++ Question 7

In 1980s and early 1990s, there was a major debate on ‘whether the computer was “master” of or “slave” to the learning process (Higgins and Johns, 1984). In relation to your evaluation - was the computer a replacement for teachers, or merely an obedient servant to students?

In relation to my evaluation, the computer (in this context, the application) is not the replacement for teachers but it is also not a servant to the students. That means, the role of computer itself differ from one group of students compared to another. If we refer to this application, we can say that it replaces one role of teacher, but still it cannot play one important role that a teacher has – giving appropriate feedback. Basically, a computer and related ‘siblings’ are developed based on the coding of 0 and 1. So, if it is not 0, it will be 1 and vice versa. Enough if you do not understand that explanation because a simpler one will be given. A computer has only 2 answers in general – correct and wrong answers. Even though students can answer the questions, they still need clarification as well as explanation from the real teacher instead. Besides that, Brown (1995) mentioned that teacher can play a role of facilitator, a role that will be rejected by the computer. This is because only teacher can facilitate learning and teaching process in the classroom. However, the greatest thing that an application can do better than a teacher might be the Games and simulations provided in the application. Sometimes teacher needs more time to prepare a game for students but sometimes it ends up very frustrating. So, by the help of an application like this one, it can be considered as a relief for a teacher as they no longer need to stay up till late to prepare an interactive-yet-supporting-learning-theory game for students.

Image 8: Crossword Puzzle (example)

Image 9: Crossword - answers revealed

So, does it an obedient servant to students? In order to answer that, we can refer to the meaning of the two words – master and slave. Slave is the one that obeys the master so, the meaning of master is of course contradicting with the meaning of slave. I do think that the students or the users are the master to the application. But, unconsciously we are the slave to the application. We are in need to find the correct answer instead of looking for the answer that we think is right. Meaning, in answering questions, we are supposed to answer according to 0 and 1 concept. 0 is correct and 1 is wrong. Students, though considered as master can only choose between the two answer. Meaning that, the concept of self-learner is not really achieved. Students are bounded to answer ‘inside the box’ thus disabling them to think critically on the questions.

In short, my stand over this issue is that the role of a teacher cannot be replaced easily by any computer or application. This is due to some of the roles of teacher that the computer cannot carry out because of their limitations as machines.