Technology used in Education

ICT has revolutionised education all over the world. Firstly, it is a subject which indicates its new found importance in life. It is this importance and dependence on technology that caused us to claimed that we are currently living in the information age. In school colleges and universities all over the world, massive amount of technology are used in the teaching of students. Take a look at st Gregory; we see that there is at least a computer in every room and also more computers in computer rooms, study rooms and library. There are also projects and smart boards in every class room. In equal measure, the needs of education have provided the driving forces behind some of our most significant technological innovations.

INTERACTIVE WHITE BOARDS

The vast improvement of technology has altered the way that children learn at school, a number of products such as interactive white board have been introduced, improving the teaching methods of children from an early stage. The interactive whiteboard has becoming the replacement if the chalk board, it is said that 45% of lessons are now taught in front if the computer. The use of this has introduced the idea of multimedia into school, with educational videos now able to be screened. The use of such technology has offered an information space that allows student to engage in active collaborative.  The interactive nature of the smart board provides many practical uses for the classroom. Using smart notebook software, teachers can record each step of a lesson activity for student to review at a later time.

COMPUTERS/LAPTOPS:

Students now have access to laptops in some schools, if not some school allow pupils to bring laptops into lessons to type their work, this can be considered a major advantages, as work is less likely to get lost and notes tens to be neater. However with children now typing in lessons handwriting overall tends to be more untidy. Through the use of advanced computing and telecommunication technology, learning can also be qualitatively different. The process of learning in a classroom has become significantly richer as students have access to new and different type of information, can manipulate it on the computer through graphic displays or controlled experiments in ways never before possible and can communicate their rests and conclusion in a variety of media to their teachers. We know now- based on decades of use in schools, on findings of hundreds of research studies and everyday experiences of educators, technology have enhanced the achievement of all students, increases family involvement in their schooling, improve teacher’s skills and knowledge and improve school administration and management.

E-MAILS:

E-mail is a high importance in education. From the school year 7-11, email is used on regular basic. School emails can be very helpful when communication through other student and teachers. With the school emails, teachers can sent you and update of what you are missing in lessons, or what topics you should revise and also student can send teachers their work to teacher via emails. As an individual, we are all given our username, which automatically becomes our school email address. Through the use of school emails, we year 13 students have been able to stay in contact with Mrs Hunter. She updates us with important information and changes about various universities. Many school now use email to send out important messages to parents, this for many parents is more efficient as it is also instant and gives the parents acknowledgment on what is happening within the schools. A number of students often forget to pass on news letter and leaves it at the bottom of their school bags. Therefore, email is very efficient for the teachers, parents, student and the school itself.

Advantages of school emails: a way of communication and setting work.

Disadvantages: sometimes if email box is full, you can’t receive emails.

VLE:  which means Virtual learning environment are now being introduced in school. VLE are now being introduced into schools, which provides a same online intranet which allows pupils to have access to their work from home as well as a number of online resources. Homework and class work can be accessed from a student VLE, this allows student to keep up to date with their work. VLE can do so many different things; they can deliver lessons through videos,, or online hand-outs, they can do group interaction and tutorial through chat, conferencing and email, they can help management of work/assignment. The using of VLE has greatly improved the method of teaching as assignment can be done at home and also lessons can be taught there. The disadvantage of VLE is that those who don’t have access to internet at home will lose out more.

SIMIS

Sims is the easiest and most effective security information management system available.  This is a computer system used in school to keep contracts of all students’ reports. With this, you can see the history of a student since he/she came into the school. You can track performance, attendance, and behaviour etc. During the old days, information of student are kept in a paper based file, which has a disadvantages as it is easily lost. But with the introduction of SIMS, documents of an individual are kept for about 10years.

Additional information

How the students have benefited

There is a huge amount of information available on the internet for just every subject known to man, resources are endless. One advantages of internet is that it has endless resources for almost every topic. For people who struggle with books and find them time consuming, the internet is the answer. Today it is also required that students should use the internet for research. Teachers have starts given assignment that requires research on the internet. Teachers sometimes set work which can be difficult  to find in a text book and others may want the student to do wider reading, with the use of internet, information of all source are provided.