Integrating Ict As Pedagogical And Innovative Tool In Secondary School Classes

Abstract

The application of ICT is changing the paradigm of secondary school educational environment. The pedagogical forces include greater information access, communication, synchronous and asynchronous learning, cooperation and collaboration, and pedagogical improvement. The question which a lot of teachers, including the lecturers and researchers from pedagogical faculties keep asking is, whether the implementation of ICT into a teaching process has positive impact on teaching and learning environment. We aimed to verify whether ICT is contributing to the development of teaching and learning processes. To detect and to study the teachers´ confidence the CUEFORTIC questionnaire was distributed among secondary school teachers. The results of our research indicate that, where the use of ICT is most effective in enhancing the learning experience, teachers have been able to integrate a number of technologies such as laptops, interactive whiteboards and the internet. Such combinations of hardware, software and connectivity allow them to develop innovative approaches to learning and teaching. ICT has also become integral to the teaching-learning interaction and when teachers are digitally literate and trained to use ICT, these approaches can lead to better thinking skills, provide creative and individualized options for students to express their understandings, and leave students better prepared to deal with ongoing technological change in society and the workplace.

Keywords: ICTteaching-learningeffectivenessIndex of Leaning Styles

Introduction

Educational system in the Czech Republic has been adopting new technologies to integrate ICT in the teaching and learning process, to prepare students with the knowledge and skills they need in their subject matter. In this way the teaching process is evolving from teacher-centred to student-centred learning environments.

ICT integration is understood as the usage of technology seamlessly for educational processes like transacting curricular content and students working on technology to do authentic tasks (Kainth & Kaur, 2010). Currently ICT facilitate not only the delivery of lessons but also the learning process itself. In educational context, ICT has the potential to increase access to education and improve its relevance and quality. Tinio (2002) stated that ICT has a tremendous impact on education in terms of acquisition and absorption of knowledge to both teachers and students through the promotion of active learning, collaborative and cooperative learning, creative, integrative and evaluative learning.

Problem Statement

In certain contexts, ICT has become integral to the teaching-learning interaction, through such approaches as replacing chalkboards with interactive digital whiteboards, using students’ own smartphones or other devices for learning during class time, and the “flipped classroom” model where students watch lectures at home on the computer and use classroom time for more interactive exercises. When teachers are digitally literate and trained to use ICT, these approaches can lead to higher order thinking skills, provide creative and individualized options for students to express their understandings, and leave students better prepared to deal with ongoing technological change in society and the workplace (Goodwin, 2012).

The management of secondary Public-Law School TRIVIS, which has invested in new technologies in 2017, aimed to verify whether and to what extent ICT contributes to improving the teaching-learning process. The school educates students in the field of security legal activities. Students who study in the 4-year educational program graduate at the age of 19 and are predominantly employed in the bodies of the Ministry of Interior, Ministry of Defence, Ministry of Justice and Ministry of Finance. We were directing our research to this school as it is one of the exceptional secondary schools in the region, whose mission is to provide blended learning environment for students and implement ICT into the curriculum of almost all subjects.

Research Questions

In this paper we focus on one research question: how ICT is contributing to the development of teaching and learning processes.

Purpose of the Study

This research focuses on the need to develop appropriate strategies to face the new teaching role and, furthermore, the students’ role when integrating ICT in the teaching and learning processes. The role and the perspective of teachers have become highly relevant, emphasising them as crucial actors in this process. Predominantly, teachers use technology depending on their perceptions and their trust in the way it can contribute to the teacher and the learning process. Through knowing what they think, we can understand what they do or what they might do with technology in their classrooms and in relation to their work.

Research Methods

The teachers (No:143) at the secondary Public-Law School TRIVIS, who took part in the research within two years (January 2017- January 2019), were asked to complete a questionnaire to collect data about their competencies, uses and attitudes related to ICT in education. The specific questionnaire (CUEFORTIC) was drawn up with this objective. It was divided into five sections: personal data (six items), use of ICT in teaching practice (79 items), attitudes towards ICT (17 items), training experience and training needs (47 items), and school equipment (10 items). Each item was related to a five-point Likert scale: 1, nothing; 2, a few; 3, something; 4, quite enough; and 5, a lot.

An analysis of the 143 answers was carried out with the Statistical Package for Social Sciences. Although we have data relating to teachers’ gender, age and teaching experience, in this paper we will only present the main findings.

Findings

Knowing teachers’ opinion on the influence of ICT in each of the domains established by Bloom puts us closer to their vision on how technology can be used to reach the educational aims related to each of the categories of Bloom’s taxonomy. When considering these categories, we are investigating the learning aims that the teachers consider might be achieved through the use of technology and the kind of teaching strategies that can be developed in the technology-mediated classrooms.

Bloom (1956) classifies educational objectives into three main domains: cognitive, affective and psychomotor. In the cognitive domain are those processes related to knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. In the affective domain we find processes related to attention, elaboration of responding patterns, valuing skills and development of organisational schemes. Finally, from the psychomotor domain we selected perception, expression and communication skills. The average scores from the questionnaires were quite high and were spread evenly across the three domains (see Table 01 and Figure 01 ).

Therefore, we can confirm that teachers from the sample group have a high expectation level with respect to ICT and a positive estimation of its impact on learning: most of the teachers that took part contended that the use of ICT in classrooms supports some teaching and learning processes.

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Conclusion

Based on the research results we can conclude there is a mainstream opinion that sees using ICT in teaching as favouring several processes related to teaching and learning – in particular, those involving attention, perception, responding mechanisms, application of learning and understanding. Besides, those related to information transmission and knowledge facilitation are well thought of. However, some of the proposed processes were valued weakly: interaction processes and expression and communication skills were not regarded highly by the teachers, perhaps because they have considered ICT as being generally used in a one-way mode.

Teachers are involved in a global project that takes into account aspects such as continuous training and motivation and they feel the schools have strong leadership. To summarise, the use of ICT is a key factor for innovation, teaching and improvement within learning processes.

Acknowledgments

Authors would like to thank especially the management of the secondary technical school TRIVIS Třebechovice pod Orebem for their helpful approach and support. The research is part of Project Literacy Innovatively CZ.02.3.61 / 0.0 / 0.0 / 16_012 / 0000608

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