Digital Pedagogy in Saudi Arabia - Case Study Example

Digital Pedagogical Review Student’s Name Institutional Affiliation Digital Pedagogical Review 1. Background and Context The peer-reviewed article chosen is called “Interactive and multimodal pedagogy: A case study of how teachers and students use interactive whiteboard technology in primary science” and it was written by Karen Murcia. The paper is published in the ‘Australian Journal of Education’, and it explores a case study research on the teacher’s use of interactive whiteboard (IWB) technologies in the classroom and the impacts on the students. The investigative research took place in two different boy schools in the Perth metropolitan area of Western Australia. The methods used by the researchers were video recording and microanalysis techniques on two teachers who were working on schools that had installed permanent IWBs in classrooms with ICT support services. The case study research was conducted in two different schools from a metropolitan area due to diversity, and the schools are recognized to have the highest band of the Index of Community Socio-Educational Advantage (ICSEA) (Murcia, 2014). The target is on elementary school teachers working with 11-year-old students. The primary-level teachers are the main focus because the integration of IWBs is likely to have a significant impact on the student’s participation and interaction in the classroom. The research shows the rapid changes taking place in a contemporary classroom, and the teacher’s perspective on the use of digital technologies in education. The evolution has created an active environment that challenges the teacher’s and student’s interpretation of multimodal representations and scientific occurrences (Murcia, 2014). The primary school students are the main target because they are still developing cognitively, and the use of digital technologies inside and outside the classroom has a significant impact on their creativity, participation, and communication. The article involves a comprehensive insight into the pedagogical decision of teachers to incorporate IWBs and interactive digital technologies in the classroom. The findings show that the use of IWBs helped the students in many ways because teachers could use the boards for different types of interactivity. As a result, the classroom was active and interactive because both students and the teachers could use the tools of the boards and manipulate objects in a creative way. The case study further integrates the use of IWB into the teaching of primary science with the introduction of new tools that facilitate the interpretation of different science concepts, and the overall facilitation of the student’s learning process. The pedagogy has been applied in some schools in Perth metropolitan area of Western Australia such as the two boy schools in the case study. The evaluation of the exploratory case study outlined a link between intentional use of IWB and the enhanced level of thinking and student participation and engagement. Teachers deliberately used representations, sequencing, and linkages to provoke children into creative thinking. The classroom experience is dynamic, active, and interactive with the students moving from the whiteboards to their desks. Therefore, the deliberate use of IWBs in the classroom should be implemented on a large scale for maximum benefits. The case study shows that a wide-scale execution in primary schools would help the students understand different concepts better, and schools diverse background students would have the capabilities to cater for the learning needs of all the children. 2. Critical Appraisal Many researchers have devoted their time and resources to studying the impacts of incorporating technology in the modern day classroom. Studies are continually being published in journals outlining the effects of digital integration in the education system. Focus is placed on the students and the educators rather than the digital technology being introduced. However, the article by Karen Murcia focuses on the teacher’s decision to use f interactive whiteboard (IWB) technologies in two Western Australian primary science classrooms (Murcia, 2014). The question being researched is thoroughly defined in the article, and the case study has a clearly outlined objective that is addressed through the research methodologies applied. The digital pedagogy in the article responds to some issues concerning the application of digital technologies in the classroom. Specifically, the effects of IWB in a primary classroom full of young people. There are many challenges associated with the digital technologies, and the young people are exposed the negative aspects such as ethical questions, social and identity concerns, technological issues and so on. Students have criticized the introduction of IWBs by citing technical problems, unskilled educators, and the boards are difficult to read from a distance. However, there is a lot of positive feedback as well because students enjoy feeling engaged in the lesson, the boards enhance learning motivation, increases concentration levels, improves behaviour and learning due to the creative and fun activities involved. According to a study showing the relationship between the application of IWBs and student achievement, the influence of the boards is multidirectional. The implementation of IWB has a positive bearing on the learning and attainment of math and science subjects. However, the same does not particularly apply to the language area (Manny-Ikan et al. 2011). The primary objective of any classroom is knowledge creation and production. The article claims that IWBs create a productive teaching and learning environment because students can brainstorm ideas, annotate images and texts, as well as search for results online. The intentional use of the boards ensures that the learning process is authentic for the students because they have control of the direction of learning and the active participation encourages cognitive growth. However, Manny-Ikan et al. (2011) argue that the use OF IWBs and other digital technologies in the classroom capitalizes on knowledge production depending on the level of expertise of the educator. The IWBs helps create a faster and fun learning process but, the teacher’s skills and knowledge of the subject matter are crucial for the board to have a positive impact on the students. Therefore, the expertise of the educator is the determining factor, and as such, it should go beyond the capability to use the board for teaching and instruction. The digital pedagogy does not address the issue of technological difficulties and other problems encountered by the educators with the implementation of the IWBs. There technical malfunctions when operating the boards that can be frustrating to teachers. For example, calibration and too much noise can cause delays and restlessness among the students. According to research done by Akkoyunlu and Erkan (2013), teachers complained that technical difficulties led to time loss especially when the issue cannot be resolved immediately. The technological issues also affect the educators who are not skilled in the use of digital technologies. Thus, the implementation of whiteboards is a challenging task for the teachers who have to learn new skills. The intentional integration of IWBs in the classroom requires the necessary know-how to instruct the students and to control the lesson. Therefore, it is crucial for educators first to learn the necessary skills required to plan and use the interactive whiteboard (IWB) technologies. Digital pedagogy addresses the issue of social and cultural identity through participation in the learning process. The case study took place in a metropolitan area, and the schools were chosen partly due to the diversity of the students. Students were willing and active participants in the classroom, and the article asserts that the children would move to the board and manipulate individual objects. The teachers also grouped the students for different tasks. As a result of the active participation and teamwork, the young people appreciate power relationships and dynamics. The use of technology provides the young people with a platform for self-expression and identity learning (Goldman, Booker, & McDermott 2008). Therefore, an active digital classroom helps the students learn how to take charge, express their ideas, and voice their opinions as a way of expressing their identity. The case study needs a thorough look at the issues affecting the young people globally with the integration of new media in the classroom. 3. Application to Your Professional Context I am a primary school teacher in Saudi Arabia, and I teach science. The learning process in Saudi Arabian primary schools is teacher-centred, whereby students play a passive role in the classroom. The teacher provides all the instructions, and the materials and knowledge are directly imparted to the students. Therefore, the students memorize the content rather than understand it. Recently, the Ministry of Education standardized the curriculum to accentuate on creative and critical thinking and problem-solving in the teaching and learning of the science subjects. As a science teacher, I urge my students to learn and understand the concepts in a way that is more meaningful, and I believe that a student-centred teaching and approach has a positive impact on the learning experiences and outcome of the students. Saudi Arabia has taken a significant step towards the integration of digital technologies in the primary schools. The project included training the educators on the use of ICTs to enhance the quality of the learning and the teaching process (Alghamdi & Higgins, 2015). This section compares the Saudi Arabian context and the original context for the digital pedagogy. The case study was intended for the primary school teaching and learning of science and that will be the applicable setting in Saudi Arabia. The similarity is on the positive impact that the use of IWB has on the students. The primary school students have a positive response towards digital technologies in the classroom because learning becomes more fun. Teachers have reported that students become more active and participative in learning. IWBs increase the focus and motivation of the students because of the introduction of various visual and audio learning methods (Gashan & Alshumaimeri, 2015). There is also the development of children in the social and cognitive area because digital technologies provide the young people with a platform for expression. Students with reading difficulties can easily use a visual aid to explain an idea. The main difference is the teaching approach adopted in Saudi Arabia. Digital pedagogy insists on a student-centred approach to the curriculum because students get the chance to control their learning and they are exposed to situations that require the use of creative thinking. Therefore, students gain knowledge and skills during learning. However, Alghamdi and Al-Salouli (2013) explain that the teacher-centred approach is the most practical way in Saudi Arabia because of a large number of students in one classroom. Public primary schools have numerous students from diverse backgrounds. Hence, the behaviour, understanding, and capabilities are different for each student. As a result, it is difficult to implement an instruction-based approach in such a classroom. The application of digital pedagogy in Saudi Arabia exposes the education system to numerous possibilities such as a more improved learning process through different hyperactivities. The students and the teachers will gain new experiences and acquire more digital and social capabilities. The students will potentially become more creative and innovative because they understand different concepts and the interpretation process. Public schools with diverse students will have the capacity to cater for the needs of the various students including those experiencing learning difficulties. Students will learn to plan, observe, analyze reason, question and explain different phenomena. The potential limitation is the technological problems experienced when using IWBs and the educator’s lack of motivation. Teachers who lack the technical know-how are likely to be less enthusiastic in the use of digital technologies in the class. Digital pedagogy is significant in Saudi Arabia because young people get to effectively learn in the same way as other students in developed countries, hence giving them a fair opportunity to compete. However, there are certain actions I would take as a science teacher to make the digital pedagogy more relevant in the country. First, I would enhance the training programs for the educators to ensure that there is some degree of expertise acquired. Second, I would increase the cooperation between educators and the school authority to make sure that the implementation process is smooth. The coordination exercise is essential because the schools are responsible for maintenance and technical support of the technologies. Additionally, I would insist on a strict adherence to the student-centred approach in the teaching process so as to increase the student’s participation in learning and minimize adverse impacts of memorization. Therefore, I believe a combined use of IWBs and the traditional teaching methods is a sure way of encouraging the development of young people because different needs are catered for using various methods. Further, students get the confidence to express themselves during presentations and to display their scientific capabilities to their peers and adults. References Akkoyunlu, B., & Erkan, S. (2013). A study on student and teacher views on technology use. Procedia-Social and Behavioral Sciences, 103, 68-76. Alghamdi, A. K. H., & Al-Salouli, M. S. (2013). Saudi Elementary School Science Teachers’beliefs: Teaching Science inthe New Millennium. International Journal of Science and Mathematics Education, 11(2), 501-525. Alghamdi, A., & Higgins, S. (2015). Investigating how teachers in primary schools in Saudi Arabia were trained to use interactive whiteboards and what their training needs were. International Journal of Technical Research and Applications, Special Issue, 30, 1-10. Cogill, J. (2002). How is the interactive whiteboard being used in the primary school and how does this affect teachers and teaching. Retrieved November, 6, 2009. Gashan, A. K., & Alshumaimeri, Y. A. (2015). Teachers’ Attitudes toward Using Interactive Whiteboards in English Language Classrooms. International Education Studies, 8(12), 176. Goldman, S., Booker, A., & McDermott, M. (2008). Mixing the digital, social, and cultural: Learning, identity, and agency in youth participation.Youth, identity, and digital media, 185-206. Manny-Ikan, E., Dagan, O., Tikochinski, T. B., & Zorman, R. (2011). Using the interactive white board in teaching and learning–An evaluation of the SMART CLASSROOM pilot project. Interdisciplinary Journal of E-Learning and Learning Objects, 7(1), 249-273. Murcia, K. (2014). Interactive and multimodal pedagogy: A case study of how teachers and students use interactive whiteboard technology in primary science. Australian Journal of Education, 0004944113517834. Read More