We can’t imagine our lives without productivity suites anymore. Microsoft Office has enabled us to create various textual files, presentations, spreadsheets, etc., which completely changed the way students and instructors exchange information. Google Classroom became a life-savior for many teachers, especially during the pandemic, as it provided a comfortable space for them to interact with learners online. Even when we, the grad students, are working on a project together, our first step is always creating a shared space on a cloud platform like Google Workplace and Microsoft One Drive to brainstorm ideas and make initial drafts. As productivity tools become more and more widely used in the sphere of education, the question of their advantages, drawbacks, and future development becomes increasingly relevant.

The Influence of Productivity Suites on Learning

During the interactive part of the presentation held by my talented colleagues Ayushi, Gagan, and Mohammad, the facilitators conducted a poll asking the participants whether productivity suites help encourage or discourage creativity. My first thought was, “Of course they support creativity!” By the time I was ready to select the answer, I had already had some doubts, but I still voted in support of the productivity applications. However, the more I think about that, the more I see both the “light” and the “dark” sides of productivity suites.

On the one hand, productivity suites encourage student collaboration and make education more student-centered. Productivity applications allow instructors to effectively utilize cooperative and project-based teaching methods. For instance, Power Point has become almost a standard program for students’ projects, and similar tools such as Canva, Google Slides, or Prezi are also widely used by learners to prepare and demonstrate their creative assignments in class. Cloud platforms make cooperative teaching methods strive more than ever, as now learners are able to work on their tasks together even outside of the classroom. Moreover, productivity instruments are also helpful tools for the flipped classroom adherents who prefer their students to prepare for classes beforehand. Such platforms as Google Drive, Google Classroom, One Drive, and even our UR Courses website enable educators to conveniently share materials with learners. So, overall, there are plenty of ways productivity suites can benefit learning processes and outcomes.

As we have clearly witnessed in Ayushi, Gagan, and Mohammad’s presentation and in Dr. David Parsons’s lecture, productivity suites also fit well within several learning theories. For instance, Connectivism was developed as “a learning theory for the digital age” and was based on the fact that the interned has opened new ways for us to learn and share information. Connectivism is highly supportive of the idea of learning through online peer networks, and what can create a better environment for such networks than productivity suites? Consequently, productivity tools would be of great help to Community of Practice advocators who promote learning based on group participation and social relationships. With productivity suites, such relationships can be easily established between learners from all over the world.

On the other hand, according to the constructionist Seymour Papert, “nothing can be more absurd than an experiment in which computers are placed in a classroom where nothing else is changed.” I quite agree with this statement as I also believe that the new tools change the process of learning itself, and educators don’t always realize that. For instance, teachers should keep in mind that productivity tools may reduce students’ creativity and critical thinking skills as they provide too many ready-made formatting and editing options.

Another disadvantage of the cloud productivity platforms is that we often forget how fragile and vulnerable online world is, which was proven by one of my colleague’s experience. She works an ESL teacher, and she was actively using an interactive whiteboard to share resources and materials with her students. She also provided access to her whiteboard to her students, which allowed them to make edits and interact with the activities the teacher was displaying. Unfortunately, intentionally or by mistake, one of my colleague’s student once deleted the majority of materials that she had been accumulating on the interactive whiteboard over a long period of time, which made the instructor extremely frustrated. This example clearly shows that over-reliance on technology may cause one simple mistake or glitch to destroy long hours of one’s work, so backing up or keeping hard copies of the materials could always be good idea.

The Future of Productivity Suites (which rapidly becomes the present)

As it is mentioned in the article “Revolutionary Software: Milestones in the Development of Productivity Suites”, productivity suites have a bright future. In the next couple of years we would most likely witness the rise of productivity tools empowered by such technologies as artificial intelligence (AI), virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR). Who knows, maybe in several years students will be using VR glasses in the classroom to create spectacular group projects set in other historical eras or even universes! As for AI, it is already increasing people’s productivity a lot by, for example, eliminating grammar mistakes in one’s writing or answering any questions in a flash. However, not all AI features align with the rules of academic integrity, which should be seriously considered by students.

The world of the productivity suites is not limited by just commonly used Google Workplace and Microsoft Office. Such open-source productivity suites as LibreOffice and Zoho Workplace can be employed to make learning more exciting and diverse. While LibreOffice is rather similar to Microsoft suite, it offers a wider range of educational instruments, such as a vector graphics and flowcharts creator or a formula editor. Zoho Workplace provides access to numerous built-in productivity applications which make group and/or business collaborations much easier.

By the way, as I was looking for the author of the “Revolutionary Software: Milestones in the Development of Productivity Suites” article for the reference purposes, I was astonished by the fact that it was actually composed by AI! How scary and at the same time exciting it is to realize that you are being taught by a machine, and you are citing the machine in your university assignment! However, as modern educators, we should do our best to embrace this new reality and find the ways for it to enhance our productivity and creativity.

I knew that I was a teacher, but this week I also discovered that I am a constructivist.

When I started teaching ESL to adult newcomers in Canada, I was introduced to Portfolio-Based Language Assessment (PBLA) – a teaching and assessment model that is widely used in Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada (LINC). The more training I did in this model and the more I applied it in my classroom, the more I approved of it and tried to adhere to it.

Only now I realize that PBLA is to a great extent based on the principles of constructivism. For example, social constructivists believe that learning is more effective through encouragement and social interaction (A.W. Tony Bates). In PBLA, peer feedback is highly encouraged, as well as working in pairs or groups. Moreover, according to the principles of constructivism, students must work towards building their own meaning and knowledge (A.W. Tony Bates). Similarly, one of the main PBLA guidelines is that students should be the owners of their learning – they should be given a choice of what to study, they have to perform regular self-reflection, and each learner tracks their progress by updating their portfolio. Most importantly, constructivists consider process to be as important as the outcome, and so do PBLA adherents, as the students’ skills in the classroom are being assessed regularly and not just at the end of a term/academic year.

Although I can now call myself an eager advocate for constructivism, I must admit that my classroom practice is not free from behaviourist and cognitivist influence. For instance, I have always believed that praising students for their achievements, however big or small they are, will reinforce their progress. Little did I know that evoking certain responses by specific stimuli (A.W. Tony Bates) is a key principle of behaviourism! In my defense, by encouraging the students to react certain way to my verbal rewards, I have always been appealing to their emotions and their self-esteem, while behaviourists try to view human activity objectively, rejecting reference to feelings and consciousness (A.W. Tony Bates).

Furthermore, twice a week, my students work individually on an online platform (usually Ellii or RazKids) under my supervision. Mostly, they have to read or listen to a text adapted to their language level and complete a range of comprehension and/or vocabulary exercises. The program then rewards them for correct answers and suggests to improve the wrong ones. However, now I realize that such activities are basically a new, more modern version of Skinner’s Teaching Machine, and though it can be an effective teaching tool, it should not be overused.

As for cognitivism, I believe I largely comply with this theory of learning when I plan my lessons. Some parts of my lesson plans are a vivid reflection of Bloom, Anderson, and Krathwol’s hierarchy of learning (A.W. Tony Bates) and Gagne’s 9 events of instruction: I tend to start a class with a warm-up speaking exercise (gaining attention), then I briefly inform my students about the objectives of the lesson, then we revise what we studied before, and after that, we learn something new and put it to practice, until eventually the students are able to use the new material independently (create). Nevertheless, I like experimenting with different order of activities during class – for instance, I have tried introducing more complicated new material right after a warm-up, before the students get tired, and review the previously learned matters towards the end of the class. This approach also worked well, but I am still yet to observe and decide what would be the absolute best lesson structure for my students – perhaps I could make it a part of my future research?

In conclusion, I must admit that studying the theories of learning more deeply helps me see my teaching through a new, more detailed lens. I can now identify which theory has influenced each of my teaching strategies, and I am able to see which ones of those strategies I would like to improve.

As a modern ESL instructor, I cannot imagine my class without technology. Until recently, I would identify only electronic devices in my classroom as technology. However, having carefully studied Tony Bates’ publication A Short History of Educational Technology, my understanding of this term has significantly broadened.

How can we define educational technology? This term would definitely be rather broad as it can encompass almost any teaching means. In his publication, Tony Bates starts tracing the history of educational technology from oral communication and the introduction of written communication. We would hardly associate these teaching media with the word “technology” nowadays, which reminds me of Neil Postman’s statement in his talk Five Things We Need to Know about Technological Change: tools and devices become “mythical” over the time and start being treated like a part of nature rather than an invention. However, I do not see this as a degradation of our understanding of technology, quite on the contrary – the more technologies we get used to, the more motivated we are to keep creating new ones. So, if I had to define educational technology from the perspective of a modern instructor while considering the contributions of the past, I would define it as means, devices, or tools that make the process of learning efficient and engaging.

Till now, I would say, my understanding and practice of educational technology had been forming both consciously and subconsciously by the historical and philosophical contexts. On the one hand, I had never thought about how such seemingly common invention as printing has brought me, my peers, and numerous generations before us to where we are now. I had never valued the fact that, thanks to the printing press, we are able to obtain standardized education (Tony Bates) and keep passing this knowledge on. On the other hand, if we view technology in the present day context, I have always tried to stay aware of the new technological advancements and incorporate them into my teaching process. For instance, my students and I have been using various online ESL resources and platforms, such as Wordwall, Ellii, Raz Kids, Miro, etc. I have even started using Twee, an AI tool created specifically for teachers to make task and lesson preparation faster and easier. My students and I also use multiple electronic devices in the classroom, such as computers, a smart board, and even smartphones.

Some instructors might argue that such tools as AI or smartphones would not be a good addition to a class, but I believe that every new educational technology can prove to be useful if applied rationally and moderately. While it is natural for humans to fear new developments (Neil Postman), it is also true that we cannot avoid them, and they will eventually become an inseparable part of our lives. Therefore, I firmly believe that educators should do their best to make technology their friend, not their enemy, and use it to advocate and support effective learning. Following this principle helps me understand educational technology better and be open to new innovations and ideas.