World Wide Webs
When the internet was opened to the global usage, information and technology have grown rapidly to become an important tool in every home around the world. To find information in few seconds related to any topic is possible because of the development and expansion of the World Wide Web, but as societies move forward the internet has moved too. From static pages to avatars internet has offered us a wide range of possibilities for entertainment, interaction and more important for education. Let´s see how the internet has evolved during the years:
Web 1.0 ¨The mostly read only web¨ Up to 1996 there were 45 million users, these pages were focused on companies home pages owning content like: Britanica Online, HTML, Nestcape, portal web form directories (taxonomy) etc. Those page offered static content and no interaction.
Web 2.0 ¨The wildly read-write web¨ Up to 2006 1 billion global users, it is focused on communities: blogs, sharing content, Wikipedia, XML, RSS (Really simple syndication), web applications, tagging (folksonomy). This is about user-generated content and the read-write web. In this case, people consume and contribute in places like: blogs, wikis. ¨The line dividing a consumer and content publisher is increasingly getting blurred in the 2.0 web era¨. (Plain English power point presentation)
Web 3.0 ¨The portable personal web¨ focused on the individual life stream, dynamic content, the semantic web, widgets, drag & drop. ¨this will be the semantic web (or the meaning of data), personalization, intelligent search and behavioral advertising.
Web 4.0 ¨The Integration¨ achieves a critical mass of participation in online networks that deliver global transparency, governance, distribution, participation, collaboration in industry, political and social networks and other key community endeavours. Web 4.0 delivers community sovereignty to channels and information. Source:marcuscake.com .
The World Wide Web has become an important channel of information-communication and interaction for everybody no matter the distance, the language or purpose. For teachers is an excellent tool to explore and use with students, specific information, programs, web pages, and also final products can be shared regarding to the purpose of the teachers´ course. For students serves as a backup tool besides written texts, magazines and all existing material to support their studies; it offers any possibility of search, interaction, communication, exchange and publication of information and materials.
E-Learning ¨The Present¨
¨The growing interest in e-learning seems to be coming from several directions. These include organizations that have traditionally offered distance education programs either in a single, dual or mixed mode setting. They see the incorporation of online learning in their repertoire as a logical extension of their distance education activities¨.
—Som Naidu, Ph. D (2006)
Nowadays, teaching and learning environments have crossed out the classrooms, it is not related to a single place at the same time everyday; it does not matter where you are or a course book´s text, learning using different web tools has paved the road for a new technological area. Naidu (2006) ¨Access to information and communications technology changed all that as it offered a range of possibilities for capturing and delivering all types of subject matter content to learners and teachers in distributed educational settings¨.
To attend a class is no longer a complicated process, by having a computer pc or laptop with a headset and an internet connection are the basic gadgets to be connected on the web. ¨In the last 20 years, with the advancement in technology, independent study has become more accessible for distance education students. The ease with which modern communications technologies can link educational institutions to homes, work-sites, and community centers has made college, adult education and lifelong learning matters of national policy¨, Source: ABC.COM in Bebawi. As long as the teacher accepts that to teaching is not enclosed to a classroom this practice is a valuable tool to the teachers and students. It is not necessary to be in the same city, state, country or even continent; distance learning sometimes called e-learning; according to E-learning a Guide book for Principles, Procedures, and practices Naidu, (2006) ¨is commonly referred to the intentional use of networked information and communications technology in teaching and learning¨.
The new era of global communications demands more interactions from societies and groups, it does not matter where you are, to be able to communicate is the main goal. The terms online learning, and blended learning also form part of communication, although there other terms that are related to the new trends online learning, virtual learning, distributed learning, networked or web-based. ¨They all refer to educational processes that utilize information and communications technology to mediate asynchronous as well as synchronous learning and teaching activities¨ Naidu (2066). There are some slightly differences among the terms, but they refer to educational processes; however, not all them have the same purpose of e-learning. In this setting, the letter ¨e¨ in e-learning relates to the word electronic and in this case e-learning sets out that all educational activities can be done by groups or individually working online or offline.
Finally, there is blended learning, it is a mixture of different learning environments; it provides the opportunity to both teachers and students to be involved in an effective teaching-learning situation. It provides different settings of instruction: it can be face to face including a computer; also it can have ¨the assistance of cell phones or smartphones, satellite, television channels, videoconferencing or any other electronic media¨ Wikipedia (2011)
"Blended learning means many things to many people, even within our relatively small online learning community. It is referred to as both blended and hybrid learning, with little or no difference in the meaning of the terms among most educators. In general terms, blended learning combines online delivery of educational content with the best features of classroom interaction and live instruction to personalize learning, allow thoughtful reflection, and differentiate instruction from student to student across a diverse group of learners (iNACOL)."
My local context on the ICT current situation
My working environment is Universidad Simón Bolívar, Sede del Litoral; it is located at La Guaira´s County, Camurí Grande at 10 minutes from Naiguata (the closest town). At this university, the practice of teaching English is directed to students which are taking technical careers of 3 years; and one year ago there are two engineering careers. Our context related to the use of ICT is really insufficient; the English area has 5 laboratories distributed on the 2nd floor at Edificio de Aulas, since two trimesters ago they have had air conditioning, before that it was not possible to handle any activity which includes a computer.
The internet access to the university is limited, administrative offices, professors’ offices, and a special room called ¨Sala OPSU¨ adapted as a cyber for the students which covers the demand of more than 1.500 students. This access is affected sometimes for extreme weather conditions (persistent rains on the area) which difficult the speed connection. Some classrooms are equipped with a desktop computer, speakers and a video beam, it can be used only by the professors in their teaching time; but the laboratories are not equipped in the same way yet.
The English labs are functioning only as a regular classroom, although some of them have computers, these cannot be operated due to the lack of maintenance and not enough investment in the area. These limitations sometimes do not allow us to use properly ICT´s in our teaching environment. If the students are not used to be in contact with these tools they would consider them unnecessary for their academic development and studies.
Another problem is the internet access in La Guaira, not every zone has internet availability. Due to the lack of internet access students cannot work from their houses using internet as a support; in most of the cases assignments and classes cannot be interactive, they ought to be in the classroom as well as activities and class practices.
Are we Digital Literate?
“Adolescents need to learn how to integrate knowledge from multiple sources, including music, video, online databases, and other media. They need to think critically about information that can be found nearly instantaneously through out the world. They need to participate in the kinds of collaboration that new communication and information technologies enable, but increasingly demand. Considerations of globalization lead us toward the importance of understanding the perspective of others, developing a historical grounding, and seeing the interconnectedness of economic and ecological systems.”
—Bertram C. Bruce (2002)
Nowadays, to be able to handle technological devices is part of our lives; to operate a computer, a laptop, a smart phone, a video game, and even a tablet is a necessary resource to be in touch with our daily environments (place of work, family, friends and for teachers the students). It is possible to suffer from anxiety, to become nervous, disconnected and not familiar with such equipments, but the truth is that societies are hand in hand with technology and the net, so they have to advance towards ¨what is called the future¨ which is in reality the present and become familiar with these wonderful tools.
To become Digital Literate takes time, instruction, practice, and knowledge, but let’s defined it first. Digital literacy is the ability that a person has to handle technological devices and navigate or surf on the net in order to create, edit, produce, and design any kind of resources to communicate, express, and share his/her ideas with other people. According to Eshet-Alkali and Amichai-Hamburger (2004) Digital literacy ¨has become a “survival skill” in the technological era—a key that helps users to work intuitively in executing complex digital tasks¨.
By creating and designing any technological tool (a video, a blog, a podcast, a wiki, a web page, and software) requires that the person is entitled to analyze the information gathered before elaborating a final product. Producing this kind of resources has to be carefully planned and organized, by selecting the aim of the research, its purpose, to whom is directed, and if there would be any interaction or multiplication of the project.
Paul Gilster (1997), the pioneer of the concept Digital Literacy, states that ¨digital literacy is the ability to understand information –and more important- to evaluate and integrate information in multiple formats that the computer can deliver¨. For Gilster, it is important how the information is treated ¨being able to evaluate and interpret information is critical¨; to find information on the internet is not just written texts, there are videos, audio, and photos. To find accurate information on the internet sometimes is not an easy task; teachers and students should be trained to get certain knowledge regarding this type of search.
.In this century, for a teacher it is important to be digital literate; to be able to manage and understand information using technological tools and the internet has become a major source of development on the teaching and learning environments.
Make a list of digital competences a XXI century EFL teacher should have.
To support the new digital world full of instant and improved developments and EFL teacher should have:
- Basic knowledge of how a computer and a laptop works (it is important to mention that although it seems obvious not all teachers (including me) use a computer device at its 100% workability).
- To have some trained regarding web search, to find reliable information through several pages and data bases help to provide accurate information to the intended audience, in this case the students.
- To explore different web tools which can be used in the classroom environment, as teachers, we should interact and discover web applications that could enhance and help the class development.
- To keep updated regarding functions, programs, software if those become an essential part of the course.
- As teachers, to interact with other web communities is an important objective, share experiences, information, comments, and work on on-line projects provides more knowledge and also enriches the teaching practice. If the information is related to the students’ works, asked them for permission to upload them.
- To act appropriately on line, be polite, use the recommended words at the moment of publishing, commenting or referring to others’ opinions.
- To interact with your students, and also to explain them the importance that a digital literate person ought to have these days.
