Technology, Models, and 21st-Century Learning: How Models, Standards, and Theories Make Learning Powerful

This paper describes the variety of educational technology models, how they all fall short in some ways, and how they can be used together to form a powerful integrative model that can be used to evaluate technology applications in the classroom. The integrative model is a tool to help teachers think about and improve their use of technology. It combines the best of various models, including SAMR, TPACK, Technology Integration Matrix, and more. Introduction to Models How can we think about making learning better with technology? Most technology integration starts with a piece of technology and a lot of excitement. We throw it into the classroom and declare it a success because it motivates our students. Then, we do it again...and again...and again, and the students aren't so excited about it anymore. We find that the technology is just a fancy tool replacing what we were doing before. This is where the SAMR model comes in (Puentedura, 2014). The S stands for Substitution. Too much technology is a simple substitution for what we are doing before. "But wait!" I hear you cry. The technology is making this better. Perhaps, the video clip linked to your PowerPoint is better than you droning on and on. Maybe you have reached the A in SAMR: Augmentation. But that is probably giving the video too much credit and the outstanding and engaging lecturer not enough (see, e.g., Buzbee, 2014). And still, it doesn't come close to Modification or Redefinition. This is what makes SAMR powerful. It forces us to ask if we have truly changed the lesson with technology or if we are just tinkering around the edges. SAMR's limitation is its technology focus; we want to focus on learning. It is possible to modify a lesson or even redefine the lesson in a way that doesn't help students learn. We don't want to throw away SAMR but combine it with a model of learning. We want to think about how our students can be increasingly challenged to use technology in deep and meaningful ways that support higher-order thinking. As Liane Wardlow (2014) says, "Though I would never argue that there is no room for 'lower level' activities that only require students to attend and remember, or 'lower level' instructional activities that only use educational technology as a substitute – I would like to suggest that students would benefit from instruction that increasingly focuses on higher-level cognitive actions and lessons that are redefined by technology." Carrington (2013) has created a Padagogy Wheel that combines Bloom's Taxonomy with SAMR. It shows the intention behind SAMR, not just modification for the sake of modification, but modification (and redefinition) for the sake of higher-order thinking. The wheel includes some apps that might be useful in implementing these higher levels of SAMR, but many are likely to be gone by the time this paper is published (and the apps by themselves aren't enough to improve learning). The power of these models is that the apps aren't the goal; the thinking and learning are the goal. A new app will come along, and this model helps to figure out how it fits in. As teachers think about infusing technology in powerful ways, models like SAMR and Bloom's Taxonomy and tools like The Padagogy Wheel are quite helpful, but these models are not enough. They are great places to start because they put the focus on the student, but teachers need help to create learning environments that support powerful learning. That leads to a model like the Technology Integration Matrix (TIM) developed by the Florida Center for Instructional Technology at the University of South Florida (n.d.) and adapted by the Arizona K12 Center (2012). TIM combines levels of technology integration into the curriculum with characteristics of the learning environment. Characteristics of the learning environment are not specifically about technology, but the kinds of powerful learning that technology can enable and facilitate. The five characteristics are: active, collaborative, constructive, authentic, and goal directed. While the matrix describes these characteristics in terms of technology, these are goals of good learning. Jonassen (2000) describes meaningful learning as active, constructive, intentional, authentic, and cooperative (pp. 11-12). These characteristics form the basis of the vertical axis of TIM. Sandholtz, Ringstaff, and Dwyer (1997) describe a progression with technology from Entry to Adoption to Adaptation to Appropriation to Invention. These are the basis for the horizontal axis of the Technology Integration Matrix: Entry, Adoption, Adaptation, Infusion, and Transformation. These five stages not only provide a depth of integration of technology; they also provide a path of growth. That is, we can't expect a teacher to go from no use one day to invention/transformation the next. Instead, like moving up the levels of SAMR, a teacher can progress through the stages one step at a time from struggling with technology and behavior issues at the Entry level to smoothly using technology to make the classroom more efficient at the adaptation level to redefining the way students are learning in a constructivist manner at the invention/transformation/redefinition level. Another teacher-focused model is the TPACK model (Mishra & Koehler, 2006) that focuses on the kinds of knowledge that teachers need: technological, pedagogical, and content knowledge. This model emphasizes the overlap of these areas. That is, knowing the subject matter (content) is important for a teacher and knowing how to teach is important (pedagogical) and knowing technology (technology) is important, but it becomes more powerful when a teacher has pedagogical-content knowledge (knowing how to teach, not just in general, but the specific ways that a particular subject can be taught), technological-content knowledge (knowing the technology that applies to a specific content area), technological-pedagogical knowledge (knowing how to teach with technology), and technological-pedagogical-content knowledge (knowing how to use technology to teach a particular subject area). For example, wait time (pausing after asking a question) is a valuable pedagogical tool that applies to all content areas and a word processor is a fine piece of technology. But combing probeware with spreadsheet software (technology) to collect and analyze data (content) and helping students use that data in scientific analysis (pedagogy) combines knowing the technology with knowing how to use it to teach. That is, it combines teaching methods of data analysis with technology of data analysis in ways that specifically help students understand content. The problem with this model is that it doesn't make value judgments on the kind of learning that takes place. However, it is a powerful model about the kinds of knowledge that teachers need. One final model, is the trudacot model proposed by McLeod and Graber (2014) to start by thinking about the purpose of a learning activity, asking the question "Technology for the purpose of what?" This is followed by a series of questions that help the teacher think about if the technology is being used to achieve that purpose. The trudacot model doesn't provide answers, but these questions are used as a catalyst to think about how to use technology appropriately and move through the levels of other models: from substitution to redefinition, from lowerorder thinking skills to higher-order thinking skills, from entry to transformation, and from isolated knowledge to technological-pedagogical-content knowledge, or as Fullan (1991) says, from symbolic change to real change. Combining SAMR, Bloom's Taxonomy, TIM, TPACK, and trudacot, we have five powerful models that help us think about what students should know and do, what teachers should know and do, and some ideas about how to get there. This paper will help explain how the five models can be used together to promote powerful learning environments that use technology effectively. Extension, not Criticism As Mishra & Koehler (2006) suggest: "We are sensitive to the fact that in a complex, multifaceted, and illstructured domain such as integration of technology in education, no single framework tells the 'complete story'; no single framework can provide all the answers. The TPCK framework is no exception. However, we do believe that any framework, however impoverished, is better than no framework at all." We include this quote here to make clear that this paper is not a criticism of any of these models but a combination and extension of them. There is something to be said for simplicity and many situations where any of these simple models are better than our complex model, but the simplicity makes them too easy to tend to oversimplification. Further, we appreciate but reject Green's (2014) argument that the SAMR is not research-based. It is a valuable tool. As Mishra & Koehler (2006) suggest, "Theories, frameworks, or models can be seen as conceptual lenses through which to view the world. They help us in identifying objects worthy of attention in the phenomena that we are studying, highlighting relevant issues and ignoring irrelevant ones" (pp. 1043-1044). While SAMR might not have emerged from years of work with teachers, it is a valuable lens through which to study technology use in schools and through which to help pre-service and in-service teachers question and refine their practice. All of the models generally aim toward the same goal from different angles, but educators need to move from simplicity to complexity to ensure that they use all the tools at their disposal to reach that goal. Tool-Centered vs. Purpose-Centered There are many charts that list tools that are useful for certain kinds of learning. The Padagogy Wheel (Carrington, 2013) and the Bloom's Taxonomy Pyramid (Leonard, n.d.) are good examples. It is a very useful exercise to think about the kinds of tools you might use to think in different kinds of ways.