Abstract
This chapter evaluates teacher education from a technological point of view in relation to its conventional perspectives, where teacher education was appraised in conjugation with ICT. The integration of ICT in teacher education is a means of supporting high quality teaching and learning, involving teacher educators and teachers, which requires how best to explore the utilization of technologies for meaningful learning of students. In the course of this discourse, it was ratiocinated that ICT plays a vital role in teacher education. In the field of teacher education, ICT-based applications and their integration with content and pedagogy are potential catalysts for meaningful learning of students. Finally, the behaviourist theory, the experiential learning theory, and the information processing theory were employed respectively to discuss the theoretical framework of this chapter to assert the pertinence of ICT in teacher education.
TopIntroduction
Knowledge, education and learning are strongly linked with society and its evolution, thus, one cannot teach or learn nowadays the same way as a century ago, more particularly, the quick and deep changes brought by Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) has had a strong influence on knowledge and teacher education (Cornu 2010). ICT has increasingly become pervasive in societies around the world and thereby, reaching schools and educational sectors. With numerous global advancements in ICT it is essential that educators have a thorough working knowledge of these media and their influence on the performance and engagement of their students (Zhang and Martinovic 2008). According to Cornu (2010), the educational sector was traditionally used to hierarchical and pyramidal structures in their pedagogical practices and approach, but with the advent of ICT, and most particularly the internet, a totally different and divergent means of transmission and dissemination of information in the educational sector was fabricated, which in turn led to new ways of ratiocination and cogitation. Pupils/students themselves are changing and adopting to the new technological advancements, thereby, developing new abilities, new approaches and new concepts, and this apparently affects the educational sector, where teachers have to equip themselves technologically, particularly at a time when pupils/students seem to be more competent than their teachers in technological proficiencies (Cornu, 2010). Panigrahi (2016), asseverates that, the integration of ICT in teacher education is a means of supporting high quality teaching and learning, involving teacher educators, teachers, student teachers, and leaders, which requires how best to explore the utilization of technologies for meaningful learning of students, thus, in the present digital world pupils/students must be given opportunities to learn with effective and efficient integration of ICT in the classroom. Panigrahi (2016), argues that good teaching with technology requires a shift in existing practices in both pedagogy and content domains, therefore, teacher educators are urged to think about their own context, and go beyond technology literacy to promote educational practices that innovatively use interaction of technology, pedagogy and content. According to Cornu (2010), the tradition pedagogical approach is not effective and efficient enough to solve some major problems in the educational environment, because there is a tremendous accumulation of knowledge, and knowledge is getting more complex and intricate every passing day. Therefore, Dash (2014), asserts that, the integration of ICT into pedagogical practices will improve the model of instructional design for meaningful learning of students.
According to Yekini (2014), Information and Communications Technology or (ICT), is often used as an extended synonym for information technology (IT), but is a more specific term that stresses the role of unified communications and the integration of telecommunications (telephone lines and wireless signals), computers as well as necessary enterprise software, middleware, storage, and audio-visual systems, which enable users to access, store, transmit, and manipulate information. Yekini (2014), purports that, the term ‘Infocommunications’ is used in some cases as a shorter form of information and communication(s) technology. In fact ‘Infocommunications’ is the expansion of telecommunications with information processing and content handling functions on a common digital technology base. According to Yekini (2014), ICT can be further broken into the three major concepts which encompasses it; ‘Information’, ‘Communication’ and ‘Technology’, these concepts are briefly discussed below:
Key Terms in this Chapter
Teacher Education: This refers to the policies, procedures and provision designed to equip teachers with the knowledge, attitudes, behaviors, and skills they require to perform their tasks effectively in the classroom, school, and the community as a whole.
Mediated Learning: This refers to an intervention program composed of a Learning Propensity Assessment Device (LPAD). Mediated Learning occurs when a mediator facilitates learning (of a student), in which the mediator observes the students’ potential strengths and weaknesses in the course of learning.
Virtual Learning Environment: This refers to a system for delivering learning materials to students through the web, which includes assessment, student study tracking, collaboration and communication tools, which can be accessed both on and off-campus, thereby supporting students’ learning outside the school premises, 24 hours a day and seven days a week.
ICT: This broadly refers to information and communications technology, which is an extensional term for information technology, which refers to the role of unified communications and the integration of telecommunication (telephone lines and wireless signals) and computers as well as necessary enterprise software, middleware, storage, and audiovisual systems, that enables users to access, store, transmit and manipulate information.
E-Learning: This refers to a network enabled transfer of skills and knowledge with the aid of electronic devices, in which information is disseminated to a large number of recipients at the same or different time.