The Rise of The Gatekeeper (2020-2050)
2000-2020
Throughout the first two decades of the 21st century, improvements in computer-based technologies, including electronic whiteboards and personal laptop computers, became increasingly incorporated into classroom learning (Wiki). School districts increasingly implemented and encouraged one-to-one computing, ensuring that all students in grade school would need a personal laptop. During this time, computers significantly effected traditional teaching methodologies into more “a shift in emphasis from reception-oriented to production-bases approaches…” (de Castell and Jenson, 2007, 116). Despite these challenges, numerous educational stakeholders pushed concepts detailed in Toward Defining 21st Century Competencies for Ontario. Changes such as this, along with the evolutions in the ways that 21st century learners communicate, further impacted utilization of technology in teaching and learning. The rise of Web 2.0 in the classroom allowed teachers to highlight the growing importance of using multiple modalities in design-based learning. Students were now able to express themselves using a combination of podcasts, music, graphics, video, vodcasts, and photos alongside traditional writing. Students who previously had difficulties expressing themselves through writing could increasingly communicate in creative multimodal ways. Students' creations were no longer designed for a teacher/grader alone, but had to be created for an audience of countless online prosumers (Gee, 2008, 236). Teachers needed to find new ways of tapping into enhanced abilities of computer technology by utilizing various Web 2.0 tools to enhance instruction, as these technologies helped encourage student self-expression, collaboration with peers, and opportunities for authentic deep learning experiences (Fullan and Langworthy, 2014, 21-22).
At the same time, significant concerns grew surrounding resource access for many Ontarians. While some students could easily afford laptops and fast internet speeds, others were challenged with this access, causing serious problems in socio-economic stratification occurring through education. This was further problematized under the conservative provincial government, which was voted into power in 2018. Under this government, Education Minister Stephen Lecce made strong pushes to increase the number of required online courses, due to cheaper running costs. Elementary and secondary school teachers, as well as college instructors, resisted increasing demands to move their courses online, stating that such moves would cause further educational stratification and be too complex to complete in an extremely short period of time. There are even reports that this conservative provincial government supressed poll results finding that parents, too, resisted increasing the number of required online courses.
The beginning of 2020, however, challenged the claim that it would take extensive amounts of time for Ontario instructors to move to fully online learning formats. The end of 2019 revealed the rise of a new, highly infectious virus, originally called ‘Coronavirus,’ but later renamed ‘Covid-19.’ The rapid spread of Covid-19 across the globe forced an equally rapid shift in education: instructors were forced to move their courses online at a pace never before seen in education.
