ICT in XXI century Schools

Since half of the last decade, the world had undergone multiple changes rapidly; namely war, industrialisation, new cultures, the invention of new technologies and more. This changes affected not only the political and economic aspects of society all over the world but also the cultural and educational.

Schools nowadays, do not remain as the only owners of knowledge and information. Batista & Celso(2007:32) say, that exists a revolution of Information Communication Technology, that consist of a new way to produce, process, storage and distribute information. This is possible due to the advances in technology, that digitalized the information making possible its distribution through technological devices such as mobile phones, personal computers, tablets, TV, etc. As the authors say, young people and children knowledge and skills they have learned without the intervention of adults (Batista & Celso: 21). As a consequence, some schools in our country remain as old ways of teaching and learning.

I consider it is time that teachers and schools provide an education according to the new generations of children and young people. Their ways to communicate, learn and perceive the world may not coincide with the scholar culture they are immersed. The inclusion of ICT is essential to provide this new generation of people the necessary tools for the XXI society. Nevertheless, this is not an easy task for teachers in Argentinian schools. The implementation of ICT requires that teachers acquire new knowledge regarding audiovisual technologies, informatics and more. As well as that, the development of usual tasks and teacher’s teaching modes may be affected in the process. In addition, the school should possess the necessary equipment to make possible a successful inclusion of ICT in the classroom.

The following video will provide you with interesting information about ICT transformation in Argentina.

When reflecting on how to incorporate ICT in the classroom, the fundamental questions always remain: why? what should we teach? how to organise our teaching? what and how to evaluate? I think our lesson plans should function as guides that give us the possibility of revision and flexibility.

Reference:

Lic. María A.Batista, Lic. Viviana E. Celso & Lic. Georgina Gabriela Usubiaga (2007)- Tecnologías de la información y la comunicación en la escuela: trazos, claves y oportunidades para su integración pedagógica.