connectivity, defined as “a measure of the percentage of students attending schools that were connected to the Internet for educational purposes.” Indeed, in some provinces (Alberta, New Brunswick, Prince Edward Island and Saskatchewan) all or virtually all schools, at all levels, were connected to the Internet, and across the country, with only one exception (elementary level, British Columbia), more than 80 percent of schools had Internet access. But equipment and connectivity do not, of themselves, guarantee successful or productive use. The implementation of information and communications technologies (ICT) for educational purposes is a complex undertaking, informed by pedagogical philosophies, curricular requirements, and the current proliferation of information technologies in society at large: according to Marshall (2001) over half (57 percent) of Canadian workers used a computer on the job in 2000 – compared with only 33 percent in 1989 – and of these 8.3 million individuals, almost 80 percent, or 6.4 million, use them daily. This surge in the use of technology has provided impetus for education to achieve and maintain currency in its implementation of ICT in ways that respond to and inform developments in the larger society, and also to advance its own consideration of pedagogical issues related to technological development. Given these challenges, it has become increasingly important for those involved in teaching and learning to examine successful ICT implementations with the aim of understanding precisely how and why they are successful. Thus, the broad, overarching question that frames this inquiry is: What are the factors that contribute to successful implementation of ICT in education? That is, what works and what does not work, and why? Given the paramount importance of the role of the classroom teacher, in all aspects of education and particularly in ICT implementation, the

1 Second Information Technology in Education Study (SITES) 1999, Centre for Education Statistics, Statistics Canada, and International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA); cited in Statistics Canada 1999, pp. 70-71. 2 “Elementary” and “Lower secondary” schools are defined, respectively, as schools in which grades 5 (students generally aged 10-11 years) and 9 (14-15 years)are taught; “upper secondary” schools are those in which the final year of secondary is taught (grade 12 or 13 depending on the province: students aged 17-19). Statistics Canada 1999, p. 71.


study focuses on two specific questions: first, what do teachers perceive as the factors that contribute to successful classroom implementation of ICT? – and second, how do these contributing factors act, and interact, to make their contributions? In engaging these questions we consider aspects of teacher practice in and of themselves as well as in connection with broader aspects of education such as mandated curricula, pedagogical philosophies and school communities. This report begins by defining the successful implementation we are addressing, describing the data in terms of its sources and structure, and outlining the stages of the research, including the methodologies that were applied in coding and interpreting the data. It proceeds to engage the two focus questions posed above in a detailed analysis of the data. The analysis comprises a discussion of the factors that the educators interviewed perceive as either contributory or detrimental to their success, along with an examination of the ways in which those often diverse factors overlap, interact and weave together in the complex fabric of pedagogical practice. Finally, it offers concluding comments that assert the importance of a multifaceted approach to ICT implementation. Background and context: the schools The interviews which this study analyses come from four Canadian schools, which we refer to as Ladyslipper, Ravine, Main Street and Wildrose. • Ladyslipper is a school for students from kindergarten through grade 9, located in a

small town in the picturesque eastern part of Prince Edward Island, approximately 20 kilometres from Charlottetown, the provincial capital. Built in 1971 to amalgamate a number of one-room schools in the area, it primarily serves families whose work is farming – potatoes, cattle, and dairy are the chief products. In addition, some own small businesses while others commute to Charlottetown, to work in government, business and the tourist industry. The principal describes the school population as overwhelmingly middle-class, and homogeneous in terms of ethnicity, with all but a few students coming from British backgrounds. English is the first language of all the students. The school building is equipped to serve 400 children; at time of writing the student population is just under 250. Staff number approximately 25, including 17 teachers, as well as a principal, teaching assistants, a secretary, bus drivers and caretakers. The school has a lab that houses 30 computers, and many classrooms have computers as well. Computer instruction begins in grade one.

Ladyslipper was selected as an innovative school for the ways in which its teachers have integrated technology into many aspects of curriculum. The school operates on the belief that a “hands-on” approach to ICT skills acquisition and use within the school environment will be advantageous for students throughout their lives: in addition to technological skills it focuses on teaching how technology can assist in the learning process. Students use the Internet widely as a research tool and students and staff have their own e-mail addresses. The school’s former vice-principal sums up the school’s views concerning ICT: “We have always focused on using the computers to support what we’re doing in our normal curriculum.” That is, information technologies are “not the whole program,” but are seen as useful for learning.


Consistent with this hands-on approach to ICT is the way the school has taken the initiative both in making relationships between itself and the community, and in acquiring funds and other resources it needs to fulfill its mandate.

• Ravine Public School is a kindergarten to grade 6 school located in one of the lowest socio-economic areas of Toronto, Ontario. It serves a culturally diverse population of just over 400 students, of whom over half have a first language other than English. The innovation at Ravine, known as the “Triad Partnerships Program,” involves grades 4 to 6 – approximately 12 teachers and 250 students – in collaborative teams called triads, each of which involves the school’s teacher-librarian, computer specialist (also a teacher) and a classroom teacher working together and “interconnecting a particular curricular focus through a combination of classroom, computer lab, and library instruction” (Lotherington, Morbey, Granger and Doan 2001, p. 135). The program is integrated into all areas of the curriculum. Facilities at Ravine include a combined library and computer lab with 20 computers, and at least two Apple computers in each classroom from kindergarten to grade 6. The school’s pupil-computer ratio is 5:1. The Triad program is integrated into the prevailing culture of the school, whose explicit mission is to provide students “with high quality programs that emphasize numeracy, literacy, and social responsibility” while focusing specifically on “the development of a wide range of computer skills.” The principal and staff who were interviewed share the view that within the school staff work together and share information and knowledge with one another. The fact that time for co-planning and co-teaching is timetabled into the school schedule is cited by one and all as an important and even crucial variable to both the success of the Triad program and the general collaborative mind set among staff.

• Main Street Public School is located in Toronto: specifically, in a mixed-income

neighbourhood which intersperses high-rise apartment buildings with middle class single dwellings, on the outskirts of an industrial pocket within the city. The principal informs us that Main Street School students live, overwhelmingly, in low-cost rental accommodation. Main Street is a mid-sized school of about 400 students from Junior Kindergarten through Grade 5. The special needs of the mainly ESL/ESD school population, of whom many come from developing countries, demand that equity principles such as inclusive curriculum and global perspective are central to all aspects of the student-centred program, which has focused on technology since 1994. The school’s vision, namely to “promote a dynamic and equitable learning environment, to enhance student achievement and to prepare students to be responsible citizens in the Canadian and global society through the implementation of Information and Computer Technology,” has informed the administration’s focus on creating a framework to ensure success for all students through innovative and relevant ways of using ICT for learning.

In the current innovation, students work on collaborative projects using ICT. Teachers use cooperative learning strategies to enable students with a wide range of


abilities and experiences to develop talents and skills in marketing and sales, public speaking, drawing and design, layout and technology, administration, entrepreneurship, writing and editing. Evidence shows that the staff at Main Street view computers as a critical tool contributing to educational innovation and improvement. Technology facilities in the school include 40 Internet-accessible computers in the Learning Resource Centre and at least 4 in each classroom, as well as 45-50 laptop computers for teachers, students and parents.

• Wildrose Elementary School was first begun in 1996-97 as a Kindergarten-Grade 5

school. A succeeding grade was added in each subsequent school year; the 1999-2000 year saw 21 (full-time-equivalent) staff teaching 437 students from kindergarten through grade 8. The school is nestled beside several acres of woodland in a rural area about 30 minutes from a major city in Alberta, and the great majority of its students are from upper-middle and upper class families. The student body is, to a large extent, homogeneous both culturally and in terms of socio-economic status. The school’s overarching pedagogical orientation is toward student-directed and inquiry-based learning: a constructivist direction strongly promoted by the administration and evidenced in the school’s vision statements, handbook, and plans. Principles of risk-taking and experimentation, with the aim of more autonomous, authentic, and engaged student learning, have been central to the school’s direction and culture since its inception. This approach has received enthusiastic support from the majority of parents in the school community.

At Wildrose, ICT has been understood as an integral part of this process of shifting teaching in the school in the direction of greater learner autonomy and inquiry-based work, but exploiting the potential of technology for teaching and learning has always been viewed as subsidiary to and in service of the main goal of the school: developing and applying more authentic, collaborative, and student-directed approaches to learning. Most classrooms have only one computer; additional access to ICT is available in a very large room and two adjacent island areas in the centre of the school. Teachers from grades 1 through 8 frequently take some or all of their students to work in one of these areas.

Methodology In general, this inquiry comprises characteristics of an ethnographic study in that it endeavours, through an analysis of interview transcripts, to approach the emic point of view and understand the subjective experience of some of the participants in the complex culture of education as they negotiate the new and at times rough terrain of information technology. Following Strauss and Corbin, it takes a grounded theory approach in the sense that the “data collection, analysis, and theory stand in reciprocal relationship with each other.” That is, it “does not begin with a theory, then prove it. Rather, [it] begins with an area of study and what is relevant to that area is allowed to emerge” (Strauss and Corbin 1990, p. 23). Further, following Kirk and Miller (1986), it assesses the data in


terms of synchronic reliability; the interview responses are teased apart with the aim of observing consistencies that are relevant to the inquiry. I Defining success In order to be useful, any assessment of successful practice must specifically articulate its conceptualization of success. In the present case, briefly contextualizing the source of the data under analysis is helpful in clarifying the working definition of success that this study takes as its starting point. The interviews that constitute the data examined herein were undertaken in schools across Canada selected by a nation-wide panel of individuals including practising educators, educational administrators, researchers and government representatives, and experts in various areas of educational technology (SITES M2, 2000, sec. IX, p.1). The panel chose 12 schools, out of approximately 60 originally nominated, which it deemed to be engaging in innovative pedagogical practices using technology (IPPUTs). IPPUTs, as outlined in the SITES prospectus, are practices

• in which [information] technology plays a substantial role; • that show evidence of significant changes in the roles of teachers and students,

the goals of the curriculum, and/or the educational materials or infrastructure; • that show evidence of measurable positive student outcomes; • that are sustainable and transferable, and • that are innovative3 as locally defined. (SITES M2 2000, sec. IV, p.3)

II Data collection and selection Close to 100 interviews were conducted at the 12 schools designated innovative by the selection committee. Individuals interviewed included teachers, principals, school board administrators, teacher-librarians, technical support personnel and students. The interviewers were conducted by researchers from York University, and included faculty members, associate researchers and graduate students who traveled to the schools for the purpose of observing their environments and their practices in addition to conducting the interviews. All interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed.

Given the emphasis in this study – namely, the perceptions of teachers regarding ICT implementation – out of all the interviews initially conducted for the SITES study as a whole the ones selected for this particular investigation were those involving teachers, principals, teacher/librarians and technical support personnel working closely with teachers (and indeed, many of whom are themselves teachers filling positions dedicated to technical support). Further, of that subset of SITES interviews, many involved several respondents, and lasted an hour or more in duration. Thus, given the enormous body of transcribed text generated by the interviews conducted in all 12 schools, a decision was made to reduce the data to a manageable quantity: determining which of the interviews to analyse thus became our first task. Though all the interviews offer potentially useful data,

3 In view of the international nature of the SITES project and the culturally specific concerns in defining the term, “innovation” is generally defined within the project as “those practices that prepare students for lifelong learning in the information society.” For a more detailed discussion see SITES M2 2000, sec. IV, p.3.


we have chosen to concentrate our work on 31 interviews from four of them, which we selected for their overall discursive and conceptual richness. III Coding and analysis Once the data had been collected and the recorded interviews transcribed, the transcriptions were coded using ATLAS.ti software. Initially, 29 codes were generated by preliminary readings of the transcripts, before the actual work of coding began. During the process of coding, however, the constant comparative method of analysis proved useful (Glaser and Strauss 1967): some codes were revised or refined; several new ones arose in the process of coding as unanticipated patterns seemed to emerge compellingly from within the transcripts, and still others were created after the initial coding had been completed. Generally, the codes position themselves under three overarching categories, which were designated ways of learning, individual characteristics, and environmental factors. The codes are set out in Appendix A: a few examples are shown here in order to give a sense of how the categories were constructed.

• Ways of learning

• formal courses, online/offline • informal learning with colleagues • learning from/with technical support personnel • individual exploration of the Internet

• Individual characteristics

• educators’ individual beliefs about ICT • personal pedagogical philosophies • interest in or resistance to ICT • skills, experience and educational background

• Environmental factors: • shared ideologies concerning ICT • leadership • time • policy and curriculum issues

The coded data were then examined for emphases and patterns that held across interviews and across schools, and similarly for contradictions between interviews and between schools. As noted above, at this point some codes were revised, refined, blended or teased apart as our inquiry advanced.

Findings

I Ways of learning This set of codes was used to classify and analyse the ways teachers spoke about their own learning with respect to ICT. We were interested in discovering the contexts in


which learning takes place (at home, on the job, as individuals or in groups), and the ways learning was structured (informally, as professional development workshops or university); our aim was to determine which learning experiences the teachers found most helpful in terms of their work implementing ICT in their classrooms. Figure 1 outlines the various kinds of learning experience named by the respondents, and the degree to which they were found useful. Fig. 1 TYPE of learning experience # indicating

type of learning

# identifying experience as useful

% identifying experience as useful

FORMAL Courses, at university or through school board

18* 5 28

Online courses 4 ** n/a Conferences 7 3 43 Formal inservice workshops 21 10 48

INFORMAL

Informal learning with and from colleagues 29 28 97 Family and friends 5 5 100 From students 14 12 86 Self-teaching: on/offline, at home, on the job

17 15 88

* total number of respondents: 31 (not all respondents discussed learning methods, and those who did frequently spoke about more than one)

** mentioned only: no evaluation given concerning usefulness In addition to naming the most beneficial learning experiences, teachers explain the rationale behind their choices. Alberto, a grade 5 teacher at Main Street, values university courses most highly because “the people that you are learning from are more or less experts in their field and you tend to get the best resources and the best information there. Not necessarily [the best] equipment but still the information that you are dealing with tends to be most current.” (Main Street interview 1:P1) And Mary, who teaches at Ravine, appreciates courses offered by the school board, saying that

the Board had very good teachers. They were geared specifically to the computers that we would be working with, the programs that we would be using. They were lead by teachers who were doing the same things that we were doing.... And as soon as I came back, it was the type of thing I could use right away.

(Ravine interview 3:P8) In contrast, Paul, a teacher of grades 1 through 3 at Wildrose, finds courses and “workshops and inservices...to have minimal impact [and]...to be dry, without purpose, without meaning.” He further outlines what he does find valuable:


What I’ve learned from has been to decide what I want to do with the kids and what I want to be able to highlight in their work. And then to find people who can show me how to do it. That’s how I’ve figured out how to use basic presentation things, art programs and that kind of thing have been… because I’ve had a purpose and it was involved in the work. (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

Teacher education with respect to ICT has traditionally taken the form of inservice programs which typically involve one part-day or full-day session of instruction on some aspect of hardware or software use. For Browne and Ritchie (1991), a significant limitation of such training is that it tends to act as a vehicle for “simply providing knowledge to teachers and doing little to help transfer the skills to actual classroom implementation” (1991, p.28). The table in figure 1, in presenting an overall picture of teachers’ subjective experience of learning with respect to ICT which articulates a clear distinction between formally and informally structured learning experiences in terms of their perceived usefulness, suggests that the teachers in the present study might not only concur with Browne’s assessment, but extend it to other formal learning methods. Clearly, though courses, conferences, workshops and the like are found useful by some teachers, informal learning in its various forms (at-home Internet surfing, reading, or interactions with family or friends; on-the-job discussions and cooperative learning with peers; on-the-job learning from colleagues and/or students) is overwhelmingly perceived as helpful by those who have engaged in it. Fung Lee teaches kindergarten at Main Street. Describing how she has acquired her knowledge about ICT and its implementation, she says, “I think a lot of it comes from my peers. Because I am such a young staff member...I can ask one person and if they don't know they would ask another person. [It’s] like they all have their own specialties.” Alberto, at the same school, confirms this informal approach: “ [People] just know about a certain application that you don't know about and then you can just say, ‘how do I do this, or what key [do] you press for that?’ We have people here in the school like Bernard who you can ask... knowledgeable people.” (Main Street interview 1:P1) Martin is a former vice-principal at Ladyslipper. Asked about the degree to which teachers at that school worked together in learning about ICT, he replies:

A lot. I think people who are doing collaborative projects or different projects, everybody knows what they’re doing, and everybody, all the staff members are very free to question each other [about what has] happened and how can I do it better. There is a lot of collaboration that way.... It’s very informal, a lot of teachers coming and going [in the library and computer lab]...kind of just wandering through and talking. (Ladyslipper interview 1:P11)

This kind of comment is typical of teachers at all four schools. At Wildrose, Emma, who teaches French to grades 4-8, elaborates:

...As far as learning the skills, we have had those scheduled workshop-type things, but we also have the just-in-time learning. It happens in the hallway, or the


staffroom, where someone will come in and say, ‘I need to know how to use the digital camera.” And immediately there are four or five teachers or students who will say, “Oh, I can show you how to use that.” [It’s] quick-and-dirty you use it when you need it. And I think that's very much a part of our professional development here. It's not really scheduled, it just sort of evolves.

(Wildrose interview 1:P16) Clearly, the fact that teachers perceived informal learning and mentoring as more conducive to successful ICT implementation than formal courses and workshops does not conclusively prove that learning methods such as courses are not useful. There are, however, implications concerning the importance of learning that takes place informally. The teaching and learning that occur in such collaborative moments embody some of the characteristics of the model formalized by Gilmore (1995) in an exploration of Makrakis’ (1991) study of learning partnerships between computer resource teachers and classroom teachers. This model consists of a horizontal, “coaching” approach to ICT training in the day-to-day environment as part of teacher inservice, and is believed to result in a more substantial transference of learned skills to classroom practice. While the on-the-job, just-in-time learning described by the teachers in the present study does not directly include, for the most part, the formal workshop component of Makrakis’ model, it takes up the informal aspect which the teachers find effective. Further, given its ad hoc characteristics, even though at times it positions teachers as either learners or teachers in relation to each other, it takes on the flavour of collaborative, co-constructed learning. Current research argues for a constructivist approach to learning as a component of teachers’ professional development. Because it takes place in the context of immediate need, desire or curiosity on the part of the teacher-as-learner, this need-to-know approach to the work of constructing a body of knowledge and skills with respect to ICT use empowers teachers, transforming them from passive recipients to active builders of knowledge and allowing them a substantial degree of autonomy vis-à-vis the choice of specific skills acquired. For Browne and Ritchie, this autonomy is significant:

To facilitate classroom application of technology skills introduced during an inservice, the teacher needs to not only encode the information in a cognitive form, but also achieve a level of autonomy and confidence in using the material with students. (Brown and Ritchie 1991, p.30)

The kind of just-in-time learning and development that takes place in the context of the professional workday is not limited to ICT; Wildrose teacher Paul comments that in his experience, for teaching and learning in general “it's the dialogue that makes all the difference. It's not the presented things. And the school culture is based on there being a number of places where there is on-going and sustained dialogue and discussion about what this means and what matters.” (Wildrose 1:P16) Perhaps, in addition to the effectiveness of skills-related learning that takes place in informal settings, there is something about the context of informality itself that opens up possibilities for discussion about broader issues regarding ICT in education.


In addition to learning from and with colleagues, respondents relate other informal learning experiences they have found beneficial. For example, a significant number (10 out of the complement of 31) also speak about learning from students being particularly helpful. Some sample comments:

• I think the person who was the biggest help to me was one of my Grade 7 and 8

students who was way ahead of me. And...he told me how to do things that the people on the [School] Board told me I couldn't do.

(Anita, principal: Ravine interview 4:P9) • Kids taught teachers an incredible amount. And our teachers have always been

open [to students], some of them as low as Grade 5, but teaching us HTML or teaching us how to do something in WordPerfect.

(Martin, former principal, Ladyslipper interview 1P11) • I’ve learned more from students about technology than staff and workshops.

(Emma, teacher, Wildrose interview 1:P16) • We go to [the grade 3 pupils] for help with those things.

(Dana, vice-principal, Wildrose interview 4:P19) This shifting of boundaries between teacher and student, which arises out of the novel circumstance of teacher-as-learner with respect to ICT – which is in many cases newer for teachers than for their students – is another interesting way in which informal learning benefits teachers, and in addition students, and both allows and informs new ways of thinking about what learning and teaching mean, with respect to information technologies and in education writ large. But conversely, such a shift can only take place in a context in which teachers themselves are sufficiently comfortable to permit it. This level of comfort and confidence on the part of teachers is one of a number of characteristics that contribute to success with ICT implementation, and to which the study now turns. II Individual characteristics This part of the analysis focuses on those personal characteristics of the individual respondents that contribute to their success with ICT use and implementation in their schools. Here, we look at the respondents’ educational backgrounds, ICT skills and experience; beliefs about the usefulness of ICT and goals for its implementation; and resistance to information technology in education. > Educational background, experience, skills Twenty-seven of the 31 educators interviewed spoke about their educational background. Of these, all but three have bachelor degrees, nine either have or are working toward master’s degrees, and two PhD candidates. Their fields of study have been diverse. Degrees are held in many fields, including astronomy, French literature, music, English, information science, biology, and sociology, to name but a few. There is, however, a striking absence of teachers who have specialized in ICT-related fields. Only one person’s undergraduate degree is a minor in Technology Applications, and one more has a master’s degree in “Teaching and Learning in Computer Education.” Of those with master’s degrees in progress, only one is studying computer education. When asked about


additional qualifications courses they had taken, teachers named courses in Special Education, Principalship, Library Science and Guidance. Two recalled having taken a course entitled “Computers in the Classroom” and another has obtained a “Certificate in Education Technology.” Of the 22 individuals who spoke of their experience working as educators (teachers, principals, technical support personnel), five had fewer than five years’ experience, 14 had between 10 and 20 years’ experience, and three had been working in the field of education for 30 years or more. Although the purpose of the interviews was not to enumerate actual skills mastered, the respondents did outline the degree to which they had been exposed to information technology. As was the case with respect to educational background, the levels of exposure to and experience and skills in the use of ICT ranged widely. Statements representative of the two extremes in terms of personal acquaintance with technology come from Ravine teachers Andrew and Laura, who teach grades 3 and 6 respectively. This is Andrew’s second year as a teacher, while Laura has been teaching for over 20 years.

Andrew: I've always had computers. I was growing up with computers. That's how it started.... I've always had a computer in my house.... I have grown up with computers and so introducing it to the classroom didn't seem like such a big step, because it was there. Laura: [For me] it wasn't natural. [A] decade or I don't how many years ago now, [my own] kids had a Commodore 64.... And then we'd upgrade to 128 and mom never went near it, wasn't the least bit interested. Whenever our principal...said, ‘we're going to have inservices on computers,’...I attended them very, very reluctantly and it's just this school that's got me interested. I mean for the kids at home, we've got all of the bells and whistles, and I still don't use it overly at home. But in the classroom, I enjoy it, I use it.

(Ravine interview 1:P6) Others reported similarly varied experiences in terms of exposure to and long-term use of ICT. For example, Lorraine has been teaching for 12 years, for the past five as the designated “computer teacher” at Ravine (Ravine interview 2:P7). Despite her current proficiency, however, she is one of those who reported: “I didn't know anything about computers when I started teaching.” Similarly, Alan, in his second year teaching at Wildrose, stated that he had obtained “most of my experience, as far as the technologies that are used, at this school when I got here.” (Wildrose interview 2:P17) And at Ladyslipper, former vice-principal Martin indicated, “I had been interested [in] the technology part of this for probably 10 years or so [but] until this year never had any formal training at all in anything. So I had nothing on paper to go on with ICT.” (Ladyslipper interview 1:P11) At the opposite end of the experience-skills continuum was Elsa, a first-year grade 7 teacher at Ladyslipper, who recounted substantial experience using computers at university, and during her teacher training, as well as in her current job. Her colleague Pierre, who teaches grade 5, spoke of an even greater degree of involvement:


For the past 15 years I've been involved in computers in schools. In previous schools, [I] served as a technical supervisor and generally worked with the classrooms in computer technology.... Last year I just finished working on a sub-committee that was developing computer lesson plan[s] for...junior high.... I spent a year working on that document. So I've been involved quite extensively in computer stuff. (Ladyslipper interview 2:P12)

The range of ICT experience among teachers was noted by the principal at Main Street, who observed that “on a staff there are people who are familiar with technology whether they have computers at home or whatever, and then you do have the ones that are a little more hesitant about getting on board.” This range in ability was also recognized by teachers as an obstacle to learning. Among them, Darlene, who teaches Grade 4 at Ravine, had this to say: “It's really difficult to do the whole staff because everybody is at such different levels.... You go to something at lunch on how to use Internet and some people have no idea.... They have trouble using a mouse and turning on the computer. It has to be exactly where you are or you're not going to learn anything.” (Ravine interview 2:P20) In sum, there was no consistent relationship between length of time teaching and experience with ICT. Some teachers of many years’ experience had come relatively late to ICT, while others had been involved with it for a substantial period of time. Conversely, there were new teachers who had had little experience with technology prior to their present postings, and others who had “grown up with it.” Clearly, then, success in the implementation of ICT does not stand in a one-to-one relationship with the experience, the skills, or the education of the teacher engaged in the work of implementation. At the very least, it is but one of a number of relevant factors; it is necessary to look at others. > Beliefs and goals concerning ICT Across the four schools studied, the word tool was frequently used by respondents to articulate their view of the usefulness of information technology. The connotations given to this word varied extensively, however. At one end of the spectrum Pierre, vice-principal and grade 5 teacher at Ladyslipper (interview 2:P12), called it “more than a tool,” something that for him had “evolved a little higher.” In contrast Daniel, who teaches grade 6 at Ravine, expressed his very different view: “I see it as a tool. I don’t worship it, it’s not a god, I’m not genuflect[ing] at the altar of technology....” (Ravine interview 5:P20) Between these two diametrically opposed views lie the majority of the respondents’ perceptions of technology’s usefulness. If ICT is “only a tool” for many of these teachers, it is nevertheless an important one. Indira, the principal at Main Street, believes that “especially with students who have difficulty with learning, it is a tool that engages them.” (Main Street interview 3:P3) According to Emma it is a “leveler” in the sense that “it provides students with a leveled playing field. People aren’t coming in comparing printing. Everything actually looks very


similar if it’s been done on a computer. And so we’re looking at the idea rather than the mechanics.” (Wildrose interview 1:P16) As well, it is a source of information – “it’s immediate and the answers are there for us” (Belinda, Ravine interview 1:P6); it gives students “confidence, and the knowledge that they gain, and the preparation that they gain to go on with their lives” (Elsa, Ladyslipper interview 2:P12); and it “helps them take more responsibility for their own learning, because they know where they can go and find information.” (Carole, grade 3 teacher, Ladyslipper interview 3:P13) But for the educators involved in this study the usefulness of ICT is tempered; their views of technology are not uncritical. Peter, in his third year of teaching, views it as merely one of many facets of teaching and learning, and asserted with respect to his school, Wildrose, that “if we were all into technology, I don’t think the school would even survive.” (Wildrose 1:P17) And Charlotte, teaching at Main Street, described herself as “a bit of a skeptic as to how all this stuff is going to really help or be useful,” asking, “Is it going to take way too much time for us to figure out everything we need to learn to be able to implement it, and is it going to end up being chaos instead of an organized useful tool?” (Main Street 2:P2) Two specific teachers’ comments, viewed in their entirety, illustrate the ambivalence toward ICT that is present, either explicitly or implicitly, in many of the teachers’ statements. First, Paul, a teacher of 12 years experience working at Wildrose: for him ICT is “simply a tool.... [and although] it’s important to have as a language skill for the modern world, it is not more important than the things that have always mattered most to human beings.” One problematic aspect of technology, in his view, is that

... there is a side to it that is very isolating. And I think there is a whole range of experience and relative experience that has people sitting in front of their terminal and rather than speaking face to face and heart to heart with another person, it's done electronically, it's done in chat rooms, without real names, without real information on the people. And to some extent, I think, it can be detrimental because it's missing the human component of relationship.

Yet elsewhere in the interview he points to ICT as innovative in the sense of offering students

a possibility...to be part of an authentic community that's not age discriminatory, that's not unnaturally biased, where you have this many short people to this many tall people. When there is dialogue and relationship, there is the possibility and the option that someone in grade 2 might actually get to work alongside someone in grade 4. They might actually get to work with other elders or adults besides those they were arbitrarily assigned to. I think that is the innovation – building community. (Wildrose 1:P16)


Similarly Lynne, from Main Street, indicates views concerning ICT that at times seem to be in conflict. On one hand, she estimates that her students use computers about 50 percent of the time, and states that ICT is

... critical for the children in the future – to understand how to use it, to get information, to understand how to evaluate it so they can be informed learners, to understand how to access information…If it can make it clearer, easier, can increase their confidence for children I will learn it and I will do whatever I can to do that.

She also believes that “the most important thing is to set children up for success in whatever way it takes,” and speaks favourably of the ways in which she thinks ICT has allowed equitable access to the learning of music (her specialty) for her students, many of whom come from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and cannot afford to buy instruments:

I wanted to...give them an opportunity that they wouldn't get in any other way. So [over the years] I had tried many ways to bring in music to the early years, and I think teaching them [using ICT] through mini labs allows them to...get keyboard skills probably up to Grade 4, 5 piano level. It also gives them the opportunity to know how to put music on the Internet, make their own CDs and how that music industry works....

On the other hand, she expresses substantial specific concerns about technology in terms of motor and language skills:

[Children] learn an awful lot of information by throwing balls a certain distance, by building things up that fall down, by being engaged in the real world. I think if you are depriving them of that, I think it will have an effect later on. I think that's what computers are doing because I see young boys now glued to these for very long periods of time. I think it could be negative.... In terms of the language I think you need to learn language by engaging it.... I really question how good the effect of a lot of computer technology is, or how strong it is with the early years. (Main Street interview 1:P1)

Ambivalence, as exemplified in the comments of Paul and Lynne, is part of all aspects of the very complex work of teaching. Still, the educators involved in this study are able to express a variety of goals with respect to technological implementation, for themselves, their students and the communities served by their schools. For themselves, teachers’ goals are often practical, related to their desires to improve their own ICT skills, to increase their efficiency and to save time. Teachers at Main Street, for example, deliberately choose and pursue personal goals for improvement as part of their yearly planning. Goals for student use of technology can be characterized as being one of two types: some involving the teaching and learning of skills – “teaching computers” – and others


involving the integration of those skills into the daily life and work of the staff and students at the schools – teaching and learning with computers. Ravine teacher Lorraine distinguished the two: “If I say I teach computers, it always rubs me the wrong way, because I'm thinking, no! I'm not teaching computers, I'm teaching certain skills, but I'm also teaching ways to use the computer that will make learning easier.” (Ravine interview 2:P7) On one hand, teachers recognize the need for the acquisition of skills. Comments articulating this recognition include:

If they know keyboarding then word processing is fine because they can edit really quickly. Anything that allows them to learn the skill better.

(Main Street interview 1:P1)

At the Grade 4 level, we're still covering basic skills... mostly word-processing, e-mail, you know, just the simple basics. (Ladyslipper interview 3:P13)

On the other hand, the schools aim toward integration of technology skills and knowledge in all areas of curriculum. Kate, a grade 4 teacher at Ladyslipper, succinctly expresses this objective:

Integration into the curriculum is something that I would like to see. I think the children have a lot of skills, even more so than staff members. The skills are there, it’s just integrating it into the curriculum, because we have a very vast curriculum, and as you know yourself, a lot of goals to reach and material that we feel we need to cover and so on and so forth. So it needs to be integrated to the point that we’re covering more than one thing at a time. (Ladyslipper interview 3:P13)

Subject areas in which ICT has been integrated in some or all of the schools include mathematics, science, history and social studies, language and visual arts. Teacher Dorothy’s statement is representative of the desire for balance between skills and application that is apparent throughout most of the interviews:

The children still need a lot of directed teaching to get the skills and knowledge to then apply to project use using the computers or developing Web pages...[so] [we] teach them the skill and then we have them apply it.... It depends on what I am teaching. If I am teaching writing I have to teach them the basics while these kids do not have that. But would I say I am a back to basics...kind of teacher? Absolutely not. So I give them the tools in order to achieve the expectations I set up for them, and I believe also in dealing with multiple intelligences and being able to meet expectations. (Main Street interview 2:P2)

And Paul puts it succinctly: “I believe that...what we’ve been talking about here is [getting] back to the basics that matter” (Wildrose interview 1:P16, emphasis added). His colleague, Emma, elaborates:


I don’t teach technology any more, I use technology. In my previous teaching experience, we would go into the lab and we would do skill- and drill-type activities or game scenarios. And the students weren’t using the technology for any other purpose than sitting in front of it and playing. I now use technology to enhance our learning, to share information that we’ve gathered or to communicate with people that otherwise we wouldn’t be able to communicate with. [For example]...my Grade 4 students had keypals in Quebec. So they were composing messages in French to send to these students in Quebec. And they were writing back and forth and it made the learning of the French language so much more real to these Grade 4 students. They were actually talking to real people who spoke French and they were getting to try things out and getting that kind of feedback from peers, rather than just from me. (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

The above statement is representative of the ways in which the teachers interviewed find ways to blend the teaching of technology skills with aspects of mandated curriculum. Moreover, although some teachers express a concern with ICT, in relation to what they view as reduced human interaction, often their ways of working with the technology invite, as the story of the “keypals” does, new ways of thinking about what human interaction might mean. What is significant about the beliefs and goals for ICT expressed by the teachers interviewed is the sophistication and thoughtfulness with which they are articulated. Recalling Daniel’s comment, very few of the teachers in the study can be said to “genuflect at the altar of technology” – their commitment is to good teaching, and to the use of any tools that help make their teaching good and the learning of their students worthwhile. While Cuban asserts that “many teachers may sense how the introduction of machines into classrooms endangers those intangible, highly prized rewards that count so heavily” in their work (1986, p.90), the teachers here studied seem to sense, equally well, how computers, if used judiciously, might augment both intangible and tangible rewards of all kinds. What is more, they are prepared to engage in the practical and theoretical work of determining what constitutes wise and appropriate use. > Resistance to technology Hodas (1993) discusses what he terms “technology refusal” on the part of teachers, identifying a number of factors, including structural concerns, and teachers’ fear of both technology itself and of the loss of authority which increasing ICT use might engender. He also remarks that, sometimes with good reason, some educators believe that “computers in schools are anathema to their notions of what schools ought to do with and for children” (1993, p.14). While there is very little evidence in the present study that teachers view ICT in as extreme terms, resistance is described by the respondents in several different ways. There are those who admit that they have, in the past, been reluctant to become acquainted with ICT. Among these is Richard. Now a teacher mentor, whose “key role [at the school] is to teach teachers how to use computers, make them feel more comfortable in using technology and trying to integrate it into the curriculum,” he says of his early acquaintance with computers, “When I went to teach in London, England, for a year and a half, the only way I could keep in contact with home


…was e-mail. It was the cheapest way, so I bought a computer. I hated them at first, but I bought one.” (Ladyslipper interview 4:P14) And grade 6 teacher Belinda admits that prior to coming to Ravine she was not particularly interested in ICT, and attended workshops only “very, very reluctantly.” (Ravine interview 1:P6) Of the 31 respondents, these are the only three who explicitly acknowledge that resistance in any form has ever been part of their own response to ICT. Resistance is more commonly spoken of in more general terms, as a characteristic which has been observed in others. For example, Charlotte, a grade 3 teacher at Main Street, observes:

A lot of people don't want to go out of this school for professional development because it tends to be people who talk 'techy' talk and it goes right over your head.... I know people are reluctant because they've gone to one or two and they said that they didn't understand anything that they said anyway.

(Main Street interview 2:P2) In some cases different individuals in the same school view the question of resistance from different perspectives. For example, two of the Wildrose teachers, who took part in the same interview, when asked whether they are aware of resistance to the adoption of ICT at the school, reply as follows:

Emma (at the school for two years): No, I don’t think so. The use of technology is so much a part of what we do on a day-to-day basis. It’s a tool for our learning for all of us, for the teachers and students.

Paul (at the school for five years): There’s been massive resistance here.... There was a great deal of initial enthusiasm followed by a tremendous amount of passive resistance. “Why do we have to do this? Why can’t we just teach? Why does this have to be done on top of it? What’s the matter with what we’ve always done?”

(Wildrose interview 1:P16) Similarly, at Ladyslipper, Richard exemplifies resistance this way: “Some teachers you don’t even see in the lab.... [There] are some teachers that just won’t have anything to do with computers, even still.” (Ladyslipper interview 4:P14). In contrast, Ladyslipper’s former vice-principal, Martin, takes the view that acceptance of ICT was “pretty pervasive throughout the school, right from Grade 1 to 9.” He continues:

I think the fact that the staff here have evolved, a lot of them with no trouble, [though] I won’t say 100, because I can still think of one staff member who’s resisted to it, but [everyone else has] really bought into it and seen how it can be useful to them, with their kids, with their subjects, regardless of whatever grade they’re in.


And later in the same interview, he reports even more emphatically that

There was never, ever resistance, there was never anybody who said, “No, these are bad, we shouldn’t be having them.” They were jumping in to take part, but there were never teachers who were against the use of computers or the technology. (Ladyslipper interview 1:P11)

This last statement made by Martin, and Paul’s comment (above) concerning “massive resistance,” articulate different views of resistance at their respective schools. What is similar about them, however, is that they address resistance as an ideological question – they speak of resistance to information technology itself. Within the interviews as a whole, while there are few overt expressions of ideological resistance, there is a substantial amount of questioning: as related above, ICT is by no means universally accepted as the sine qua non of progress in education. What is more common, however, is the tendency on the part of the respondents, when asked specifically about resistance, to explain teachers’ reluctance to implement ICT as something other than resistance. Martin, for instance, continued his statement that “there was never, ever resistance” by re-articulating resistance as hesitation arising out of a concern about how ICT could be implemented without detriment to other aspects of school life:

The hesitation that was there at different times [was because] teachers wanted to justify or to be assured that the time they were injecting into technology was not taking away from their language arts they had to cover, or the math they had to cover. (Ladyslipper interview 1:P11)

Fung Lee, a kindergarten teacher at Main Street, comments likewise:

The only resistance is that there’s probably a worry that with the focus on technology that area perhaps may need some really important aspect of literacy and the needs of the students might be ignored. (Main Street interview1:P1)

Other comments articulate resistance as fear in ways consistent with the views of Hodas (1993), as noted above:

I would not say there is resistance. I think that some teachers are really genuinely scared of technology.... I think that they are just afraid because there hasn't been the PD. Professional Development days have been taken away so there is no time for it. [Funding obtained by the school this year is]...making it easier this year, but prior to that the resistance was a genuine fear, not an attitudinal thing. (Main Street interview 2:P2)

A lot of people [say]..."Oh I don't know how to do anything".... Some real novices, they didn't even know how to point and click a mouse...you just have to let them know that whatever they do to a computer [they’re] not going to break it.


That's their biggest worry, they think it's going to blow up, or they think they're going to erase something, or they're going to do some sort of damage that's going to cost a lot of money. (Ladyslipper interview 4:P14)

or as uncertainty:

I think that we have teachers who just have not had an opportunity to see how to integrate it and perhaps it has not shown developmentally what skills or what tools or sub skills they need to have. They’ve sort have been overwhelmed with perhaps software or hardware glitches that have shown up. That happens all the time. (Indira, Main Street interview 3:P3)

or as frustration with computer breakdowns:

... people go in and they want the kids to all do this database and make this chart or something and half the computers don't work or the printers don't work. After that occurs numerous times, people stop using. They can only tolerate so much of that... frustration and after a while there is an easier way to do it than banging your head against a wall. (Lynne, Main Street interview 1:P1)

Why wouldn't you have resistance? Like Lynne is saying you plan this great activity, for half a day you've got the lab booked and the WIN is down and you can't do anything. So it's very frustrating.

(Dorothy, Main Street interview 2:P2) Resistance to information technology thus constitutes a complex set of relations between the individual, the technology itself, and the social, political and material environments in which it is implemented. The next section addresses the study’s findings concerning these environmental issues. III Environmental factors

This study considers the environment in which ICT implementation takes place as consisting of the complex web of relations between teachers and the other participants in education: colleagues, supervisors, technical support personnel, students, governments and the community at large. Focusing on the ways in which this relational web is viewed by the respondents, the following two aspects are reviewed: first, material and logistical factors, including issues of time and equipment; and second, questions related to two communities – that within the school, and that which the school serves. > Logistics This section addresses issues related to time and equipment, the two issues most often articulated by the respondents as a barrier to successful ICT implementation.4 Simply 4 out of 176 quotations coded for “obstacle” 108 – 61 percent – were also coded under “time” or “equipment”.


put, adequate time and sufficient, functional equipment help make successful implementation possible; when they are absent or in short supply the work of educators becomes much more difficult. Logistical concerns were raised by all but three of the 31 individuals interviewed. In a few cases either time or equipment was mentioned: the vast majority of comments in relation to these issues mentioned both. But these are schools that have met with success in implementing technology. If time and equipment are obstacles, then, to some degree at least the schools must be overcoming them. The question becomes, how? Typical comments concerning time – for training or implementation – and/or malfunctioning equipment as obstacles to learning and implementation of ICT include the following:

The barriers are time, and resources that work immediately. In other jobs maybe you can spend some time trying to figure out how something works, but teaching [in the computer lab] you have thirty kids behind you and you really don't have the time to play around with anything with this until it works. It has to work when you bring the class there. (Lynne, Main Street interview 1:P1) There is an incredible bureaucracy now.... It took me six months last year to get Winzip put on my network, six months! It’s incredibly frustrating and if I knew a way of breaking away from them and doing our own, I would be sorely tempted.... I understand it from their point of view to some degree. But obvious educational things, I don’t see why there is such a slow process to go through to get something authorized….[And] the fact that [computers are] breaking down, that is very frustrating, frustrating for kids and for teachers. I mean, if you have a 40-minute class and it takes you 20 minutes to log your class on, where is the effective teaching? It’s not there. (Martin, Ladyslipper interview 1:P11)

A particularly illustrative exchange, which connects concerns of time and equipment with the broader issue of mandated changes to education as a whole, also took place at Ravine, between two teachers taking part in the same interview:

Belinda: Yeah, the problem is that there are just not enough computers… I know we’re very fortunate and this sounds very unkind, but there simply aren’t enough computers, because if we’re going to use them more, we have to have more in our classrooms. And for some of us teachers, we still have to be given more pushes on how we use them in the classroom. And with me you push. It can be inservice…teach the staff. What is better than a good inservice to get highly motivated and return back to your class and to use it? Laura: You say go back to your class and use it. I went to a computer conference, I came away with a lot of stuff, I even got demo discs, [but] I haven’t even had a chance to use them. Belinda: It’s the time, the time to…


Laura: Find the time to do it, you don’t have 48 hours in the day.… Belinda: I think what the Ministry is asking us to do, just with our curriculum and with the huge changes that have been brought in and to just integrate that, I think right now it’s an overload period in education and it’s hard to do it all.

(Ravine interview 1:P6)

Still, although respondents have a great deal to say about insufficient hardware, delays in obtaining software, and a lack of time for learning and using ICT, they also describe ways in which these concerns are positively and creatively addressed within the contexts of the specific schools. Teachers are resourceful people; they speak about planning and teaching as teams so as to make extra time for learning, using simple programs on older and slower computers with students for whom it is appropriate, and keeping “spare parts” handy so as to be able to repair hard drives when they break down. In addition, as detailed above, they use a collaborative, on-the-job model of learning and mentoring to help overcome obstacles; in a sense crisis intervention is built into this “just in time” approach. In other circumstances, sometimes the strategy for overcoming obstacles is simply to take matters into one’s own – or one’s school’s – hands:

If we wait around for the Department of Education or the technicians to make up their mind, we'd still be waiting next year for something fairly simple to be done. So basically what it boils down to is, if we can do it, let's get it done. (Joseph, Ladyslipper interview 5:P15)

A somewhat different view of the time/equipment issue prevails at Wildrose. One teacher at this school speaks of equipment breakdowns using a discourse of opportunity:

[Computers have] never been such a focal point of what I’ve been doing on my own or with kids that [problems with them have] derailed me. It’s been wonderful when it works and in the times when there have been glitches, there have always been wonderful options in its place. So it’s never been something that I’ve depended on a whole lot. (Paul, Wildrose interview 1:P16)

And the principal, Camilla, takes a similarly positive attitude:

I’ve never seen a down side (to ICT). Even as a teacher, when things didn’t work, oh well, it was a learning opportunity and it never bothered me. Other people I know it does, and rightfully so. I mean it can be incredibly frustrating if one is a fairly tight planner. [But] we just count on things not working sometimes…And it is part of life and it depends how you handle it with the kids.

(Wildrose interview 4:P19) Still, for some individuals, both at Wildrose (where Emma describes as “insane” the amount of time she spends at her job) and elsewhere, insufficient time is problematic; teachers always have too much to do and too little time in which to do it. Thus, in


addition to acknowledging, and expressing gratitude for, their own and their colleagues’ resourcefulness, the teachers articulate, often obliquely, the need for – and shortage of –targeted technological support as a key concern with respect to ICT implementation. Ravine’s Daniel, for example, states:

We're fortunate in the Junior Division, because right across from me is [a teacher] who is one of the computer experts at our school. So if there is a problem with one of the computers, I can quickly slip into his class. He can come, fix the problem on my computer.... (Ravine interview 5:P20)

He acknowledges that that there is a technician who comes to Ravine periodically, but further asserts that “ideally, we would like to have him permanently at our school. He knows so much and shows us so much; but again, it's just a matter of time. When can he show us this? Again, it's on your lunch time when you're involved in other things as well.” Similarly, Ladyslipper’s Kate expresses the view that colleagues “are essential, because there is nobody else to do it. It's not provided at the Department level, and they really have a situation in there with their techs.” (Ladyslipper interview 3:P13) The “situation” of which Kate speaks is, quite simply, one of insufficient technical support. And this concern arises at all the schools. At Main Street, Alberto is emphatic:

In business you call it the helpdesk or something, but if we are going to buy all the technology and then rely on the good grace of people to acquire all the knowledge somehow that's not necessarily going to work. We use Bernard, he is actually a classroom assistant but he is more or less our technician.... We are lucky because Rex is in the position that he is where he is doing that for many staff people but otherwise we wouldn't really have a lab because it would fall apart and no one would have time to fix it. (Main Street interview 1:P1)

Further, Alberto distinguishes knowledgeable library teachers or classroom assistants, who want to help but have other duties to perform, from on-site technicians dedicated to ICT support. And others agree. Asked what is needed for teachers to overcome the frustrations of dealing with malfunctioning equipment, Fung Lee replies simply, “I think schools should have technicians.” The teachers at Wildrose corroborate this view. Emma and Paul outline the support that is available: one teacher, Sara, who has part of her teaching load dedicated to technology support, technicians who come to the school once every two weeks or three weeks to make sure the system is running effectively; a part-time computer technician who's here two days a week, and “a great deal of staff expertise.” But when asked if this is sufficient, Emma says it is not, because

[although] our system isn't down all that often...on the days when it does crash or is not up and running, there is a high level of frustration in those of us who are depending on it to be there. There are always things to be fixed and I know that Sara doesn't ever have enough time …and neither does the part-time technician. They never have enough time to fix everything that needs to be fixed or to get to


everything that needs to be fixed. So in that way, no, we don't have enough support. (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

At Ravine, Arielle has noticed a decrease in the amount of support available. Most of the ICT specialists, she says,

are actually centered in a high school, because of the amount of technology; [the school board] think they’re more needed there. And that is a real disadvantage to elementary schools... [because although] we have a lot of expertise on staff and a lot of basic things we can get covered...there are other things where we don’t have the expertise and we do have to wait longer now to get that support.

This is problematic for Arielle, who goes on to point out that the teachers who do provide what support they can “are both teachers, they both teach too. The time that is actually allotted for that technical support...they are really doing it on their own time, you know. And it doesn’t seem fair in some ways that they have to do that.... (Ravine interview 6:P21) Similarly, Wildrose teachers discuss their concerns about using teaching time for work that ought more properly to be done by technicians. Asked whether the available technical support is sufficient, Jill exclaims,

No! It never has been. We need a full-time, not teacher, a full-time technology person on the staff.... It's not fair to take a teacher from a classroom, even though they've been very willing.... You need a technology person on staff, full time! That that's their job, that that's what they do.... We're teachers, we are not – I call them mechanics.

Peter agrees, repeating, “Like you say, I'm a teacher! Come and do those things, the Web things, come and teach through the technology. So have a full-time tech person…” (Wildrose interview 2:P17) Further, the teachers outline numerous ways in which their colleagues, and particularly their principals, advocate for them, helping them find ways to learn about technology and make it work, even in a period of government-imposed fiscal restraint and ever-increasing demands on educators in terms of accountability. For example, when asked what is innovative about the Main Street environment, Rex, the librarian, responds:

There is a kind of permission and the freedom to just sort of explore, and recognition that you need time to do things well. There are also these other tangible examples of support. I know that we have a computer projector that was relatively expensive two and a half years ago – $3,000. We spoke about that being important so I could teach children how to use the Internet with one monitor and 26 children sitting around. So we invested in that and it made sense to Indira [the principal], so that was a very heavy investment. That really sort of transforms the lesson. (Main Street interview 4:P4)


Richard, the teacher mentor at Ladyslipper, relates how the principal

knows that in order to keep on the edge, you're going to have to find alternate ways of funding your school, finding ways of getting computers in your class, in the school, for the kids.... So [he] is finding alternate ways of getting funded to keep technology on a cutting edge here, so that we're always up and that the kids are always aware of new technology; so that they're excited.

(Ladyslipper interview 4:P14) Also at Ladyslipper, Joseph, the resource person, describes how

Martin [the former vice-principal] was the driving force behind getting computers in the school.... And Martin has always been sort of the driving force in getting the equipment in and keeping the equipment up to date and building the lab up to what it is. And we've been very, very lucky with having it, because as we became more innovative, we required better equipment, and the Department of Education did sort of recognize this and was keeping us fairly up to date on things.

(Ladyslipper interview 5:P15) And at Ravine, Laura, who speaks so emphatically (above) of having insufficient time, also recognizes that “there are a lot of influences. And again, it’s the principals who allow you the time to develop.” (Ravine interview 1:P6) >Community This study engages the concept of community in two ways: first, as it is made within the schools, through leadership and collaboration, and second, as it evolves between the schools and the communities they serve. The perception on the part of the teachers that their principals offer both tangible and intangible support, as described in the previous section, serves as a starting point for the first conceptualization of community. But principals do more than support teachers; they also lead. And it is useful to examine, school by school, the correspondences between what teachers and support staff on one hand, and principals themselves (or in one case – Ladyslipper – a former vice-principal) on the other hand, view as appropriate leadership. Indira, principal at Main Street, describes leadership as one of

many things that happen within the culture of the school that create [an innovative] kind of climate.... It’s not necessarily [done] in a formal way or in a staff meeting where we would come up with goals and vision statements.... I think one of the things you have to do is really get to know [the teachers] well, and


they've got to trust you and feel that you are there supporting them and advocating for them. Here, it's a very open door policy.

Her former vice-principal, Elaine, concurs, speaking of an openness in leadership that makes a staff collaborate in positive ways. Speaking of her and Indira’s work together, Elaine continues: “We never set barriers or boundaries, we would admit our own areas of weaknesses. We used to tease Indira because all she knew was the Internet.... No one ever said, ‘Oh, I know about this and it's my decision.’ It never happened.” (Main Street interview 3:P3) And Rex, the library teacher at Main Street, gives his own view, worth quoting at length for the ways in which it coincides remarkably with those of Indira and Elaine:

This is a school where the atmosphere is very relaxed with administrators who give you an opportunity to basically experiment and explore and you don't have to be perfect. In much the same way that my administrators, my principal, vice principal don't profess to be [perfect], they realize that they have shortcomings, that they have strengths and weaknesses and they share those with us and they laugh about them. In that kind of environment it allows us to be risk takers, to make mistakes and laugh at our weaknesses.... I think that that's the kind of culture that's created here and that's allowed Indira to hire her staff, which sort of works together well and likes being here. I think I've been here about 12 years. I enjoy being here, I enjoy the environment, I enjoy the freedom of being able to do things. Indira also recognizes that it's very important to provide...me with some administration time to do the things I have to do. She...understands teachers and their needs and I think that's another aspect in terms of why Indira has been able to assemble such a great staff and keep them happy.

(Main Street interview 4:P4) At Ravine, Laura finds that “it goes back to being allowed to do your own thing with encouragement to improve” (Ravine interview 1:P6). Her fellow teacher Belinda summarizes the ways in which leadership has been beneficial not only at Ravine but throughout her career, saying: “I think what shaped my background is being surrounded all through my teaching career by some pretty amazing...principals that were willing give tremendous, tremendous opportunities to learn.” (Ravine interview 1:P6) Both these teachers articulate a view of good leadership as that which provides opportunities for teachers to engage on an ongoing basis in their own learning. And Anita, the principal at Ravine, describes something very similar, though she is actually referring to teachers other than Belinda and Laura:

With someone like Lorraine, you let her do what she wants to do; you just keep supporting her. And the same with Mary, they are people who are visionary, who have a passion for what they do, who are knowledgeable. You just keep supporting them and you try to keep the roadblocks out of their way. (Ravine interview 4:P9)


This pattern, of congruence between teachers’ and principals’ comments on leadership, holds in the interview data from Ladyslipper. Although Martin left his vice-principalship at the school last year, he returned to take part in the study and to be interviewed. Although for the most part he refrains from speaking directly of his own administrative accomplishments, through indirect comments about principals he has worked with at Ladyslipper he depicts a leadership style that works hard to meet goals while maintaining a friendly atmosphere:

.... The two principals that were here before [the current principal] were totally supportive, not just with me in technology but with other teachers and other ideas. They were just wonderful. You'd get an idea, you'd go with it and see how far you could go. .... Schools [in the area] that had people who were interested and involved and wanted to put extra time in are far ahead with what they’re doing with their kids from the schools where the machines were just popped in and teachers either didn’t have an innate interest or leadership, or something was missing. .... [The staff] looked to me and [the former principal], yes, for some kind of leadership, guidance, support. But I never, ever felt that I was dragging people by the heels into it.... [It was] very casual, it's very informal, it's very personal.... (Ladyslipper interview 1:P11)

Once again, there is a similarity between this version of leadership and that articulated by Kate, who teaches grade 4 at Ladyslipper:

I think a lot of it was the credibility that administration had with the staff. Now we might have sometimes felt … ‘Oh gee, can I keep this pace?’ or ‘Am I being lost in left field in what's going on?’ But I guess it's very easy to follow leadership where it's ‘do as I do, not as I say.’ They [Martin and the former principal] led the way, they put in the hours, they did the work. So if they asked something of us, you would at least give it your best effort, because you knew they were leading by example, not by talk. (Ladyslipper interview 3:P13)

And in speaking of the current principal, Richard echoes this view of the importance of leadership by hard work and example:

And if you promote, ‘Well, we spent all this money on computers, we better use it’.... Well I guess the principal...teaches some, and he takes kids out and shows that he's willing to have kids out in the lab situation, [and] other people say, ‘Oh, you know he's doing it, we should do it too.’ As far as I'm concerned, you lead by showing and doing and not just telling… it's not just ‘do as I say,’ it’s ‘do as I do.’...[Leadership has to be] creative, getting funding, and also you know, going in the lab themselves and saying, ‘Look, I can do it, so can you.’

(Ladyslipper interview 14:P4) Teachers and principal at the fourth school, Wildrose, articulate a somewhat different vision of leadership than the respondents at the other three schools. While the principals


at Main Street, Ravine and Ladyslipper were clearly visionary in their philosophies, and highly democratic in their relations with the teachers in their schools, there is evidence in the interviews at Wildrose that gestures toward a leadership style that is more collaborative still. Indeed, none of the teachers interviewed at Wildrose even referred to the principal, Camilla, as a leader; throughout the transcripts from that school the word leader, with one exception, was used to refer to students or to courses in “leadership” that teachers were taking – the one exception was when the word was used in reference to a former principal. Nevertheless, at Wildrose, as at the other schools, the statements made by both principal and teachers each confirmed, repeatedly, the others’ view of their interrelationship as one of collaboration and mutual support, in which all parties are engaged in the enterprise of learning together. Camilla (the principal) says:

The principal is certainly responsible for everything that happens, although Dana and I definitely… that's definitely a team. We share things, everything, school visioning, supporting teachers, supporting children. I guess that's what we would see as our first job and responsibility here, supporting students and teachers.

Dana, the vice-principal, goes on to say that “Camilla and I don't define our different roles. We take on whatever comes on the plate when it comes.... Camilla is ultimately responsible, I mean just simply in her description, however that's not how we operate in most cases.” (Wildrose interview 4:P19) Teacher Paul described Camilla as “very supportive” and his colleague Emma agreed, enlarging her comment to relate her perception of the school’s shared pedagogical philosophy:

She's very supportive. It's really hard to separate because it is so much of part of what we do. Our decisions and our choices come in how to use it most appropriately. Whether the technology is actually going to serve the purpose that we want it to serve or whether pen and paper are the best way to get our ideas across, or paint brush a paper, or a musical instrument, or just talking. I think that our principal is extremely supportive of what we're doing and we all, for the most part of the staff, have very similar visions of what teaching and learning should be. (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

As Emma’s expanded commentary suggests, perceptions of what effective leadership is, and ought to be, are not all that is shared in these schools. The significance of collaboration among teachers, with respect to ICT, cannot be overestimated. Simply put, teachers need each other – for team teaching and planning, as Fung Lee, teaching at Main Street, puts it: “We spend time together planning. We don’t have a common time, but a lot of lunch hours and after school we do a lot of units together. We also share a lot of our resources.” Teachers also rely on each other for help solving technical problems, as outlined earlier, and for informal learning in a collegial, collaborative and mutually supportive context. Main Street’s Dorothy, for example, is valued by her colleagues for her ability to help fellow teachers “make sense” of ICT. She is committed to the idea that “as a technology leader in the school you sort of have to be a psychologist as well and support these teachers that don't have the experience and have fear about it.” (Main Street interview 2:P2) Carole, at Ladyslipper, echoes this view; for her the support of fellow


teachers is “essential [because] I don't have the confidence to just tackle [ICT concepts] on my own, if they weren't there to give me backup.” (Ladyslipper interview 3:P13) For Wildrose’s Alan, who has “been lucky enough to be associated with some extremely strong teachers in the ICT skills,” collaboration is “an opportunity” – “There is no threat between veteran teachers and new teachers, there is no threat of information. Either someone has a lot of experience or someone is bringing in brand new knowledge.” (Wildrose interview 2:P17) And fellow teacher Jill asserts emphatically that informal networking is “the strongest, strongest thing in this school.” (Wildrose interview 2:P17) These shared practices, along with the shared perceptions of leadership and needs, are representative of something larger: shared pedagogical philosophies – or ideologies – respecting ICT. The interviews reveal that in each of the schools there are specific pedagogical goals informing and supporting the project of ICT implementation. Briefly, these goals and ideologies can be summarized as follows:

Ravine’s educators see themselves as preparing children for a future involving technology. As the principal, Anita, puts it, “We have to provide the kids with some of the skills and some of the tools they need for the future. And one of those is going to be computer expertise.” (Ravine interview 3:P9) Other goals are related to goal-setting, issues of social responsibility, and the increasing of student self-esteem, and ICT is viewed as having the potential to contribute to those goals. Linguistic, social and cultural equity are also concerns: the community served by Ravine includes new Canadians whose first language is not English and for whom, it is perceived, there may be linguistic and cultural barriers to full participation in education, and diminished “life chances” because, it is believed, “the language and educational backgrounds of their parents may provide limited exposure to the kinds of communication and literacy practices expected and valued by the school” (Lotherington et al 2001, p. 142). In this vein, the school conducts initiatives such as “Internet nights” in an attempt to improve school/home communication and to impress upon the community the importance of education for its children. At Main Street as well, it is believed that ICT will help prepare students for the future. Technology is spoken about using discourses of equity and opportunity. The student body is made up of children from lower socioeconomic classes who are seen, due to a shortage of financial resources, as individuals who “lack lots of experiences – they haven't been places, they haven't seen things.” Thus, an important goal, understood to be achievable partly through with the use of ICT, is to provide opportunities for students to make connections with a larger world, and with various forms of knowledge, in ways the educators believe might not otherwise be possible. As at Ravine, equity issues are at the forefront at Main Street; here the focus is on cultural equality as it relates to gender, and goals include providing opportunities for girls to engage with technology in ways that, given the home cultures of the students at the school, might not “naturally” occur. Ladyslipper’s philosophy with regard to ICT focuses on using technology as “just another part” of “relating to the child” (Carole, Ladyslipper interview 3:P13) – meeting the needs of individual learners, and preparing them for the future by teaching them skills that will


keep them at the forefront of ICT. The school aims to expose students to the world outside their own community through projects that involve using ICT to share their work with others, and to help them pursue their own educational goals, both individually and collaboratively, in creative and original ways. Goals include the integration of ICT in all aspects of curriculum, so as to provide the balance between technology and traditional academic work that the Ladyslipper educators believe the community demands. At Wildrose the overall goal of the school is making meaningful learning relationships between students, the community and the environment. The prevailing aim, with respect to ICT, is an ongoing “evolution of understanding of teaching and learning” (Camilla, Wildrose interview 4:P19). It is further summed up by Emma as the work of imparting to teachers, students, and the community at large, which initially resisted the implementation, a “deeper understanding of how technology is a tool to learning and that we need to make appropriate decisions about how we are using it effectively....” (BP interview 1:P16) Skills acquisition takes place as an ongoing component of learning writ large – computer skills of themselves are not a learning goal at Wildrose, but rather are usually seamlessly integrated into learning and teaching practices. Although there is significant overlap with respect to some of their objectives, the four schools studied clearly differ in terms of pedagogical goals, ICT objectives and actual practices, their differences arising, in large part, out of the differences in the demographics of the communities they serve. What they do share in common is a deep commitment to their respective communities, and a conceptual understanding of information and communications technologies as increasingly useful for the communities’ work. Each school’s commitment to ICT is thus grounded in its commitment to its community. Still, ambivalence with respect to many facets of education is present outside the schools as such, in the community at large. Couture refers to the work of teachers as that of “receiv[ing] and interpret[ing] the calls for an increased emphasis on technology within a social milieu that is ambivalent about their work” in general (1992, p. 141). It follows then that community resistance to ICT is common, and the experiences of the educators at the schools studied here bears this out. All four schools studied have met with resistance to ICT implementation, not only on the part of the teachers, as discussed earlier, but from the communities in which they function. At Wildrose, Paul reports, parents asked “Why should [students] be sitting in front of a computer screen all the time? What does that have to do with what matters in the world?” (P16) At Ladyslipper, ICT was initially understood by the community as conflicting with academic pursuits. And at both Main Street and Ravine, while it is perceived that cultural factors in the surrounding communities may be a limiting factor with respect to the potential of ICT, there is also an understanding that schools must negotiate with the communities they serve: as Main Street’s principal comments,

It does take a while when you have such a vibrant community to really get to know them and you don't want to go in and start disturbing without really understanding the context in which you are working. We found that we had to


pretty well modify most of our approaches vis-à-vis the school and I think that's partly one of the reasons why it's been as successful as it has.

(Main Street interview 3:P3) At the four schools studied, community resistance, in particular to the implementation of ICT, has been and continues to be addressed by actions grounded in the philosophical commitments on the part of the educators and administrators at each school to information technology as a worthwhile component of education. The prevailing view of ICT as a useful pedagogical tool, and the sense of its usefulness with respect to the needs of the school community (both students and their families), does not mean, however, that support for ICT is unbounded and unquestioning. On the contrary, part of what makes these schools strong is the fact that philosophical inquiry into the usefulness of the technology is both encouraged and ongoing. Teachers articulate questions on many levels, from the particular to the very general. For example, Dorothy mentions a specific concern in relation to an online course she is currently taking:

... Human interaction face-to-face is eliminated... and because you don't have that face-to-face interaction people write nasty things to each other. Also you are to comment on the person's write-up that they posted on the Web chat, [and] people will really criticize you in a way they would not do in a class. So I do wonder about that, that people take certain liberties that they shouldn't take, or whether or not it's better because it encourages more honesty.

(Main Street interview 2:P2) Wildrose teacher Jill perceives ICT as valuable for the ways in which it demands inquiry into teaching in general:

I think it’s essential to have that questioning and that looking deeply at your practice and discussing your practice and I find that the work I’m doing with AISI5 this year [is] what most schools are striving for now. They want to start examining practice. They want to start having those conversations about why do we do these things. Why do we have spell tests? Are they worthwhile? And examining it and not just throwing it out, but actually looking at it and saying, “What are the benefits, what are the pitfalls? Why are we doing it? Are we doing it just because it’s tradition or is it grounded in something that’s educationally sound and valuable for children?” (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

In fact, many of the educators at Wildrose articulate these large philosophical concerns. For Emma, the question is whether “the technology is actually going to serve the purpose that we want it to serve or whether pen and paper are the best way to get our ideas across, or paint brush a paper, or a musical instrument, or just talking.” (Wildrose interview 1:P16) Paul speaks of the profound difficulty encountered by teachers in the process of changing their practice to incorporate, among other things, information technology, in

5 Alberta Initiative for School Improvement


asking important questions of themselves, such as “Have I not been on the right track, has nothing I've done been meaningful?” He goes on:

There is a snowball effect that has repercussions that go far beyond the simple questions posed in examining a theory, because it's rooted very deeply in the person, the practice. And we discovered that quite painfully in those first two or three years.... It was so difficult to have any distance between the person and the practice. (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

And Laura agrees with Paul’s earlier comment concerning “the basics that matter” (at p. 15above), saying that, indeed, there is

a different sense of what is basic. But it's not only a different sense of what is basic for the students but what is basic for the teacher. And it's made the teachers examine how they are perhaps developing programming, how they're presenting it to their students. And are their students able to progress in [such] a manner that they're still enhancing their learning? (Wildrose interview 1:P16)

This kind of rigorous and sometimes painful inquiry requires intellectual work: such work takes time. Recalling a comment of Rex, the librarian at Main Street, concerning the principal’s “recognition that you need time to do things well” (Main Street interview 4:P4), it is worth noting two things: first, it is the teachers at Wildrose who articulate these pedagogical concerns most explicitly; and second, of the four schools studied, Wildrose is the only one that offers its teachers scheduled “blocks of time...to engage in research-related activities.” The principal, Camilla, explains this as part of an overarching commitment, at the school, to “inspire a passionate commitment to learning.” (Wildrose interview 3:P18) Specifically, with reference to ICT, Camilla stresses the importance of two factors:

Time, and commitment. Time in the form of time to reflect; time to talk; time to play with ICT; hardware, software; time to work alongside children so that we can observe and be with them as learners. Commitment on the part of staff, certainly, and parents to value this kind of work and to value that time. (Wildrose interview 3:P19)

But Camilla also recognizes the problematic aspects of this approach to acknowledging the importance of these factors and providing time for educators to engage with them, and the potential conflict between valuing this intellectual and theoretical inquiry, on one hand, and the daily work of maintaining continuity for both students and teachers on the other. While the four schools may differ substantially in terms of the general ideologies, and specific goals, which they pursue in their implementation of information technology, what the interviews make clear is that grounding these different philosophies is a core sense of purpose that is remarkably consistent. Ladyslipper’s Pierre articulates it as a “struggle...whether you have technology or not. You’re always looking for ways for


children to improve. And all teachers, I think, are constantly looking for that. (Ladyslipper interview 2:P12) And Lynne, at Main Street, similarly asserts that she and her colleagues “are constantly trying to get better, and teachers on a whole want to make the world better.” (Main Street interview 1:P1)

Conclusion The educators whose stories about technological implementation are told here form a diverse group. Working in schools in different settings (urban and rural), in different parts of Canada, embodying a wide variety of experiences, educational backgrounds, ages, attitudes and beliefs concerning ICT, and ways of learning, at first glance there might seem to be little that unifies them. Yet their stories are being told because of something they share in common: they are all participants in successful ICT implementation projects. This inquiry has addressed multiple factors that affect the process of implementing new technologies: modes of learning, characteristics of individual teachers-as-learners, and ideological issues within the schools themselves and the communities they serve. While it is of paramount importance to note that there is no one factor that can guarantee success with technology or with any other facet of a practice as complex as education – that is, no single sufficient condition – the data reveal that, though differently articulated, there is, present in the four schools, a set of necessary conditions, without which success as it has come to pass in the schools would not have been possible. And within the four schools, Wildrose, Main Street, Ravine and Ladyslipper, these conditions are remarkably consistent. In the written version of an address given to the US’s National Commission on K-12 Science and Math Education,6 concerning the challenges currently faced within education, Soloway et al articulate “Three Ts of Elementary Education” – tasks, tools, and time – as necessary to support teachers and teaching in their efforts to “integrate technology into the daily fabric of their instructional practices” (Soloway et al 2000, p.15). Mapping this general concept onto the analysis of the views articulated by the educators in this Canadian study, the factors contributing to the success of the schools can be grouped into three new categories: computers, commitment, and community. Clearly, the category of computers includes the hardware and the software necessary for implementation. Teachers cannot teach computer skills, nor can they integrate these skills into curriculum, without having at their disposal machines that work. At Main Street School, in recognition of this need, teachers were provided with state-of-the-art laptop computers, which allowed them to undertake the kind of exploratory research, both at school and at home, that they found so helpful in advancing their own learning. But simply possessing equipment is not enough: administrative or logistical delays in obtaining equipment and software, and in repairing machines that have broken, cause significant difficulties for teachers. Although educators are resourceful, and remarkably 6 www.ed.gov/america-counts/glenn/toc.html

http://www.ed.gov/america-counts/glenn/toc.html


willing to soldier on with outdated equipment, making do as best they can – and indeed to remain purposeful and optimistic while doing so – it is clear from the data analysed here that a lack of appropriate material resources causes frustration, inhibits learning and invites resistance on the part of teachers, students and the community. In addition to material resources, schools need appropriate technical support. At all of the schools studied, the need was expressed similarly: full-time technical support is as necessary as the machines themselves if teachers are to surpass the basic logistical and technical problems of computer use in order to move on to the more significant, and sought-after, components of implementation, namely curricular integration and meaning-making. Related to technical support is the need for significant opportunities for learning how to use ICT resources. This is self-evident: teachers need to know what they are teaching. What is perhaps less obvious is the form these learning opportunities ought to take. The evidence detailed in this study points firmly in the direction of informal learning as the most useful context for the acquisition of computer skills on the part of teachers. It is tricky, for by definition informal learning of the kinds described by the teachers interviewed takes place in unstructured settings, as it is needed, and as time permits. Still, it is not impossible; at Wildrose, for example, ways have been found to provide teachers with time designated for learning and discussion without mandating specifically what the learning and the discussion might be about. The vision that has enabled Wildrose to find creative ways to support teacher learning regarding ICT is exemplary, but it is not unique. Each of the four schools embodies the kind of commitment that is necessary to find creative ways to make technology useful for them. This commitment takes many forms: school boards make commitments to schools; principals are dedicated to providing professional development in whatever forms their teachers find useful, and teachers themselves are focused on investigating the potential of ICT as a useful pedagogical tool. But across the four schools, two commitments are most significant. The first is a universal commitment to their students’ learning. Significantly, not all teachers view technology in precisely the same ways, or in equally positive ways; this commitment takes as many different forms as there are teachers in the different schools. In all cases, however, it is grounded in the teachers’ understanding of the needs of their students and in their belief that information technology offers ways to help meet those needs. The second crucial form that commitment to worthwhile ICT implementation takes is the determination, on the part of the educators studied, to an ongoing critical inquiry into all aspects of ICT. While some respondents articulate it as “skepticism” and others describe it as “concern”, it is apparent that all are engaged not only in learning the skills needed to work with and to teach the technology, but also in the practical and theoretical work of thinking about technology in ways that inform their practice. And this thinking, this inquiry, itself arises out of still another commitment: the educators’ commitment to serving the needs not only of the individual students they teach, but also of the larger communities from which their students come and to which they return at the end of the school day.


The communities served by the four schools share some characteristics, yet each is unique; as set out in the introduction and evidenced throughout this report, each community has specific needs and particular ways of engaging in relations with its school. Teachers at all four schools have perceived, and are continually working with, multifaceted questions of equity, privilege, language and community support, and with varying philosophies of pedagogy informed by the various cultural and socioeconomic characteristics of the communities in which their schools function. Further, in each school, ways have been found to begin bridging gaps between the work of education and community perceptions of what that work ought to be. At Main Street, for instance, community outreach programs have been implemented in order to assist families new to Canada with finding available resources, while at Wildrose, community resistance to the innovative teaching practices has been ameliorated through the structured exhibition of student work. These efforts have not always met with unbridled success, but it is significant that the teachers understand the importance of their work not only as pedagogy writ large but also as the making and maintaining of relations between the school and the larger community. Here the concepts of commitment and community are woven together. In addition to the larger communities within which the schools function are the learning communities within the schools. In each of the four schools studied, the notion of community among the educators interviewed can be seen to manifest itself in multiple ways, including collegial support, collaborative engagement in learning, and encouragement from administrators. These three factors are of paramount importance. To illustrate, we recall the striking distinction in the degree of usefulness of various forms of professional development, as perceived by our respondents (fig. 1, p.5 above). While a substantial number find university courses, and workshops offered by school boards, to be useful for the acquisition of technological skills, there is clearly a strong preference for the kinds of learning that take place informally, in school halls and staff rooms with colleagues, and in classrooms and computer labs with students, whose roles at times seem to be transformed from pupil to colleague. It is this learning, undertaken collaboratively and as needs arise, which has the most significant impact on teacher practices. Further, support from and collaboration with colleagues function on levels other than skills acquisition as such: when a teacher refers to “on-going and sustained dialogue and discussion about what [ICT] means and what matters” (Paul, Wildrose interview 1:P16), he is speaking to the question of how knowledge and ideology are constructed within a community that does much more than focus on the learning of skills. This is a community that thinks not only about what it is doing, but about why it should be done, and how best to do it. Similarly, the Triad program at Ravine embodies structured collaboration and continuous communication among teachers, which serves to broaden and deepen understandings of the ways in which ICT can help meet the needs of the educational community within and around that school. The importance of collegial dialogue, learning and encouragement extends to the numerous kinds of enthusiastic support given by principals to the teachers under their supervision. This support is most frequently articulated as the ways in which the


principals in this study encourage teachers to undertake learning on their own, variously described throughout the interviews as “a kind of permission and the freedom to just sort of explore” (Main Street interview 4:P4); “the time to develop” (Ravine interview 1:P6); the sense that “you don't have to be perfect [but can]… be risk takers, to make mistakes and laugh at our weaknesses” (Main Street interview 4:P4). These principals seem to take a constructivist view of teachers’ professional development, which corresponds to the teachers’ own sense that the learning they find most useful is that undertaken in informal settings, for specific purposes, in the context of a recognized need. Interestingly, Becker (2000) has also found a relationship between a constructivist philosophy of pedagogy (specifically with respect to student learning) on the part of teachers and their use, in their teaching, of ICT. In a survey of more than 4000 teachers in the US, Becker finds that

…teachers who have students use non-skills-oriented computer software in academic classes [are]…disproportionately supportive of constructivist pedagogies such as developing student responsibility, …group work, and …projects, products and performances for outside audiences. (2000, p.28)

Perhaps the relationship articulated by Becker with respect to teachers’ views of student learning can also be applied to teachers’ views of their own learning, and by extension, to principals’ acceptance and encouragement, at least in this study, of such learning processes as pedagogically sound for both students and teachers. Still, whether principals’ support takes this form, or another, more tangible, form of efforts to obtain funding for needed equipment, or even a third form of support for all of the contributions – not just those related to ICT – which staff members make to the life of the school, it is to a significant extent the work that principals do, in recognizing and building on all aspects of community within the school, that allows innovation to take place in the atmosphere of shared commitment that these four schools exemplify. This last form of support on the part of principals, namely the recognition of all the varied contributions that teachers make to school life, may help our understanding concerning the lack of a direct relationship between the length of an individual’s teaching career and his/her and experience with ICT, on one hand, and the successful implementation of technological innovation, on the other. Becker notes that

teachers who have a reasonable amount of technical skill … use computers in broader and more sophisticated ways with students than teachers who have limited technical skills and no personal investment in using computers themselves. (Becker 2000, p. 7)

In our study, however, while teachers’ ICT skills clearly factor into the success of their implementations, the relationship between success and skills qua skills is complex and not obviously predictive: simply put, attitudes, philosophies, communication, and access to skills training are all contributing factors. Perhaps what makes for success in these four schools can be viewed globally as what Becker names “personal investment”. At Wildrose, Ladyslipper, Main Street and Ravine the individual teachers have a twofold investment: in ongoing individual development, and in the school community writ large.


Thus, though knowledge and skills are certainly not without importance, it is the ways in which they are relevant to the school community which determine both their pedagogical usefulness and the degree to which they are integrated successfully into the day-to-day work of education. In addition, the ways in which such knowledge and skills are acquired – through collaboration, ongoing informal co-constructed learning, and shared contributions in all areas of school life – reinforce the notion of the school as a community of learners, and allow for the full participation of a heterogeneous group of individuals. Put differently, in an environment where continuous learning – as well as already having skills – is emphasized and encouraged, the opportunity exists for individuals to excel in multiple ways, both as individuals and as contributing members of a learning community. And it is this learning community, and the culture and ideology developed within it, which constitutes perhaps the most significant component of successful ICT implementation – or of any other pedagogical initiative, for that matter. For it is this in-school community, formed and informed by all the practices, relationships and philosophies of its individual members, that carries out the work of technological implementation, and that supports and enables this work to continue. It is this community whose members advocate for adequate and appropriate hardware and software, provide opportunities for teacher training, and time and support for collaboration and critical inquiry; who engage in the training and the collaborative inquiry, and who bring together the interests of the individuals and communities they serve.


Appendix I. Coding software used: ATLAS.ti version 4.1 II. List of codes A Ways of learning (re ICT):

Formal

a. Courses in ICT skills and/or application i. at university/college ii. online iii. through local school boards iv. through teachers’ unions

b. Formally organized workshops i. in-school ii. outside school iii. outside school

c. Conferences d. Software supplier presentations

Informal

a. With colleagues i. on-the job, “just-in-time” learning ii. “after hours” collaborative learning

b. From technical support personnel c. From students d. From friends and/or family

Individual learning, self-teaching

a. Online Internet exploration b. From software manuals c. Software exploration/play

B. Individual teacher characteristics

Background a. Personal educational background


b. Teaching experience c. ICT skills and experience d. Personal philosophies of learning and teaching

Beliefs and goals relating to ICT in education

a. Pedagogical philosophy concerning ICT b. Interest in ICT implementation c. Resistance to ICT implementation d. Classroom practices using ICT

Personal characteristics

a. Confidence in own ICT skills and experience b. Attitude toward technological change c. Awareness of educational issues related to ICT

C. Environmental factors Logistics

a. Time i. in-class – for teaching using ICT ii. outside class – for teachers’ PD

b. Hardware/software c. Technical support d. Sustainability e. Obstacles to implementation

Community - within the school a. School-wide, shared ideology concerning ICT b. Collegial support for teachers c. Leadership within the school

Community - served by the school

a. Demographics b. Cultural backgrounds of students and teachers c. Equity issues d. Community resistance to ICT e. Community support for ICT f. Community leadership

Policy and curriculum

a. School-, board- and province-wide policies b. ICT and curricular requirements

D. Miscellaneous


c. “successful use” definitions/descriptions

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ndbook.html Smith, L., P. Kleine, J. Punty and D. Dwyer (1992) School improvement and educator

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Canada: Factors Contributing to Teachers' Successful Implementation of Information Technology

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