Students in a Digital Age: Implications of ICT for Teaching and Learning

Chapter 1.4

Students in a Digital Age: Implications of ICT for Teaching and Learning

John Ainley

Laura Enger

Dara Searle

Australian Council for Educational Research

Camberwell Vic

Australia

Abstract: Given the predominance of ICT in the workplace and in our lives more broadly, the extent to which our students are able to access and utilise these resources is an important issue.Education systems are designed to equip students with the skills that they need to function effectively as members of our society and the ability to function effectively increasingly requires proficiency in a range of ICT tools. The first part of this chapter considers the extent to which students are literate in ICT. In particular, it examines the level of access students have to computers, the extent to which they are able to perform various tasks using computers and their level of engagement with such technologies. The second part of this chapter examines how ICT is currently being used in schools and classrooms to change students’ learning experiences and to more closely align what students do in the classrooms with what they are required to do in real life.

Keywords: computer access; frequency of computer use; type of computer use, attitude towards computers, international research, student achievement

Introduction

The ‘information society’ is a label often applied to describe the way in which our society has come to function following the rapid proliferation of information and communication technologies (ICT). The term ‘information society’ is a somewhat nebulous one. Webster (2002) argues that there is little agreement on what the defining features of an information society are, with many commentators struggling to identify how our society can be differentiated from previous societies at a fundamental level. Common definitions focus on the types of technological advancements that have occurred or the resultant changes in the world’s economy (Webster, 2002).Regardless of the definition used, it is generally agreed upon that the information society is characterised by the exchange of information and knowledge, primarily through ICT, and Anderson (2008) argues that these concepts are particularly helpful in attempting to explicate the process of incorporating technology in education.

ICT Use: Access and Confidence

Large scale international studies assessing student competence in various areas of study provide a unique opportunity to gain information about students’ educational opportunities and access to educational resources. The findings from the Programme for International Student Assessment and the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study can provide an indication of the extent to which participating students from around the world have access to ICT and their degree of proficiency in using such technologies.

The Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) is a triennial assessment of fifteen year-old students’ literacy in reading, mathematics and science. Developed by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, PISA assesses the extent to which students, at the end of their compulsory schooling, are prepared to meet the challenges they face as young adults in today’s society (OECD, 2004). Forty-one countries participated in PISA 2003[1], which encompassed an in-depth assessment of mathematics and a less detailed assessment of science, literacy and problem-solving (OECD, 2004). As part of the PISA 2003 assessment, participating countries could elect to administer a short questionnaire on students’ familiarity with information and communication technologies. The questionnaire asked students to provide information about their level of access to, and use of, ICT, their level of confidence in performing various tasks on the computer and their attitudes towards computers (OECD, 2006).Of the 41 participating countries, 32 elected to administer the ICT questionnaire (OECD, 2006).

The Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS) is conducted every four years and examines students’ proficiency in mathematics and science.Conducted by the International Association for the Evaluation of Educational Achievement (IEA), TIMSS examines the extent to which Year 4 and Year 8 students have mastered skills in a number of areas common to mathematics and science curricula throughout the world (Martin, Mullis, Gregory, Hoyle & Chen, 2000). At the Year 4 level, 26 countries participated in TIMSS 2002/3 and 48 countries participated at the Year 8 level.As part of TIMSS 2002/3, students were asked to provide an indication of the extent to which they are able to access a number of educational resources, the extent to which they have access to, and use, computers at home and at school.

Throughout this chapter, the relevant results from PISA 2003 and TIMSS 2002/3 are presented for only a select number of countries. The results displayed are intended to provide an indication of what can be considered average across countries and the extent to which there is deviation from this average.Comprehensive data tables including data for all participating countries can be obtained from the relevant references cited below the tables.

Students’ Access to ICT

According to the PISA 2003 findings, the majority of students across the countries who participated have access to a computer at school and a slightly smaller percentage of these students have access to computer at home (see Figure 1 for results for a selection of countries).There is greater variability in access to computers at home than at school, with a much lower percentage of students in countries such as the Russian Federation, Thailand and Turkey having access to a computer at home than students in Australia, Korea and Sweden.

Figure 1

Students’ access to computers at home and at school in selected participating countries (PISA, 2003) Source: OECD (2006)

While students may have access to a computer at school, their access can be restricted by demand from other students. Consequently, it is also important to consider the nature of the access students have to computers at school. The PISA 2003 school questionnaire asked principals to provide an indication both of the overall number of computers in the school and the number of computers in the school available for students to use (OECD, 2006). On the basis of this information, the number of computers available per student can be calculated (OECD, 2006). Table 1 presents the number of computers available per student on average in a selection of countries participating in PISA 2003.

Table 1

Number of computers per student in selected participating countries (PISA, 2003)

Source: OECD (2006)

On average across the participating countries, the number of computers per student was 0.16, indicating that there are approximately 6 students to each computer. However, there is a large difference between the countries with the lowest number of students per computer and those with the highest. For example, the average across schools in the United States is around 3 students per computer whereas in Serbia and the Russian Federation it is around 33 students per computer. These findings suggest that, while access to a computer at school is fairly equivalent across the nations, there is a large gap between the participating countries in the number of computers available for students to access.

The findings of TIMSS 2002/3 also provide an indication of the opportunity students have to access computers at home and at school (see Table 2). Although TIMSS 2002/3 was conducted at both the Year 4 and Year 8 level, data from the Year 8 level only will be considered here to facilitate comparisons with the PISA results previously discussed. Of those Year 8 students participating in TIMSS 2002/3, approximately 60% indicated that they have access to a home computer. However, access to a computer at home varies considerably across the surveyed nations from as high as 98% of students in Sweden to as low as 16% in Egypt. Countries which have a high percentage of students with access to a computer at home also tend to have a high percentage of students using computers both at home and at school, rather than one or the other. In countries where only a small percentage of students have access to a computer at home, it also appears that few students are using a computer at school. This suggests that students only have limited opportunities to use computers in these countries.

Table 2

Computer access at home for Year 8 students in selected countries(TIMSS 2002/3)

Source: Mullis, Martin, Gonzalez & Chrostowski (2004)

Students’ Proficiency in ICT

According to Mioduser, Nachmias and Forkosh-Baruch (2008) there is a discrepancy between the ICT skills students are being taught in formal education and the literacy skills they need in order to function effectively outside the school environment. Given the predominance of ICT, particularly in the work environment, the extent to which students are gaining appropriate skills in ICT, whether these skills are attained at school or elsewhere, is an important issue.Findings from PISA 2003 provide an indication of students’ perceptions of their ability to carry out various ICT tasks and their confidence in performing these tasks.

To gain an indication of their ICT skills, students participating in PISA 2003 were asked to indicate, for a number of ICT tasks, how well they could perform that taskon a scale from ‘0 – I can do this very well by myself’ to ‘3 – I don’t know what this means’ (se for further details OECD, 2006). Figure 2 shows the percentage of students on average across the OCED who indicated that they could perform the task very well by themselves. The majority of students indicated that they could perform routine tasks, such as opening a file or deleting a computer document, on their own.Most students also indicated that they felt they could perform a range of internet tasks without assistance, though a lower percentage of students felt they could attach a file to an e-mail message without help. Higher-level tasks, such as creating a multimedia presentation or constructing a web page, seem to present more of a challenge to students, with a much a lower percentage of students reporting that they can undertake these sorts of tasks by themselves than for routine or internet tasks.

Figure 2

Percentages of students who could perform various ICT tasks by themselves, OECD average (PISA 2003) (source, OECD, 2006)

The results indicate that there are considerable differences between countries in terms of the percentage of students who indicate that they can conduct various ICT tasks alone. These differences are particularly pronounced for internet tasks; perhaps reflecting differences in level of internet access across countries. As would be expected, countries where the percentage of students indicating that they had access to a computer at home or school was comparatively low also tended to have fewer students indicating that they could perform the ICT tasks listed.

An index of students’ confidence in performing routine, internet and high-level tasks was also calculated for the participating countries on the basis of students’ indications of how well they could perform the various ICT tasks (OECD, 2006). Students who responded that they could perform a task very well on their own were deemed to have a high level of confidence and students who responded that ‘I could do this with some help from someone’ were deemed to be somewhat confident (OECD, 2006). Based on scale where ‘0’ represents the average level of confidence across all the participating OECD students, a positive index score indicates that students’ confidence in that country is higher than the average for all participating students in OECD countries, a negative index score, that students’ confidence is lower than the average for all participating students in OECD countries. The index values for a selection of countries are presented in Table 3.

Index values tended to be consistent across the three types of tasks for most countries; where students indicated a comparatively high degree of confidence in performing one type of task, they also tended to report a comparatively high degree of confidence in the other tasks.Generally, student confidence in performing tasks was lower in countries where a lower than average percentage of students reported having access to a computer at home.

Table 3

Index values for confidence in performing computer tasks among 15-year-old students for selected countries (PISA 2003)

Source: OECD (2006)

Gender differences were observed in students’ degree of confidence in performing various ICT tasks, with males reporting higher levels of confidence on average than females across the tasks (OCED, 2006). This gender gap was particularly pronounced for high-level tasks, with the largest differences observed for creating a web page or creating a multimedia presentation (OECD, 2006). The comparatively low degree of confidence expressed by females about their ability to perform more complex tasks is of some concern as it suggests that fewer females are likely to undertake more complex computing subjects at school or to pursue careers in this area (OECD, 2006). There is evidence that in 2001 in Australia male enrolment levels in information technology subjects at school were double those for females (Fullarton et al., 2003).

The results of PISA 2003 provide an indication of the types of ICT tasks students are capable of performing and the extent to which different groups of students have acquired similar degrees of proficiency with ICT. While it is valuable to consider student proficiency at an individual task level it is also useful to conceptualise the general capabilities students are developing through their interactions with ICT. Building on the work of previous commentators, Mioduser et al. (2008) suggest that it is appropriate to view students’ literacy in terms of the comprehensive set of skills they require to cope with everyday life. They suggest that these skills can be represented in terms of seven ‘new literacies’, each of which describes a set of skills which relate to the relationship between technology and individual functioning: multimodal information processing, navigating the infospace, communication literacy, visual literacy, hyperacy, personal information management literacy, coping with complexity (Mioduser et al., 2008). The notion of ‘new literacies’ should provide a useful framework to guide future research.

Engagement with ICT

A key question associated with the use of ICT in schools is the extent to which such technologies are able to capture students’ attention and promote student engagement with educational material. Fredericks, Blumenfeld and Paris (2004) suggest that engagement is best conceptualised as a multidimensional construct, consisting of three different components; a behavioural, an emotional and a cognitive component. The behavioural component refers to the participatory nature of engagement; that is, an individual must be actively involved in something in order to be engaged (Fredericks et al., 2004). For example, behavioural engagement might encompass the frequency with which students use various types of technology. Emotional engagement refers to an individual’s emotional reaction to a task (Fredericks et al., 2004). In the context of information technology, this might refer to a student’s attitude towards technology and their motivation to learn with such technologies. Finally, cognitive engagement refers to the mental effort that is expended to understand concepts or ideas (Fredericks et al., 2004). This form of engagement might be reflected in students’ approaches to learning, their investment of effort in learning and their learning outcomes.

The findings of PISA 2003, some of which were discussed in the previous section, also have the potential to shed light on the behavioural and emotional engagement of 15-year-old students with ICT. Students’ cognitive engagement will be considered in terms of several theories about the way in which students approach learning using ICT.

Behavioural Engagement

The PISA 2003 results provide some indication of the behavioural engagement of students through data relating to the frequency with which students are using computers and various computer programs. The frequency with which students are using computers at home and at school needs to be considered within the context of the opportunities students have to access computers in these places (see Table 4).

Across the selected countries, the majority of students who have access to a computer at home tend to use this computer at least a few times each week. Japan is perhaps the only exception to this trend, with around 79% of students having access to a computer at home but only 37% of students indicating that they use this computer at least a few times each week.In contrast, while a relatively high percentage of students on average across the participating countries indicated that they have access to a computer at school, a much lower percentage reported using a computer at school at least a few times each week. In Germany, for example, 93% of students responded that they had access to a computer at school but only 23% indicated that they use a computer at least a few times a week at school. This suggests that, while students have the opportunity to access a computer at school, students are not necessarily using this computer on a frequent basis as part of their studies.

As part of the PISA 2003 student questionnaire, students were asked to provide an indication of the extent to which they use various ICT resources on a scale from ‘1 – Almost every day’ to ‘5 – Never’ (OECD, 2006). These resources were grouped into two categories; Internet and entertainment, and programs and software. Activities relating to the Internet and entertainment included communication via e-mail or chat, playing computer games and downloading music or software. Some of the programs and software activities listed were word processing programs, educational software such as mathematics programs and programming applications.