Hamad Alshahrani

Hamad Alshahrani
Sara How
English 120
04/11/2016
Technology and Education
Introduction
Technology is a major step ahead in making easier the activities we engage ourselves in
from day to day. Technology ensures that, as human beings, we are more efficient and fast in
doing these activities. It achieves this by facilitating the analysis of information, problem solving
and communication. Technological investments have become a priority for most governments for
most sectors of their economies. Investment in technology for educational institutions has
increased over the years. But then, how is technology related to education in particular. To find
out this, we need to look at the various ways that technology has been integrated into education
and its impacts in the education sector all over the world. We need to know how technology has
been received by most of the actors within the education sector. This project is created to show
how technology is being interpreted in the education sector. In addition to, it show how teachers
clarify concepts.
Unlike most industries that have realized an improvement in business activities, the
education sector has not realized greater benefits from the use of modern technology in the
educational institutions. This can be refer to the fact that in most educational institutions most
education related activities are still based on grades, standards of the education and measures of
outcome.. Ironically, technology may have led to an increase in the costs of operating these

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educational institutions in various ways. For example, apart from a number of resources pumped
into setting up the technology, there is a need for constant maintenance and update of both the
technologys software and hardware. At the rate at which technology changes, it means that these
institutions are requires us to buy new hardware from time to time in order to experience the
same level of a given technology access.
Additionally, these institutions are under pressure from policy makers, the media and the
public at large to implement the use of technology in the teaching and learning processes. This
pressure is huge, and it demands greater investment in technology in order to have better
outcomes. This is because such investments are financed by taxpayers money and thus the
policy makers should ensure good returns from the technology. From such pressure, policies are
now based on evidence, and this has led to some positive outcomes. Some recent studies have
shown an improvement in school achievements at fundamental stages that are statistically linked
to the use of better technology (Harrison et.al, 2004). The British Educational and
Communications Technology agency were in agreement with these findings. The agency further
outlined the lack of technology in schools as one of the major factors that may affect school
performance (Becta).
As a result of more positive and less negative effects of technology on education, some
policy makers have tried to come up with a universal way of determining the returns of investing
in technology. This is connected with the pressure that comes with globalization. However, the
universal bench marking of school achievements has so far proved almost impossible because of
the many differences between education systems. The educational institutions are also under
some pressure to ensure that student does not use technology in the wrong way. This is because

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technology only facilitates to gain, processing, and storage of all sorts of information but the
actual sorting of this information should be monitored by the educational institutions.
In order to address some harmful and risky effects of technology, some institutions have
resulted to limiting access to some websites for the students as well as blocking some kinds of
online activities. In addition, some other harmful effects of technology that need to be addressed
by the institution include hacking and others.
In the long terms, this pressure and increase in the cost of operations for the institutions
will affect the teaching and learning processes. There are so many aspects projected to be in
place to ensure the whole process is a success. Changes within the school and the school
technological policies have to be made. For example, reengineering the whole learning setup and
reviewing the standards of learning for the institution. Technology itself is often viewed as an
agent of change which can be of great use when it comes to changing the learning environment,
the modes of teaching and the learning methods. This has a great impact on the whole
educational institution.
For example, a new technology project often requires the installation of new facilities,
modification of existing policies or establishment of new policies and regulations,
relocation of resources, changes in the informal and formal activities, and may also affect
the social relationships of different groups of people. In this way, technology innovations
introduced to schools are essentially invaders from outside. Whether they can be
successfully adopted and become permanently established depends on their compatibility
with the teaching and learning the environment and the co-adaptation between the
technology and the school as an ecological system (Zhao & Frank, 2003).

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If the school system, for example, would be viewed as an ecosystem which has got many parts
within it. These parts of it and the way they relate to each other directly affect the growth of new
parts within the system. In a more complex socio cultural environment of this same school,
different groups and processes are inter linked with each other very closely both inside and
outside the school to create a net of changes. In the same way, these groups and processes affect
the students learning process. The same changes caused by these parts interactions also affect
the institutions operational. This means that the way the actors within the institution and those
outside it will interact and affect the integration of technology in the education system (Zhao &
Frank, 2003).
An implementation plan may work for a certain technology at one time, and it may not work at
another. This calls for a dynamic plan which reflects changes. This will definitely work better
compared to a static plan (Tondeur, Van Keer, van Braak, & Valcke, 2008). It is good to note that
new policies need to be formulated for a project that has been regarded as successful to remain
so. There is a need for extra resources should be injected into increasing and improving the
technical support, upgrading the technologys software and buying new hardware to ensure the
technology remains a success. The teachers are supposed to have granted to the necessary help
just like the students need it. For all these to be realized, there is a need for a constant technology
planning and evaluation, strong leadership in place, provision of adequate and prompt support as
well as refining and revising the practices in place from time to time (Tondeur, Van Keer, Van
Braak, & Valcke, 2008).
It may still to be difficult, with all these factors in place, to judge whether implementation
of technology in the educational institution is a success because there are yet no models or set
goals to follow. For the teachers and the institutional heads, there is also the challenge of

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determining the effectiveness of technologys use within an institution (Russell, Bebell, ODwyer
& OConnor, 2003). This has seen most policy makers looking at the amount of time the students
spend using technology and the types of technology in a given institution as a marker of
successful technology implementation instead of measuring how the technology is used in a
meaningful way to aid the teaching and learning within the institution, as well as whether that
really happens.
There is a need for a universally acceptable or widely accepted basis for determining an
effective form of teaching. Some studies use the students academic performance as the indicator
of an effective method of teaching. Some scholars argue that this form of measuring the
effectiveness of teaching only serves to support an education system that is full of social and
intellectual inequalities. An effective teaching method is just one of many factors that may lead
to a students good academic performance (Campbell, Kyriakides, Muijs, & Robinson, 2004).
Campbell et al. realized there were some problems that are equivalent with the concepts of the
effectiveness of teaching. First is the conception of the effectiveness of a teacher or teaching
help. Second, the connection between the educational institution and teaching effectiveness.
They argued that teachers can be more effective in enabling environments and may be ineffective
in less helpful learning environments. Teachers in a helpful environment are more likely to try
new ways of teaching.
The other cause of this gaps between the trends in technology and the use of technology in
educational institutions is the lack of technology planning. Technology planning is the process of
forming, revising and implementing technology plans with the aim of guiding an organization
towards achieving its goals. This plan also describes how this technology will be used within the
organization, how it will be evaluated and the institutions learning objectives.

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Fishman and Zhang (2003) said that it is the technology plans that are at the boundary between
research and development in the learning of technologies as well as their actual use in
educational institutions. They further highlighted the four characteristics of successful planning
for any technology. First, the technology plan should be used as a policy document. Second, this
policy document should then be available to all the teachers within the learning institution. Third,
the technology plan should be able to change with changes in technology. This will not only
ensure that the institution has the most recent technology but will also enable the teachers to be
in line with new technologies at all times. Lastly, for the technology plan to be successful, there
should be support, collaboration and commitment from all the actors within the educational
institution and the education sector as a whole.
Conclusion
Technology has undergone a massive revolution in a very short period. There are many students
who don't think that technology is a useful invention because they were not good by using
them .However, technology comes with a lot of pressure and challenges for the educational
institutions. A good number of actors within the educational sector are yet to understand fully
how best they can use technology so as to achieve the best results. Their quests to fully address
this have led to a lot of debates. Examples are the debates on the objectives and educational goals
to be accomplished by the use of technology, how best technology should be integrated into the
existing school subjects.
It is evident that integrating technology into the educational system is more than just acquiring
computers and setting up an internet connection. There is a need for specific educational
objectives to be in place, therefore (Sugar, Crawley, & Fine 2004). Hence, technological

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integration as a process requires factors acting together in a given manner and over a period of
time (Tondeur et al., 2008).
It is true that very few institutions have achieved full technological integration. In most cases,
there is a lack of a common vision about the use of technology in educational institutions by the
institutions and actors from their communities. Studies carried out by Lawless and Pellegrino
(2007) indicated that the integration of technology will be found wanting where the principals
are not well trained and technology capable.
Technology has undergone a massive revolution in a very short period. There are many
students who don't think that technology is a useful invention because they were not good by
using them .However, technology comes with a lot of pressure and challenges for the educational
institutions. A good number of actors within the educational sector are yet to understand fully
how best they can use technology so as to achieve the best results. Their quests to fully address
this have led to a lot of debates. Examples are the debates on the objectives and educational goals
to be accomplished by the use of technology, how best technology should be integrated into the
existing school subjects.

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Creative or reflective writing

Technology in education is very vital as well as very risky. Its involvement in the education is
necessary now but a strong check is needed.

Since the technology is both constructive and destructive. It can be used for research and It and
been also used as hacking. The problems that schools are facing right now is how to keep up with
technology since new ways and problems have been faced by schools on daily basis. They are
unable to make a static plan to keep up with that. Only dynamic planning can work with that type
of problems and they need to upgrade their labs to solve those problems.

Since they are paid by the tax payers money, a strong check is kept on them. So it is helping the
institutions in a good way. It is necessary to understand the mechanism of the education so the
integration of technology is proper.

It is true not many schools or institutions have been integrated with technology but with the pace
it has changed over the few years just keeping up is a big gain. The rest can be done by devising
proper ways and laws so the integration is proper and maximum benefits of technology can be
gained.

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Work Cite

Bryant, Lee and Downes, Stephen and Twist, Jo and Prensky, Marc and Facer,
Keri and Dumbleton, Tim and Ley, David, British Educational Communications and
Technology Agency (BECTA), corp creator. Emerging technologies for learning (volume
2). 2007.
Campbell, J., Kyriakides, L., Muijs, D., & Robinson, W. Assessing teacher effectiveness:
Developing a differentiated model. London, UK: Routledge Falmer. 2004.
Fishman, B., & Zhang, B. Planning for technology: The link between intentions and use.
Educational Technology, 43.4(2003): 14-18.
Godwin-Jones, Robert. "Emerging technologies." Language Learning & Technology 7.2 (2003):
12-16.
Lawless, K., & Pellegrino, J. Professional development in integrating technology into
teaching and learning: Knowns, unknowns, and ways to pursue better questions and
answers. Review of Educational Research 77.4(2007): 575-614.
Lei, J., & Zhao, Y. Technology uses and student achievement: A longitudinal study.
Computers and Education 49.2(2007): 284-96.
Russell, M., Bebell, D., ODwyer, L., & OConnor, K. Examining teacher technology
use: Implications for preservice and in-service teacher preparation. Journal of Teacher
Education 54.4(2003): 297-310.

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Sugar, W., Crawley, F., & Fine, B. Examining teachers decisions to adopt new
technology. Educational Technology & Society 7.4(2004): 201-213.
Tondeur, J., Van Keer, H., van Braak, J., & Valcke, M. ICT integration in the classroom:
Challenging the potential of a school policy. Computers & Education 51.1(2008): 212223.
Zhao, Y., & Frank, K. A. Factors affecting technology uses in schools: An ecological
perspective. American Educational Research Journal 40.4 (2003): 807-840.