Using the traditional textbook + classroom approach, the places where learning can occur are limited. A portable wireless computer has access to the teacher's course material and the entire Internet almost anywhere. And this is a vastly larger resource than can be practically carried on paper in a backpack.
Bottom line: information technology allows learning anywhere, anytime; not just in one particular classroom for one hour a day.
Reason 2. Depth of Understanding
Interactive simulations and illustrations can produce a much greater depth of understanding of a particular concept. When virtual manipulatives are used in a classroom setting they can go far beyond chalk and talk. Using a projector, the teacher can conduct onscreen investigations and demonstrate concepts far more easily than with just words and arm-waving. For example see Subtended Angle. Combine this class demonstration with access to the same tools over the web, and the student can reinforce the ideas by playing with the simulations themselves, any time, any where.
Reason 3. Learning vs. Teaching
Technology allows the tables to be turned. Instead of teaching (push), students can be given projects that require them to learn (pull) the necessary material themselves. Key to this is the ability to get the information they need any time anywhere, without being in the physical presence of a teacher. This project-based pull approach makes learning far more interesting for the student. I have seen firsthand how students cannot wait to get out of regular classes to go to the after-school robotics project.
Reason 4. New media for self-expression
In the old days, students could write in a notebook, and what they wrote was seen only by the teacher. Using modern technology, they can: make a PowerPoint presentation, record/edit spoken word, do digital photography, make a video, run a class newspaper, run a web based school radio or TV station, do claymation, compose digital music on a synthesizer, make a website, and/or create a blog.
Reason 5. Collaboration
A vital skill in the new digital world is the ability to work collaboratively on projects with others who may not be physically close. This can best be done using modern computer tools such as the Web, Email, instant messaging and cell phone. Rather than laboring alone on homework, students can work in small groups wherever they happen to be and at any time. They are doing this already – it can now be formalized and taught as a vital skill. Many university projects are undertaken by teams spread around the world. Your students need to be prepared for this.
Reason 6. Going Global
The worldview of the student can be expanded because of the zero cost of communicating with other people around the globe. The internet permits free video conferencing which permits interaction in real time with sister schools in other countries. From an educational viewpoint, what could be more important than understanding other cultures through direct dialog and collaboration?
Reason 7. Individual pacing and sequence
Students are, of course, all different. Information technologies can permit them to break step with the class and go at a pace and order that suits each student better. Without disrupting the class, they can repeat difficult lessons and explore what they find interesting. With time, it will become more like having a private tutor rather than being lost in a large class.
Reason 8. Weight
Three textbooks and three binders easily weigh over 25 pounds. A laptop computer weighs about 5 pounds and provides access to infinitely more material via its own storage and the Internet. A 40Gb hard drive can hold 2 million pages with illustrations; the Web is unfathomably large. Right now, students are getting back injuries lugging around a tiny subset of what they need in the form of black marks printed on slices of a substance not all that different from the papyrus used by the ancient Egyptians. And it's just static boring text.
Reason 9. Personal Productivity
Students need productivity tools for the same reasons you do. They need to write, read, communicate, organize and schedule. A student's life is not much different from that of any knowledge worker, and they need similar tools. Even if they are never used in the classroom, portable personal computers will make a student's (and teacher's) life more effective. To cash in this benefit, schools need to go paperless.
In summary, if education is about knowledge and intellectual skills, then information technology lies at the heart of it all. We have only just begun this transition. School will eventually look very different. Get ready.
"The problem with all of what we currently do in the general scope of education is that we, the educators, hold on to how we learned and how we process information and knowledge rather than thinking through the realties of how new students and future students think and process and the challenges they will bring to our courses. Even those most innovative 'early adopters' among us struggle to discover effective uses of technology in education but do not really understand how our students perceive what we do or how they process the content we give them. All of this is further challenged in the delivery and distribution of learning. At present enough is not known to establish conclusions about which is better, but we know enough through our own experience to realize that things are different. New technology has challenged the way in which education is delivered, but newer technologies are now challenging how people process information and what they expect to be able to do with that information."
- Ruth Reynard, Ph.D.
