The Impact of NTIC (New Technologies of Information and Communication) on Teachers in The

The Impact of NTIC (New Technologies of Information and Communication) on Teachers in the Educational Process

Researchers: Rotaru,Ileana ; Drobot,Loredana

Document type and origin: Paper presented at the European Conference on Educational Research, University of Ghent, 19-21 September 2007

Date of Research: january 2007- june 2007

Contact Details: “Eftimie Murgu” University of Resita

Resita, 1-4 Traian Vuia, Caras-Severin

Tel./ Fax: +40255 212 924

E-mail: ;

Research Topic: ICT in Education and Training

Geographical Area where

Research Conducted: Romania – South-Western Region, Caras-Severin county

Educational Sector of

Participants: under-graduted: gymansiun and secondary

Key terms: NTIC (New Technologies of Information and Communication), education and new media, ICT education and training

Abstract:

This small-scale case study examined how the Internet and NTIC (or ICT) are used by teachers within the educational process.

The globalization phenomena and the contemporary society of information stress out new necessities in achieving changes in communicational competences of the didactic personnel (teachers).We all are in the McLuhan's "global village" and the informational society has become a daily fact. These phenomena and social processes have determined changes on the teachers’ competences and their representation of the educational process.

There is a real critical school in the French cultural area, critical to the effects of the "education industry" and "new media” (L.Sfez, P. Moeglin, B. Miege). Nevertheless, concepts as "multimedia project", "e-learning", "CMC - computer mediated communication-", "ICT" (Information and Communication Technologies) are more often used in the educational area. Also, in the Anglo-Saxon cultural area, there are not only research schools to study the effects of the virtual communication or of the NTIC, but this area represents the real promoter of this kid of models and concepts.

Our paper does not try to determine between one area and another, but to present the specificity or the Romanian educational area in this matter. Romanian educational area is characterized by a period of changes and it is confronted by one hand with the lack of the teachers' skills in basic NTIC and on the other hand with the lack of material and technical resources in schools. There is also a large discrepancy between rural and urban areas as it is between young teachers and those with a long teaching career.

The aim of our research is to determine the way that the impact of NTIC (New Technologies of Information and Communication) is perceive and represented by the teachers in the educational process. We consider as a work hypotheses that teachers who had skills of using NTIC are most efficient in the learning process.

In this order, our objectives are:

- to determine the measure of NTIC use in the educational process and to identify the obstacles in using NTIC;

- to identify possible differences of use between rural and urban areas; and also the causes of using or not-using NTIC

- to identify disciplines, subjects and curricula that are most fit in using NTIC in the learning process.

Methodology:

Our used in the research was as it follows:

- the conceiving of the main research instrument: the questionnaire contains several items in order to describe the research lines. A pre- questionnaire was administrated in order to elucidate the main items. The pre-questionnaire was administrated to a number of 30 subjects.

- the final research instrument, the questionnaire contains open and closed items and it is applied to 157 teachers from the rural and the urban area. The average age for the sample is 47 years old and having more than 20 years experience in education.

Introduction:

The research idea came out based on an intensive work of four years in continuing and permanent forming of primary and secondary teachers in Caras-Severin county. This process has been taken place as an Education Ministry policy due to the general process of Reform in education. The courses were held at the “Eftimie Murgu” University in Resita, at the Department of Training of Didactic Personnel and they are part of several training programmes of 30 credits each: “Management and Communication” and ICT.

In this research paper we have tried to determine the next:

-the degree of NTIC’ usage in two ways that we considered inter-related:

• personally, by teachers in their spare-time;
• professionally in schools and within the lessons

-the causes of not using the NTIC. And at this level, we took into account the next three main directions:

• mentalities/ resistance to change
• capabilities
• lack of resources (technical)

Therefore our main hypothesis is that the development of knowledge of using NTIC determines also an increase in using NTIC within lessons and a light resistance to change.

Next step, we tried to determine:

-the frequency of using NTIC and

-the subjects and curricula areas where teachers considered using NTIC most suitable.

We also considered as a work hypothesis that during our research we would find significative differences between the schools and the teachers from rural and the urban area.

This fact is due to a common sociological process that generally characterized the Romanian data, as an accentuated cleavage between rural and urban. Regarding our research and based on our experience we considered that this discrepancy will still remain.

Describing the sample and the research:

We considered a sample consisting of 154 teachers from the next areas (that covers the entire county) around the main cities: Resita (capital), Moldova Noua, Caransebes, Oravita and Anina (considered as one due to the small number of participants) – Table 1 and Table 2 .The sample was randomized as teacher came into a continuing forming session of “Management and communication”. As a general feature, they didn’t participate in any type of continuing forming and training for a period of time of more than 5 years and their average age was 47 and more years old. Most of the sample teachers had more than 20 years length in service (Table 3).

Table 1 / Sample areas
Teachers’ number / Resita / Caransebes / Moldova Noua / Oravita and Anina
54 / 30 / 40 / 30
34% / 20% / 26% / 20%
T=154
Table 2 / Environmet
Teachers’ number / Urban / Rural
122 / 32
79.2% / 20.8%
Table 3 / Age / Length in service
Years old / Urban / Rural / Years / Urban / Rural
a) 20-35 / 7 / 5 / a) less than 5 / - / -
b)36-50 / 59 / 19 / b) 6-10 / 2 / 2
c) over 50 / 39 / 15 / c) 11- 20 / 36 / 8
d) over 20 / 86 / 20
Total / 105 / 39 / Total / 124 / 30

Starting from our main hypothesis, we imagined the next variables:

• V1 : the degree of openness to new and the opposite: the resistance to changes;
• V2 : frequent usage of the computer;
• V3 : self perception of using NTIC;
• V4 : ICT learning sources;
• V5 : main obstacles in using it within lessons;
• V6 : pupils’ perception of the educative process when using NTIC;
• V7 : teachers opinion on subjects and curricula where NTIC can be used successfully

Research findings and results interpretation

1. V1: the degree of openness to new and the opposite: the resistance to changes

This variable was described by several items and the most significant answers regarded “the interest towards new technologies, in general”, “the perception in the future of the teacher replaced by computer” and “the resistance to changes”. Even they were coming from the urban areas, we met a high number of responses that were not so interested in new technologies (22% of the answers). Also both subjects from urban and rural areas declared their preoccupations and up-dating to new technologies (computers, mobiles, television-sets etc.). We didn’t encountered any “no” answer at this question.

Referring to the “teacher’s perception of being replaced by the computer in the future” most of the answers (over 85%) were against such a representation considering yet central the teacher’s place in the educative process. The “yes” answer were most frequent within the subjects coming from the rural area where the wish to being updated and having technical resources is more intense.

The item if “resistance to changes” was described by the next affirmations:

a)Using NTIC is only a fashion;

b)Ministry of Education and the EU impose to use NTIC;

c)Children’s interest and participation within lessons;

d)Is to late for me to learn to use as I’m too old;

e)Pupils learn better in the old fashion way: using blackboard and manuals;

f)Children spent too much time in front of the computer;

g)I enjoy the time when pupils come with new information from the internet.

The results are as in next chart:

And for the rural area it is obvious the same answers for points “g” and “c” as the most frequent, but also a change for point “e” as a consequence of the lack of technologies in schools and a more active resistance to changes. In comparison, teachers from the cities considered as imposed the courses of ICT that the Ministry of Education offers them (see charter above).

Charter 2:

1. V2 : frequent usage of the computer

70% of the teachers from the urban areas declared that they used computer in their daily activities and 10,3% from the rural area declared the same. The latest number is equal with the ones that don’t use computer at all. This fact can be explained as a result of the age of the teachers from the rural area and of the lack of time and possibilities of learning. The same explanations is given also for the frequency of using computer: daily in the urban area and from time to time (more frequent) in the rural one. The lack of financial support and new technology is more accentuated in the rural area when subjects answered to the means of using computer. 43% of the subjects from the rural area answered that using the computer from the ICT laboratory in comparison with 77, 7% from the urban area using their personal ones.

Also, in the urban area over 75% teachers affirmed that using new technologies within lessons, when in the rural one they recognized not using them.

1. V3 : self perception of using NTIC

Teachers were asked, first of all, to indicate on a scale of five points (1 representing the best and 5 insufficient) the mark they considered they deserved in computer’s skills. Most of the answer were situated at the middle of the scale (around three) both for the rural and the urban areas. Also, the next item describing this variable referred to teachers’ perception of the using the internet in their professional activity due to the fact that also a negative representation can be explained as the results of not using it or as a resistance to changes. Over 85% subjects of the both area appreciated using the internet as a positive fact.

Another item describing this variable referred to the most accessed functions of the internet as teacher understood to use. In this matter, both in the rural and in the urban area the most frequent internet function chosen was the search for professional information, seconded by looking for new information from different fields. Only a few young teachers (between 20-35 years old) recognized that using the internet for playing. The interpretation of the general answers is marked by the average age of the sample and of their competences of using the internet.

Internet most used functions / %
1. professional information / 81,9
2. new information-different fields / 42,6
3. e-mail / 7,4
4. playing / 7,4

1. V4 : ICT learning sources

One of the main sources of learning ICT and achieving the competences of using new technologies was named as different courses followed. This hierarchy maintains for both rural and urban areas (68,8% urban and 56, 2% rural). At the same level and having the same percentage were situated the sources of: teaching themselves and thought by friends (informal learning).

1. V5 : main obstacles in using it within lessons

One of the most relevant response regarding this aspect was that variable “age” wasn’t seen as an obstacle in using NTIC even the average age of the subjects sample was over 47 years old (which represents for Romanian population an increase degree of middle age – and characterized that people not willing to learn).

Next items where conceived as questions with free answers in order to comprise the multitude of possibilities of difficulties and obstacles met by teachers within lessons and educative process. Therefore we imagined a simple enumerations of difficulties in a free answer. The most common responses indicated in order of frequency:

-lack of computers in schools and in the laboratories or an insufficient number;

-lack of internet connection;

-the high degree of moral and physical usage of the existent computers;

-difficulties in having access into the informatics’ laboratory for all the classes;

-lack of educational software for most of the disciplines;

-little degree of competences in using a computer, not speaking about NTIC

-others (lack of material resources – paper, toner etc.; thefts)

Some answers indicated not having any obstacles in using ICT but the identification data revealed that those answers belonged to informatics’ teachers.

1. V6 : pupils’ perception of the educative process when using NTIC

As already demonstrated the teachers’ perceptions about how the pupils considered the lessons using NTIC methods and means of teaching and learning refers to the next positive points:

-Increase the degree of pupils’ interest during lessons;

-A high level of pupils’ attention and receptivity;

-Learning fast by using time in a more efficient way;

-Learning from examples and experiments that in other way were almost impossible to make;

-Pupils become more cooperative and independents

And the next negative aspects:

-pupils see the lessons as too leisure;

-loosing the competences of hand-writing;

1. V7 : teachers opinion on subjects and curricula where NTIC can be used successfully

Despite the teachers and the school residence, most of the answers indicated that all subjects can be thought by using NTIC. Although the curricula indicated as NTIC can be used most frequently referred to subjects as: informatics, technologies, chemistry, physics, biology, geography and foreign languages. This aspect may be explained by the implementing the educational software for those subjects, a programme that was created at the request of Ministry of Education and a IT company.

Conclusions

The Romanian Reform in education should accentuate the general aspects of the social and economical life. Cleavage between rural and urban area of education may become more accentuated that it is in present due to the lack of materials and financial means.

Our general and work hypothesis were both confirmed as demonstrated above: teachers are more willing to use NTIC within lessons when having the necessary competences/ skills, knowledge and technical support .

A special attention should be given to the continuing training and forming of teachers in ICT this being one of the main development coordinate of the educational reform. These aspects regards also the quality system in the educative process. Having this data and this general profile of the state of teachers and schools in Caras-Severin county, we can imagine a more extensive research at the national level, and also an intensive one, regarding how the internet can be effectively used and integrated into lessons.

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