3.Technology and Teaching

In today's information age, technology has become more and more important as a tool for teaching. Even going back 7 years, when I was still in high school. Some of my teachers were already utilizing technology in their teaching. I still remember our english literature teacher taking us to the library one class to the computer lab just to research on materials for our research paper. At the time, google just came out and becoming more and more popular. She specifically asked everyone to go to google.com and search for materials. It was from that class that I learned what google was and how much information there was out there. It seemed endless and fascinating. If you go back even further, overhead projectors were one of most commonly used teaching tools since the 1980's. Before they were invented, teachers had to hand write everything on the board which is highly inefficient. With the overhead projector, the transparency sheet is pre- written with materials. After each use,it can simply be replaced with a new, fresh sheet with more pre-printed material, saving class time vs a blackboard that would need to be erased and teaching materials rewritten by the educator. Following the class period, the transparencies are easily restored to their original unused state by washing off with soap and water. Hence, saving time for teachers as well as the students. In recent years, however, new technology, especially computer technology have grown tremendously and new computer softwares have been invented to replaced old used of projectors. Now microsoft powerpoint have replaced the use of overhead projectors in that it not only allow educators to put text, but to allow images, videos, as well as audio, thus, creating a highly animated and interactive presentation. The use of internet is another huge movement of technology today. As I researched for the topic of our group presentation on social network sites and it's relation to education, I noticed it's potential in helping educators better communicate with their students and in turn helping the students learn in a more interactive way. John Dewey strongly believed in a democractice form of life, in self-directed learning. It is through that mindset along with cultural resources provided by the educators can one be successful in acquiring knowledge. With the vast amount of resources on the internet, it is now possible for educators as well as students to self-direct ourselves to learn. Similarly, Jerome Bruner believed learning only takes place when one creates it's own work. It is through creating does learning takes place. That idea is somewhat similar to Dewey's belief that art is a lived experience. With art, we do not sit there and master the facts and techniques. One has to go through the process of creating to really learn and not just knowing the process and seeing the end product. It seems to me that the view points of Dewey, Bruner, Elliott, Mcluhan, and Eisener, all have one thing in common, and that is that the most important part of learning is the process, and as human being, we learn from what we have previously acquired and build up from there.