Technology as a Tool for Learning

Mission

The integration of current technology and applications across the curricula is an integral part of the College of Education Mission Statement. One of the goals of the College is to "continue to integrate technology throughout the college so that graduates can use the latest technologies in their fields and faculty can use technology effectively in teaching and research." The Professional Development Technology Lab serves as a technology resource center to support teaching and learning in both pre-service and in-service teacher education.

The focus of the Professional Development Technology Lab centers around a basic tenet: information literacy should take precedence over technology literacy. The Lab’s goal is to support the learning community in the College of Education in order that each member can be information literate. Both material and human resources will be available to help learners gain appropriate skills and information in their personal progression from the physical access skills for the use of media and technology, to the intellectual access skills of information use, to skills and attitudes for learning independently and thinking critically, and finally to the skills needed for being responsible and productive teachers who help the next generation become information literate.

The Role of Technology in Education

The only real measure of the effectiveness of technologies and technology-enhanced educational programs is the extent to which they promote and support students’ engaged learning and collaboration.

Plugging In: Choosing and using educational technology, North Central Regional Educational Laboratory

Our conception of educational computing and technology use … does not conceive of technologies as teachers. Rather, we believe that in order to learn, students should share the role of representing what they know, rather than memorizing what teachers and textbooks know. Technologies provide rich and flexible media for representing what students know and what they are learning. A great deal of research on computers and other technologies has shown that they are no more effective at teaching students than teachers, but if we begin to think about technologies as learning tools that students learn with, not from, then the nature of student learning will change.

Learning with Technology: A Constructivist Perspective, Jonassen, Peck, & Wilson

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