Lesson 11: The Computer as a Teachers's Tool

               

            Another application of a computer software program in the field of education is that it can foster higher thinking skills and creativity; it can then be therefore become as a teacher’s handy-tool. Computers as a teacher’s tool can in fact support the constructivist and social constructivist paradigm of learning.

  Ø  Piaget (1981) and Bruner (1990) introduced constructivism. They gave stress to knowledge discovery of new meaning/concepts/principles in the learning process.

  Ø  Social constructivism is an effort to show that the construction of knowledge is governed by      social, historical and cultural contexts.

ü  Vygotsky stressed that learning is affected by social influences.

ü  According to Dewey, human learning is really human languaging that occurs when students socially share, build and agree upon meanings and knowledge.

Learning Framework	Constructivism	Social Constructivism
Assumption	Knowledge is constructed by the individual	Knowledge is constructed within a social context
Definition of Learning	Students build their own learning	Students build knowledge influenced by the social context
Learning Strategies	Gather unorganized information to create new concept/principle	Exchange & share formed ideas, stimulates thinking
General Orientation	Personal discovery of knowledge	Students discuss & discover meanings
Example	8*5 – 8 + 8 + 8 + 8 +8	Two alternative job offers: Option 1 – 8 hours/day for 6 days/week Option 2 – 9 hours/day for 5 days/week

The Computer’s Capabilities

                Today, computers can provide access to information, foster creative social knowledge-building and enhance the communication of the achieved service package.  Teachers can employ the computer in several ways as an:

          1.       Information tool

                    Internet can provide vast amounts of information in various forms even encyclopedias are available, in which it can serve as one of the educational resources. It is not enough for students to download the information but use these to compose or present projects as may be assigned by the teachers.

          2.       Communication tool

            Through the internet, Computers can serve as a channel for global communication, in which it can become a key tool for video teleconferencing sessions.

          3.       Constructive tool

                Computers can be used for manipulating information, visualizing one’s understanding, and building new knowledge, an example is the Microsoft Word.

          4.       Co-constructive tool

                        With the aid of computers, students can work cooperatively and construct shared understanding of new knowledge wherein students may co-edit the same documents from their homes. One good example is the Computer-Supported Intentional Learning Environment (CSILE) created by the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education.

          5.       Situating tool

                      Computers can create 3-D images on display to give the user the feeling that are situated in the virtual environment. Some examples of this tool include the flight simulation program, Multi-User Domains or Dungeons (MUDs), Mud-Object Oriented (MOOs) and the Multi-User shared Hallucination. School-to-school or classroom-to-classroom environment is also possible, users can chose to walk around campus or talk to other users who are logged to the same site.