The new natural? Authenticity and the naturalization of educational technologies

Abstract

The past 40 years have been characterized by an ongoing shift in the rationale underlying the use of educational technologiesan earlier emphasis on efficiency and engagement has been overshadowed by a vision centered on educational technologies' capacity to facilitate authentic learning in the inauthentic school context. However, despite its intuitive appeal, authenticity is a vague and contestable concept that warrants further scrutiny. Accordingly, this theoretical paper sets out to offer a conceptual analysis of the various meanings of authenticity in educational discourse, and to examine how these both shape and obfuscate arguments concerning educational technologies. To do so, I identify two key ambiguities inherent in the concept of authenticity: (1) whether authenticity relies on correspondence to real-world contexts (is), or aims to tap into a deeper essence of an individual or phenomenon (ought); (2) whether authenticity is mainly viewed from a supposedly objective perspective (external), or aims to capture individuals' subjective experiences (internal). The depiction of technology as authentic, along with the conflations between its various meanings, serve to naturalize existing patterns of technology use, while obscuring the ways in which they are shaped by social, political and pedagogical considerations that should remain open to evaluation and critique.

Modelling Authenticity in Science Education

“…However, to go beyond the usual approaches for this kind of theoretical contribution, which-while providing useful and well thought-out analyses-are Fig. 2 Increase in the total number of conceptualisations of 'authenticity' in reviews (y-axis) as a function of the chronological order of the reviews (x-axis) not based on a sufficiently systematic method to ensure enough coverage (e.g., 'offer a conceptual analysis of the 'various meanings' of authenticity in educational discourse' (Dishon, 2021); quotation marks ours), we operationalise our approach as follows: first, it is based on the available reviews on the topic over the last two decades (11 reviews). Second, within these reviews, we identify a set of 22 aspects of authenticity (discussed in detail in the main body of the contribution) and provide evidence that this set provides satisfactory coverage of the educational use of the term in the following way: when displaying the total number of aspects discussed in reviews of the topic over the position of the reviews in chronological order (see Fig.…”

“…First, we address the dimensions real-world authenticity and disciplinary authenticity (Sections 3.2,3.3,and 3.4). They represent authenticity from the 'external' perspective in the sense of Dishon (2021), which is the perspective of, for example, the instructor or science education researcher, but not that of the student. We then consider the dimension of personal authenticity as the 'internal' perspective of each learner in the sense of Dishon (2021), referring to the learners' experience of authenticity, which will be discussed in Section 3.4.…”

Research on Virtual Reality Interactive Teaching under the Environment of Big Data

“…In the literature [4], a boom-based virtual scene was investigated for the drawbacks of the low resolution of HMD systems, too heavy helmets, and eye discomfort, but it still did not solve the limitations of single-student virtual environments and eye discomfort due to too close screens. e literature [5] proposed the concept of a cavernous automated virtual environment with multistudent support and successfully solved the problem of eye discomfort for students at that time, which could provide users with unprecedented immersion. Since then, immersive virtual reality environments have incorporated projection elements, where students can interact with virtual objects in the projection plane.…”

The Impact of Students’ Learning Interest on Students’ Process Skill in Mathematics

“…Multimedia technology is developing with increasingly rapid science and technology (Sökmen, 2021;Shin & Bolkan, 2021;Nurzaelani et al, 2018). 21st century skills have several features to require students to think critically (Dishon, 2021;Pratiwi & Mustadi, 2021;Rusmono & Alghazali, 2019).…”