K-12 BITS held a webinar on EdTech trends Julie Evans, CEO of Project Tomorrow identifies three different areas of trends in EdTech.

Three different areas of trends identified are:

  • rising
  • just emerging
  • waning

I found these interesting.

Among the “rising trends”, there are a couple that caught my eye:

  • New classroom models: blended, flipped, virtual
  • personalization

In the “just emerging” category, I found these of particular interest:

  • “Seamlessness” in digital instruction
  • Moving beyond teacher skill development

Finally, in the “waning” category, these stand out:

  • Bring your own device
  • Gamification for gamification’s sake
  • “One size fits all” teacher professional development

*Please note that there are more trends identified than I’ve pointed out as of interest.

In the rising trends category, I’m quite surprised that blended, flipped and virtual are included. These have been heavily discussed. There has been tons of virtual ink spilled on these areas. Schools have not universally implemented these (and probably with good reason). All of these take some adjustment within the system. First of all, students have to have some kind of reasonable access to devices. A bigger issue is teachers having access, training and support on implementing these pedagogies. While implementing any of those can be powerful, it does take work. Districts need to support teachers by providing them with platforms and training.

Personalization is a trend that we are all trying to really wrap our heads around. I doubt that it will look like what some Silicon Valley entrepreneurs are pushing, but I think that it will clearly have a role in education. I would’ve place personalization in the “just emerging” category.

The waning category is of particular interest. Many schools and teachers are still debating the “bring your own device” issues. These aren’t really as clear cut as some would make them out to be. In the real world, some of these issues are extremely complex. Gamification just for the sake of gamification should never have existed. This is one of the touchstones for me about the Glorification of Technology (see The Glitteratti).

One size fits all teacher professional development does seem more and more on it’s way out. More and more I see opportunities targeted much more closely to teacher need instead of one size fits all. That’s not to say that one size fits all is dead. Not by a long shot. However, we do seem to be moving quite purposefully to more appropriate professional development that is targeted to need. (Let’s hope that ends up translating to student education too).

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