What Are The Top Trends In Education Technology For The 2015 School Year?

by Terry Heick

What’s trending up for 2015 school year in terms of education technology?

iPads are still the standard but other platforms are making headway. That should be fun to watch over the next 3-5 years.

Educators are getting better at spotting crap edtech, but waste still abounds. There are even some educators who are against technology in the classroom at all.

Schools are getting better at thinking tech-first (not in terms of priority, but design). But they are still struggling to meaningfully integrate edtech at the learning model and curriculum level.

Apps are getting downright brilliant in spots, but in-app purchasing? That’s getting a bit out of hand, isn’t it? And something has to be done about all of the usernames and passwords.

Below are 30 entirely subjective but hopefully somewhere close to reality takes on what’s trending up and what’s trending down in education and education technology for 2015 and beyond. A handful of these aren’t pure edtech items, but it’s all part of the same ecosystem yes?

Note that this list isn’t an endorsement–meaning this isn’t necessarily the way I think things should be, but rather what they seem to be–at least from my vantage point, right here, right now. Ask me again in August.

What’s trending up, what’s trending down, and what’s in that awkward middle ground of education and education technology? Below are 30 guesses.

30 Trends In Education Technology For The 2015 School Year

Trending Up

1. Teacherpreneurs
2. Decentralizing academic standards
3. Rethinking data in the classroom
4. Adaptive learning algorithms
5. Digital Citizenship
6. Focus on non-fiction, digital media
7. Depth of content
8. Experimentation with new learning models (including flipped classroom, sync learning, blended learning, etc.)
9. Teacher self-directed PD, webinars, streams, etc.
10. College as a choice
11. Collaborative learning
12. Digital Literacy
13. Focus on learning spaces
14. Design thinking
15. Mindfulness, meditation, downtime
16. Teacher as guide-on-the-side
17. Gamification of content
18. Genius hour, maker hour, collaboration time
19. Workflows
20. Cloud-based word processing
21. Mainstreaming + co-teaching
22. Platform Agnosticism
23. Librarian as digital media specialist
24. YouTube channels, Google Chromecast, AppleTV
25. Apps like Storehouse
26. 1:1 tablets/devices
27. Project-Based Learning
28. Mobile-first #edtech design
29. The innovation of apps
30. Microsoft OneDrive, Google Drive

Awkward Middle Ground

1. Google, Microsoft, Apple, etc.
2. “Accountability”
3. Professional Learning Communities
4. Differentiation
5. Computer coding
6. Traditional reading lists of truly great literature
7. Pure creativity
8. Self-directed learning
9. Massive in-person education conferences
10. Colleges in general
11. Experiential learning
12. Cultural Literacy
13. The physical design of most school buildings and universities
14. Memorization of prioritized content that leads to design thinking
15. Debate
16. Pressure on systems
17. Gamification-as-grading-system
18. Tutoring
19. To-do lists
20. Cloud-based learning
21. One teach, one drift/prompt/observe
22. Moving from one OS to another (e.g., from Android to Windows Phone)
23. Librarian/DMS as bibliophile
24. Online encyclopedias
25. Apps like Prezi
26. Socioeconomic disparity
27. Mobile learning
28. Mobile assessment
29. Honest-to-goodness free apps
30. iCloud

Trending Down

1. Mass education publishers
2. Common Core standards, Race to the Top
3. Data Teams
4. Scripted curricula
5. Draconian district filters
6. Humanities
7. Coverage of content
8. “21^st century learning” as a phrase or single idea
9. The perceived quality of teacher certification & training programs
10. College as the standard
11. MOOCs
12. Agricultural Literacy
13. The traditional classroom
14. “Low-level” recall of easily accessed data (facts) or skills (arithmetic)
15. Lessons that favor “verbally expressive” students
16. Pressure on teachers
17. Standards-based grading; pass/fail; student retention
18. Increased “instructional hours”
19. Whole class processes
20. Flash drives, hard drives, CDs, emailing files
21. Alternative schools/classrooms for special needs students
22. Apple-centric thinking
23. Librarian as no-nonsense, ruler-wielding taskmaster
24. Cable television, subscription-based content streaming
25. Apps like PowerPoint
26. Oversimplifying BYOD thinking
27. “Doing projects”
28. Mobilizing non-mobile content
29. In-app purchase gouging
30. Dropbox

30 Trends In Education Technology For 2015; image attribution flickr user flickeringbrad