9. Looking Back and Looking Forward

Although this study was focused on the laptops that teachers acquired as part of an operational policy innovation, the report illustrates incidentally a wide range of uses of technology in teaching and learning. What this study showed was that the laptops are critical for the type of innovation and expertise shown in the participating schools, particularly in those that were case studies. The teachers we questioned through surveys and in focus groups and informal interviews expressed the view that they could no longer work without their laptops. We would argue that without them these teachers could not even begin to achieve what they had in terms of the inclusion of ICT in their professional lives and their classrooms. The portability, the access and the links to other resources and infrastructure the laptops have provided has enabled them to extend their professional practice and the learning experiences of their students.

Meeting Ministry goals

The Ministry operational goals for this initiative were clear and very specific. Primarily, the initiative was about raising teacher competency and confidence in using ICT so that greater use was made of ICT across all aspects of teachers’ professional lives. Underpinning this were a number of specific goals related to the activities of individual teachers and to school ICT development in general.

Overarching these operational goals are the strategic goals for e-learning related to 21^st century learning and the digital age with their strong reform messages (Ward & Parr, 2006).While these goals are not always explicitly stated in operational discourse, they are implicit in such policy and as such can also be seen as drivers for this initiative.

The first operational goal relates to the development of new ICT skills. The teachers reported, in the May 2005 baseline survey, that this was an area where they expected a large amount of impact, suggesting a match with Ministry goals. Findings from the November 2005 survey suggest that, while the impact was not as great as initially expected, there was an overall improvement in teachers’ ICT skills over the preceding six months. It would appear that the laptops were offering teachers both more opportunity and more need to develop skills. Laptop portability and increased functionality, compared to other school computers, meant that teachers were using computers more widely than before, particularly in the classroom, and this had meant either the development of new skills or of more advanced skills in other areas. Data from the 2008 survey showed that teachers considered they had made improvements in their skill levels and range of skills in the previous 12 months. Importantly, this continued reported increase in level of skill, suggests that learning was ongoing. While teachers continued to report extending their range of skills, this was not to the same extent as their level of skills, suggesting that they found out early what worked for them and consolidated and enhanced their skill in these areas. The picture that emerges is one of ongoing, cumulative and compounding shifts in teacher skill and use of ICT.

The second goal stated by the Ministry was that teachers would be able to access online professional development and support. The laptops, with their increased portability and the access they afford teachers to such opportunities, certainly had the potential to impact in this area. However, it seems that this was not an area where teachers perceived them as having any great impact. In 2008 the mean level of impact for this area was below 4. This was lower than for the preparation of resources, professional and administrative work or for improving their ICT skills, all of which were above 4. A similar finding was reported in the November 2005 survey. In both instances, 2005 and 2008, the only areas with similar low reported means were classroom teaching practices and academic outcomes for students.

However, these findings have to be interpreted with caution. It may be that teachers struggle to differentiate between their learning and the professional work they do in preparing material for their students. In responding to the professional development question, they may have been thinking of formal professional development, such as distance learning courses rather than other learning opportunities, such as emails, professional listserves and the Internet where they can access and share ideas and resources with other teachers.

The third goal, relating to teacher capacity, was the creation of, and access to, quality curriculum and assessment resources. Certainly, teachers expected the laptops to have an impact in this area and in November 2005 they reported a relatively large impact. Comments made during the focus groups and reported here suggest that there had been a shift in the type and quality of resource and this had occurred owing, again, to increased functionality and portability.

The second set of Ministry goals were related to the provision of ICT resource for the schools themselves. While neither the baseline nor the follow-up survey dealt with these goals specifically, comments made in the focus group interviews suggested that these goals were also being met in 2005. Teachers spoke of the value of the laptop as an additional resource in their classroom. They also spoke of the value of it for, generally informal, professional learning. For some being able to use their laptop at any time and in any place had motivated them to learn how to do things, in their classroom practice, they had not previously tried. It must be stated though that the majority of teachers already had access to computers and most would have had opportunities to engage with ICT previously. The value the laptops appeared to add in terms of motivation to engage lay in their portability and the additional freedom that such portability provided teachers. This was not about accessing professional development per se but about what they learnt as they “played” on their laptops and discovered new skills, incidentally almost.

Changes in classroom practice

The findings that were, perhaps, the most interesting relate to what appears to have been an unintended, and largely indirect, outcome of the provision of laptops. While the overall Ministry operational objective for the initiative did mention increased use in teaching and learning, the emphasis was apparently more on professional and administrative tasks than pedagogical. However, the findings from both the surveys and the focus groups suggested that the laptops were enabling teachers to change what happens in their classroom and to make greater use of other computers in the school for student learning. In this sense, they were meeting the broader, and more reform-focused, goals of wider strategic policy.

Conclusions

This report has covered a wide range of uses of technology in teaching and learning. The focus of the study was on laptops. What this report has shown is that the Ministry goals for the Laptop Initiative were met. Laptops are critical for the type of innovation and expertise shown in the schools and espoused in strategic discourse related to 21^st century and e-learning. In general, teachers felt they could no longer work without their laptops and, arguably, we contend that they could not even begin to achieve what they have without them. The portability, the access and the links to other resources and infrastructure the laptops have provided has enabled them to extend their professional practice and the learning experiences of their students.

However, the extent of growth in skill and use may be bounded. It may be that there was considerable room for improvement initially, although the data looking at the situation before the laptops showed that teachers did report a reasonably high level of use. There may, at various points, be plateaus in utility and, as technology increases in complexity, some teachers who, to date, have made good progress, may flat-line. It may also be that they have satisfied their current needs. Fresh injections of ideas and support may be needed periodically providing a balance between internal, home-grown expertise and injection of specialist skills. An external boost may help to get over the plateau, which may be a function of reaching levels of competence/imagination/risk taking, and it may serve to lessen the effects of innovation weariness. Where there is coherence across pedagogical initiatives and different ICT initiatives like TELA and ICTPD, effects may be strengthened.