The limits of computers in schools: an actor-network analysis

This thesis explores educational innovation through the investigation of computer use in a school. This study is timely given the financial cost outlaid to equip schools with the latest technological paraphernalia and the volume of research findings that indicate computers have had little impact upon student achievement, or school practice in general. This study takes a first step in suggesting a rationale for these research findings.

Data for this study were collected over a one-year period from a regional primary school in Queensland. The data consist of teachers and student interviews; classroom and school observations, and various school documents. In traditional educational studies, this study would be described as an ethnographic case study. However the theoretical framework upon which this study is based modifies what is traditionally understood as an ethnographic case study.

The study of technology in an educational setting brings together both social and technical elements. However, current literature argues against the application of deterministic approaches-socially determined or technically determined, as approaches to study technology in schools. This study therefore employs a theoretical approach drawn from Actor-Network Theory that denies privilege to either the social or technical. An Actor-Network Theory approach is premised on an analytical move that treats both the technical and the social in the same way. Such an approach is neither technically determined nor socially determined.

This study draws on a theoretical framework recently developed within the field of Actor-Network Theory studies referred to as STS- Science and Technology Studies. This move, referred to as the performative turn, uses an analytical tool of performance. This study contributes to new knowledge by exploring the application of such a methodical approach to the study of an educational innovation. No other study of educational innovation using a framework of performativity has been undertaken to date.

Following the STS turn to performativity, this study takes the position that what we regard as a school can be conceptualised as a performance. This study argues that one of the implications arising from this position is that the enactment of school draws on a limited range of performances which are repeated again and again. It also argues that when teachers integrate computers into their teaching, they draw on established practices. This means that the way in which computers and technology are used in school is necessarily limited. This study also argues that computers and technology are performed in different and often contradictory ways that appear to co­ exist.

Rather than conclude in an anti-technology vein that discourages the use of technology in educational settings, this study suggests that to extend the manner in which computers are used, a necessary first step is a reexamination of the practices found in schools.