John Howells’ new book, Management of Innovation and Technology (2005) is not the easiest book to read. It is however, quite interesting. In the first chapter, he discusses skeuomorphs. A skeuomorph, in case you have forgotten, is an element of design that has lost its original function but is nevertheless retained. An example is the square on top of a Doric Column. Originally, columns were made of wood, so they were topped with a wooden square to distribute the stress. Marble and stone columns did not require this square but, for esthetic purposes, it was retained, thus becoming a skeuomorph. Other examples are watch pockets on jeans, plastic dinnerware made to look like stoneware (including the imperfections), and the consumer version of the Hummer, made to look like the original, but certainly not ready for the next war.
In distance education, especially online instruction that is asynchronous, the role of the teacher is significantly different, even unrecognizable when compared to traditional classroom instruction. In classrooms, teachers present information, talk, draw on the board, demonstrate, and take apart; they do it all. The classroom teacher has a critical and necessary role. Without the teacher in the traditional classroom, teaching and learning—education—would not occur.
Conversely, in an asynchronous, online course the instructor does none of these traditional things. True, many of our instructional tools allow us to simulate the classroom and the functions of the classroom teacher, but it is not the same.
We have kept the teacher, but is the teacher’s function really critical? If we look at the teacher’s changing role superficially, as some do, one might conclude that teachers have no real purpose anymore; they are skeuomorphs.
Admittedly, the word is a little hard to deal with, but then so is the idea that teachers have lost their original function. However, if we are realistic, we recognize that teachers are becoming designers, organizers, motivators, and assessors, among other things; roles that teachers have long been advocating as vital to the education process, even more important than presenting.
And finally, recognizing that teaching as we have known it is losing its original function is an important—albeit first—step. As distance education leaders, we can take an important, positive role in identifying the new teacher.
