When I started teaching, classrooms still contained blackboards and chalk and the personal computer hadn’t been invented. When I stopped some 10 years later, technology had stretched to whiteboards, wipeable markers and the BBC B.
On returning to teaching as a private maths tutor I spent a day in a local secondary school to see how technology was being used. Interactive whiteboards and their linking with in-class computers makes the teaching environment a lot better than in the late 1970s. Lesson preparation is much easier – no more creating purple Banda masters and duplicating using a mixture of isopropanol and methanol, though the smell was quite enticing!
If there is one part of technology that has made a really big difference it has to be the internet and online teaching resources. Sites like BBC’s GCSE Bitesize are brilliant for students while tried-&-tested lessons from the likes of the TES (Times Educational Supplement) site can save hours in planning.
On the homework front, a number of websites offer comprehensive packages to which many schools subscribe. A good example is MyMaths (www.mymaths.co.uk). For less than £600 per year a secondary school gets a huge interactive resource covering National Curriculum level 2 through to A-level. Unlimited access for all students and teachers, online homework tasks, an assessment manager and booster packs are just some of the advantages.
So what could be wrong with the scenario of personalised homework for all students? From the teacher’s perspective, not much. Cuts down on setting homework, taking in exercise books and handling marking. But there is a huge downside.
Anyone who has marked GCSE papers or worked with the marking schemes that are made available will appreciate that most marks are given for showing the correct methods and working out. In fact it’s possible to get a grade A without having a single correct answer! How? If small mistakes are made, the answer would be wrong (which usually loses one mark) but all method and working out marks would be obtained – and that’s the lion’s share of the marks. How do you show method and working out with online resources such as MyMaths? You can’t. So how do students get used to showing methods and working out? They don’t.
Technology is a brilliant helper but the problems start once you become a slave to it. MyMaths has its place in maths teaching but from what I’ve seen, too many teachers are using it instead of setting proper homework. This might be expedient and provide a short-term answer but until GCSE exams are taken online too, such a lazy approach will adversely affect students’ grades – especially those on the margins of passing.