The Internet and Education PDF

THE INTERNET AND EDUCATION Topics: What is Internet? What is education? Advantages and Disadvantages of Internet Internet in Education INTRODUCTION This lesson defines the Internet and education. Education in the 21 st-century is more diffe...

THE INTERNET AND EDUCATION Topics: What is Internet? What is education? Advantages and Disadvantages of Internet Internet in Education INTRODUCTION This lesson defines the Internet and education. Education in the 21 st-century is more different than in the past. It discusses how the Internet can be used in education. This will differ the understanding of students about internet usage and the Internet in education. Giving the students the information about how the Internet started (history) and the comparison of before and today’s Internet—discussing the advantages and disadvantages of the advanced sharing of information through the Internet. Education is defined to understand further. Developing one’s comprehension in today’s situation in education is also discussed. Roles of the Internet in education are well defined. In this module, the students will learn the five priorities for the Internet and education, which is essential in implementing flexible/blended learning. Objectives/Competencies: 1. To define the Internet and education. 2. To apply netiquette in online lessons/transactions; To equip students with the 21st-century teaching skills. 3. To appreciate the role of Internet as applied in the field of education. 4. To manifest the value of potential by integrating the Internet in education for upgraded learning. ANALYSIS Now, let’s see how the Internet is important to education. Beginnings of the Internet How do you think the Internet started? Who invented it? How has the Internet been used before? And is it useful before? The Internet could not have existed without the two major inventions of the 19 th Century, electricity and the telegraph system. What is the Internet? A worldwide system of interconnected networks and computers. Short for “internetworking”. This is a system architecture that has revolutionized communications and methods of commerce by allowing various computer networks around the world to interconnect. Sometimes referred to as a “network of networks.” The Internet provides a capability so powerful and general that it can be used for almost any purpose that depends on information, and it is accessible by every individual who connects to one of its constituent networks. It supports human communication via social media, electronic mail (e-mail), “chat rooms,” newsgroups, and audio and video transmission and allows people to work collaboratively at many different locations. What is a Network? A computer network is an interconnection of a group of computers. A network is a collection of computers, servers, mainframes, network devices, peripherals, or other devices connected to one another to allow the sharing of data. An example of a network is the Internet, which connects millions of people all over the world. Networks may be used for: Communications such as email, instant messaging, chat rooms, etc. Shared hardware such as printers and input devices. Shared data and information through the use of shared storage devices. Shared software, which is achieved by running applications on remote computers. Evolution of the Internet ARPANET - Was the world's first operational network, and the predecessor of the global Internet. Advanced Research Projects Administration (ARPANET) was developed by the U.S. Department of Defense. One theory was that it was developed to survive a nuclear attack. Figure 7: ARPANET (March 1972) Trivia: The Internet was a result of an unsuccessful military and Academic research program. The World Wide Web The original Internet provided screens full of text. It is excellent for sharing information and accessing the Library of Congress. The text was all one font and size. By the name, the Web, the leading information retrieval service of the Internet (the worldwide computer network). The Web gives users access to a vast array of documents that are connected to each other by means of hypertext or hypermedia links—i.e., hyperlinks, electronic connections that link related pieces of information in order to allow a user easy access to them. Hypertext allows the user to select a word or phrase from text and thereby access other documents that contain additional information pertaining to that word or phrase. Hypermedia documents feature links to images, sounds, animations, and movies. The Web operates within the Internet’s basic client-server format; servers are computer programs that store and transmit documents to other  computers on the network when asked to, while clients are programs that request documents from a server as the user asks for them. Browser software allows users to view the retrieved documents. The World Wide Web Saved the Internet Hyperlinks were invented. In this time, the mouse was invented to click on hyperlinks. The URL (Uniform Resource Locator) was also invented. This allowed sites to be named. Tim Berners Lee brought all of this together to form the World Wide Web in 1990. The URL, colloquially termed a web address, is a reference to a web resource that specifies its location on a computer network and a mechanism for retrieving it. Mosaic: The First Web Browser It is very slow. Cannot handle loading pictures very well. Did not give an indication of the potential of this medium. National Center for Supercomputing Applications’ (NCSA) Mosaic wasn't the first Web browser. But it was the first to make a major splash. In November 1993, Mosaic v 1.0 broke away from the small pack of existing browsers by including features—like icons, bookmarks, a more attractive interface, and pictures—that made the software easy to use and appealing to "non-geeks." Figure 8: Mosaic Web Browser for MS Windows In 1994, Tim Berners Lee developed the World Wide Web Consortium to develop standards for the Web. In this time, Netscape was founded.  Netscape Communications was a computer services company best known for its Web browser, Navigator. Navigator was one of the two most popular Web browsers in the 1990s Figure 9: Netscape Web Browser Between 1994 to 2000, the Internet exploded during this period. The first commercial site was Amazon.com In 1994 the World Wide Web grew by an astounding 2300 percent. Amazon saw that online shopping was the wave of the future. ➔ Netscape was mainly used until 1998. Microsoft Internet Explorer snagged 96% of the browser market. Today the most popular web browser is Chrome by Google Company. IMPORTANCE OF EDUCATION From history, during the time of Plato, Socrates, Aristotle and other great educators, do you think there is a formal education system? Who has the privilege to become educated in those times? In times of great people in history, there was no formal education like today, sitting on an armchair, listening to the teacher, writing on notebooks or papers, or even answering examinations. In their times, formal education happened while they were walking; talking; and asking different philosophical and logical questions. Thereafter, the education evolved. It became formal because people knew that education was the key to everyone's understanding of the world and of their lives. What is Education? Education is the wise, hopeful and respectful cultivation of learning undertaken in the belief that all should have the chance to share in life. Education is a process of inviting truth and possibility, of encouraging and giving time to discovery. (from infed.org, 2015) “A process of living and not a preparation for future living.” (John Dewey, 1926) Education – cultivating hopeful environments and relationships for learning Learning is both a process and an outcome. As a process, it is part of living in the world, part of the way our bodies work. As an outcome, it is a new understanding or appreciation of something. 92  “Teachers are losing the education war because our adolescents are distracted by the social world. Naturally, the students don’t see it that way. It wasn’t their choice to get endless instruction on topics that don’t seem relevant to them. They desperately want to learn, but what they want to learn about is their social world—how it works and how they can secure a place in it that will maximize their social rewards and minimize the social pain they feel. Their brains are built to feel these strong social motivations and to use the mentalizing system to help them along. Evolutionarily, the social interest of adolescents is no distraction. Rather, it is the most important thing they can learn well.” (Lieberman, 2013) The cultivation of learning is cognitive and emotional and social activity (Illeris, 2002). Education is deliberate. We act with a purpose – to develop understanding and judgment and enable action. We may do this for ourselves, for example, learning what different road signs mean so that we can get a license to drive; or watching wildlife programs on television because we are interested in animal behavior. This process is sometimes called self-education or teaching yourself. Often, though, we seek to encourage learning in others. Examples here include parents and carers showing their children how to use a knife and fork or ride a bike; schoolteachers introducing students to a foreign language; and animators and pedagogues helping a group to work together. Education – being respectful, informed and wise Education is wrapped up with who we are as learners and facilitators of learning – and how we are experienced by learners. In order to think about this, it is helpful to look back at a basic distinction made by Erich Fromm (1979), amongst others, between having and being. Approaches of Fromm: 1. Having is concerned with owning, possessing and controlling. In it we want to ‘make everybody and everything’, including ourselves, our property (Fromm, 1979). It looks to objects and material possessions. 2. Being is rooted in love. It is concerned with shared experience and productive activity. Rather than seeking to possess and control, in this mode we engage with the world. We do not impose ourselves on others nor ‘interfere’ in their lives (see Smith and Smith, 2008). Being Respectful: The process of education flows from a basic orientation of respect – respect for truth, others and themselves, and the world. It is an attitude or feeling which is carried through into concrete action, into the way we treat people, for example. Respect, as R. S. Dillon (2014) has reminded us, is derived from the Latin respicere, meaning ‘to look back at’ or ‘to look again’ at something. Educators, as with other respecters of truth, should do their best to acquire ‘true beliefs’ and to ensure what they say actually reveals what they believe (Williams, 2002). Being Informed: To facilitate learning we must have some understanding of the subject matter being explored, and the impact study could have on those involved. In other words, facilitation is intelligent. 93 Being Wise: Wisdom is not something that we can generally claim for ourselves – but a quality recognized by others. Sometimes when people are described as wise what is meant is that they are scholarly or learned. More often, I suspect, when others are described as ‘being wise’ it that people have experienced their questions or judgement helpful and sound when exploring a problem or difficult situation (see Smith and Smith, 2008). This entails: appreciating what can make people flourish being open to truth in its various guises and allowing subjects to speak to us developing the capacity to reflect being knowledgeable, especially about ourselves, around ‘what makes people tick’ and the systems of which we are a part being discerning – able to evaluate and judge situations Education – acting so that all may share in life Thus far in answering the question ‘what is education?’ we have seen how it can be thought of as the wise, hopeful and respectful cultivation of learning. Here we will explore the claim that education should be undertaken in the belief that all should have the chance to share in life. This commitment to the good of all and of each individual is central to the vision of education explored here, but it could be argued that it is possible to be involved in education without this. “Reconstruction or reorganization of experience which adds to the meaning of experience, and which increases ability to direct the course of subsequent experience.” (John Dewey, 1916) ABSTRACTION The Internet and Education The Internet has immense potential to improve the quality of education, which is one of the pillars of sustainable development. Education is both a basic human right and a core element of sustainable development. Education enables individuals to build more prosperous and successful lives and societies to achieve economic prosperity and social welfare. Access to the Internet is fundamental to achieving this vision for the future. It can improve the quality of education in many ways. It opens doorways to a wealth of information, knowledge, and educational resources, increasing opportunities for learning in and beyond the classroom. Teachers use online materials to prepare lessons, and students to extend their range of learning. Interactive teaching methods, supported by the Internet, enable teachers to give more attention to individual students’ needs and support shared learning. Access to the Internet helps educational administrators to reduce the costs and improve the quality of schools and colleges. The Internet plays a very vital role in education. It contains a wealth of knowledge that can be searched at any time. The Internet has introduced improvements in technology, communication, and online entertainment. Five priorities for Internet and education Lessons have been learnt from experience with different technologies and services in countries with different educational systems. The rapid pace of change in technology and the availability and affordability of access means that experience is not always a 94 good indicator for the future. The diagram below shows the five priorities for education such: infrastructure and access, vision and policy; inclusion; capacity, and content and devices. Figure 10: Five Priorities for Internet and Education 1. Infrastructure and access No strategy for the Internet in education can succeed without adequate infrastructure and access to resources. Networks and services need to be affordable, for both schools and individuals, if they are to be used effectively. Schools need computers, tablets and other ICT devices that are integrated in a smart fashion in the educational environment to make the best use of Internet-enabled learning. These need to be maintained, upgraded and cyber-secure. They also need reliable electric power. 2. Vision and policy Policymakers concerned with ICTs and with Education have the opportunity to develop a vision for the future which will enable technology to benefit both students and national development. Policies for the Internet in education should focus attention and resources on national development priorities. 3. Inclusion The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development aims to ‘ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning opportunities for all.’ Policies should promote greater equality in access to learning resources for disadvantaged groups within societies, such as those living in rural areas or in poverty, ethnic minorities and speakers of minority languages, and those with disabilities. 4. Capacity Education is at the heart of capacity-building. It is through education that people gain skills that equip them to find jobs, start businesses, lead fulfilling lives, and provide for themselves and their families. Success in the digital age requires digital skills. As they enter the world of work, individuals should be able to make use of computers and other digital equipment. Digital literacy is the ability to use online applications, find information online, assess its quality and value, and make use of it in daily life. It is crucial to living in the digital world, particularly for the growing number who will work in ICT-intensive industries. Teachers need to learn new skills to make effective use of Internet resources. 5. Content and devices One of the most dramatic differences the Internet can make lies in opening access to a broader range of content for teaching and learning – content that is explicitly educational in purpose and the much more comprehensive range of online content that can supplement curricula. Instead of relying primarily on textbooks, teachers can direct students to many different sources, and students can develop research skills by exploring online content on their own.