Technology was supposed to transform education. But it has not. Instead of using technology to fundamentally change (improve!) teaching & learning, we have used it to automate old ways of doing things.

I recently discovered Larry Cuban’s book Oversold & Underused: Computers in the Classroom (2003, Harvard University Press).  In the book, Cuban notes that university boards, presidents and administrators uniformly say the reason their institutions are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on instructional technology is to “revolutionize” teaching and learning. To test the validity of this expectation, Cuban examined the impact of massive technology investments in K-20 education in Silicon Valley. His conclusions are not terribly optimistic. He found little evidence that technology infusion has yielded significant changes in teaching strategies (Cuban 2003, 130). On the contrary, Cuban concluded that, by and large, “teachers used technology to maintain existing practices” (138) rather than to “revolutionize” the way they teach their students.

Once again, history repeats itself. Teachers in Silicon Valley (where resources and attitudes are favorable to a technology-enabled teaching and learning revolution) have responded to new technologies much like their predecessors responded to film, radio and instructional television. The adoption curve was slow, but over a long period of time, even the most stubborn “laggards” began using films and television in their classrooms. But the new technology did not lead to the transformation of teaching & learning practices. Rather, new technologies became “peripheral to the daily routines of teaching and learning,” much like today’s new technologies are for today’s teachers (140).

Perhaps even more worrisome are the results Cuban uncovered at Stanford. Notwithstanding the University’s investment in thousands of computers, networks connections in dorm rooms, and computer labs, teaching and learning activities remained largely unchanged: “Lecturing still absorbs more than half to two thirds of various departments’ teaching practices. . . . These traditional forms of teaching seem to have been relatively untouched by the enormous investment in technologies” (171).

In 2008, we might ask if course management systems (CMSs) like Blackboard, ANGEL, Desire2Learn, Sakai and Moodle have made the kind of revolutionary difference we’ve been waiting for. By all accounts, CMSs have had largely the same impact as previous technologies–they are used to maintain existing practices and, I would add, to make them more efficient. CMSs are generally used to support traditional, semester-based courses. Even hybrid and online courses taught via a CMS are frequently “lecture-driven” in their design with multiple-choice quizzes and exams accounting for the lion’s share of course assessment.

Why do we persist in pouring the same old wine into new (and shinier) bottles? The reasons are many. But at least one significant driver of this phenomenon is that CMSs, like most of the educational technologies that have proceeded them, were designed to support traditional teaching and learning activities. While this may have made sense 10 years ago, the net result is that most CMS functionality reinforces learning through rigid, semester-based courses. And these courses are largely about “content.”

Admittedly, there are many, many counterexamples to what I’m describing. In fact, I serve as a Director (judge) of the Blackboard Exemplary Course Program. As such, I have had the privilege of reviewing dozens of excellent courses over the last few years that break the mold, transforming the way teaching and learning occur. But the truth remains–CMSs started out as “course website” creation tools. As they’ve evolved and matured, they’ve opened more opportunities for faculty & students to interact and learn in new and exciting ways. However, as long as the CMS continues to essentially mimic the traditional, semester-based, lecture-centric (think “content”) model of learning, we’ll have to keep waiting for the learning revolution to arrive.

What’s a revolutionary learning technologist to do? Pressure CMS developers to change and encourage faculty members to be innovative in their use of the CMS on your campus. Viva la revolucion!