Ny i klassen Om införande och användning av pekplattan i skolan ur ett elevperspektiv
Sammanfattning: This thesis is concerned with the introduction of digital tablets to schoolchildren. The aim is to contribute to knowledge about how tablets can be introduced and used as a mediating tool in schoolwork by drawing focusing on the schoolchildren’s perspective and understanding of this medium. The research questions addressed in this study were as follows: 1) What characterizes the schoolchildren’s use of the tablet as a tool? 2) How do the schoolchildren perceive the introduction and use of the tablet as a tool in school? and 3) What limits and conditions are emerging as important for schoolchildren when they encounter tablets in school. This thesis draws on research within on socio-cultural perspectives on education, with a particular focus on the concept of empowerment as a key element in promoting schoolchildren’s health and wellbeing. In line with SCOT, The social construction of technology, based on technology and focusing on its meeting with the social context, technology is deemed not to bepredetermined, but rather, negotiable. The material comes from a case study involving 17 schoolchildren in grade six. The study lasted for an academic year from the beginning of the fall semester when they were given their tablet and continued through to the end of the school year. The data collected includes observations, a special task called “tell another class", written questions and individual interviews with all 17 schoolchildren at the end of the school year. The material was analyzed by using meaning analysis which resulted in three themes. The first theme, yet another tool in school, explores how the tablets schoolchildren and the teacher sought opportunities to use the tablet in their classes and school work. The second theme, given roles and unclear expectations, is about how students perceived the tablet in relation to themselves and their expectations about what the tablet came to mean for the students. The third theme, the overriding technology, highlights the schoolchildren’s belief that the tablet needed to be supplemented with more peripheral activities if it were to prove valuable, and their focus on the technology in its own right. The discussion highlights the importance of seeing the students as a possible resource and involving them and empowering them by proffering them a say in the process. The schoolchildren saw the tablet more as a technical artifact than as a tool for learning. The tablets were mainly used to write notes and search for information on the Internet. My conclusion is that investment in tablets in schools is more complex than access to technology: to be effective, the entire organization must support the process and schoolchildren need to be involved and have the opportunity to influence how they are used if they are to be empowered by the process. The tablet as a technical unit needs to benegotiated in the school organization in order to create a common understanding of what it is and how it should be used.
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