If you are in the academic sphere, you must have heard the common saying ‘Publish or die’. I wonder if a modified version of this saying can be applied to the technical and technological situation in my country, Egypt, and others more. I wonder if something like ‘Integrate technology or lose your students’ is appropriate to use in describing the complicated situation of school teachers.

The discussion on my previous post stimulated me to consider the reasons behind the unpleasant situation of little or none use of technology in our schools. Pardon my reference to the Egyptian context often as it is the only context I’m very familiar with. Believing that teachers are the ambassadors of change, I decided to start with this human factor in the education system and try to go deeper into their reasons for going on without considering technology.

Why do most Egyptian EFL teachers are not considering the integration of technology in their teaching? Having been a school teacher for many years, I was in close contact with many EFL teachers and I can assume I’m aware of many of the thoughts haunting many of them:

• Some teachers think that technology is a waste of time, if they have been ‘good’ teachers for years without technology, why bother about it now? They are just satisfied the way they are.
• Some teachers believe that technology is not for them. “I’m not into technology and I don’t think I can ever be’.
• Some teachers feel, which is true sometimes, that it takes a lot of time and effort to learn even basic stuff about technology. Many of them can afford neither the time, money, nor  the effort technology requires.
• Other teachers blame the situation on the somehow discouraging conditions they have to work under: large classes, the widespread of private tutoring, indifferent students, unsupportive administration, mocking colleagues, … NAME IT! Honestly speaking, I sympathize with them at some of those points.
• Some teachers can’t simply see what technology may add to their classes; NOBODY told them before.

This list does not go in any specific order. I just recalled how things were like when I was a school teacher a few years ago. No, it’s not from the past, believe me; this is the exact current situation.

These are my two cents for now. Eager to know what you have to say and how similar/different things might be in your context.

This post was inspired by Carla R.’s comment on my first one. Carla wondered if teachers in my area have problems with technology. The sad situation is that many of the teachers in my town, as I come from a small, not very advanced town, are reluctant to use technology in their classes in any way. They think that it’s a luxury beyond thier grip or their students’ realization. A very few English teachers would care to explore and learn about educational technology. This is mostly the case in government run schools.

The fact that most schools do not have advanced computer labs adds to the problem. Even if the labs are available, they are in the custory of narrow-minded technicians who see technology as a brooch to ornament the school when a high stake visitor comes.

 So, it’s a multi-layered problem. Wanna hear your say here.