Event Information Box

Table of Contents

KEY PIECES OF INFORMATION FROM THE EVENT

Event title:

Education Technology Action Group report published

Timeline Date

January 26, 2015

Category

Government, Department or Organisation

Secretary of State

Subject

Area

BECTA Category

Event Content

By disapplying the ICT programme of study from September this year schools will be able to offer a more creative and challenging curriculum, drawing on support and advice from those best positioned to judge what an ambitious and forward-looking curriculum should contain.

DETAIL OF THE EVENT

http://etag.report
At the beginning of 2014, Ministers from DfE and BIS set up the Education Technology Action Group (ETAG). We are an independent group and we were asked to advise on how digital technology might empower teachers and learners by enabling innovation across schools, further education and higher education sectors for the benefit of students, employers and the wider economy. The group is chaired by Stephen Heppell who has authored the approach presented here on the basis of contributions from other ETAG members.

Fundamentally, we concluded that the use of digital technology in education is not optional. Competence with digital technology to find information, to create, to critique and share knowledge, is an essential contemporary skill set. It belongs at the heart of education. Learners should receive recognition for their level of mastery; teachers and lecturers should too.

Digital technology can and should bring joy and engagement: a delight in stellar progress, the exhilaration of unexpected challenges, some playfulness, the reaffirmation of a global audience.

Some things will need to move over, to be dropped, to change and to vary to allow all this to happen. We are calling for everyone to play their part in enabling this progress.

Evidence indicates that recent curriculum and qualifications reforms have not led to significant improvements in the teaching of ICT, and the number of students progressing to further study in ICT-related subjects is in decline. Furthermore, the ICT curriculum in its current form is viewed as dull and demotivating for pupils. Its teaching may not equip pupils adequately for further study and work, may leave them disenchanted or give rise to negative perceptions that turn them off the subject completely.

Event Media

Further Research around the event

Views, Blogs and Criticism

More
articles

browse the timeline