"We are now 12 years into the new millennium and technology has become
a prime element of almost all English language teaching (ELT)
conferences and journals around the world. Yet, when we look for real
improvements in student performance and effective use of technology by
teachers, I think that the results are pretty disappointing.
I
have spent the past 10 years doing technology-focused training work,
materials writing and conference presentations and it still saddens me
to see how much resistance and cynicism exists among teachers to the
introduction of technology. But is it their fault? I don't think so.
Even as an enthusiastic and experienced trainer, I can see that once
technology gets into schools, things start to go wrong.
Investment
in technology has often been equated with investment in hardware. In
many ways this is the easy fix: throw money at the challenges that
technology integration poses. For example, education ministries around
the world have been willing to invest in expensive interactive
whiteboard (IWB) technology without really considering the benefits
inside classrooms. Having made the investment, teachers are often left
to sort out how to use IWBs in a pedagogically effective way, often with
very little training or support. Meanwhile managers can wash their
hands of the problem and report back that they have done their part in
integrating technology.
The willingness of many schools to invest
heavily in this hardware is rarely matched by a similar, and comparably
smaller, financial commitment to provide adequate broadband connectivity
to classrooms. Without sufficient connectivity the investment in
hardware is wasted because, as soon as teachers and students start
accessing content-rich websites in any numbers, the connection grinds to
a halt, leaving the teacher embarrassed and reverting to traditional
paper-based resources."
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