by Mieder van Loggerenberg
ICT plays a crucial part of society and should be considered as a building block of modern society. Many countries viewpoint is that the knowing ICT and mastering the concept and basic skills concepts of it plays and intricate part of the core of education, which also includes numeracy, reading, and writing.
Worldwide research has shown that the implementation and use of ICT can lead to better learning and teaching methods. The National Institute of Multimedia Education in Japan made a report that proved that with the increase usage of ICT in education and integrating technology to the curriculum had a major and positive impact on students’ achievements. The results showed that the students who are constantly exposed to technology through education had better ‘knowledge’, presentation skills, innovative capabilities, and also took more effort into the learning process.
The 21st century classroom has taken important steps forward in its evolution of the learning environment. Many of the benefits that we have seen in education are due to the introduction of new technology options for students. Like in the past instead of having a single computer for a class to use or a laboratory environment for the entire school placed in the infamous ICT lab, we can now help students learn at their desk through either e-learning or mobile learning also known as m-learning.
ICT has developed to become an essential part of the education system and many countries are utilizing the ICT curriculum and development to resolve the communication and technological differences. Some of the advantages of ICT in education are:
· Better engagement
· Improved learning techniques
· Help students and teachers to stay motivated during the learning process
· Give both students and teachers access to information from a single location
· Acquiring vocational skills
· Encourages collaboration and communication
So, ICT in education can help students to be more competitive in the global economy as a skilled worker and social mobility by:
· Enriching learning experiences and providing new sets of skills,
· Exposing and reaching more students to Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs),
· Facilitating the training of faculties,
· Minimizing costs and saving time associated with information delivery and automating regular day-to-day tasks,
· Improving the administration of institutions to enhance the quality and efficiency of service delivery.
But why is ICT so important? Well, basically, it is a central tool that supports teaching and learning at all stages of education and across all areas of the curriculum. We live in a world where all aspects of life are connected to technology and provide extraordinary opportunities for young students who are just setting out on their educational journey. And as such ICT does not only play a vital part to the overall operation of the school, but it can also help to improve achievement levels, inspire creative thinking, and promote the improvement and development of skills that will prove valuable in the real world.
ICT allows students to engage, observe, explore, even solve problems, and also make exciting discoveries for themselves. It encourages collaboration and interaction between students and teachers and also amongst peers. These ICT resources does not only provide the tools for developing skills but also helps them to engage confidently in creative learning and makes teaching and learning more effective and fun for everyone involved.
In a nutshell, ICT is important because it, improves the learning experience by raising the standard across the curriculum to improve the delivery of lesson content and allows students to engage in class in a variety of ways. It also extends the learning experience beyond the four walls of the classroom for an anytime, anywhere approach. Meaning students and teachers can continue to work and access resources even from home or collaborate with anyone anywhere in the world. The biggest selling points would be how ICT streamlines the assessment process. Students’ data can be recorded and analyzed more efficiently for accurate assessment of their learning abilities and allow teachers to see which areas of learning need a higher level of support. In turn making the learning process more effective. It can also promote higher-order thinking skills for the 21st century. This can include skills like evaluating, planning, monitoring, and reflecting to name a few. The effective use of ICT in education requires that students have the skills to explain and justify the use of ICT in developing solutions to problems. Students need to discuss, test, and speculate the various strategies that they will use. As I have mentioned previously with the advantages, we can all agree that motivation for learning is important. Technology offers a myriad of interesting learning methods which can encourage, motivate and improve engagement. As a consequence of this increased engagement, students will be able to retain knowledge more effectively and efficiently.
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