New Media for Educational Change

Abstract

Educational technologists should be regarded as change agents. New media should be regarded as digital tools that can be used for innovation. The contention here is that experiential learning offers an effective way for new media to affect change and can be accomplished through an experiential learning framework. A five-component strategy for organizing new media based on an experiential learning framework is presented here and includes technology-supported student activities that are active, interactive, situated, authentic, and case-based. Thus, the use of digital tools is used to increase the fidelity between the activities that occur inside the classroom and the actual performances that will be expected of students once they leave the classroom. The new media classroom will remain a common forum and will continue to be a meeting place, but the reconceptualized classroom will include a broader array of contexts. New media for educational change will likely focus on effective instructional design and development strategies.