Why use technology?
Studies have shown that
students with access to the Internet and other technology not only present
their projects in more creative ways but also turned in work that was more
complete and had better syntheses of different points of view.
Numerous other studies show that children in technology-rich learning
environments showed more enthusiasm, had higher attendance rates,
developed better writing skills and displayed a greater capacity to
communicate effectively about complex problems. Technology has given our
students the capability to construct their own learning. It gives them
the power to create and problem solve on their own. We know from research
that students learn and retain more information if they are interested in
the subject and if they can synthesize and create their learning.
Technology gives them that freedom. Technology has changed the way that
we live and think. It is not going away. It will only grow and change our
lives even more. It is critical that our students understand this and
learn to use technology in their everyday lives.
Technology is changing the
way we live. It has way we communicate with each other, and even the way
thinks. And it has done this in a few short years. Not long ago,
technology was a word that was linked to a huge computer that took
up large amounts of office space that only a few people knew how to
program. Today technology is in our pockets and purses in the form of
phones and daily planners. Computers that were once owned exclusively by
rich, large companies are now in most homes in America. With this type of
growth it is crucial that we began teaching our future generations why and
how to use it. It is estimated that 60% of all jobs in America today
require technology skills. Without technology training
it will be impossible for our youth to obtain these jobs and be
successful. It is important that our students begin early to learn these
needed skills. In the elementary schools there are many ways for the
students to be taught about technology. Group projects can be based around
the computer. Power Point Presentations are a great way for students to
present their new found knowledge. The internet, when used properly is a
great resource of up to the minute information that students can explore.
There are many other technology besides the computer that can be used.
The TV, Digital Camera, and E-mail are all ways for our students to
communicate to the teacher what they have learned.
Introduction
Our world
today, as viewed by more than five billion people, is vastly different
from the one just five years ago or even five minutes ago! We never know
what
major event is making its way as a story to one of the major event is
making its way as a story to one of the major international news stations.
Electronic communication has totally changed the way we think, observe,
work, worship, negotiate, play, shop, invest, entertain, and live today.
Technology in general; and information technology in particular, are
growing and changing people’s lives dramatically all over the world. There
are both advantages and perils to high-speed global communication. On the
one hand, most if not all of us on this planet are being networked
together through satellite communication capabilities. For example, the
news reported daily makes us all aware of the opportunities available and
challenges we face, but at the same time puts considerable pressure on
enterprises business and non-business alike to respond to these rapidly
changing conditions. Just three years ago, the Internet, World Wide Web
and Gopher, sounded sophisticated to even technically knowledgeable
people. Today, not only are these words part of our everyday vocabulary,
but thousands of companies and individuals are doing business on the
internet. It is impossible to keep track of the
new users browsing cyberspace every hour. Today, at least 30 million
computers are connected to the Internet, and the number is growing by
about 30,000 per day!
Today
there seems to be a strange paradox of cooperation and competitiveness
among companies and countries. Because of high-speed information
technology, companies can cooperate more easily within their own divisions
and subsidiaries and even with their competitors. However, political,
legal and intellectual property issues require that a constant competitive
edge be maintained.
Technology is changing business for everyone
Walk into
almost any business, big or small, and you'll quickly see how technology
has transformed the way we work. Whether you're an entrepreneur, a bike
courier, or a criminal lawyer, one thing is clear: our lives are
surrounded by technology that just a handful of years ago would have
seemed unfathomable.
How, for example, did we live without the
fax machine? The fax machine, which was actually invented by Scottish
physicist Alexander Bain in 1842, came onto the scene in the mid-1960s
when a court decision allowed non-telephone-company products access to
telephone-company lines. In 1986, by which
time lower-cost, easier-to-use models had hit the market, 200,000 fax
machines were sold. That number soared to 2.2 million in 1991. By the
end of 1995, sales of the now-ubiquitous machines are expected to reach
a staggering 5 million units.
How has that and other types of
technology changed business? The way we do our jobs? We posed those
questions to dozens of business owners, technologists, and celebrities.
The answers often surprised us, but they did not disappoint. And more
often than not, they told us as much about the respondents themselves as
they did about the technology that has insinuated itself into their
lives.
Technology has made us more responsive,
more able to gain access to information over a broader spectrum. It has
taken our information and, instead of putting it into little cubbyholes
of the company, made it broadly accessible. Technology is basically a
slave to the information you give it. But it makes that information much
more functional and dynamic.
When technology breaks down, it makes
you realize how effective it is when it's working. Its value hits home
when there is a piece of information outside your spectrum, and you're
so aggravated that you say, "I can't believe I have to go look for this
here!" You almost come to assume that everything should be right at your
fingertips at the click of a mouse.
People are working harder and are more
enslaved to their work
than before. People I know are walking around with beepers, with laptops
or organizers, with portable phones. They're becoming slaves to high
technology. So it's not high-tech, it's kind of high-shackles or
high-manacles. There's no escape.
Still greatest companion is a sub-note
book. And technology has changed the nature of the manuscripts I'm
seeing. I'm getting stuff that's more creative, maybe because the
technology is freeing authors from involved with the ideas and can play
more with words.
Technology doesn't get enough credit
for being the feminists' friend. Technology has killed hierarchy. When
you get into companies that have E-mail systems, you don't have to be
the loudest man or the biggest braggart. It flattens gender differences.
I am a big fan of technology when it's
used to make our lives simpler, and it's done that in the editing room
for the past five years. Everything's on computer, so you can change
scenes with the push of a button. No longer do you have to take out film
and cut it and wait an hour before you can see the same scene again. Now
you can see the scene within minutes. It's an enormous boost to anybody
in television who's turning over shows weekly. Now, could I explain how
the machines work? Not for a second. Do they make my life easier? Do I
depend on them? Yes, absolutely.
The key thing this year is the
Internet. It has revolutionized
business communications. The Internet is exploding -- I think all the
partners here use it actively for E-mail, not only with our existing
portfolio companies, but also with potential investors.
Technology has allowed those
progressive retailers to offer not only a better price but also quality
service. Technology squeezes the inefficiency out of every process in
the retail chain, from manufacturing to distribution.
The real technological advances have
come in the area of communications. But even in communications, it is
not certain that the increases in speed and accuracy outweigh the
additional costs. At the risk of being suspected of being a Luddite, I
would say that technology in the moving industry has succeeded only in
increasing the power bureaucracy can exercise over a cringing business
community. Technology is revolutionizing the communications business.
Satellites, of course, give us the ability to broadcast live anywhere.
People working at every level, from the shop floor to the Oval Office,
are heralding the coming of a truly interactive, technologically savvy
workforce capable of commuting to and from the workplace via the
information superhighway.
Technology
Whether
you're a technophobe, a techno-geek, or something in between, you have to
be living in total isolation not to be communicating on some level through
technology. The phone, mobile, fax, voice mail, E-mail, video and audio
conferencing, the net, are all pieces of technology that people use to
communicate through in order to reach someone else: the technology is the
interface between one real live human
being and another some distance away. These are supposed to be
technological aids to communication.
Most of the time when people use a piece of technology to communicate with
they think that they are received at the other end as though it's them.
It isn't.
It's a
representation of themselves.
Voices, images, words, get squeezed down an electronic device and comes
out the other end as a reasonably accurate facsimile or an inaccurate
distortion or any number of possibilities, none of which are the real
person.
When people understand the effect that technology has on their
communication they can make a far greater impact by taking charge of the
technology and letting it support them, rather than the technology running
the show.
Educational technology
Many
different types of technology can be used to support and enhance learning.
Everything from video content and digital moviemaking to laptop computing
and handheld technologies are being used in classrooms, and new uses of
technology such as pod casting are constantly emerging.
Various
technologies deliver different kinds of content and serve different
purposes in the classroom. For example, word processing and e-mail promote
communication skills; database and spreadsheet programs promote
organizational skills; and modeling software promotes the understanding of
science and math concepts. It is important to consider how these
electronic technologies differ and what characteristics make them
important as vehicles for education.
Technologies available in classrooms today range from simple tool-based
applications (such as word processors) to online repositories of
scientific data and primary historical documents, to handheld computers,
closed-circuit television channels, and two-way distance learning
classrooms.
Even the
cell phones that many students now carry with them can be used to learn.
Each technology is likely to play a different role in students' learning.
Rather than trying to describe the impact of all technologies as if they
were the same, researchers need to think about what kind of technologies
are being used in the classroom and for what purposes.
Two
general distinctions can be made.
where
technology used essentially as tutors and serves to increase student’s
basic skills and knowledge; and
where
technology is used a tool that can be applied to a variety of goals in the
learning process and can serve as a resource to help develop higher order
thinking, creativity and research skills.
Nano technology
Nanotechnology is the understanding and control of matter at dimensions
of roughly 1 to 100 nanometers, where unique phenomena enable novel
applications. Encompassing nano-scale science, engineering and
technology, nanotechnology involves imaging, measuring, modeling, and
manipulating matter at this length scale.
At the
nano-scale, the physical, chemical, and biological properties of materials
differ in fundamental and valuable ways from the properties of individual
atoms and molecules or bulk matter. Nanotechnology is directed toward
understanding and creating improved materials, devices, and systems that
exploit these new properties.
One area
of nanotechnology R&D is medicine. Medical researchers work at the micro-
and nano-scales to develop new drug delivery methods, therapeutics and
pharmaceuticals. For a bit of perspective, the diameter of DNA, our
genetic material, is in the 2.5 nanometer range, while red blood cells are
approximately 2.5 micrometers.
A
nanometer is one-billionth of a meter; a sheet of paper is about 100,000
nanometers thick. The Scale of Things for a comparative view of the sizes
of commonly known items and nanoscale particles.
Speech Recognition
Speech
recognition technology is different from many technologies that can assist
users with disabilities. The driving force behind the growth of speech
recognition is not the disability market but how everybody including
professionals
are embracing the capabilities of speech recognition. Doctors, lawyers,
businessmen, and numerous other professionals are trying to find ways to
record information using speech. These users want to eliminate the
barriers of getting ideas down into an electronic format such as having to
use a secretary or having to interpret one's own handwriting.
People
with disabilities use the technology to overcome barriers, but the
advantages of speech recognition are not convenience but out of necessity.
Many people with disabilities who use the technology go from complete
dependence on others, to having the independence necessary to complete
their work hands-free. No longer is it necessary for the user to struggle
with slow keyboard commands. The growth of speech recognition as a
mainstream technology has both potential benefits and drawbacks for people
with disabilities. Depending on the nature of an individual's disability
or disabilities and the way the technology is implemented with that user,
speech recognition may be the best solution leading to productivity or it
could be a frustrating waste of the user's time.
Technology at play
I was
watching Cricket Classics on television a few days back. For the
uninitiated, Cricket Classics is a program that shows highlights of old
cricket matches.
Being a cricket fan since childhood, when I watch those highlights, one
thing that strikes me is, how much the live coverage of Cricket has
evolved in the last few years: the action replays from multiple angles,
the stump vision, the statistical information bytes, the third-umpire, the
wagon wheel and other visual aids, frame-by-frame replays, etc. Many of
these technologies have enriched the experience of watching the game on
television. It is really hard to say how much they have contributed to the
popularity of cricket telecasts, but surely, they're one of the factors.
Conclusion
Technology
has given us yet another screen, first the television then the computer
& now the mobile.
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