Technology becomes one of the important dynamics in shaping society with its swift and enormous impact. Its sphere of influence expands from the daily life of the communities to industry, from business to education. In the last decades, it is observed that technology presents a big endeavor to transform schooling. In order to actualize this transform, lots of attempts have been done through bringing different technological tools and infrastructures into schools: One Laptop per Child in the US, Rwanda, Peru, Uruguay, Ethiopia Italy, Nigeria, Ghana, and in Portugal (Camfield, Kobulsky & Paris, 2007; OLPC, 2007), One Tablet per Child (OTPC) in Thailand (Viriyapong & Harfield, 2013), in the US, Ethiopia, India, Netherland (King, 2013); Global Learning Portal (GLP) for teachers and educational administrators in Afghanistan, Brazil, Egypt, Kenya, Mexico and the Phillippines (Camfield, Kobulsky & Paris, 2007); UNESCO’s “Combat-the-Digital-Divide” project in Lebanon, Beirut, France (UNESCO, 2002); and Smart Education in Korea (Jeong-ju, 2012). Welcoming these new instruments into the educational system is followed by the excessive researches, some of which presented the positive effects while some emphasize the misconceptions about these integrations (Collins & Halverson, 2009). However, rather than following a dichotomic approach reciprocity between technology and schooling requires more holistic approach. In this respect, it seems necessary to reach a synthesis through using both technology enthusiasts’ and skeptics’ arguments. Moreover, the nature of technology is proposing revolutionary changes in human life: The new invention crowds the old one out. This tendency is also experienced in education through radical changes. That, bringing a new tool attempts to take place of all the other methods and techniques. However, educational processes should be evolutionary rather than the radical changes. So, it is suggested that neither dichotomic nor revolutionary approaches will help to establish a healthy relation between school and technology.

In this regard, it is crucial to consider developing a holistic and systematic approach. The need is very urgent for countries--tech-absorbers rather than tech-producers-- similar to Turkey. For instance, OTPC project has been introduced in 2010. Hence, Turkey’s Ministry of National Education attempted to achieve technology integration in classrooms through the Project of Movement-of-Enhancing-Opportunities-and-Improving-Technology, known as FATIH Project. This significant educational investment consists of five components: establishing hardware and software infrastructure, e-content preparation and management, effective use of informational technologies (IT), in-service trainings, social sharing environment, providing assistance and data center, and finally achieving conscious, manageable and quantifiable IT use (About Fatih Project, 2018). However, researchers highlight the problematic parts of these components: Insufficient e-content and z-books (Dursun et al., 2013; Pamuk et al., 2013); technical problems (Çiftçi, Taşkaya & Alemdar, 2013; Gürol, Donmuş, & Arslan, 2012); teachers’ lack of digital competency (Cüre & Özdener, 2008; Gürol, Donmuş, & Arslan, 2012), and so on. All the components mentioned above, function around a system and Education Reform Initiative (ERG, 2013) evaluates the system of project’s implementation model, which has been chosen among the examples of South America, the USA, Kazakhstan and Russia, as “insufficient”. It is not surprising the dysfunction of the components while the system is not accurately structured.

Considering these complexities, this study suggests a holistic and systematic model in order to change this great investment into a well-designed application. Thus, the purpose of the study is to develop a model in order to reveal the instructional design steps of the tablet integrated classroom applications, which can be instructionally functional and advantageous. Developing the model, the supporting conditions, which should be met, the expectations and current applications are investigated. 

The purpose of the study is to explore instructional design steps of a course, where tablet usage is promoted, and to develop a model unique for tablet integrated instruction. Having this purpose in mind, Grounded Theory Method (GTM) is selected to develop a comprehensive instructional design model. Grounded Theory, in general, is explained as a qualitative research method of generating and discovering a theory (Glaser & Strauss, 1967), but more specifically, it can be defined as “an inductive, theory discovery methodology that allows the researcher to develop a theoretical account of the general features of a topic while simultaneously grounding the account in empirical data” (Martin & Turner, 1986, p.141). In this method, collecting of data goes together with the foundation of constructs through developing theoretical analysis from the beginning of the study (Atkinson, Coffey, & Delamont, 2003). Thus, in the present study, a circular and repetitive flow is followed in order to gather data and write analysis and reflect on the entire process. At the beginning of the study literature review and expert opinions are consulted in order to reach the first categories of the research. Then, preliminary data collection is done through the interviews with teachers to emerge core categories. After that, the secondary cycle of interviews is conducted with experts and teachers to densify and saturate core categories. During the interviews theory building is done to construct the instructional design model. For the interviews, theoretical sampling is used. To data collection, interview schedules and document analysis form are developed. The participants of the study are 3 experts from the fields of instructional design, curriculum, computer education and educational technology; 15 teachers and 2 administrators. In addition to the interviews, teachers’ documents, literature, media is also consulted as a source: From the beginning of the project, there have been several news and writings about the project on newspapers, forums and daily writings on magazines or online newspapers. Data analysis of this methodology is done under three categories: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding. In addition to the researcher, two de-briefers are engaged in coding, providing feedback on coded categories, and interpreting the data to develop the theory. Additionally, during the data collection and analysis, examples of coding interview data; memo-writing and diagrams are used in order to create a clearer view of the results.

On the basis of data analysis, an instructional design model is developed, which can be considered as one of the optimal model to guide teachers and decision makers for more functional use of tablets and achieve goals of FATIH project. Also, this study revealed that to use this model efficiently, there are some conditions which needs to be met. Thus, in this section, two main findings are discussed: The necessary conditions to be met in order to use tablets functionally and the instructional design model which can guide the practitioners to integrate tablets powerfully. This study revealed that to get benefit from the existence of tablets in the classroom and to use this smart machine advantageously for the instruction, there are six pre-conditions: Revision of the curriculum, considering the technology integration; full-time technology leaders in schools, school-based technology education for both teachers and students; sufficient e-content; technology budget for schools; software developer team, which can work under ministry; revision of tablets. The Instructional design model, developed in this study, can be categorized under 5 main components as analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation. In analysis, the process started with the objectives, which needs to be enriched by the rethinking of needs of the learners, the place of tablets, goals of education and philosophy behind education. In design process, the decisions about limited or active usage of tablet, budget analysis, necessity of pre-training are given. In development stage, in-school, out-of school and back-up plans are done. In implementation process, after the pre-trainings, the instruction is started, considering un-planned use of tablets. During the implementation, it is necessary to be aware of both positive and negative effects of tablets in order to conduct an effective evaluation. In evaluation, formative and summative evaluation needs to be conducted considering the curricular objectives.

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