Teachers, pedagogy and professional development - Teaching with Technologies: The Essential Guide - page 100

are invariant. What is fundamental is the perception of the material properties of an
object (tree), or tool (computer) as seen by the user.
However, there remains a tension between tool and perception, because percep-
tions of use are multi-faceted, in that a tool could be used in a variety of different
ways. What technology requires is for teachers to allow themselves 'to recognise the
flux of possibilities' (Latour 2002: 250, cited in Hammond 2010: 214). With respect
to education, the term 'affordance' is used to refer to the opportunities for action,
which various technologies provide. What shapes the 'seeing' of a range of possibili-
ties for action with a tool - that is, what influences users' perceptions - are memory
and context. Further to this, affordance contains the idea of complementarity (oppor-
tunity and constraint), in that technology offers both countless opportunities for
actions and countless constraints on actions. In citing the example of interactive
whiteboards and how, when fixed to a wall, this provides a physical constraint on
use, so does placing an interactive whiteboard flat down on a table provide other
opportunities, but other constraints too.
Kennewell's (2001) work with trainee teachers' use of the Internet identifies the dif-
ferent ways teachers perceive the affordance of this technology and how opportunities
and constraints are complementary. Crucially, however, Hammond's (2010) critique
of Kennewell's research resides in noting the failure of it to offer an account of why
teachers should perceive affordances differently regarding the same technology. For
a deeper consideration of why teachers perceive affordances in different ways, Ham-
mond (2010) examines further the nature of perception, in particular, the ontological
tensions inherent in the concept of affordance and gives an account of how differ-
ent writers have appropriated this explanatory concept since Gibson's (1979) original
inception. Ultimately, though, the significant observation is that 'if a teacher is unable
to directly perceive the affordances of technology, relative to well rehearsed goals such
as creativity, analysis, authentic learning and so on, then he or she is unlikely to be
an enthusiastic adopter of technology' (Hammond 2010: 215). If the affordances of a
tool cannot be seen, then it will not be appropriated.
An affordance is then:
. . . the perception of a possibility of action provided by properties of, in
this case, the computer plus software. These possibilities are shaped by
past experience and context, [and] can be signposted by peers and teach-
ers. Affordances provide both opportunities and constraints. Affordances are
always relative to something and, in the context of technology, relative to
desirable goals or strategies for teaching and learning.
(Hammond 2010: 217)
The distinctive insight from Gibson (1979) therefore involves the understanding
of the interaction between the user and tool (organism and object) in how the former
perceives the latter. This process is more than direct perception of material properties
and concerns the meanings that shape how a tool is seen: the lens through which
meaning is made and possibilities for action are envisaged. Perceiving the possibilities
that technology opens up for learning comes from previous experience, and can be