Technology Driving Innovation in Education

Kids, these days, have become ‘screenagers’. iPods, PSPs and computers have become their best friends. How can their texts books interest them when a far more entertaining source, the computer or television screen, is awaiting them?

This shift that has taken place in the preference of children has given impetus to innovation in education. The role of technology in education is now coming to the forefront. Educators are looking out for newer learning methods to be introduced. Given the monotony of the age-old textbooks, graphic books with interactive content are gaining popularity. Involving content, fresh presentation of knowledge and brilliant self-assessment would be the key elements of the next generation textbooks.

The current trend in education is doing away with monotonous lectures and instead gripping the attention of the children with edutainment. Edutainment is a term coined by the new-school educators who believe that retention of knowledge is possible only if the kids like what they learn. The only means of ensuring this is by revolutionizing the technique of teaching. To put it simply, children will like what they learn only if they enjoy how they learn.

A teacher lecturing dryly for an entire class or a dull textbook is sure to take all the fun away from learning. Instead, if one were to work around the interests of the kids and develop an innovative learning pattern, we could be looking at a whole new world of education. If films are what they like, help your kids learn through movies. If your kid is an online gaming fan, look for learning-based games.

Kids, today, are smarter than we can ever imagine them to be. All that is needed is to tap the right source to educate and teach them. We need to play the game as per their rules. For all you know, you may end up learning a thing or two in the process.

Audio-Visual Aids in Education

The profession of teaching can also be looked at as an opportunity to alter the lives of students. How does one do that? Well, as a teacher you can enrich their lives with knowledge.

When it comes to certain topics, it might be possible for students to follow the subject quite easily. For other topics, however, you might have to explain with the help of audio-visual aids. Why audio-visual aids? Well, simply because the use of such visual representation really enhances the lecture and enables better and easier learning for the student. Even research has proved that the greater the number of senses involved, the better is the learning.

Students enjoy it when they are exposed to different styles of learning. As a teacher, you can include ways to increase student participation in class. A great way of doing this is by asking students to make presentations. Besides that, you can also have screenings of movies in class, followed by discussions based on the same.

Another exciting way of teaching is through the experience of educational trips. Organising an outing to the local science centre or planetarium is a good option. One more way of making the lecture interesting is recording educational content on audio or video CDs/DVDs and then playing it to the class. This is particularly useful when learning languages as listening improves our ability to understand.

Using audio-visual aids in class helps make the learning process more fun. Essentially, the education system remains traditional. It is only the method that becomes more contemporary. The idea is to hold the attention of your students and get your point across. Audio-visual aids also give you the opportunity to incorporate different educational resources.

Thanks to the constant development in science and technology, educational audio-visual aids are continuously changing and improving. The use of these aids has helped transform our traditional education system into one which is highly interactive as well as a lot of fun.