Why technology in education? What is this hype about? This is a question we get asked in many different forms, day in and day out. And, this is not from people who are skeptical about it, this is more from harried education management/principals, teachers who think that they are irrelevant in today’s context.
Given the above theme, I would like to introduce a slide deck I presented on behalf of Ariem at the School Needz Expo in Jan 2010. The topic was technology as an important resource in Education today. You can view it below.
Technology as an important resource in Education Today
There has always been resistance to technology adoption in education. To cite a few examples, back in 1700s when the Quill and Bark was mainstream and slate and chalk was launched, I can imagine the educators groaning about the “costly” slates and how the “skill” for developing “own” bark was being lost on the children. Let us take something even closer in history, ball point pens vs. ink pens and the hoopla that was created around handwriting to prevent one from shifting to using ball point pens.
We are at another such point of inflection and it is ever more important because today access to information via the internet can drastically transform the way we teach today. Educators can don the role of facilitators, instead of data banks, to instil reponsibility and the right perspective towards accessing, distilling, extracting, discarding, referencing and using information in today’s children. The teachers are digital migrants today while the children are digital natives, but the concept of mentoring and guidance are still as alive and kicking today. Hence, the call for creating simple technologies that help teachers bridge the digital gap and connect with today’s generation becomes all the more important.
With the empowerment of teachers through technology, it can act as a bridge to collaborate, enabler to reach the underprivileged, differentiator to keep the teacher relevant and a source of power to ignite minds. More on each of these perspectives in the next few posts as we talk about some real life case studies.
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