Zeitschrift für Informationstechnologie und Softwareentwicklung
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Back to the Era of Conditioning Theory? The Case of the Moodle Platform

Sophia Ming-Lee Wen

This article discusses the role of critical theory in the process of enlightening teachers and students in the digital era, in which higher education has been obsessed by meritocracy. Taking critical theory especially, Herbert Marcuse’s critique of the “one-dimensional man”, as guide line, the author objects to the conditioning theory as the basis of teaching and learning, since it would alienate the intrinsic relationship between teachers and students. To show the tenability of my view, an empirical study on the awareness of the negative function of teaching and learning integrated with ICT among teachers and students is conducted. As result, some main problems are found as follows: 1. Although both student and teacher are aware of their own rights and the significance of autonomy, their teaching and learning integrated with ICT are far from expectation, as seen in the low speed of the Moodle platform. 2. On the other hand, teachers in university are rather passive in using the Moodle platform (They are asked for and the Moodle system is free). They are, in fact, not conscious of the danger of being dominated by the system and, consequently, of the inequality of rights, which could hinder the development of autonomy and self-reflection. By criticizing the Moodle system, I indirectly show the indispensable role of critical theory in helping teachers and students to emancipate themselves from the pitfall of technology and its instrumental rationality