INTERNET & THE COMPUTERS: A BOON TO TEACHERS OF THE 21ST CENTURY

Technology, in the last ten years had advanced by leaps and bounds. For the last decade alone, we had seen the tremendous advancement unseen and unparalleled in the modern times. While computers have been in existence for more than fifty years, it is the birth of the internet that really sent technological advancement to the roof. It enabled people from all over the world to get connected, share information, made a lot of work easier. Time zones became a thing of the past and the world suddenly became almost borderless and less intimidating.

People from all walks of life are now enjoying the great benefits of the internet. From plain housewives to topnotch honchos of big companies simply cannot do without the net. Who would ever think that shopping could be done at home simply with a click of your mouse? That’s unthinkable ten years ago. Many would admit that they could no longer exist without the internet and a computer.

Career professionals reap a great deal of benefits from this technological marvel and one specific group is the teacher. Whereas teaching, which I believe is one of the noblest profession in the world, was tedious, laborious thus making it mentally and physically exhausting, it has become an almost ideal career for many because of the many benefits it derived from computers and the internet.

Whereas it was a daily grind for them to write their lesson plans by hand daily, they can simply type away their lesson plans way in advance in one sitting, retrieving them later on when necessary.

Whereas they rely solely on textbooks provided by schools, they can now update their knowledge and scope of the subjects they teach by simply browsing over the net making them not only competitive as teachers but also passing it on to their respective students. They can monitor the latest teaching methods being adopted in first world countries and apply it in local setting.

Many schools uses computers for their audio visual presentations which do away with the archaic method of using actual big-sized pictures, manual writing on the board, flipping of big manila papers, etc. Exchange of ideas from one side of the globe to another among teachers is common nowadays. Teachers from first world countries are able to pass on the latest teaching techniques to their local counterpart and vice versa.

Online conferencing among educators are ordinary occurrences today. It makes these gatherings very quick to organize, cheaper and a lot more productive because they need not be in one location physically which entails a lot of manpower to achieve. They are able to conduct these types of meetings frequently and without any major obstacles.

It is predicted that in the next ten years even in the remotest parts of the country, computers and internet will be available for the teachers and students to use and benefit from.

Arguably, teachers are having the best times of their lives with the aid of computers and internet.