The Digital in French Schools

In this issue’s special feature on “Schooling in the Digital Era”, Alain-Marie Bassy draws on a historical analysis of the French case to show how digital media have gradually invaded every facet of the education system. First, he reminds us that this enormous change has been accompanied by a highly significant semantic evolution in the way these changing realities are referred to, with the emergence of a slightly anachronistic terminology aimed at reassuring teachers (particularly the older ones, who are often uneasy at the ever-renewing technologies, guarded as to how they are to be appropriately used in teaching, and wary of the dexterity with which their pupils handle them). Bassy underscores the main upheavals that are taking place in terms of the operation of schools and of governance in the implementation of education policy… Lastly, he makes a plea for giving more responsibility to each school or college and lays down some conditions required by a successful strategy for the use of digital technology within the school.