This chapter explores the methodological challenges of studying future imaginaries in education and introduces a revised model of future workshops to address these difficulties. Based on workshops with representatives from the EdTech sector, research institutions, and educational policy organizations in Sweden and Estonia on the theme ‘The Classroom of 2040’, the study examines the interplay between sociotechnical imaginaries, collectively held visions about how (new) technology can solve current problems and contribute to societal progression, and the participants own imaginations about what the future of education could or should be. The workshops facilitated a process that moved from a mapping of dominant educational imaginaries to critical reflection and the co-creation of alternative, postdigital futures. This approach can be used to understand how sociotechnical imaginaries are materialized in educational technologies and policies while also revealing the tensions and negotiations involved in this process. By engaging influential stakeholders from the EdTech and education sector, the workshops model also highlights the potential of experimental and participatory methods to facilitate dialogue and collaboration between different actors that can inform future development in education.

Claims of becoming the first, the best, and the most digitized are standard rather than outstanding in most public-facing digitalization agendas and strategy documents of countries in the Global North. These grand narratives of digitalization need translation through concrete practices by sometimes unexpected actors-in this case, librarians. This article develops the notion of digital care work based on 18 book-chapter-length essays by active librarians based at Swedish public libraries. It illustrates that librarians are central to the process of translating digitalization into reality; they have become ambassadors of digitalization not only by fostering digital skills and competences in workshops and official training sessions but also, we argue, through a specific form of digital work, namely, digital care work. This kind of gendered work, which is typically carried out alongside the official tasks and assignments of librarians, is of low prestige and often involves affective aspects, such as emotions of shame and uncertainty.

Estonia has since the liberation from the Soviet Union in 1991 successfully branded itself as a digital society and an education nation. This transformation builds on a sociotechnical imaginary where the progression of learning and the advancement of future citizens is postulated by a restructuring of the classroom through digital solutions. In this case study, we look at a prototype of a future classroom that was set up at the Estonian pavilion at the world fair EXPO 2020 in Dubai, as part of a nation branding process, promoting the nation's educational system and prosperous ed-tech sector. The future classroom was promoted using slogans and futuristic visuals that targeted foreign investors and policy makers, in a way that suggested that the anticipated digital future already exists in Estonia, and therefore, is available for foreign investment, while at the same time connecting to a national and historical narrative of Estonia as part of the European cultural sphere.

This chapter presents Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death, which is a critique of the effects of television on print culture, public debate, and public education. Postman’s book can also be read as an example of a media ecological approach to the long-term effects of communication technologies on human culture. This presentation approaches Postman’s book from four perspectives: as a form of media philosophy, media history, media critique, and finally as a proposition for a media ecological approach to education.