Rory Cellan-Jones, technology correspondent for the BBC, has posted an article that discusses the technology revolution in schools that has taken place in the last 10 years.

After billions of pounds have been spent fitting out classrooms with the latest IT equipment, politicians and teachers alike are questioned if the huge investment is really providing children with what they need.

Rory speaks to the head teacher of Bristol Brunel Academy, a school that has 400 desktop computers for 1,000 pupils and provides every child in years seven and eight with a netbook computer of their own.

The projectors, electronic whiteboards, a wireless network and a swipecard electronic registration system in place at the school all adds up to about £1.5m for the initial fitting-out, and then big running costs every year.

When asked if the money had been well spent, the head teacher insisted that overall the school had got good value. But he conceded that a swipecard registration system had not worked – teachers preferred to register pupils themselves, albeit using an electronic system. And the wireless network had indeed fallen over under the strain of hundreds of students trying to use it at once. The school had needed to spend extra on a new one from a different supplier though the principal was hazy about how much that had cost.

Rory states that no one he spoke to wanted to go back to chalk and talk, dump the computers, and leave children to make their own way in the digital age. But there was a growing recognition that spending big sums on kit did not necessarily deliver better education.

Read the full article online at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/thereporters/rorycellanjones/2010/03/are_we_building_schools_for_th.html