As published at http://education.guardian.co.uk 

Polly Curtis, education correspondent

Teachers are wary of using digital media and new technologies during their lessons and risk failing a generation of computer-literate schoolchildren, David Buckingham, from the Institute of Education, will say in a lecture at the Institute of Education tonight.

Prof Buckingham's comments echo mounting fears about the quality of the use of information technology communications in schools.

Research by the University of Bristol earlier this year found that teachers were happy using computers at home, but would not take the risk of getting it wrong in front of a class of pupils. Some 30% of teachers surveyed failed to make good use of computers in the classroom - despite the government's £1bn investment.

And an Ofsted report also found the use of information communication technology in schools to be "sporadic" and "disappointing".

Despite massive government investment, few teachers have made much use of technology in the classroom, and most are sceptical about its educational benefits. Money has been spent on hardware, not software, with little used for training teachers, leaving many teachers unwilling to integrate technology into their lessons, he will argue.

In contrast, the modern media - television, computer games, mobile phones, the internet - are a constant part of children's lives and young people spend hours using technology outside of school.

Prof Buckingham argues that children should even be encouraged to play computer games: "Playing computer games involves a whole range of informal learning processes - remembering, hypothesis testing, predicting, strategic planning - and online chat and instant messaging require specific skills in language and interpersonal communication."

In contrast, educational media tend to be "visually impoverished, lacking in interactivity and thin on engaging content", and surfing the internet gets turned into "an unexciting obstacle course" by the filtering systems used by schools designed to keep in check the information children access.

Research by the University of Bristol earlier this year found that teachers were happy using computers at home, but would not take the risk of getting it wrong in front of a class of pupils. Some 30% of teachers surveyed failed to make good use of computers in the classroom - despite the government's £1bn investment. An Ofsted report also found the use of information communication technology in schools to be "sporadic" and disappointing".

eSchoolNews editor Gregg Downey offers six prognostications for the coming year.

#1. Web 2.0.

YouTube is just the latest and most spectacular example of how the democratization of the internet is about to change everything. For education, it seems to me, the populism inherent in the internet means one key thing: Call it student-centered learning, project-based education, constructivist pedagogy–all these related education philosophies and movements finally have a medium to give them genuine momentum.

YouTube also illustrates the leveling affect the internet is having on technology and business. This has big implications for schools and colleges as they seek to prepare their students for life and work in the 21st century. It's notable, too, that Google figures into this rags-to-riches tale, because Google is a central player in another emerging trend affecting education.

#2. Cloud computing

"We call it 'cloud computing,'" Eric Schmidt, formerly of Sun, now of Google, proclaims. "The servers should be in a cloud somewhere. And if you have the right kind of browser or the right kind of access, it doesn't matter whether you have a PC or a Mac or a mobile telephone or a Blackberry–or new devices still to be developed–you can get access to the cloud."

# 3: Service-oriented architecture

In a general sense, service-oriented architecture–or SOA–is a software solution intended to enable the enterprise to organize and marshal multiple processes. With SOA, software applications no longer are massive bundles of functions and processes. Instead, applications are composed by assembling modular services. A service, remember, is a single software function–such as cancel school bus route. It can be executed on demand by any system, without regard to its operating system, platform, programming language, or geographic location.

What's revolutionary about SOA is not the concept itself, which has been around for a while, but the fact that it now can be implemented via the World Wide Web. Just as web pages load on any platform, web services work the same regardless of platform, provided they are built using universal standards.

#4: The gathering SCORM (Sharable Content Object Reference Model)

SCORM is a collection of standards and specifications adapted from multiple sources to allow for the interoperability, accessibility, and reusability of digital learning materials: everything from a video clip illustrating how cells divide to a PowerPoint explication of a sonnet.

Though SCORM might sound complicated, its desired outcome is quite simple–to facilitate the sharing and reusability of digital learning materials among educators. Educators hope the untethering of content from its method of delivery will be a big outcome of SCORM.

Toward that end, educators should consider building SCORM compliance into their specifications when evaluating and purchasing online content and delivery systems. Virtually all of the major LMS solutions used by schools today comply with the standard. Blackboard, Desire2Learn, and Pathlore, for instance, all have been certified as SCORM-compliant, and the open-source system called Moodle is on its way toward compliance.

# 5: Telepresence

Imagine a conference room with six chairs, three on each side of a conference table. Envision a clear glass panel running down the center of the table.

Walk into this room while a high-level parlay is under way, and you'd see six executives deep in conversation. But here's the catch: Only three of them are physically present. The three participants closest to you actually are in the room–in Chicago, say. The others are in San Jose, Calif., but their life-size, high-definition images are on the glass partition in the Chicago conference room.

Whether schools and universities would be willing to pay for a full-fledged telepresence capability is unclear. But, in time, the potential for education could be substantial.

Leading universities already are making course content available over the internet, and medical schools are presenting in high-definition clinical demonstrations via Internet2. Large K-12 districts increasingly rely on video conferencing for management meetings and professional development.

#6: 21st-century learning

An organization called the Partnership for 21st Century Skills has developed a program designed to help educators prepare their students for the future. According to the Partnership, students need the following skills. The job of educators in the 21st century is to deliver them:

• Information and communication skills;
• Thinking and problem-solving skills;
• Interpersonal and self-direction skills;
• Global awareness;
• Financial, economic, and business skills; and
• Civic literacy.