I. Preface – ICT at our
hand
Today, as
computers and the Internet have become so handy for us to use、we
appreciate their benefit and convenience in our daily life. In fact, electronic communication is
now prevalent in our society, bringing tremendous positive contributions. Would this benefit, however, be
available to all of us living in this world? With this question in our mind, we have decided to make a
research on educational surroundings of ICT especially at school in various
countries.
First, as we had
information for Japanese primary schools that educational programs on the
computer are available in general curriculum, we accessed to a homepage of the
Ministry of Education and Science to know to what extent those programs are
practiced at schools. Although it
was realized that in many schools in various regions lessons for exchanging
e-mails and setting up homepages are exercised in numerous ways, it was hard
for us to read from the Ministry’s site whether any guideline or syllabus is
made available for elementary school.
Consequently, in order to keep our research going, we have decided to
start getting information from the overseas on what it has been actually taught
at schools for the subject of ICT (see the Table I-2) in the foreign countries.
Secondly, we are
also minded to make a research if homogeneity and universality of educational
programs for ICT have been assured at schools in the overseas (see Table I-3). In addition to them, we decided to
survey over the issue of gender equity in the field of ICT education (see Table
I-4). While studying some
documents, we realized that in the United States in l996, President Clinton
tried to set up the policy of Super Highway Communication System at every
school within the States, and that in Korea, in response to President Kim
Dae-jung’s call, it was decided that educations on ICT and English Language
should be initiated at every primary school throughout the country, and that
the reason for these decisions did come from the concerns that digital divide
should not be brought into their countries. We therefore decided to ask for the relevance between
educational programs carried by schools and their concerns toward digital
divide (see Table I-5). Finally,
we questioned about the prospect and concerns by the school toward ICT
education (see Table I-6).
From the aspect of
these five viewpoints, we made it our purpose to make a research on the present
situation of ICT education at schools, and we prepared questionnaire to meet
this purpose.
Contents of the
Questionnaire: [Table I]
1.
Identification
of the schools asked for answering questionnaire:
(1) Persons responsible to answering the questionnaire
(2) Name and location of schools (public or
private; urban, suburban, or country-side)
(3) Number of pupils enrolled (male/female)
(4) Required period of attending school and
grade of years starting ICT education
(5) Conditions of infrastructure of ICT education
(basic installment including computers)
(6) The purpose for using computers
(7) Teachers involved in ICT education
(8) Availability of a long distance educational
system; a system of Computer Assisted Instruction, etc.
2.
Toward ICT
Education
(1) What is taught in the first year of ICT
education
(2) What has been taught up to the last grade
(3) Subjects offered and allowed to study
(4) Syllabus
(5) Principles for ICT education
3.
About the
National Policy for ICT Education in your country
(1) Any national policy or guideline available
for ICT education
(2) Any National back up for ICT education
(3) Relevance between national policy and ICT
education given at school
(4) Allocation of national budget
(5) Year for starting ICT education
(6) Opportunity for initiating ICT education
4.
Gender Gap
Issues
(1) Hours of lesson for giving ICT education
(2) & (3) Gender proportion
(4) Difference of attitude toward ICT education
between girls and boys
5.
Solution to
the problem of digital divide
(1) Availability of computers at home
(2) Concerns for digital divide
(3) Validity of ICT education at school
6. Expectation and concerns toward ICT
education
(1) Expectation
(2) Concerns
II.
Method of Research
The committee
members asked their friends and acquaintances through e-mail for a help to
answer questionnaire for research.
In addition to this, while they appealed to voluntary helps from the
overseas through the links to the IFUW homepage, they received a response from
17 countries and over 60 schools.
From Korea and Thailand, thanks to the help of national presidents and
CIR of each association of University Women, 19 schools responded to the
questionnaire. We are very
grateful to their collaboration (see Fig. 1.)
[Fig. 1: Countries where people cooperated
in answering the questionnaire]
In
handling the data for the statistics, the committee classified the cases by the
nature of questions between a case where all 60 schools responding separately
were counted by individual unit, and another case where the answers from the
same nation were grouped into one as a national unit, so that an imbalance of
figures of the answer caused by nation could be better and more fairly handled.
However, data was
not necessarily available from all schools, since as in the case of Kenya and
some cases of the Philippines, we obtained an answer that there was no computer
available in school, or, if any, not enough to let pupils use it. In fact, there lies a question of
digital divide.
III.
Analysis and Perspective
(1) What has been offered at schools?
As for installment
of hardware, according to our research, the educational institution that
possessed the largest number of computers at school was a learning center in
the United States where 3000 pupils were enrolled and 395 computers were
available. Next to this figure,
the largest number of computers installed at school was a high school again in
the United States where 300 computers were available for 3500 students. Following these examples were two
schools in Korea, where 240 computers were equipped for the capacity of 700
students and 950 students respectively.
Ninety-five per cent of the schools those responded to our questionnaire
were using computers for the purpose of practicing and learning by
students. As for the fulfillment
of equipment, the American School at the Yokota US Military Base in Tokyo where
two pupils can work at one computer was a superceding case. On the contrary, a school in Mongolia
where 3200 pupils are enrolled sent comments to the questionnaire: “In our
school, we have only 15 computers and these computers are not connected to the
Internet. Pupils, both girls and
boys, are eager to learn and work at computers, but a chance to use computers
is hardly left for them.”
Now, in Japan, how
many teachers specialized in the field of computer skills are engaged in
teaching the subject at each school?
According to the research we made, three-fourth of schools overseas have
one or more teachers specialized in ICT education. From our suspicion that there could not be too many
specialized teachers available at school throughout the world, we launched the
next question leading to ask how often the occasions for training teachers for
ICT have been provided. The answer
was that three-fourth of schools provide such occasions. In Thailand, one of the answers was
that “the nation makes it their policy to keep all teachers knowledgeable for
ICT.” However, another school in
the same country points out: “Schools lack of the staff for teaching and
programming ICT.” Apparently, It
seemed that there could be a gap between the national policy and its
implementation. Consequently, we
had a feeling that if there could be any full-time staff specialized in ICT
education available at each school, it would make a big difference to teachers
who are trying hard to accomplish ICT skills.
The following
figure shows if, or if not, computer skill training, item by item, has been
carried in curriculum, either compulsorily or selectively, at schools on all
levels of primary, middle high, and senior high school (see Fig. 2.) As for primary schools, on average,
they teach in the first year of computer training how to handle key-board, to
use mouse, and to draw pictures, and through the whole course of primary school
they teach how to input sentences and to exchange mails. In Korea, characteristically drawing pictures
is scarcely taught while wave surfing (accessing to homepages one after another
on the Internet) is taught at more than half of the schools.
[Fig. 2: What
Subjects Are Offered at Your School?]
As for middle and
senior high schools, most of the schools teach how to use key board and mouse,
to input sentences, to exchange mails, to wave surfing, to draw pictures, to
tabulate calculation, and to draft materials for presentation. Furthermore, in more than half of the
schools, they teach how to set up a homepage. On the other hand, they rarely teach skills of searching for
data, programming, algorism and maintaining data at high schools. Such tendencies can be reasoned in the
way that techniques of setting up homepages should not necessarily access to
the Internet; and likewise that wave surfing could be demonstrated by teachers
so that students could have a quasi-experience without actually accessing to
the Internet. In contrast to these
skills, searching data would definitely require students and pupils to keep the
net environment always available for them.
Maintenance of
hardware is not always an easy task for schools to carry, and that the net
environment should be frequently checked and censored by schools for
educational purposes would cause tremendous burden on them. While bilateral direction of
communication is the key word of the Internet, difficulties of teaching the
method of data searching have prevented ICT education from being truly
appreciated by learners at school.
Consequently, in addition to the physical and financial difficulties of
installing computers at school, most of the schools have tended negative and
cautious toward ICT education, mainly in fear of harmful information as well as
virus problems brought over to their Internet environment.
As for the hours
of learning ICT, a majority of primary schools have a class only once a week or
less than that. At high schools,
setting hours is varied from school to school. Some have only 36 hours a year, while others spare more than
161 hours for ICT education. Among
those offering many hours of classes for ICT are science course schools, and it
is understandable that they provide a variety of selective classes for the
study of science-technology including ICT. However, it is too obvious that how many hours of ICT
classes are offered in the course of studies would reflect a reality whether or
not the schools are devoted to ICT education.
One of the schools
in India sparing some 180 hours a year for ICT programmes defined the ICT
education as the learning “all about the computers.” India has been known as the country bringing so many
brilliant engineers of the computer.
A school in the Philippines offering 200 hours of ICT education expresses
their hope that “we can even implant technical abilities among the students who
have only finished middle high school.”
(2) National Policy for ICT Education
The year when each
school started ICT education varied; the earliest school started in 1988 and
the latest in 2003. Needless to
say, the year does not mean nationwide initiation of ICT education in
respective countries. We did find,
however, that counties Costa Rica, France and Korea now provide nearly
homogeneous education across the nation.
Because they answered that their governments set out a guideline and
earmark budget to carry out the same ICT courses nationwide. Providing adequate budget is essential
to implementation of any policy.
The junior high school in Yokota US military base near Tokyo is
supported through the US Defense Department. On the other hand, however, regular public schools in the
USA are taken care of by their school districts; with exceptions of Internet
cables co-funded by the federal government in less affluent neighborhoods. As you can see in the American case, we
must conclude that homogeneity and universality of ICT education is not
guaranteed in most of the surveyed countries.
(3) Gender Gap Issues
As to the gender
proportion of students in ICT courses, the schools responded either they see no
difference or that boys are proportionally higher. No school suggested higher girls’ proportion other than
those in which girls outnumber boys.
Then we asked about gender difference in attitude. Many school answered they see no
difference, including even those in which class enrollment showed a great
disparity between two genders. For
example, schools in China, the Philippines, and India, whose gender proportion
they say stands at 7 to 3, responded they see no difference. Similarly those schools in Thailand,
Korea, and Germany, in which the gender proportion is 6 to 4 say ‘no’ to the
question above. It may be true
that the individual students enrolled in ICT courses do not show any gender
difference but we think we need to consider the rest; the students as a
whole. Are such students in sight
who do not or will not learn, supposedly with many girls among them? We must point out that gender
differences come from many factors that we are not aware of.
Here are some of
the remarks by the respondents: “Girls do not find ICT more difficult and
neither their families exert influence upon them (India).” “Boys are more interested in computers
(China, the Philippines, Thailand).”
“Boys want to get on to play games. Girls like arts programs/ reading and drawing
(Canada).” These remarks
nonetheless indicate that motivation and instruction are important. At the same time, they make us argue if
boys and girls are different in terms of interest and, accordingly, if the
materials provided in classroom are truly adequate for both.
In the course of
this research, we learned about a teacher in a Japanese elementary school who
instructed the boys to use a unit of computer for oneself while ordering the
girls to share one unit between two.
In this deplorable case, the teacher is to blame for not motivating
students fairly but even worse, for creating gender bias. We found another interesting anecdote
in a magazine article. A leading
computer maker in Japan is engaged in a volunteer activity to teach computers
to junior high school students.
Since their goal is to have an equal number of female engineers as male
counterparts in the long run, they invite only girls to their institute during
school vacation and women engineers are there to teach them. They also serve as roll models. The magazine article reveals that when
they first started out the program in a regular classroom setting, with both
boys and girls present, it didn’t works out. Because they found boys came forward while girls sat back as
they normally would. That’s why
they have come to the current, most ‘effective’ way.
(4) Digital Divide
To understand the
schools in their environment, we asked the rough percentage of students’
families using computers at home.
The answers varied, from less than 10% to more than 70%. The difference can be seen as a facet
of digital divide. 17 out of the
19 Korean schools surveyed answer that 50% and over of their students’ homes
own computers. Home computer
ownership seems quite remarkable in that country. Similarly remarkable was their answer denying that ICT
education at school help overcome digital divide. They often alleged it was because computers were already in
use at home. They may think that a
little lesson at school would not help to solve digital divide and that could
be true. However, before we do any
judgment, we should ask what aspiration we have toward ICT education.
(5) Expectations and Concerns
[Fig. 3: What Expectations Do You Have
Toward ICT Education?]
The respondents
often pointed out that there is too much game factor in ICT. In a different part of the
Questionnaire, one said, “Some boys indicate that they are playing when they
use computers.” In this specific
part, there were several remarks to the effect that ICT education does not
enhance students’ ability to think.
We have also found people worry about addiction and unsolicited
information. Then how can we
expect ICT education to help overcome digital divide? What is good ICT education? What should be the goals of ICT education?
IV. Summary
Through this
survey, we have learned that some countries regard the arrival of ICT a chance
for national development, and accordingly, place high hopes on it. They have explicit expectations of ICT
such as helping their children expand their horizon and pursue their
career. At the same time, we have
also learned that digital divide do exist due to lack or uneven provision of
hardware and social infrastructure.
Digital divide is seen between countries as well as within a
country. We came across a
literature, however, in which they assert that lack of independency on the part
of the learner is one essential cause leading to digital divide. Another research we found proposes two
concepts, namely ‘mind factor’ and ‘skill factor,’ as constituents of media
literacy and asserts to gain command of ICT focusing on techniques is not
enough but that the learner’s goal in life or proactive mindset toward
information play a significant role.
They seem to suggest whether an individual is willing or not is as
critical as the abundant facility/ brand new technology or the lack thereof in
the emergence of digital divide.
Furthermore, with
regard to limitation to furthering one’s capability, even those who live in
developed countries are not free from limitation. They could be faced with multitude of choices within a
certain timeframe. For example, if
they are to teach computers, they have to drop some subjects instead. Here we would like to quote a remark
presented by a French respondent: “To make children capable of using computer
is a skill in itself necessary in professional life, but also for higher
education. In my opinion,
computers do not increase children's social, mental, artistic, cultural,
scientific, etc. abilities of knowledge any more than pencils, books, and
notebooks.” Here the author put
ICT education in the broader context of cultural expression.
Time is a limited
resource. In order to make best
use of it, let us dare to propose an ideal ICT education now. “ICT education should awaken different
interest of each child and bring out his/her abilities via well-designed
materials and instruction. Through
such practices, ICT education should aim at nurturing responsible individuals
capable of selecting and exchanging information on the Internet.”
The essence of the
proposal was presented to Japan’s Ministry of Education along with other
proposals by the Japanese Association of University Women (JAUW) in winter
2003.