TE year1handbook/Introduction

Historically, human beings have used different ways of organizing and  presenting information, and communication. Language, script, print, mass media such as radio and television have been important information and communication technologies (ICT). Whenever a new ICT is introduced, we see significant changes not only to education and knowledge processes, but also to larger socio­cultural, political and economic structures and processes. In the last few decades, digital ICT are being widely used.

The agricultural revolution and industrial revolution created the agrarian and industrial societies respectively. The term information society is being used to describe the society today, in which socio­economic activities based on the production and consumption of information have become predominant. The ease of creating, accessing, processing and sharing information using digital technologies has caused an explosion of information in society, thus creating what is termed as an “information society” (a term used by the sociologist Manuel Castells to describe our current society). Participating in this society requires an understanding of how these processes are affecting society as well as the development of new skills. It is the responsibility of the education system to respond to this by helping students develop an understanding of ICT, its impact on society and the possibilities for learning through ICT. The education system also has to support the building of skills in students that will make them capable of functioning in, and be responsive to a society shaped by ICT.

In this course, ICT refers to digital technologies. It includes digital infrastructure and digital processes that allow the creating, processing, organizing and presentation of information, as well as communication. Development of digital literacy skills is required for all, to navigate this ‘information society’. Recent curricular (NCFTE, National ICT Curriculum) and policy (ICT Policy in School Education) documents on education in India have recognized the importance of integrating ICT in school education. Teachers, student teachers and teacher educators need to be able to use ICT for their professional development, for creating resources and for use in teaching-learning. ICT can support professional development of teachers by providing possibilities for self learning and peer learning. It is also important to develop a critical understanding of the larger positive and negative implications of the design and adoption of ICT in society.

The ICT Mediation paper is part of the ‘Teacher Development Studies’ in both years of the program. The approach of this paper has been to keep technology learning situated within educational processes and map these to relevant and available software applications. Hence, many skills and dimensions of ICT have been described in a generic way without reference to any specific application. The paper also has introduced different digital processes predominantly through a wide variety of free and open source applications. This approach is also in line with the National ICT Curriculum.

In Year 1, the aim will be on building broad-based digital literacy and learning digital methods for self learning, peer learning and generic resource creation. In year 2, the aim will be on the learning digital methods for subject-specific digital resource creation and integrating ICT in subject teaching. Integrating digital methods for subject teaching is purposely kept in year 2 only, in line with the overall KETEC focus of year 1 on LPS and year 2 on HPS levels, as it is currently considered appropriate to introduce ICT at the classroom level in HPS but not in LPS.