ICT—the hopes and the reality

AbstractAn analysis is made of the reasons for excessive optimism concerning thepotential of ICT to enhance levels of pupil achievement. After a review of evi-dence concerning the potential of ICT, a small-scale survey is reported thatshows continuing problems in the adoption of ICT by teachers. It is concludedthat more research is needed to improve the expectations and effectiveness ofICT provision and utilisation.

ICT—the hopes and the reality

David Reynolds, Dave Treharne and Helen Tripp

Address for Correspondence: School of Education and Life Long Learning, University of Exeter (St.Luke’s Campus), Heavitree Road, Exeter, EX1 2LU. Email: [email protected]

© British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, 2003.Published by Blackwell Publishing Ltd., 9600 Garsington Road, Oxford OX4 2DQ, UK and 350 Main Street, Malden, MA 02148, USA.

IntroductionOver the past two decades, government ICT policy both in Britain and abroad has restedon claims that ICT can change the nature and raise the quality of teaching and learn-ing. These claims appear to have an evidential basis, drawing upon a wide body of lit-erature. Yet such claims, when exposed to critical review, prove to be insubstantial andrhetorical, as shown by the Cuban (2001) evaluation of the impact of ICT on schoolsin Silicon Valley; Selwyn and Goddard’s paper; Martin Cohen’s (2000) doctorate on ICT;and Conlon and Robinson’s Scottish review. We will describe the official claims for theeffectiveness of ICT as optimist-rhetoric. Optimist-rhetoric is multi-faceted, encompass-ing politicians, industrialists, policy makers, civil servants, local government advisoryservices, the media, related ICT support bodies and national agencies. The overall forceof the optimist-rhetoric has led to massive British government investment in ICT sincethe 1970s. The total runs into billions of pounds. From 1998–2002, £900 million wereallocated to connect schools to the National Grid for Learning and to provide relatedstaff development to ensure that the connection was effective. However, and signifi-cantly, apart from the initial period of the National Development Plan for ComputerAssisted Learning [NDPCAL] and the micro-electronic project [MEP] programmes,there has been no major government investment in long-term curriculum developmentand research into the use of ICT both for discrete subjects and as an integrated elementwithin cross-curricular provision. ICT in the curriculum has been broken-backedwithout a pedagogic spine to provide the necessary structure and support.

ICT remains a contentious issue for many teachers at the point of implementation. Atti-tudes to whether, how and why it should be used for teaching and learning are very

British Journal of Educational Technology Vol 34 No 2 2003 151–167

varied. This paper aims to summarise the findings of the main literature on the role andnature of ICT in schools, with specific reference to maths education. It will comparethese findings with those from a small-scale survey carried out which aimed to gaugethe attitudes of schools, teachers and pupils towards ICT. As such, the paper will relateoptimist-rhetoric to two other perspectives on ICT, pessimist-rhetoric and research evidence.

Optimist-rhetoricOptimist-rhetoric permeates the educational establishment at all levels, influencing thethinking of government agencies such as the British Educational Communications andTechnology Agency (BECTa). BECTa has analysed national data from OfSTED [Office forStandards in Education] and the QCA [Qualifications and Curriculum Authority] withrespect to primary schools. It found that “Schools that were judged by OfSTED to havevery good ICT resources had better achievement than schools with poor ICT.” (BECTa,2002). These findings went across the socio-economic divide, and showed that whenschools in similar socio-economic circumstances were compared, schools with betterICT also tended to have better achievement. This was true for all socio-economic cir-cumstances. However, there is a huge methodological problem here. Do high perform-ing schools, as a facet of their performance, invest in both the human and physicalcapital at the cutting edge of school improvement, including ICT, or does investment inthe human and physical capital of ICT result in school improvement? Which is causeand which effect? Indeed, the effect-hypothesis makes sense when related to researchinto effective in-service programmes. The seminal study of Harland and Kinder (1997)provided a typology in which the key element was the attitudes and beliefs of the staffinvolved related to the embedding of change in what they perceived to be effective pro-fessional practice. This ties in with the current emphasis on the overall cultural andenvironmental circumstances that surround teaching and learning, and the multipleand complex factors that are involved.

A large body of optimist-rhetoric, couched as research, supports the idea that ICT raisesstandards of pupil achievement. The consensus among the optimists is that ICT canraise standards—if it is used in very carefully designed ways. Immediately, the riderraises warnings in the mind—it is an unsubstantiated claim. One such optimist is DavidGuile who argues that teaching with ICT is not suited to the traditional pedagogicalstyles where teachers are “solely managers and didactic teachers” (Guile, 1998). Teach-ers will need, he explains, to ensure that “different types of learning (ie transmissionand inquiry-based) are clearly differentiated and carefully related to the proposed useof ICT.” Only this fundamental change will “ensure ICT can fulfil its potential as aresource to make learning more intrinsically satisfying and meaningful.” Guile believesvehemently in the huge potential of ICT for the improvement of education, but he alsobelieves that a revolution is required in the way teachers plan and deliver their lessonsin order for the changes to occur. His emphasis throughout is on the role of the teacherin the centre of the process, stating that gains in achievement “occur primarily becauseteachers have designed new contexts as well as new learning processes to supportlearning with ICT”. We can infer from this that he would expect a teacher to spend moretime in the planning process before a lesson or series of lessons. ICT would not be a time

152 British Journal of Educational Technology Vol 34 No 2 2003

© British Educational Communications and Technology Agency, 2003.

saving device for the teacher in the initial stages, at least. Guile is without doubt on thepotential of ICT in schools: “ICT can lead to tremendous gains in student learning, forexample, significant improvements in examination or statutory test performance,development of broader forms of social, cultural and intellectual capability.”

But, what we have here is, in fact, a rhetorical optimist acknowledging that this is atheoretical perspective that unfortunately does not accord with the educationalresearch community’s understanding of the factors that bring about positive changesin teacher performance and teaching styles.

Optimist-rhetoric curriculum surveys provide further claims to suggest a relationshipbetween ICT and improved standards in schools. A study of secondary schools inEngland and Wales found that pupils made significantly better progress (using a “value-added” approach) where schools rated ICT use and its perceived impact as significantor substantial. (Treadaway, 2001).

Pessimist-rhetoricWhile on one side we have optimist-rhetoric, there is conversely a pessimist-rhetoric, pro-duced from a different perspective. One sector of pessimist-rhetoric is opposed in princi-ple to the use of any form of computer technology in schools. The pessimists link thisto their perceptions of how society should develop, what should be its goals, its purpose,and its ethical underpinnings. A report by the Alliance for Childhood in the USA illus-trates this (Cordes and Miller, 2000). It argues that parents and teachers are distractedfrom the provision of children’s basic needs—contact with other human beings and thenatural world around them, space to grow and develop and time to be children—bypressure to introduce them to technology: they impose the adult mode of seated, intel-lectually orientated approaches, such as Internet research. It suggests that forcing thistype of “sedentary” learning could be responsible for obesity, and that the solitary styleof working with a computer will deprive children of the emotional contact they needwith other people. The authors warn against the danger of educators being drawn intoa corporate trap—they remind the reader how inextricably involved business is in theprovision of technology. It should be noted, however, that the Alliance for Childhoodconcerns itself only with “pre-school and elementary school children”. It states, “Thereis still much work to be done on the question of how to introduce computers safely andeffectively for older students.”

Academic researchThe third group are academic researchers who have been evaluating the impact of ICTupon teaching and learning for over 20 years using a range of research methodologiesthat have a proven track record in terms of reliability. From the mid—1980s, academicresearch has consistently thrown up evidence that refutes the optimist-rhetoriciansclaims. A point upon which academic researchers and the pessimist-rhetoricians agreeis that it is not sufficient justification to argue that early ICT use will prepare pupils forthe technological world in which they will live. They agree that current technology willbe obsolete by the time today’s children enter the world of work, in any case. The

ICT—the hopes and the reality 153


Alliance for Childhood suggests that “our national infatuation with computers in earlychildhood and elementary education... is fuelled by adults’ fears about their own abilityto keep up with the pace of technological and cultural change.” A Report from the Pres-ident’s Panel on Educational Technology which, in contrast to the above, suggests that“technology may indeed have the potential to play a major role in transforming primaryand secondary education”, also recommends that schools and teachers should “Focuson learning with technology, not about technology” (Abrami, 2000) [emphasis in orig-inal]. That Information and Communications Technology should be used as a tool toteach about aspects of the existing curriculum, and not taught as a subject in itself, isthe first principle upon which many in the literature agree. However there is a highlevel of contention on this issue in schools; we will return to this in our review of ourresearch in schools, especially with the interviews with teachers.

Research study: research questions and issuesBelow we report findings from a small-scale funded study into the factors affecting theimplementation of ICT in the classroom. We were asked to investigate a number ofresearch questions. In terms of effective ICT two immediately emerged:

1 How many computers are needed in a school?2 Where should computers be sited in the school—individually in classrooms, in small

suites annexed to classrooms with perhaps five or six computers, or in large labs, toallow one computer per child?

OfSTED has drawn upon its nation-wide evidential base and review process to set downa standard ratio in a school of one computer to seven pupils. It also set a target ofconnecting 20% of schools (including all schools in the 11–18 age range) to broad-band Internet by August 2002. (OfSTED, 2002) It is more difficult to answer the secondquestion—how should computer facilities be deployed around the school? OfSTED recommends that “Schools generally need... to seek greater flexibility, for examplethrough the use of clusters of machines located in departments or faculties or sets oflaptops with wireless links to existing networks.” (OfSTED, 2002) This seems to suggestthat the best possible policy is not the installation of large labs, and is the deploymentof computers in smaller areas which are more freely accessible by students, teachersand whole classes. These also have the advantage of needing less space than a full suite,therefore making them popular in primary schools. The main problem is that they aremore difficult to manage; teachers have to plan carefully to ensure each pupil gets suf-ficient access to the computer during a lesson. This system does correspond with theidea that ICT should be a tool for teaching, not a subject to teach in itself and thereforeshould be integrated into normal classrooms, and not made into an independentdepartment. OfSTED found that these types of resources have facilitated the teachingof ICT lessons, but that “many schools... find it difficult to complement these lessons by sufficient use of ICT in other subjects.” Here we face the research question of dis-covering the optimum way of embedding ICT in the day-to-day learning and teachingof pupils.



A second recommendation from the President’s Panel on Educational Technology, asquoted earlier, is that lessons using ICT should “emphasise content and pedagogy, andnot just hardware.” Again, the inference here is that the subject being taught is at timesbeing neglected, because teachers are focussing on the equipment that is being used,instead of the content of the lesson. The implicit research findings are beginning to jarharshly with the optimist-rhetoricians assumptions and beliefs about the value and roleof ICT in the classroom.

The research question that arises from this is whether some subjects are more likely tocause this to happen than others? That is, is it more likely that the technology inad-vertently will become the focus of the lesson in one subject more than in another? Thiscould occur, one might suggest, as a result of the inherent nature of a certain subject,or because teachers of a certain subject or subjects tend to have a different level of skillin using ICT. It could also occur if teachers in some subjects tend to have a differentattitude to the use of ICT in lessons—some may disagree completely with the recom-mendation made by the Panel. We will briefly examine the attitudes of commentatorson the use of ICT in education within specific subject fields, and summarise their ideason how ICT should be used within their subject.

DfES 2002 and literacyThe IMPACT2 interim evaluation highlighted the positive role of ICT in primary schoolEnglish, but reported that the effect in secondary schools was minimal. This is reflectedin an English specialist, Ellis’s, (2001) criticism of the reluctance among English teach-ers to use ICT in their subject teaching, saying that “Choosing between the ‘analogueclock’ and the ‘digital display’ models of literacy is not an option; it can’t be aneither/or.” Here we see the rhetoric-reality gap. Ellis’s comments suggest that there is ahigh level of scepticism amongst teachers about the benefits of ICT use in their subject,and that there are fears among English teachers about possible changes to the wayEnglish is taught. She reassures the reader “It isn’t the end of literacy or of English orof literature as we know it.” Her argument is that ICT will enhance what already existsof written English. Her own reservations are that we live in a “political and economiccontext in which digital technologies are available to some and not to others in whichaccess to information, play and imaginative literature may depend more than ever uponthe social class and ethnicity of individuals and communities”, and that this is “some-thing about which all of us need to be concerned, especially those of us who are teach-ers of literacy and English.” Ellis clearly feels that ICT has a great value in the teachingof English, and predicts that English teachers will “begin to make digital technologiesa critical feature of the literacy curriculum.”

However, the author acknowledges some effects of the technological revolution on theconstruction of English as a subject. There has been an addition to the content ofthe subject due to “the gradual inclusion of media education in the school English curriculum”, which “has resulted in increased emphasis on psychological approachesand theories of representation.” Whether there is value added in relation to the



overall investment in human and physical resources is another unanswered researchquestion.

Ellis’ suggested uses for ICT in the teaching of English and literacy include opportu-nities for improved access to written texts using the World Wide Web and the use ofdrill-and-practice software to help with basic literacy skills. She cites an anecdote,which calls into question the effectiveness of these programs, however. A group of herstudents who were having difficulty with spelling, punctuation or sentence construc-tion were given the opportunity to use one of these programs, and their scores on theseareas improved dramatically, according to the tests provided by the software manufac-turer. However, their “apparent gains in accuracy on the standardised tests were notcarried over to the students’ own writing.” This is echoed by the experience of a teacherinvolved in a research project concerned with the uses of ICT to teach literacy inprimary schools by the University of Newcastle, (Moseley and Higgins, 1999). Theteacher suggests that this could be because “spelling accuracy and reading accuracydevelop at very different rates.” However, she also feels that it is possible that there are“more effective ways of ensuring that pupils apply recently practised spelling and punc-tuation skills in their free writing.” The implication is that the ICT tools are useful forthe purpose of the practise, but that teachers need to find better ways of helping pupilsto integrate the use of their improved skills into other writing activities. Once again wereturn to the concept that ICT has to enhance existing patterns of learning, buildingupon good practices in a way that extend them beyond what conventional means wouldhave allowed.

The University of Newcastle research suggested several ways in which ICT can improveteaching and learning in English (Moseley and Higgins, 1999). ICT was found to havesupported learning by helping to “increase the intensity of pupils’ learning” forexample by using multimedia to create a teaching resource about apostrophes for otherpupils to use. It also had the effect of “increasing pupils’ focus on story-writing” in theexperiment where pupils planned a story by creating pictures to accompany it with adrawing package. Teachers used ICT “to support reading, spelling and redrafting as wellas to enhance reading comprehension.” It also “supported pupils’ literacy skills by pre-senting words and text visually and aurally”. This study involved a series of experimentswith teaching with ICT, and the evaluations of its success and future potential by thedifferent teachers varied a great deal. Most felt that ICT had been a good tool to use inthe situations they used it, but some mentioned that they had initially found “thedemands of individualised work [by pupils on the computer] were considerable”.However, most said they intended to use the system again, with alterations to improvethe way the lesson ran. Some teachers were extremely enthusiastic about the ideas pro-vided by the experiment; others acknowledged that ICT had not been “a ‘Damascusexperience’, at least not in its present state of development.” While at the level ofteacher perceptions this research is persuasive, the evidential base of measuringimprovements in pupil performance is simply not there. Where is the evidence that theICT improved the pupils’ performance?—a methodological nettle that the IMPACT2report research team noted as being outside their remit to grasp.



ICT in the teaching of mathematics and numeracyICT is used in school mathematics in a variety of different ways, and the variation inthe frequency with which it is used is very wide. The following is a summary of themain ways in which it is used.

• As a provider of fast and non-judgemental feedback for pupils, for example, calcula-tors to check answers to numeracy questions. The benefits of the use of ICT as achecking device are clear—it means that pupils do not have to wait in line for theirwork to be checked by the teacher, perhaps just to be marked with crosses. If usedcarefully, teachers should be able to ensure that pupils do not simply use the calcu-lator to do the work for them; they can be asked to show and discuss their workings,and the teacher could insist that he/she sees that the pupil has completed the workbefore being allowed to use a calculator. Indeed, this strategy has been found to havepositive effects on pupils’ mathematical thinking; “if the wrong answer wereachieved, children had to revisit their conceptions and their methods in order toobtain the correct answer.” (Selinger, 2001) In this way ICT can support the teacher’swork to develop pupils’ own mathematical strategies. This teacher also found thatpupils were “more willing and able to test out their ideas with ICT than with pen andpaper or with a teacher.”

• As a tool for fast and accurate visual displays of mathematical figures, for example,polynomial graphs.

• As a tool for pupils to manipulate mathematical figures and to allow them to see whateffect their changes are having. For example, pupils can learn to draw a polygon usinga logo program, and then experiment themselves with how the interior angles willchange when they increase the number of sides of the shape.

• As an aid to calculations which cannot be done quickly manually in problems wherethe main aim is not to practise numeracy, but to apply some mathematics to aproblem in algebra or geometry. A calculator to perform the calculations allows the pupil to ‘keep his/her eye on the ball’, and not be distracted by numeracy diffi-culties. There is evidence that “the use of the computer to carry out the process, thusenabling the learner to concentrate on the product, significantly improves the learn-ing experience”.(Gray and Tall, 1994) In short, from the point of view of most pupilsin the age range 5 to 16, ICT is currently used as an aid to visualisation, as a tool forchecking accurately their own work, and as a tool which can perform calculationsvery quickly, allowing them to work with large numbers, and perform fairly complexcalculations.

One of the main reservations from commentators on the use of ICT in maths educationseems to be that ICT may come to be seen as a ‘magic ingredient’, when in fact there aremany fundamental areas of mathematics where its potential is seen by some as non-existent. It is argued that visualisation of many number concepts, such as negativenumber addition or fractions is achieved better by the use of ‘real-life’ experiences thanby ICT methods. But, in reviewing the research literature, we are again left with theunanswered question—where is the hard evidence both about the nature of cognitivegains, the extent to which they become a constant within the pupils’ learning, and, crucially, how they are part of a progressive pattern of teaching and learning?



An additional factor is the extent and use of ICT in secondary maths teaching—againthe IMPACT2 interim evaluation is extremely scathing about the actual level of ICT usein maths teaching—it is minimal. Maths has been a major area of ICT investment—the rhetoric and reality gap stares us in the face.

ICT in the teaching of scienceBECTa’s 2002 analysis of OfSTED and QCA data has found that 62% of schools with‘good’ use of ICT in Science achieve on or above national standards in Science, whereas43% of schools who had ‘unsatisfactory’ use of ICT reached or exceeded these stan-dards. This is a classic case of optimist-rhetoric that contrasts sharply with the interimfindings of the IMPACT2 evaluation study, where again it is reported that there isminimal effective use of ICT in the science classroom:

“School science and teacher training experiences include direct environmental explo-ration using sensors, data capture and graphing packages.” (Barton, 1997) One com-mentator claims that “ICT use can free up time for exposing... values, developingunderstanding not only of ecological principles but of the limitations as well as theadvantages of scientific method... With ICT use our teacher can manage debate aboutquality and relevance of different types of data... and explore difference in representa-tion both in debate and, perhaps more importantly, in a range of images and writinggenres.” (Miller, 2001) It is suggested that ICT can facilitate the clear, fast and accuraterepresentation of scientific data, allowing the focus of a lesson to move to a discussionof what the implications of such results might be.

A second common use for ICT in Science is the use of CD-ROMs and multimedia pack-ages. These are claimed to provide “highly motivating access to information and waysto communicate that information.” (Miller, 2001) Again, this is optimist-rhetoric. Unlessyou can prove a relationship between motivation and learning, it is simply an unprovenassertion. However, the writer of the article doubts whether this is sufficient justifi-cation for the use of such tools in Science lessons. She warns that they will not necessarily address the need she perceives for pupils to learn to question established ideologies: “if scientific concepts are still presented as ‘true’, objective knowledge to belearned and recalled for test, then the traditional, partial and gendered construction ofscience is replicated.” The writer suggests that ICT equipment can help to bring aboutthese changes in approach, if they are used in conjunction with encouragement to“think critically”.

ICT also allows pupils to communicate more easily with research scientists, through e-mail and on-line discussion groups. The World Wide Web can also allow them to takepart in specific research projects, such as the Pupil Research Initiative at SheffieldHallam University. (Miller, 2001) This should make Science seem more real and proxi-mate to pupils, rather than being a distant and separate area. It can also facilitate linksbeing made between the science which is taught in schools, and the experiences ofpupils in their everyday lives, thereby enriching their scientific understanding and



experiences. The “enormous and increasing number of science-based websites, fromnational museums to scientific research institutions and specific pressure groups”provide a good link between informal and school-based learning. The author of theaforementioned article goes further than this—to suggest that “in a technoscience cur-riculum, the emphasis would no longer be on doing science as it has traditionally beenpractised in the laboratory.” Even if most do not completely subscribe to this fairlyradical view, this serves to illustrate in what direction ICT could be capable of steeringscience education in the future.

The contrast between optimist-rhetoric and academic research evidence is evinced inBECTa’s study that found that ICT appears to have a cumulative effect on raising standards across all subjects: the more subjects ICT is used for, the better the resultsacross all subjects. This is in contrast to the interim findings of the IMPACT2 evalua-tion study, which showed minimal evidence of effective ICT application. The converseinterpretation is that schools that have effective ICT provision [not use, note] do sobecause they are good schools with effective in-service training, subject review andassessment procedures that drive on curriculum change. We can argue that the scopeand nature of ICT here is a consequence, not a cause, of effective schooling.

We will briefly summarise other factors found to be causing effective ICT use, whichhave not yet been dealt with herein. These will be compared in the next section to theresponses and findings from visits to schools to find out what teachers feel is effectiveuse, and how well they are achieving it:

• Unsurprisingly, teacher confidence and competence in the use of ICT has been foundto have a very significant impact on both the amount of ICT used in a classroom, andhow effective that use is. It follows, therefore, that the quality of training which teach-ers receive in ICT will have a massive effect

• OfSTED has found that “the training funded by NOF (the New Opportunities Fund)remains unsatisfactory in its overall effect. Training in around six out of every tensecondary schools and in half of the primary schools has so far failed to tackle ade-quately those issues relating to the quality of ICT use in classrooms.” (OfSTED, 2002)Another related factor is how much access to equipment teachers have outside oflessons to plan and prepare.(OfSTED, 2002)

• An improvement of whole-school development planning is needed to improve accessto ICT facilities for lessons, and to ensure that appropriate and sufficient resourcesare available. 64% of primary schools with ICT resources judged to be ‘very good’also provided ‘good’ learning opportunities, compared with only 3% of schools with‘unsatisfactory’ ICT resources.(BECTa, 2002)

• BECTa’s study found that four other factors were crucial to the development of goodICT learning opportunities in schools. These were ICT teaching, ICT leadership,general teaching and general school leadership.

• Two other factors that were investigated were not crucial to good ICT learning oppor-tunities. These were the socio-economic circumstances of the school and the priorperformance of pupils.



OfSTED has summarised the characteristics of good secondary school ICT provision.(OfSTED, 2002) They are:

• availability of different groupings of resources to match the needs of departments,for example computer rooms, clusters of machines and individual workstationsaround the site

• computers networked and well maintained with good Internet access from all workstations

• well-lit, comfortable computer rooms with sufficient space for pupils to work awayfrom computers and for teachers to circulate and talk to individual pupils

• effective communication with the whole class using digital projectors or the capac-ity to control all the computers

• an efficient and equitable booking system for computer rooms.

These standards will be compared in the next section with what actually seems to bethe current state of ICT provision in secondary schools. To conclude this section, wewill quote the OfSTED report: “Inspection evidence indicates that ICT is capable ofimproving the quality of teaching and learning for individuals, even though this is notyet the norm in schools.” (Cox, 1997)

The secondary school surveyThe central issue of the gap between optimist-rhetoric and academic-research is reflectedin the findings from our own research, based upon a survey carried out in secondaryschools during the autumn term, 2001. Twenty schools were visited for half a day.These schools were chosen using a stratified random sample; schools representing allsocial backgrounds were selected using free school meal percentages for each school.During this visit, the ICT co-ordinator was interviewed, to get an overview of theschool’s ICT resources, and how they were used. The ICT co-ordinator was also askedto recommend one or two departments for the researcher to speak to; preferably twodepartments which used ICT for teaching in contrasting ways. Representatives of thesedepartments answered questions about how they use ICT, and their views on the mosteffective use of ICT for teaching in their subject were recorded. Pupils were interviewed.These results were also informed, where time permitted, by the observation of a lessonusing ICT in that subject. It is intended that these results will be compared to the picturedrawn by the review of literature in the earlier section.

Teachers were asked whether they believed that ICT raises standards in education, andthis seems to be the point of greatest contention. (BECTa, 2002). They offered a hugerange of opinions on this question, which seems to explain the equally wide-rangingapproaches to the teaching of ICT, and the use of ICT as a teaching tool, as illustratedearlier.

Findings and discussionSeveral teachers who said that ICT unquestionably raised standards cited improvedpresentation of work and consequent increased self-confidence as their main reason,while teachers in many other schools suggested that the same use might be considered



an ineffective and time-wasting use of ICT—the production of ‘neat nonsense’. Thishighlights a discrepancy in approaches to teaching and learning from school to school.It does seem to depend largely on the expectations of the teachers, according to theiropinion of the capabilities and attitudes of their students. On the other hand, in otherschools which were very confident in the ability of ICT to raise standards, teachers saidthat in their view pupils expressed themselves more clearly given ICT as a medium.Another teacher said that in her experience, pupils were more resourceful whenworking with ICT. Many others also observed that pupils worked more independentlyon computers. But, this is not necessarily a learning gain: after all pupils work inde-pendently when reading a book or producing a piece of work at home.

One of the most popular explanations for why ICT raises standards was that ICT seemsto motivate children. The observation that pupils are “more resourceful” or “creative”with ICT may often stem from increased motivation. There has also been a great dealof research into how ICT can affect pupils’ motivation. One report found evidence thatICT use can lead to increased commitment to the learning task, enhanced enjoymentand interest in learning, an enhanced sense of achievement in learning, an increase inself-directed learning and enhanced self-esteem. (Denning, 1995–97)

As the pie chart shows (see Figure 1), many of the teachers in the survey of secondaryschools stated that ICT is particularly useful for motivating traditional underachievers.There certainly seemed to be a sense among pupils that ICT work was a separate skillarea; that the people who are ‘good with computers’ are not necessarily the same peoplewho get the best marks in traditional subjects. It is easy to see how this can improvethe self-esteem and confidence of pupils who usually feel that they are underachievers.This is supported by another study, where 61% of pupils who claimed to ‘always’ mis-behave in lessons also said that they ‘get so interested in lessons where IT is used’ thatthey do not want to stop. The same study also found that 55% of pupils who claimedto truant ‘often’ or ‘sometimes’ find that lessons where ICT is used ‘seem much moreinteresting’. (Denning 1995–97) Of course it would be naïve to assume that a causalrelationship necessarily exists between disaffection with school in general, and a morepositive approach to ICT lessons in school in particular, but these studies all pointtowards a possible link.

The most striking result from the research was the response to the question of how ICTis used in schools—was it delivered as a discrete subject alone, was there a mixture ofdiscrete use and use across the curriculum, or was ICT only used in other subjects? 16%of schools said they only used ICT for teaching of a discrete ICT curriculum; 68% saidthat the majority of ICT use was for the discrete curriculum, but that there was someuse across the subjects; 11% said that there was discrete and cross-curricular use, butthat the skew was towards cross-curricular use, and 5% said that the only use of ICTwas in other subjects.

In one case, the ICT co-ordinator was completely committed to discrete ICT teaching,because that school had, until a few years ago, tried to deliver the ICT curriculum com-



pletely through other subjects. Teachers had found that this increased their workloadconsiderably, and pupils were not achieving the levels required. Schools who were inthe later stages of their ICT development seemed to be aspiring to move towards fullcross-curricular use, because, as many teachers observed, pupils are entering second-ary school with much better basic ICT skills than their counterparts a few years ago.In some schools the KS3 ICT assessment is now being completed in year 8. Some schoolshave succeeded in delivering the ICT curriculum sufficiently well through other sub-jects. One school, which believes that this is the preferable way to teach ICT, but whichdoes not feel ready to carry this out fully, has devised a compromise. ICT is still exten-sively taught discretely, but communication and co-operation between the ICT depart-ment and other departments is such that the ICT department uses material taken fromhumanities subjects to provide material to work with on the computers. In this way,pupils are always fully engaged in the content of the work in ICT, as well as the context.This is a rare example of ICT being used to help deliver other areas of the curriculum,rather than vice-versa.



13%

24%

16%13%

17%

13%

4%

Yes- always.

Yes- if used in certain ways.

Yes- in particularunderachievers will benefit.

Yes- but still depends verymuch on individual’smotivation.

Yes- if used effectively. It canalso be detrimental.

No- it is simply a skill to betaught discretely.

Unsure

Figure 1: Does ICT use in schools raise standards?

As the figures show, the vast majority of schools had an extensive discrete ICT cur-riculum; nearly always one hour per week up to year nine. Most also had a range ofICT options in KS4. In a few schools, an ICT course was now compulsory throughoutthe year groups. In addition, teachers of other subjects used ICT in a fairly ad-hocfashion as a tool. These results suggest that the reality in secondary schools is in starkcontrast to the ideals set out by the literature on the subject: the recommendation thatteachers focus on “learning with technology, not about technology.” The reasons for theenormous disparity between the two sources must be examined. The schools who usedmainly or exclusively discrete ICT teaching can be divided into two main groups: thosewho employed this policy through choice—because they considered it the best policy-and those who had no alternative due to one or more of the following problems:

• A lack of ICT resources in departments, or difficulty in booking ICT suites, oftenbecause these are almost always being used by discrete ICT lessons. 85% of teacherssaid that their school did not have enough ICT resources for them to use as they wouldlike to. Many also added that the recent NOF training which many teachers had bythis time received had increased the demand for the ICT equipment, and this hadmade access even more difficult.

• Lack of teacher competence or confidence was a reason cited in some cases, but thiswas a much less common response than the first.

BECTa’s 2002 analysis of OfSTED and QCA data found that the socio-economic cir-cumstances of the schools had no effect upon the effectiveness of the school’s use ofICT. If a school was judged to have good ICT, it tended to have better achievement thana school in similar socio-economic circumstances which did not have good ICT. So,schools in the same socio-economic circumstances are on an equal footing in terms ofprospects for improvement of teaching and learning using ICT. However, it remains tobe seen whether a school in deprived circumstances is likely to be as well resourced asa privileged school. OfSTED’s investigations found that good ICT resources “are gener-ally not biased to any one socio-economic group.” There have been various governmentinitiatives to try to ensure that schools in difficult circumstances have as good, if notbetter ICT resources that those in better circumstances. However, these results are fromthe primary schools, and the research by the University of Exeter has so far beenfocussed on secondary schools. The schools which were visited were placed into fourcategories, using the percentage of pupils who took free school meals (FSM) there. Thisis a good indicator of the socio-economic circumstances of the community from whichthe pupils come. Table 1 shows how the schools were grouped.

The schools were asked to give details of the resources they had in the school. Regard-less of socio-economic grade, most schools said that all KS3 pupils had an hour’s accessto computers in an ICT lesson per week, and that ICT was offered as an option in KS4.

As stated earlier, only three schools said that they had enough ICT resources. Of thesethree, one was in grade B, one was in grade C, and the third was in grade D. This seemsto suggest that there is no relationship between socio-economic grade and amount of



resources. The Grade D school mentioned had made a conscious decision to make ICTprovision a priority, and the Head felt that standards had improved considerably as aresult. Most of the pupils in this school did not have access to a computer at home, andthe school’s deployment of the resources was designed to allow pupils free access tocomputers in their spare time, for example, in an open-access area in the library. Inaddition, all the departments in the school used ICT extensively. Many departments hadtheir own ICT suite.

Another Grade D school, which had not made ICT provision a priority, was very poorlyresourced. The school had not yet put a school-wide ICT policy into place, and mostdepartments had no access to ICT equipment at all. The ratio of computers to pupils inthis school was approximately one to twenty. The other Grade D school had a ratio ofone to three. This is compared to the government target of one to seven.

It seems that the first-mentioned Grade D school, which was well resourced, was theexception rather than the rule. Most of the other schools in the survey, which had ahigh rate of free school meals, were also poorly resourced with ICT equipment. Thesealso tended to be the schools in which ICT training for teachers had made leastprogress—in some cases it had not begun at all (Autumn term 2001). It seems thattraining for teachers and a whole school ICT development policy have a symbiotic rela-tionship—the existence of one of these factors tends to be the vehicle for the other tomake progress. But in the absence of both, very little progress is made.

It appears that the least-privileged schools, as a group, contain the widest degree ofvariation in terms of ICT use. It would be inaccurate to state that all underprivilegedschools are poorly resourced and managed with relation to ICT. Indeed, there are somecases where government initiatives to improve ICT access in underprivileged areas havebeen very successful. However, this group does seem also to contain many examples of the least developed schools. The cause of this seems to be the existence of other priorities amongst the teachers and the management team; the one that was most frequently mentioned was discipline. In one of the Grade D schools, the school’s onlywritten ICT policy was concerned with the prevention of damage to the equipment.

A few schools had participated in the Anytime, Anywhere Learning (AAL) scheme, wherepupils can buy a laptop computer on a lease that runs through their time at school.Unsurprisingly, the only schools that ran this scheme were in Grades A and B. However,it is interesting to note that many of these schools did not have a high ratio of com-puters to pupils, despite having a good socio-economic grade.



Table 1: School groupings

Grade A Up to 7% free school meals 4 schoolsGrade B 7% FSM, up to 10% 6 schoolsGrade C 10% FSM, up to 20% 8 schoolsGrade D More than 20% FSM 3 schools

A comparison needs to be drawn between the standards set down by OfSTED for goodsecondary school ICT provision (listed earlier), and what seems to be the real situationin most schools. The first point is availability of suites and clusters of computers, andalso individual workstations, to meet the needs of departments. In seventeen out oftwenty schools, staff said that their needs were not being fully met in this way. Thesestaff came from various departments; some were ICT teachers, but most were not. In alot of cases, it was reported that some departments had better access than others, some-times because of a firm departmental ICT policy or the existence of enthusiasticmembers of staff, and sometimes simply due to chance; the department had been givenits own ICT facilities before other departments.

The second requirement is that computers are networked and well maintained withgood Internet access from all workstations. Most schools had achieved this target. Manyof the schools had broadband Internet connection. Pupils and teachers alike, however,often referred to computer crashes or network problems being the most significantfactor that discouraged them from using computers. Teachers explained that the natureof a lesson using computers often requires the whole class to print their work at thesame time, and this often caused hardware problems. These types of inconvenienceswere enough to completely discourage some teachers from using ICT in class. They saidthat, in their view, the problems too often outweighed the benefits.

This brings out another very significant point that arose in discussions with teachers.The teachers who usually had the support of a technician during ICT lessons tendedto be much more confident in their use of computers. One school, which was in GradeD, had a member of non-teaching staff, entitled Facilities Manager, who was respon-sible for all ICT equipment throughout the school. He has a strong background in ICToutside of education. Three years ago he introduced a whole school ICT policy, and allsoftware and hardware must be purchased in consultation with him. This ensures thatall teachers discuss their needs with him before anything is introduced. He has contactwith a local Beacon School, and takes every opportunity to share good practice withother schools, including helping with ICT at feeder primary schools, as they cannotafford to employ an ICT expert. He works closely with teaching staff, and is involved in their continued professional development with respect to ICT. In addition he isresponsible for applying for funding for further resources. In three years the ratio ofcomputers to pupils has decreased from one to forty to approximately one to three. TheFacilities Manager is credited with this achievement.

Computer rooms, the OfSTED report states, should be well-lit and comfortable, with suf-ficient space for pupils to work away from computers, and for teachers to move aroundand talk to individual pupils. In many cases, most of these targets have been achieved.The one that seems to have caused most problems is the provision of space for pupilsto work away from computers. A very large room is required if thirty pupils are to havea computer each, and space to work away from them. However, OfSTED does notmention here that pupils should have one computer each—perhaps this has not beenfound to be necessary, or even desirable. The problem of accommodation is exacerbated



by the fact that many computer rooms in secondary schools are not purpose-built—they have been converted. Schools with the most recent development of ICT facilities,and schools with new buildings, are therefore at an advantage in this respect.

Many schools do not yet have comprehensive provision of digital projectors, and manyteachers said that they would need further training to use them.

The fifth point—that there should be an “efficient and equitable” booking system forcomputer rooms—seems to be the aim that is furthest from being achieved. As men-tioned earlier, the very extensive teaching of ICT as a discrete subject tends to occupycomputer suites for most of the time, even in schools where the one-to-seven ratio hasbeen achieved. This is often explained by the popularity of KS4 ICT courses, in additionto the mandatory ICT lessons in KS3. In many schools, teacher ICT training has notcoincided with the addition of ICT facilities, and so demand increases for facilities thatwere already used to the full. Naturally, ICT classes have regular ‘block-bookings’ onsuites, so some classes may never be able to use the computers, simply because theirtimetable does not fit in with the computer vacancies which remain.

ConclusionsThe comparison of the OfSTED standards detailed above, with the apparent realitiesfound in the research in secondary schools, seems to show a high level of disparitybetween schools, regardless of socio-economic grade. There are some examples ofexceptional performance, and these schools seem to have a strong whole-school ICTpolicy in common, being driven forward by an expert in ICT. In these schools, teachersare gaining in confidence in using ICT for teaching, because they feel that they havethe necessary support. There appears to be one other essential factor for the effectiveuse of ICT in schools; teachers need to have faith that ICT will improve their teachingand their students’ learning.

“Both students and teachers must see the value in using technology for learning. Both students and teachers must expect to succeed using technology in general but especially as a tool for meeting learninggoals. Finally, both students and teachers must see the costs of using technology for learning as acceptable.” (Abrami, 2001)

There is cautious ground for optimism to be drawn from this study if we adopt an opti-mist-rhetoric stance. 83% of teachers interviewed in schools said that they believed thatICT can raise standards. Yet, we wonder, why is this a belief instead of a reality after theinvestment of so much in terms of both money, time, commitment and energy in ICT over thepast twenty years? Indeed, some of the teachers’ other responses suggested that they arenot yet as committed to ICT as this statistic suggests. It seems that the third require-ment in the quotation above—the acceptance of the human as well as financial, socialand organisational costs of using ICT—is a factor which is still lacking. There is a greatdeal of focus upon these costs, and perhaps too little on the expectation to succeed. Itseems to be a healthy sign, however, that there is a degree of scepticism about the poten-tial of ICT, as with any other innovation. This should “avoid the use of computers for



learning which is excessive, inappropriate or thoughtless.” (Abrami, 2001) In order toconvince everyone fully to take this ‘leap of faith’, there is a need for further examina-tion of exactly how ICT can improve education, and for the debate to continue. Theseis a pressing need to subject the optimist-rhetoric to the objective examination of aca-demic research, as indeed the evaluations reported in this volume of BJET appear to havedone.

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ICT—the hopes and the reality