NETS – New Generation of Technology Standards

I’m not sure how many educators would respond with enthusiasm when told about new standards for learning. In principle, of course, consistent clear expectations to guide what happens in the classroom are exactly what is needed. In practice, however, standards often end up as that forgotten, if not avoided, component of curriculum documentation that is seldom referred to save for a series of reference numbers embedded in lesson and unit plans. The NETS, by the International Society for Technology in Education, are a welcome change and offer concise guidance regarding the “skills required for students to be competitive and successful in a global and digital world.” What is likely the most valuable

contribution of the NETS is their direct management of two assumptions that currently plague the inclusion of digital literacy in education.

The first assumption falsely upholds that because our current students have certain digital competencies that they are somehow equipped to manage the full range of higher order cognitive, social, and technological skills required to participate in the global dialogue. The NETS define a more comprehensive range of abilities that require but are not about the tools. This manages the first assumption by developing a broad spectrum of competencies needed to engage and participate.

The second assumption falsely upholds that because our current students grow up in an era where the tools of digital media are widely available that they all have widely available access to them. It isn’t fair to expect either teachers or students to develop competencies dependent on having the tools of digital media if they are not available. The NETS provide for this by outlining both the essential conditions and the role of administrators in creating these conditions for their teachers and students.

The value of the NETS as begun to be discussed above is that rather than satisfy a legislated need for alignment between standards and curriculum, they seek congruence between what students need and what schools offer in a way that assumes very little about the stakeholders involved. – AC

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