Technology Integration In Colleges

The digital era is assuming a profound social change since it has altered the two great ways of development of the human being, it is modifying both the productive model and the means of knowledge transmission. In this article, we will focus on how to take advantage of information and communication technologies (ICT) for the benefit of what, in my opinion, is the most important means of transmitting information that exists: education. Surely ICT has done much with academic writing help and it is taking the classroom to the next level of the learning platform.

Advantages of ICT in college

1.                   ICT helps students develop new skills and be more creative.

2.                   It improves the academic performance of the students since their class experience also improves substantially.

3.                   Motivation and attention levels are increased, contributing to greater effectiveness in the learning process.

4.                   Teacher training is essential for the success of the process.

5.                   Increase the responsibility and sense of autonomy of the student.

6.                   Students use the Tablet as a work-at-home tool, which leads to the incorporation of new learning methodologies, online education, inverted classroom, etc .

THE KEYS TO THE USE OF ICT IN THE CLASSROOM

However, in order to take advantage of the benefits of using ICT in the classroom it is important to consider some aspects:

PLANNING

It is not enough to provide tablets to students, it is necessary to make a planning on how to start introducing technology in the classroom, analyzing its implications (necessary infrastructure, training, aid, etc ...), in order to implement a gradual process of implementation of ICT.

CREATION OF LEARNING EXPERIENCES

In order to use ICT in the classroom, learning experiences must be planned with which students can acquire the desired knowledge and skills, such as information search, virtual communication, problem-solving, teamwork, creation of information, etc.

STUDENT AUTONOMY

The technologies used should promote the participation of students in their learning autonomously and responsibly. There are new models that are being implemented little by little with great success, as is the case, for example, with the inverted classroom.

ALWAYS KEEP IN MIND THE OBJECTIVE

ICT should not be seen as an end in themselves, but as another tool to achieve educational objectives, which should never be lost sight of. In fact, the idea is that ICTs are integrated into strategies that are already used within the classroom, and not be an activity outside of what is normally done within the school.

TEACHER TRAINING

As the last point, it is important to emphasize that, in order to properly implement ICT in the classroom, teachers must be properly trained in the use of technology. In fact, in my humble opinion, this is the real key to the success of this process, that both the educational center and teachers know and know how to use these technologies to implement them effectively.

There is still a long way to go to consolidate this process of integrating ICTs in the classroom, especially in public education, where an important investment is needed to make it happen, but we must not lose sight of the improvement of the quality of teaching of a The country is synonymous with improving the quality of life of its inhabitants in the future and therefore it is necessary as soon as possible to start planning this change, to also achieve the objective as soon as possible.

Learning outside and inside the classroom

Since its first implementations in the school environment through computers during the eighties of the last century, learning through ICT has overflowed the limited space of the classrooms, which over time have adapted their space to computers, tablets, digital whiteboards, and other ICT devices.

Thanks to the impact of e-learning and virtual learning in the educational community, learning is now accessible from the student's home, which on many occasions can choose where and when to receive that training. However, access to countless data through the Internet, and the speed to exchange information propitiated by social networks, has taken a step further dislocating the knowledge that until now could only be learned in the classroom, giving rise to new models of the spatial distribution of learning like these:

Mobile Learning: Use of mobile devices with Internet access in the classroom, and that allows learning knowledge taught in class at any time and place. One of its hottest ramifications today is the Bring Your Own Device (BYOD), which advocates that students make use of Mobile Learning through their own mobile devices.

Collaborative and project learning: Research and practice as the best method to learn together. Learning with a final objective, treated transversally from several curricular subjects, has diluted the boundaries between class groups differentiated until then by age or student capacity. Access to ICTs, which allow the student to train on their own easily outside the school grounds and hours, and the cooperative that can be derived from social networks, finds its echo in educational spaces such as creative classrooms, which are not supported by the age and degree of knowledge of the students, two we will have traditionally delimited the classroom space.

Flipped Classroom, or “inverted class”: It is an educational model in which the student learns the contents outside the classroom and through ICT devices, to later comment, debate and refute what they have learned in the school, turned into an agora where they are resolved doubts and students are guided in their learning process.

A new role for students

But all of the above is the result of an even greater change, which greatly affects the relationship that until not long ago had students with teachers as a source of wisdom, and their relationship with the classroom space as a place to receive training. For many reasons:

The student can become an "active" learner. Some online training platforms involve the practical application of many of the knowledge that, otherwise, was only learned at a theoretical level. All of them, like Knewton or Mind tap, are encompassed within adaptive learning systems, or pedagogical methodologies such as gamification or education through virtual reality and augmented reality.

Thanks to social networks, students can share their knowledge and work as a team with a greater degree of coordination than until now. In this way, the student learns to collaborate with others for the sake of a common good: the learning of a series of knowledge and its joint development with other students from all over the world, being able to know first-hand realities that are alien to him.

And the most important: thanks to accessing to information of all kinds through the ICT connected to the Internet, the student has become the center of his own educational process, able to learn wherever and whenever he wants. In addition, some digital educational platforms, such as the Matic platform, allow students to know where they are in their training process thanks to Learning Analytics, giving them the opportunity to reinforce their weaknesses on their own.

A new role for teachers

The fact that thanks to ICT, the student can now be responsible for their own training, puts in check the role of the teacher as a creditor of a series of knowledge much greater than that of their apprentices. But it also forces teachers to adopt new roles, which continue to make their figure a crucial element for the education of their students, and that involve new practices and situations such as these:

·         The teacher has gone from being the only source of curricular knowledge in the classroom to a learning guide whose high level of knowledge of the subject no longer gives him the last word. Therefore, one of its tasks is to create the educational contexts necessary to stimulate student learning, which in the information society can learn outside the classroom as much, or more, than within it.

·         Knowledge and mastery of the ICTs that are used, with pedagogical or training purposes, inside and outside the classroom. In this way, the teacher can guide the student more easily

·         and without having to distract himself in the technological aspect of his formative process, to focus on the educational one. There are numerous reports or yearbooks, such as this one, that can help you familiarize yourself with the latest educational trends related to ICT.

·         Digital training and netiquette that allows teachers to select and collate the knowledge that is scattered throughout the network. This way, they will not only be able to transmit a more or less solid speech to the students, but they can also teach them to question the validity of the sources of information and learn to separate the grain from the informational straw.

·         And, in short, continuous training at all levels throughout his career as a teacher. The informative and technological avalanche of the information society must not forget that a teacher always is, with or without ICT.

Has the irruption of ICT in the educational world changed the way you teach? Do you think they have also done the spatial distribution of the classroom and the way students learn? How have they done it? Share it with us.

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