In A Perfect EdTech World…

In a perfect EdTech world, I would give every teacher an ultrabook running Ubermix, an iPad with AppleTV and a Projector or other Large Format Display (LFD) device. Perhaps even two. This would be the basic “Technology Package”. I’d wrap it around Google Apps for Education and the web. Then I’d throw in a classroom set of student devices; Chromebooks, iPads, Ubermixed notebooks, Nexus 7 tablets or BYOD devices and shake well. Windows and Office would be things learned about in history books as part of the first great wave of personal computing.

Absent too would be printers. The bane of Help Desks everywhere. When everyone has a device, printing becomes a throwback to a different era. A muscle memory that must be excised through conscious and concerted effort. Packaged Curriculum would also be a thing of the past, replaced with teacher generated and curated content, projects, inquiry, search and the web. With a device for every student, they would own their learning, top to bottom.

Classroom technology doesn’t have to be expensive or difficult or restricted. It doesn’t have to conform to the old business norms of yesterday. It just requires a different way of thinking about education technology and what we want to accomplish in the classroom. Free your OS and the rest will follow.