«We don't use the devices for their own sake»
Mr Neff, you were already dreaming of using smartphones in the classroom back in 2007. Are you a geek?
Neff: No. Many students have a more modern smartphone than I do. But I was immediately impressed by the possibilities when everyone has a stopwatch, a camera, an internet connection and a recording device in their trouser pocket. We use the devices as tools, not for their own sake.
What does that mean?
Neff : Learning apps are not the main focus; we tend to use the functions that the device has.
Döbeli: For example, when the topic of the forest is discussed, the pupils don't stay in the classroom and look at an app. The class goes into the forest. But they also record sounds and photos or look something up.
Aren't you breeding a generation that can no longer do anything without a smartphone?
Neff: We also discuss media use in the classroom. However, children today have far fewer problems with this than we adults do. They sometimes leave the device in the classroom over the weekend because they think: I don't need it at the weekend.
Döbeli: And to pick up on the forest example again: The smartphone can supplement direct reality. Or should the school class stay in the forest until a fox comes along?
Prof., accompanies the project school as a lecturer with a research assignment at the Institute for Media and Schools at the Schwyz University of Teacher Education.
Christian Neff (right)
is head of the primary school in Goldau. Together with Beat Döbeli and teachers, he describes his experiences with the project school in a blog at: www.projektschule-goldau.ch
Is media education a fixed teaching unit for you?
Neff: No - but the questions about how we should use the media are automatically incorporated into the lessons. As a result, teachers also become confidants in digital matters. Our project classes discovered cases of cyberbullying in other classes early on and informed the teachers. I also find it interesting that I am not aware of any cases of cyberbullying in the project classes themselves.
Don't teachers make it very easy for themselves when they put students on a device that corrects them straight away?
Neff: I think our teachers are too well paid to spend hours correcting tasks where pupils just have to tick something or write a number. That can be automated. They'd rather spend this time on individualised support for the children!
Critics of digital learning believe that children in primary school only learn wiping and not media skills. Professor Gerald Lembke calls for this: No computers in the lower school classes.
Döbeli: However, these critics usually assume that digital methods will replace other methods. We only use the devices when it makes sense. A guideline is: 10 to 15 per cent of teaching time. We still have compasses and blackboards in our classrooms, and they are still used.
But something else has to fall away. Do your pupils learn less by heart?
Neff: They learn vocabulary, of course, and I'm also a big fan of learning poems by heart. But we think about what makes sense. For a long time, my pupils had to know the coats of arms of our cantonal districts - and I had to look them up myself every two years. Now they prefer to learn how to look them up. We want to prepare them for life in the information society. We assume that at least 50 per cent of them will one day have a job in which digital media play a role.
Döbeli: The abstinence demanded by Professor Lembke is useless. It has never worked with any medium. Pupils just use their smartphones at home or during the break - and we can't accompany them there, so the entire media education is left to the parents.
