Bulletin

Issue: January/February 2008

News

Teachers need to span ICT knowledge gap

Professors Robertson, left, and Galton

La Trobe University Professor Margaret Robertson sees a world of education without borders — where the internet and Google have left teachers goggle-eyed, worried about how they can develop skills quickly enough to meet the learning needs of young people in this rapidly changing society.

Professor Robertson is Research Director in the Faculty of Education. She carries out international research on sustainable development, geographical education and the latest digital information and communication technologies.

Her work includes the introduction of teaching and learning with global positioning systems, associated geographical information systems and online connectivity — areas, she says, that are arguably at the frontier of mainstream information access.

She works in partnerships with teachers and young scientists, and is team leader and chief investigator of e-learning research funded though a variety of bodies including an ARC Linkages project with the Victorian and Tasmanian Departments of Education.

A former researcher at several overseas universities — most notably at the University of Cambridge where she continues her links with UK-based colleagues — Professor Robertson also has associations with the universities in Helsinki, Finland, NIE in Singapore and Songkla in Thailand.

Professor Robertson says research in Britain — 'Childwise', the latest survey of children's online behaviour — reported 85 per cent of five to 16-year-olds accessed the internet, and more than a third (including a quarter of five to six-year-olds) owned a computer or laptop.

'On average, they go online over four times a week, two hours each time. Research in Australia mirrors this trend. And teachers' working lives are further complicated by increasing demands to convert all assessment and curriculum reporting to online formats.

'These research trends — of young people's behaviour and management demands — highlight the importance of professional development for teachers critical for effectiveness in our digitised society.

'Our research highlights the gap in teachers' knowledge to meet these demands for our future citizens. One can only imagine that this knowledgegap compounds the feelings of frustration of many teachers in their attempts to maintain parity with other members of the workforce.'

To help address this issue, Professor Robertson in January hosted a visit to Australia of British colleague Professor Maurice Galton for a series of summer schools. Research Director from University of Cambridge's School of Education, Professor Galton's classroom-based research spans three decades.

His findings highlight the pedagogical challenges facing teachers and gaps in their expertise to make these changes.

Professor Galton has also carried out joint studies on the working lives of teachers, to be published by Sage, titled, Teachers under Pressure: The impact of the workforce remodelling agreement.