The Top-Down Digitization of Norwegian Classrooms and Exams
A large scale introduction of computers in high school and junior high school was the last two decades conducted without professional rethinking of consequences.  Technological Tightness in Norwegian classrooms in lower secondary and upper secondary school is located at the absolute world top (Krumsvik, 2013). School digitization is an example how a reform should not be introduced in schools. And it is today an example of an unruly element in schools that have significant negative impact on the work environment, pupils’ interests and achievements. Digitization has happened without realistic assessments of the didactic consequences that may arise for teachers and students who must live and work in an overdigitized school. This paper provides a critical review of selected research on ICT introduction in Norwegian schools, and analyzes the ongoing projects with digitization of exams.

This paper shows that a number of scientific research reports point to unfortunate didactic consequences of rapid and extensive introduction of technology in Norwegian schools. Curriculum analysis shows that the process by which technology has risen from being considered as aids to professional teachers in their teaching into autonomous objects for student learning and school improvement has occurred over decades. The use of technology has not led to more professional engagement and better learning for students, but instead opened a door for non-academic pursuits in classrooms.

This paper then seeks to answer the following research questions:
1) Which didactic consequences for teaching and learning has the digitization of Norwegian schools in the period 1980-2010 led to?
2) Which didactic implications do the projects with digitization of exams in Norwegian schools have for teaching and learning?

The digitization is reviewed in a didactic theoretical perspective with emphasis on the teacher perspective. The concept of teaching has a long tradition both in school practical teaching and the theoretical didactics. In one of Herbart main works Umriss pägagogischer Vorlesungen from 1835 teaching is one of the main concepts, and education has in its Greek original meaning also teaching as one of its main meanings (Herbart, 1835; Gundem, 2011). New media and new educational technology developed in schools  from 1930, and is referred to by school curricula from the 1930s until 1980s as aids to teaching. Both school movie tape recorder, slides, overhead projector, radio, gramophone, language laboratory and television are discussed positively in the curricula. During the entire period a teaching concept was dominant, and thus the teacher had a starring role in school curricula. Geir Haugsbakk has shown how a marked change in the descriptions of data technology occurred in the 1990s compared to the previous mention of technology in public documents (Haugsbakk, 2010).

The Education Directorate in 2012 and 2013 conducted experiments with exams with Internet access in some subjects on 35 schools involving 83 teachers, 67 sensors and about 1,000 students. The purpose of the experiment is to prepare for the introduction of digital examinations in all Norwegian schools. The pilot projects follow a familiar pattern in Norwegian education policy: First a project is introduced, then it will be stated that the experiment is successful and should be expanded until it can be implemented as the current policy. The experiments with digital exam is politically approved by the Ministry of Education, but implemented and evaluated under the auspices of the Directorate of Education. The evaluation was conducted by the consulting firm Ramboll by anonymous authors. (Directorate of Education, 2012 and 2013)

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