Information and communication technologies in schools: a ...

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ICT IN LEARNING
AND TEACHING
The latest ICT allow radically new opportunities for human activities. How will
education meet these challenges? Today, in the wider society, most people who
need to add up a bill use a calculator. Most texts are written and read on a computer.
However, such activities are not paralleled in our schools. Even in developed
countries, most children use a calculator or a computer at school only occasionally
(and calculators are used more often in science classes, than in mathematics
lessons). We observe a digital divide, therefore, between the world at
large and the schools teaching children to enter it. Of course, we do not underestimate
a further digital divide between countries and between communities
within a country. In the near future, it will be possible to turn to a mobile handset
to answer most problems and questions on school tests, and to receive oral or
written help or advice automatically (without even using a qualified expert) in a
few seconds. What does all this mean for the future of education? What does it
mean for the school finding itself in such circumstances?
NEW POSSIBILITIES
Do what we are not already doing
The fundamental error that many educators commit when they consider using
ICT is to view them through the lens of their current practice. They ask, “How
can I use these technological capabilities to streamline or improve what I’m really
doing?” instead of asking, “How can I use ICT to do things that we are not
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