Hard time coping now? Don´t wait five years.

I still haven´t convinced myself to continue to write in English. It made a lot more sense when I was in the US and had a few international readers, somehow I´ve started to find it quite satisfying and challenging to write in English. I get spelling and grammar mistakes pointed out from a friend of mine but I´ll take that as a compliment.

Right now all high school students in Sweden are doing the "SAT:s", in Sweden called Nationella prov (National tests). I started wondering when 1-to-1 learning, i.e having access to laptop with internet, will make its way in to the classrooms and the standardized tests. As the world gets smaller and smaller due to globalization, collaboration and social media, the demand from students being able to using these tools in their natural learning environments will steadily increase.

One important aspect of this is the fundamental understanding that students progress more through collaboration, social skills and digital competence than by standardized tests and individual test taking. By that, I don´t mean that each student shouldn´t be given tasks according to their own development and skills but rather that we should emphasize and value more and different skills. The thing is, with computers and ICT we have possibilities to give students tasks that previously wasn´t possible. So how do we do it? How do we change the structure of learning from individualized competitiveness to collective progress without missing out on "the subject" (a reference to Foucault). Is it possible to make these structural transitions without losing the few benefits students have by "learning all by themselves"? To me, this raises some very important questions and I think the thing to look for beyond the 2.0 web, social media and collaboration is the whole organization of time and place in school. When 1-to-1 is as natural as pen and paper, which it will be in 5 at max 10 years, how do we organize schools?

That question is more controversial and revolutionary than anything our system has ever gone through. The impact this will have, not only on education but on our society as a whole, will be mind boggling. And those who don´t start to adapt to these changes right now, that includes the whole education system, will be left way behind.

If you think your teachers are having a hard time coping now how do you think they will cope in five years?