Group Admins
Description
Teachers are commonly ignorant of what history in technology can bring to technology education. Technology therefore tends to be presented as deterministic, leaving the pupils with the impression they are in the hands of technology itself. Contrary, the story to be told about technology should be that it is a consequence of needs and successive improvements built on political as well as individual values and decision. Teachers’ historical consciousness should therefore be taken into consideration in teacher education as teachers’ ignorance could otherwise imply a non-critical perspective in school. In the history of technology, for instance the implementation of gas OR electricity could be used as an exemplary case for how people struggled to raise their standards and what brought them to do so. These days electricity is considered a crucial innovation for what modern society can offer. At the time though when it all was considered new, many was reluctant to its use, as others were investing their spare money to reach new heights. A description made by pupils of that historical tension can open up a critical perspective.
With cultural heritage collections teachers can to offer a picture of yesterday’s society. Searching for documents and artefacts highlighting these settings could become an educational practice of considerable use for development of pupils’ historical consciousness. An educational methodology is proposed with cultural heritage to raise new standards in technology education. Such an educational practice could become a necessity for development of critical citizens in tomorrow’s technological world.