“I never think of the future – it comes soon enough,” said Albert Einstein. It is one of Einstein’s lesser-known quotes that nevertheless are as true as his iconic aphorisms.
In fact, the future that we all anticipated with mixed feelings of hope and apprehension is already here. The rapid advance in the realms of artificial intelligence, genetic engineering, and space travel inspires optimism. The sphere of education, which used to be more conservative and view innovations with a good deal of doubt, is rapidly catching up.
The pandemic did not leave enough space for contemporary educational institutions to keep on maneuvering and delaying the comprehensive integration of educational technology into the teaching process.
Schools and colleges all over the world found themselves in a sink-or-swim situation and were forced to find effective solutions practically in no time. The urgency of the circumstances made the complete or partial switch to online learning unavoidable and thus less divisive.
Now that the dust has settled at least a little bit, it is high time we summed up the factors that define the effectiveness of educational technology so that we can optimize the teacher-learner interaction and achieve a productive balance between the traditional teaching methods and innovative approaches. Let’s have a closer look at the matter together.
What Is Educational Technology?
In this post, we will use a helpful definition offered by David Lee, an acknowledged EdTech guru. In his video “Everything You Need to Know About Educational Technology,” Lee defines educational technology as “the study and ethical practice of facilitating learning and improving performance by creating, using, and managing appropriate technological processes and resources.”
What Makes Educational Technology Effective?
High Level of Personalization
The most prominent benefit of educational technology is that it promotes an individualized approach and allows each student to thrive in a tailored virtual environment.
Today, students with disabilities as well as learners from remote places or financially challenged communities have received an opportunity to get access to quality education. This is why it is so important for the teachers to be able to make use of this advantage and to provide their students with a choice when it comes to the modes of material presentation, tasks, and forms of public display of the learning results.
The digital superpower of educational technology which makes it so effective is that it promotes diversity and helps each student excel through self-pacing and reacting to instant feedback. Thanks to high levels of personalization, it is now possible to spot a lack of understanding among students early on and address it to make sure everybody has an equal chance to succeed.
Opportunity to Learn from the Best
Thanks to contemporary educational technology, amazing Yale lectures, and incredible Harvard courses are available all over the world. In addition, any assignment can be dealt with when experts from professional paper writing services come to the rescue. You can now write my essay for me by native writers and ensure you receive the top grade by simply going online.
Thanks to EdTech and the Internet, in particular, students can resort to world-class materials without leaving the comfort of their rooms. At the same time, it raises the bar both for the learners and the educators. MOOCs and other formats of online education have made learning a universal hobby, popular all over the planet, but they have also provided traditional educational institutions with healthy competition, induced students with fresh rigor, and offered teachers new role models who inspire them to grow.
Gamification
In the words of Anant Agarwal, an education innovator, the president of edX, and a TED speaker, gamification is one of the key features that have allowed online learning platforms to revolutionize the contemporary educational paradigm. As we all belong, in the words of Dutch historian and cultural theorist Johan Huizinga, to the “Homo Ludens” species, the play in all the spheres (including not only sports and free time, but also studying and working) is an essential element of cultural development and a healthy society.
A wide variety of apps allow educators to gamify the learning process, especially the practice and the assessment processes, with little effort and tangible outcomes, which results in higher involvement and increased motivation to study among learners.
Digital Empowerment
The most experienced teachers know that students need to feel safe and confident to succeed in mastering new material. They need to be ready to take ownership of their learning. Using technology in the classroom and offering students a choice of digital tools empowers them to tackle learning challenges on their own ground, make use of digital expertise they have already acquired out of the classroom, and feel that they are conscious stakeholders. And even if today some learners are resorting to essay help services online, tomorrow they will be tempted to show that they can cope with the assignments on their own.
Optimal Combination of Educational Technology and Teaching Expertise
Research has shown that any daring project aiming at integrating technology in the classroom cannot succeed without the support of enthusiastic and highly professional teachers. Helpful software can take the most tedious tasks off the teachers’ hands and allow them to focus on the creative side of their profession. Also, educational apps give students the opportunity to practice as much as they need, so they feel more confident and get more proactive in the classroom.
High-quality teaching is the core element of any educational enterprise. When it is enhanced through the use of appropriate technological solutions, which meet the needs of both the learners and the teachers, positive results are forthcoming and often exceed expectations.
To Sum Up
American futurist Alvin Toffler said, “The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read or write; they will be those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn.” Today, educational technology is the bridge over the troubled waters of global challenges that can take humanity to its dream of a better education for everyone.
