EducationTecnology

Education or teaching in the broadest sense is any act or experience that has a formative effect on the mind, character or physical ability of an individual. In its technical sense education is the process by which society deliberately transmits its accumulated knowledge, skills and values from one generation to another.

Teachers in educational institutions direct the education of students and might draw on many subjects, including reading, writing, mathematics, science and history. This process is sometimes called schooling when referring to the education of teaching only a certain subject, usually as professors at institutions of higher learning. There is also education in fields for those who want specific vocational skills, such as those required to be a pilot. In addition there is an array of education possible at the informal level, such as in museums and libraries, with the Internet and in life experience. Many non-traditional education options are now available and continue to evolve.

The right to education has been established as a basic human right: since 1952, Article 2 of the first Protocol to the European Convention on Human Rights obliges all signatory parties to guarantee the right to education. At world level, the United Nations' International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights of 1966 guarantees this right under its Article 13.


[edit] Systems of formal education

Education is a concept, referring to the process in which students can learn something:

Instruction refers to the facilitating of learning toward identified objectives, delivered either by an instructor or other forms.
Teaching refers to the actions of a real live instructor designed to impart learning to the student.
Learning refers to learning with a view toward preparing learners with specific knowledge, skills, or abilities that can be applied immediately upon completion.


[edit] Primary education

Primary (or elementary) education consists of the first 5-7 years of formal, structured education. In general, main education consists of six or eight years of schooling starting at the age of five or six, although this varies between, and sometimes within, countries. Globally, around 70% of primary-age children are enrolled in primary education, and this proportion is rising.[1] Under the Education for All programs driven by UNESCO, most countries have committed to achieving universal enrollment in primary education by 2015, and in many countries, it is compulsory for children to receive primary education. The division between primary and secondary education is somewhat arbitrary, but it generally occurs at about eleven or twelve years of age. Some education systems have separate middle schools, with the transition to the final stage of secondary education taking place at around the age of fourteen. Schools that provide primary education, are mostly referred to as primary schools. Primary schools in these countries are often subdivided into infant schools and junior schools.


[edit] Secondary education

In most contemporary educational systems of the world, secondary education comprises the formal education that occur during adolescence. It is characterized by transition from the typically compulsory, comprehensive primary education for minors, to the optional, selective tertiary, "post-secondary", or "higher" education (e.g., university, vocational school for adults. Depending on the system, schools for this period, or a part of it, may be called secondary or high schools, gymnasiums, lyceums, middle schools, colleges, or vocational schools. The exact meaning of any of these terms varies from one system to another. The exact boundary between primary and secondary education also varies from country to country and even within them, but is generally around the seventh to the tenth year of schooling. Secondary education occurs mainly during the teenage years. In the United States and Canada primary and secondary education together are sometimes referred to as K-12 education, and in New Zealand Year 1-13 is used. The purpose of secondary education can be to give common knowledge, to prepare for higher education or to train directly in a profession.

The emergence of secondary education in the United States did not happen until 1910, caused by the rise in big businesses and technological advances in factories (for instance, the emergence of electrification), that required skilled workers. In order to meet this new job demand, high schools were created and the curriculum focused on practical job skills that would better prepare students for white collar or skilled blue collar work. This proved to be beneficial for both the employer and the employee, because this improvement in human capital caused employees to become more efficient, which lowered costs for the employer, and skilled employees received a higher wage than employees with just primary educational attainment.

In Europe, the grammar school or academy existed from as early as the 1500s; public schools or fee paying schools, or charitable educational foundations have an even longer history.


Higher education

Higher education, also called tertiary, third stage, or post secondary education, is the non-compulsory educational level that follows the completion of a school providing a secondary education, such as a high school, secondary school. Tertiary education is normally taken to include undergraduate and postgraduate education, as well as vocational education and training. Colleges and universities are the main institutions that provide tertiary education. Collectively, these are sometimes known as tertiary institutions. Tertiary education generally results in the receipt of certificates, diplomas, or academic degrees.

Higher education includes teaching, research and social services activities of universities, and within the realm of teaching, it includes both the undergraduate level (sometimes referred to as tertiary education) and the graduate (or postgraduate) level (sometimes referred to as graduate school). Higher education generally involves work towards a degree-level or foundation degree qualification. In most developed countries a high proportion of the population (up to 50%) now enter higher education at some time in their lives. Higher education is therefore very important to national economies, both as a significant industry in its own right, and as a source of trained and educated personnel for the rest of the economy.


Adult education

Adult education has become common in many countries. It takes on many forms, ranging from formal class-based learning to self-directed learning and e-learning. A number of career specific courses such as veterinary, medical billing and coding, real estate license, bookkeeping and many more are now available to students through the Internet.


Alternative education

Alternative education, also known as non-traditional education or educational alternative, is a broad term that may be used to refer to all forms of education outside of traditional education (for all age groups and levels of education). This may include not only forms of education designed for students with special needs (ranging from teenage pregnancy to intellectual disability), but also forms of education designed for a general audience and employing alternative educational philosophies and methods.

Alternatives of the latter type are often the result of education reform and are rooted in various philosophies that are commonly fundamentally different from those of traditional compulsory education. While some have strong political, scholarly, or philosophical orientations, others are more informal associations of teachers and students dissatisfied with certain aspects of traditional education. These alternatives, which include charter schools, alternative schools, independent schools, and home-based learning vary widely, but often emphasize the value of small class size, close relationships between students and teachers, and a sense of community.


Indigenous education

Increasingly, the inclusion of indigenous models of education (methods and content) as an alternative within the scope of formal and non-formal education systems, has come to represent a significant factor contributing to the success of those members of indigenous communities who choose to access these systems, both as students/learners and as teachers/instructors.

As an educational method, the inclusion of indigenous ways of knowing, learning, instructing, teaching and training, has been viewed by many critical and postmodern scholars as important for ensuring that students/learners and teachers/instructors (whether indigenous or non-indigenous) are able to benefit from education in a culturally sensitive manner that draws upon, utilizes, promotes and enhances awareness of indigenous traditions.[2]

For indigenous students or learners, and teachers or instructors, the inclusion of these methods often enhances educational effectiveness, success and learning outcomes by providing education that adheres to their own inherent perspectives, experiences and worldview. For non-indigenous students and teachers, education using such methods often has the effect of raising awareness of the individual traditions and collective experience of surrounding indigenous communities and peoples, thereby promoting greater respect for and appreciation of the cultural realities of these communities and peoples.

In terms of educational content, the inclusion of indigenous knowledge, traditions, perspectives, worldviews and conceptions within curricula, instructional materials and textbooks and coursebooks have largely the same effects as the inclusion of indigenous methods in education. Indigenous students and teachers benefit from enhanced academic effectiveness, success and learning outcomes, while non-indigenous students/learners and teachers often have greater awareness, respect, and appreciation for indigenous communities and peoples in consequence of the content that is shared during the course of educational pursuits.[3]

A prime example of how indigenous methods and content can be used to promote the above outcomes is demonstrated within higher education in Canada. Due to certain jurisdictions' focus on enhancing academic success for Aboriginal learners and promoting the values of multiculturalism in society, the inclusion of indigenous methods and content in education is often seen as an important obligation and duty of both governmental and educational authorities


Curriculum

An academic discipline is a branch of knowledge which is formally taught, either at the university, or via some other such method. Each discipline usually has several sub-disciplines or branches, and distinguishing lines are often both arbitrary and ambiguous. Examples of broad areas of academic disciplines include the natural sciences, mathematics, computer science, social sciences, humanities and applied sciences

Learning modalities

There has been work on learning styles over the last two decades. Dunn and Dunn[6] focused on identifying relevant stimuli that may influence learning and manipulating the school environment, at about the same time as Joseph Renzulli[7] recommended varying teaching strategies. Howard Gardner[8] identified individual talents or aptitudes in his Multiple Intelligences theories. Based on the works of Jung, the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and Keirsey Temperament Sorter[9] focused on understanding how people's personality affects the way they interact personally, and how this affects the way individuals respond to each other within the learning environment. The work of David Kolb and Anthony Gregorc's Type Delineator[10] follows a similar but more simplified approach.

It is currently fashionable to divide education into different learning "modes". The learning modalities[11] are probably the most common:[12]

Visual: learning based on observation and seeing what is being learned.
Auditory: learning based on listening to instructions/information.
Kinesthetic: learning based on hands-on work and engaging in activities.
It is claimed that, depending on their preferred learning modality, different teaching techniques have different levels of effectiveness.[13] A consequence of this theory is that effective teaching should present a variety of teaching methods which cover all three learning modalities so that different students have equal opportunities to learn in a way that is effective for them.[14] Guy Claxton has questioned the extent that learning styles such as VAK are helpful, particularly as they can have a tendency to label children and therefore restrict learning


Teaching

Teachers need to understand a subject enough to convey its essence to students. While traditionally this has involved lecturing on the part of the teacher, new instructional strategies such as team-based learning put the teacher more into the role of course designer, discussion facilitator, and coach and the student more into the role of active learner, discovering the subject of the course. In any case, the goal is to establish a sound knowledge base and skill set on which students will be able to build as they are exposed to different life experiences. Good teachers can translate information, good judgment, experience and wisdom into relevant knowledge that a student can understand, retain and pass to others. Studies from the US suggest that the quality of teachers is the single most important factor affecting student performance, and that countries which score highly on international tests have multiple policies in place to ensure that the teachers they employ are as effective as possible


Technology

Technology is an increasingly influential factor in education. Computers and mobile phones are used in developed countries both to complement established education practices and develop new ways of learning such as online education (a type of distance education). This gives students the opportunity to choose what they are interested in learning. The proliferation of computers also means the increase of programming and blogging. Technology offers powerful learning tools that demand new skills and understandings of students, including Multimedia, and provides new ways to engage students, such as Virtual learning environments. Technology is being used more not only in administrative duties in education but also in the instruction of students. The use of technologies such as PowerPoint and interactive whiteboard is capturing the attention of students in the classroom. Technology is also being used in the assessment of students. One example is the Audience Response System (ARS), which allows immediate feedback tests and classroom discussions.

Information and communication technologies (ICTs) are a “diverse set of tools and resources used to communicate, create, disseminate, store, and manage information.”[17] These technologies include computers, the Internet, broadcasting technologies (radio and television), and telephony. There is increasing interest in how computers and the Internet can improve education at all levels, in both formal and non-formal settings.[18] Older ICT technologies, such as radio and television, have for over forty years been used for open and distance learning, although print remains the cheapest, most accessible and therefore most dominant delivery mechanism in both developed and developing countries.[19]

The use of computers and the Internet is in its infancy in developing countries, if these are used at all, due to limited infrastructure and the attendant high costs of access. Usually, various technologies are used in combination rather than as the sole delivery mechanism. For example, the Kothmale Community Radio Internet uses both radio broadcasts and computer and Internet technologies to facilitate the sharing of information and provide educational opportunities in a rural community in Sri Lanka.[20] The Open University of the United Kingdom (UKOU), established in 1969 as the first educational institution in the world wholly dedicated to open and distance learning, still relies heavily on print-based materials supplemented by radio, television and, in recent years, online programming.[21] Similarly, the Indira Gandhi National Open University in India combines the use of print, recorded audio and video, broadcast radio and television, and audio conferencing technologies.[22]

The term "computer-assisted learning" (CAL) has been increasingly used to describe the use of technology in teaching


Educational theory

Education theory is the theory of the purpose, application and interpretation of education and learning. Its history begins with classical Greek educationalists and sophists and includes, since the 18th century, pedagogy and andragogy. In the 20th century, "theory" has become an umbrella term for a variety of scholarly approaches to teaching, assessment and education law, most of which are informed by various academic fields, which can be seen in the below sections


Economics

It has been argued that high rates of education are essential for countries to be able to achieve high levels of economic growth.[23] Empirical analyses tend to support the theoretical prediction that poor countries should grow faster than rich countries because they can adopt cutting edge technologies already tried and tested by rich countries. However, technology transfer requires knowledgeable managers and engineers who are able to operate new machines or production practices borrowed from the leader in order to close the gap through imitation. Therefore, a country's ability to learn from the leader is a function of its stock of "human capital."[24] Recent study of the determinants of aggregate economic growth have stressed the importance of fundamental economic institutions[25] and the role of cognitive skills.[26]

At the individual level, there is a large literature, generally related back to the work of Jacob Mincer,[27] on how earnings are related to the schooling and other human capital of the individual. This work has motivated a large number of studies, but is also controversial. The chief controversies revolve around how to interpret the impact of schooling.[28]

Economists Samuel Bowles and Herbert Ginits famously argued in 1976 that there was a fundamental conflict in American schooling between the egalitarian goal of democratic participation and the inequalities implied by the continued profitability of capitalist production on the other


History

The history of education according to Dieter Lenzen, president of the Freie Universität Berlin 1994 "began either millions of years ago or at the end of 1770". Education as a science cannot be separated from the educational traditions that existed before. Adults trained the young of their society in the knowledge and skills they would need to master and eventually pass on. The evolution of culture, and human beings as a species depended on this practice of transmitting knowledge. In pre-literate societies this was achieved orally and through imitation. Story-telling continued from one generation to the next. Oral language developed into written symbols and letters. The depth and breadth of knowledge that could be preserved and passed soon increased exponentially. When cultures began to extend their knowledge beyond the basic skills of communicating, trading, gathering food, religious practices, etc, formal education, and schooling, eventually followed. Schooling in this sense was already in place in Egypt between 3000 and 500BC.

Nowadays some kind of education is compulsory to all people in most countries. Due to population growth and the proliferation of compulsory education, UNESCO has calculated that in the next 30 years more people will receive formal education than in all of human history thus far


Philosophy

Educational psychology is the study of how humans learn in educational settings, the effectiveness of educational interventions, the psychology of teaching, and the social psychology of schools as organizations. Although the terms "educational psychology" and "school psychology" are often used interchangeably, researchers and theorists are likely to be identified as educational psychologists, whereas practitioners in schools or school-related settings are identified as school psychologists. Educational psychology is concerned with the processes of educational attainment in the general population and in sub-populations such as gifted children and those with specific disabilities.

Educational psychology can in part be understood through its relationship with other disciplines. It is informed primarily by psychology, bearing a relationship to that discipline analogous to the relationship between medicine and biology. Educational psychology in turn informs a wide range of specialities within educational studies, including instructional design, educational technology, curriculum development, organizational learning, special education and classroom management. Educational psychology both draws from and contributes to cognitive science and the learning sciences. In universities, departments of educational psychology are usually housed within faculties of education, possibly accounting for the lack of representation of educational psychology content in introductory psychology textbooks


Sociology

The sociology of education is the study of how social institutions and forces affect educational processes and outcomes, and vice versa. By many, education is understood to be a means of overcoming handicaps, achieving greater equality and acquiring wealth and status for all (Sargent 1994). Learners may be motivated by aspirations for progress and betterment. Education is perceived as a place where children can develop according to their unique needs and potentialities.[32] The purpose of education can be to develop every individual to their full potential. The understanding of the goals and means of educational socialization processes differs according to the sociological paradigm used.


Educational Development


In developing countries, the number and seriousness of the problems faced are naturally greater. People in more remote or agrarian areas are sometimes unaware of the importance of education. However, many countries have an active Ministry of Education, and in many subjects, such as foreign language learning, the degree of education is actually much higher than in industrialized countries; for example, it is not at all uncommon for students in many developing countries to be reasonably fluent in multiple foreign languages, whereas this is much more of a rarity in the supposedly "more educated" countries where much of the population is in fact monolingual.

There is also economic pressure from those parents who prefer their children making money in the short term over any long-term benefits of education. Recent studies on child labor and poverty have suggested that when poor families reach a certain economic threshold where families are able to provide for their basic needs, parents return their children to school. This has been found to be true, once the threshold has been breached, even if the potential economic value of the children's work has increased since their return to school.


Russia has more academic graduates than any other country in Europe.A lack of good universities, and a low acceptance rate for good universities, is evident in countries with a high population density. In some countries, there are uniform, over structured, inflexible centralized programs from a central agency that regulates all aspects of education.

Due to globalization, increased pressure on students in curricular activities
Removal of a certain percentage of students for improvisation of academics (usually practised in schools, after 10th grade)
India is now developing technologies that will skip land based phone and internet lines. Instead, India launched EDUSAT, an education satellite that can reach more of the country at a greatly reduced cost. There is also an initiative started by the OLPC foundation, a group out of MIT Media Lab and supported by several major corporations to develop a $100 laptop to deliver educational software. The laptops are widely available as of 2009. The laptops are sold at cost or given away based on donations. These will enable developing countries to give their children a digital education, and help close the digital divide across the world.

In Africa, NEPAD has launched an "e-school programme" to provide all 600,000 primary and high schools with computer equipment, learning materials and internet access within 10 years. Private groups, like The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, are working to give more individuals opportunities to receive education in developing countries through such programs as the Perpetual Education Fund. An International Development Agency project called nabuur.com, started with the support of American President Bill Clinton, uses the Internet to allow co-operation by individuals on issues of social


Internationalisation

Education is becoming increasingly international. Not only are the materials becoming more influenced by the rich international environment, but exchanges among students at all levels are also playing an increasingly important role. In Europe, for example, the Socrates-Erasmus Programme stimulates exchanges across European universities. Also, the Soros Foundation provides many opportunities for students from central Asia and eastern Europe. Some scholars argue that, regardless of whether one system is considered better or worse than another, experiencing a different way of education can often be considered to be the most important, enriching element of an international learning experience

History, the History of Computers, and the History of Computers in Education

1780 - Early public schools adopt the teacher/manager model with the teacher as the primary manger of instruction and assessment in a single classroom.

1946 - First vacuum tube-based computers developed; universities help in computer development effort; technology used in war effort.

1951 - Little technology used in schools, primarily TV; baby boom begins with resulting increases in class size; first-generation Univac computer delivered to the US census bureau.

1954 - General Electric is the first business to order a computer. Early rock and roll music, based on the rhythm and blues tradition, gains a little in popularity.

1955 - IBM's first commercial computer is sold; the cold war results in use of technology in aircraft design and in weapons control. Russia developing the technology for the first spacecraft.

1956 - Eisenhower elected president; Elvis Presley records "Hound Dog"; school overcrowding growing; school dropout rate rapidly declining toward zero; schools still based on the teacher/manager model in individual teacher-controlled classrooms; the cold war continues with technology playing an important role and is intensified when Russia sends up their Sputnik space vehicle to demonstrate their lead in technology.

1958 - As cold war continues, National Defense Education Act brings some new money and some new technology into schools, but primarily in vocational education. Mainframe host computers are not widely accepted in schools that are still using the si ngle classroom, teacher/manager method of delivering information to students.

1959 - Transistor-based computers in use; the cold war continues with public support for the development of technology needed for space exploration.

1960 - COBOL business-oriented, high-level programming language created; Kennedy elected president with campaign promises to put more money into education; crime rate doubles in one decade; Gary Powers shot down in hi-tech spy airplane; 70,000 invo lved in civil-rights sit-ins.

1962 - Airlines begin to use a computerized reservation system. President Kennedy diverts more money into education. The cold war continues and results in a confrontation with Russia as hi-tech spy planes discover missiles in Cuba; George Wallace campaigns for governor of Georgia pledging segregation forever.

1963 - Vocational Education Act passes with new money supporting the use of technology in schools; however, the mainframe and minicomputers in use at this time are using batch processing methods that do not fit well with the single teacher-as-manag er-of-learning methods in use in most schools; BASIC, a simple high-level programming language is developed, mostly for use in universities to train programmers; IBM 360 family of computers is developed; most computers still using host methods with punche d cards as the primary input device; line printers are still the primary output device; the cold war and the competitive space exploration effort continues with President Kennedy's call for the science to be developed that could put a man on the moon.

1964 - Johnson elected president; the Beatles rapidly rise to stardom; Bob Dylan writes songs that give voice to the protest movement; the Gulf of Tonkin incident results in the first confrontation between the US and the government of North Vietnam ; the civil rights movement grows including a one-day civil-right protest absence of 464,000 students in New York; China explodes a test Atomic bomb.

1965 - Elementary and Secondary Education Act brings new money into schools for technology. mainframes and minicomputers are put into place in some schools, but most are used for administration or for school counseling (databases for information a bout and for students); the cold war continues as President Johnson expands the war, with 125,000 American troops in Vietnam; ; hi-tech weapons are used in bombings of North Vietnam; 50,000 Americans killed in traffic accidents.

1967 - High-level programming languages such as Fortran are being taught are in universities. School vocational training programs begin to include computer maintenance; Stokely Carmichael declares a need for SNCC to move from civil rights to black power; Mohammed Ali refuses army induction for religious reasons bringing national attention to both the black power movement and the anti-Vietnam movement; student strikes on many campuses related to protest over both civil rights and the policy in Viet nam; acid rock and protest rock grow in popularity; centers of dissidence like Haight-Ashbury in San Francisco develop; anti-war protests grow, especially on college campuses; 380,000 US troops in Vietnam.

1968 - Nixon elected president; riots in many cities break out over civil rights issues; the cold war continues with a rapid expansion of the war in Vietnam 9,419 dead in Vietnam; some programs designed to bring money for technology into schools ar e canceled; host computers are not widely adopted in schools because they are seen as appropriate for use with the teacher/manager model of learning (they don't fit into the single classroom, but instead are accessed remotely by sending batches of data).< BR>
1969 - Neil Armstrong arrives on the moon; the Woodstock rock concert in upstate New York draws hundreds of thousands; the cold war and the war in Vietnam continues; many students, religious leaders, civil rights leaders, and ordinary citizens begi n to speak out against the war in Vietnam.

1970 - Pascal created; the US bombs Cambodia; Kent State antiwar students killed by Army reserve troops; mainframes and minicomputers in use in some schools, but very little use in the delivery of instruction.

1971 - Intel's first microprocessor developed; the first microcomputers (PCs) are developed; mainframes and minicomputers are in wide use in business; a few software companies begin to develop mainframe and minicomputer- based instructional program s; 18-year old given the vote.

1972 - Five men working for President Nixon's re-election caught in the Democratic party's headquarters in the Watergate hotel complex; Nixon re-elected president and orders the bombing of North Vietnam.

1974 - President Nixon resigns and is given a full pardon by his successor, President Ford; a gasoline embargo creates lines at gas stations; Patty Hurst kidnapped; Hank Aaron breaks Babe Ruth's lifetime home run record; Apple I computer is sold in kit form.

1975 - Some Apple 1 PCs are donated to schools; some schools have adopted mainframes and minicomputers and refuse to consider PCs; four Nixon administration official convicted in Watergate cover up; The war in Vietnam ends and the government of Nor th Vietnam invades and takes over South Vietnam.

1976 - Carter elected president; the cold war continues; Iraq holds hostages, rampant inflation; the Apple I computer gains popularity in small business.

1979 - 15 Million PCs estimated to be in use worldwide; PC-based spreadsheets developed, mainframes and minicomputers still in wide use.

1980 - Reagon elected President, the cold war continues with Reagon declaring Russia to be the "evil empire"; the TI 99 which uses a television screen as the monitor is the world's most popular PC.

1981 - IBM is the first mainframe manufacturer to develop a PC; drill and practice CAI gains acceptance in schools; the cold war continues. The first educational drill and practice programs are developed for personal computers.

1983 - IBM PC clones proliferate; Sperry Corporation is the second mainframe manufacturer to develop a PC (actually developed by Mitsubishi in Japan); the Apple II computer finds widespread acceptance in education because PCs better fit the teacher /manager model of instructional delivery (PCs can be used to "support" the ongoing teaching in the single classroom). Simple simulation programs are developed for personal computers.

1984 - Reagon re-elected; 31 states use 13,000 PCs for career guidance, but there are still relatively few computers in classrooms; the Apple Macintosh computer is developed; computer-based tutorials and learning games are developed by commercial software manufacturers.

1986 - 25 % of high schools use PCs for college and career guidance, K-8 schools buying mostly Apple II and Macintosh computers, high schools buying mostly DOS-based clones.

1988 - Bush elected President; 60 % of all workers in the US use computers, laptops are developed; Gorbachoff proposes an end to the cold war;.

1990 - Multimedia PCs are developed; schools are using videodiscs; object-oriented multimedia authoring tools are in wide use; Simulations, educational databases and other types of CAI programs are being delivered on CD-ROM disks, many with animati on and sound; the US crime increases dramatically; the cold war ends.

1992 - Clinton elected President; for the first time, police and prison budgets begin to surpass education budgets; schools are using Gopher servers to provide students with on-line information.

1994 - Digital video, virtual reality, and 3-D systems capture the attention of many, but fewer multimedia PCs than basic business PCs are sold; object-oriented authoring systems such as HyperCard, Hyperstudio, and Authorware grow in popularity in schools; most US classrooms now have at least one PC available for instructional delivery, but not all teachers have access to a computer for instructional preparation.

1995 - The Internet and the world wide web began to catch on as businesses, schools, and individuals create web pages; most CAI is delivered on CD-ROM disks and is growing in popularity.

1996 - The Internet is widely discussed as businesses begin to provide services and advertising using web pages. New graphics and multimedia tools are developed for the delivery of information and instruction using the Internet; many schools are rewiring for Internet access; a few schools install web servers and provide faculty with a way to create instructional web pages.

1997-2007 - The growth of the internet expands far faster than most predicted. It soon becomes the world's largest database of information, graphics, and streaming video making it an invaluable resource for educators; but marketing-oriented web pages, computer viruses hidden within downloadable programs and/or graphics, and spam (widely disseminated email-based sales pitches) threaten it's usefullness. Search engines such as Google and Yahoo constantly develop new ways to find information within the ever-growing number of web pages. Web sites that offer individuals a place to put personal information become popular, as does internet-based publishing and discussion forums. Voice recognition slowly enters the computing mainstream, but it's development is slowed by an unacceptable frequency of errors. Some computers incorporate TV input, but it is not as common as many predicted. Educational software becomes more useful and interesting to students as graphics and video are incorporated. Larger computer storage capacity and the growing prevalence of CD-ROM and DVD drives in personal computers make it easier for educators to store large graphic and video and sound files for educational applications.

2008 and beyond ???

Advantages and Disadvantages of Advanced Technology

About the advantages and disadvantages of technology. I mention in the piece that even though there are both advantages and disadvantages of advanced technology, I wish a more developed world, with great technologies.



Today, we can’t imagine ourselves without technological advances such as cars, microwaves, cell phones, computers, and televisions. However, technology won’t stop here, but develop further. As technology develops, there are not only advantages, but disadvantages from them. A few advantages of upgraded technology are that one can save time and money and life will be made easier as a result of not having to do all the hard labor. In contrast, the disadvantages of upgraded technology are that people will loose their jobs to machines that will do the work for them. In addition, machines and robots are too complex for most people to use.

I personally would want a developed world with advanced technologies. The following are the reasons why I do want a more advanced world with advanced technologies. My major reason is because when you have advanced technologies, life is much easier as robots and machines would take over your daily life chores. For example, daily life chores might be serving your breakfast, cutting your lawn, or cleaning your room. With robots and machines doing one’s chores one has time to relax. Another reason is because unlike humans, robots and machines do not make mistakes when programmed correctly. They always accomplish tasks perfectly so you won’t have to worry about making a mistake and getting trouble.

Other reasons why I want advanced technologies are because they save a great deal of time and money. For example, if you are a wealthy man who always had trouble employing talented maids, you can buy a cleaning robot and use it for the rest of your life. Therefore, you won’t have to use all your time employing talented maids. Also, you will save a lot of money from not having to pay servants. Another example of benefits from advanced technology is that if there are new, developed vehicles that will transport people to anywhere rapidly, so that one would not need to spend all those boring, long hours in an airplane to try to get to another country, which will save much time not only on long travels but also on daily commutes.

As there are so many advantages from highly developed technology, there also is a great deal of disadvantages from them. One disadvantage is that as technology develops, robots and machines will take over many jobs and people will loose their jobs by contrast. As people loose their jobs, they will have hard time getting money which would make it hard for them to continue to meet living expenses. Moreover, as people use less money the economy would be difficult to control and especially if it is a country as large as the United States, the problem will influence the world greatly.

Another disadvantage of highly developed technology is that machines and robots are complex. It is hard to activate all the machines you have unless you can multitask. Think about it, if most people have trouble on computers and almost all of us don’t know the actual limit of computers’ abilities, how will us, normal people, work with all the robots and machines? Moreover, just like computers, robots and machines will easily break and most time you won’t know how to fix them and one will have to call someone to fix them. People will loose their temper over this and it will create a large expense to repair them.

Even as there are as many advantages ad disadvantages of technology, I personally wish a more advanced world with great technologies. It would be so cool to work out all the complicated machines and robots. Don’t you think it will be awesome to press just a few complicated buttons than do the labor yourself? In the future it would be more about using your brain and being intelligent than doing the hard labor yourself. I hope these days come within my lifetime.

How Does Technology Enhance Student Achievement

Basic Skills Instruction
Computer assisted instruction to drill
Multi-media software - teach to a variety of learning styles
Videodiscs - strengthen basic skills
Video and audio technologies - bring material to life
Distance learning - at least as effective as traditional methods of instruction
All forms - develop new skills related to use of technology itself, necessary in workplace

Advanced Skills Instruction
Interactive educational technologies, including:
Computer-generated simulations
Videodiscs
Internet
CD-ROM
Students learn to: organize complex information, recognize patterns, draw inferences, communicate findings
Learn better organizational and problem-solving skills

Assessment of Student Progress
More comprehensive with multimedia
Assessments which require student’s active participation
Electronic portfolios

Student Motivation
They like it better
Increased family involvement
Improved teachers’ skills
Improved School Administration and Management

"We know that successful technology-rich schools generate impressive results for students, including improved achievement; higher test scores; improved student attitude, enthusiasm, and engagement; richer classroom content; and improved student retention and job placement rates. Of the hundreds of studies that show positive benefits from the use of technology, two are worth noting for their comprehensiveness. The first, a U.S. Department of Education-funded study of nine technology-rich schools, concluded that the use of technology resulted in educational gains for all students regardless of age, race, parental income, or other characteristics. [GET THIS] The second, a 10-year study supported by Apple Computer, Inc., concluded that student provided with technology-rich learning environments ‘continued to perform well on standardized tests but were also developing a variety of competencies not usually measured. Students explored and represented information dynamically and in many forms; became socially aware and more confident; communicated effectively about complex processes; became independent learners and self-starters; knew their areas of expertise and shared that expertise spontaneously.’" (ACOT)

Success Seen in ED Study:
Rising scores on state tests
Improved student attendance
Increased student comprehension
Motivation
Attitude
Strong study
Parent and teacher support
Improved student retention
Improved placement in jobs.

Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow (ACOT)

ACOT as summarized by Howard Mehlinger:

"In 1986 Apple Computer, Inc. launched a project call Apple Classrooms of Tomorrow (ACOT). The project began with seven classrooms representing what was intended to be a cross section of K-12 schools. Each participating student and teacher received two computers: one for home and one for school. The goal of the project was to see how the routing use of computers would affect how students learn and how teacher teach."

One issue the project hoped to confront was the possibility of any negative effects from prolonged exposure to computers. Some critics have worried that students who use computers extensively will become ‘brain-dead’ or less social from looking at the computer screen all day. At the end of two years, the investigators learned that some of their worst fears had been groundless.
Teachers were not hopeless illiterates where technology was concerned; they could use computers to accomplish their work.
Children did not become social isolates. ACOT classes showed more evidence of spontaneous cooperative learning than did traditional classes.
Children did not become bored by the technology over time. Instead, their desire to use it for their own purposes increased with use.
Even very young children had no problem becoming adept users of the keyboard. With very little training, second- and third- graders were some typing 25 to 30 words per minute with 95% accuracy - more than twice as fast as children of that age can usually write.
Software was not a major problem. Teacher found programs - including productivity tools - to use in their classes.

Standardized test scores showed that student were performing as well as they might have been expected to do without the computers; some were doing better. The studies showed that ACOT students wrote better and were able to complete unites of study more rapidly than their peers in non-ACOT classrooms. In one case, students finished the year’s study of mathematics by the beginning of April. In short, academic productivity did not suffer and in some cases even improved.

Most interesting, however, is that classroom observers noticed changes in the behavior of teachers and students. Students were taking more responsibility for their own learning, and teachers were working more as mentors and less as presenters of information.

By the end of the fourth year, ACOT classrooms had change; teachers were teaching differently, though they did not all teach alike. Each teacher seemed to have adjusted his or her own style to the computer-rich environment, but all the teachers were aware of the changes that had occurred in their own professional outlooks.

The students had also changed, especially the ACOT students at West High School, a school serving urban, blue-collar families in Columbus, Ohio. Twenty-one freshmen were selected at random from the student body to participate in a study of ACOT. They stayed with the program until their graduation four years later. Al 21 graduated, whereas the student body as a whole had a 30% dropout rate. Nineteen of the ACOT students (90%) went on to college, while only 15% of non-ACOT student sought higher education. Seven of the ACOT students were offered full college scholarships, and several businesses offered to hire those who did not intend to go on to college. ACOT students had half the absentee rate, and they had accumulated more than their share of academic honors. But perhaps the most important finding was the difference exhibited by these students in how they did their work. The ACOT students routinely and without prompting employed inquiry, collaboration, and technological and problem-solving skills of the kind promoted by the school reform movement.

Learning More About ACOT

Visit the ACOT Homepage at ACOT http://www.info.apple.com/education

Or Call:
900-APPL (1775) (Apple education information)
825-2145 for ACOT research reports and video

The ACOT Research Portfolio - 1990 includes the following reports:
ACOT Evaluation Study: First- and Second-Year Findings
Teacher Beliefs and Practices Part I: Patterns of Change
Teacher Beliefs and Practices Part II: Support for Change
Teaching in High-tech Environments: Classroom Management Revisited
Development of Teacher Knowledge and Implementation of a Problem-based Mathematics Curriculum

The ACOT Research Portfolio - 1992 includes the following reports:
Computer Acquisition: A longitudinal Study of the Influence of High Computer Access on Students’ Thinking, Learning, and Interactions
The Negotiations of Group Authorship Among Second-Graders Using Multimedia Composing Software
Partnerships for Change
The Relationship Between Technological Innovation and Collegial Interaction
Trading Places: When Teacher Utilize Student Expertise in Technology-Intensive Classrooms

The ACOT Research Portfolio - 1994 includes the following reports:
Creating an Alternative Context for Teacher Development: ACOT’s Two-year Pilot Project
Creating an Alternative Context for Teacher Development: The ACOT Teacher Development Centers
Environments that Support New Mode4s of Learning: The Results of Two Interactive Design Workshops
MediFusion: A Tool That Supports Learning Through Experience, Reflection, and Collaboration
Student Engagement Revisited: Views from Technology-Rick Classrooms

Two-page summaries of many of the research reports are available free, either by fax of electronically. To order by fax, call Apple Education at (800) 800-APPL (2775)

ACOT of Impact on Students

The following information summarize ACOT's impact on students:
Explored and represented information dynamically and in many forms.
Became socially aware and more confident.
Communicated effectively about complex processes.
Used technology routinely and appropriately.
Became independent learners and self-starters.
Knew their areas of expertise and shared that expertise spontaneously.
Worked well collaboratively.
Developed a positive orientation to the future.

Other ACOT Findings After 10 Years
Technology acts as a catalyst for fundamental change in the way students learn and teacher teach.
Technology revolutionizes the traditional methods teachers use.
Students become re-energized and much more excited about learning - resulting in significantly improved grades - while dropout and absentee rates decrease dramatically.
For high school students in the program, drop-out rates fell from 30 percent to near zero, while absenteeism was reduced from 8 percent to 4 percent.
Teachers can and will embrace technology, if they are given the kind of professional development and support they need.

Effects of Educational Technology

In a 1994 Software Publisher's Association (SPA) study, research found that:
Educational technology has a significant positive impact on achievement in all subject areas, across all levels of school, and in regular classrooms as well as those for special-needs students.
Educational technology has positive effects on student attitudes.
The degree of effectiveness is influenced by the student population, the instructional design, the teacher’s role, how students are grouped, and the levels of student access to technology.
Technology makes instruction more student-centered, encourages cooperative learning, and stimulated increased teacher/student interaction.
Positive changes in the learning environment evolve over time and do not occur quickly.

Information Superhighway

"America’s Children and the Information Superhighway: A Briefing Book and National Action Agenda" Wendy Lazarus and Laurie Lipper, Directors, The Children’s Partnership, 1994
A five-year report (1987-1992) by the Sacramento School District in California found that students using multimedia and telecommunications showed improved attitudes toward reading, social studies and science, and became more active and independent in learning. Some also showed improved reading scores.
A survey of 550 teachers who use telecommunications technology in the classroom reported that "inquiry-based analytical skills - like critical thinking, data analysis, problem solving, and independent thinking - develop when students use a technology that supports research, communication, and analysis. However, telecommunications does not directly help their performances on state- or city- mandated tests.

Multiple Intelligences and Multi-media

Howard Gardner, Professor of Harvard University and author of Frames of Mind (New York: Basic Books, 1983) from Multimedia Book, ITTE wrote that:
Seven or more "multiple intelligences" that are of equal importance in human beings and develop at different times and in different ways in different individuals.
Multi-media can go along way to addressing these intelligences, much more than traditional teaching methods.
Below is a list of the intelligences and the technology tools that can be used to teach to them

Verbal/Linguistic intelligence: The ability to think, communicate, and create through words both in speech and in writing.
Computer software which allows young children to write and illustrate their own stories before their fine motor skills are developed enough to allow them to do so by hand.
Word processing software stimulates learners to interact more closely with their work.
Audio and video recording can give students instant feedback on their story-telling skills and can help them develop them further.
Multimedia software helps students produce multimedia reports.
Telecommunications programs link students who correspond in writing.

Logical/mathematical intelligences: Memorize and perform mathematical operations, ability to think mathematically, logically, and analytically and to apply that understanding to problem solving.
Multimedia products that graphically illustrate physics concepts.
Providing challenging visual/spatial tasks which develop mathematical and logical thinking .
Develop higher-order mathematical thinking by making abstract ideas concrete.

Visual/spatial intelligence: The ability to understand the world through what we see and imagine and to express ideas through the graphic arts.
"Paint" programs that allow students who are unskilled with paper and brush create art on computer screens.
Databases of art work.
Desktop publishing.
Camcorders to create documentaries.
Internet links to museums and virtual tours.

Bodily/kinesthetic intelligence: The ability to learn through physical coordination and dexterity and the ability to express oneself through physical activities.
Educational games which challenge fine motor coordination while developing logical thinking skills and mastery over abstractions.
Construction of lego robots and program their movement through the computer.
Electronic fieldtrips - programs that allow students to interact electronically with a scientist who is exploring the depths of the Mediterranean or the inside of a volcano.

Musical intelligence: The ability to understand, appreciate, perform, and create music by voice or instruments or dance.
Students can hum into a synthesizer and make it sound like any instrument they want.
Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) makes it possible to make music on an electronic keyboard, which can be made to sound like any instrument and then can be orchestrated electronically.
Interactive presentations of renowned classical music let students understand music on many different levels; listening to it, seeing the score as it is played, hearing individual instruments played alone, reviewing biographical material about the composer and learning about the music’s historical and cultural backgrounds.

Interpersonal intelligence: The ability to work cooperatively with other people and to apply a variety of skills to communicate with and understand others.
Clusters of students working together on computers learn more than individual students working alone.
Electronic networks linking students with their peers within the community and around the world.
Lumaphones allow students to see a picture of the person with whom they are speaking.

Intrapersonal intelligence: The ability to understand, bring to consciousness, and express one’s own inner world of thoughts and emotions.
Multimedia gives teachers the tools to turn the classroom into centers of student-directed inquiry.
Technology offers tools for thinking more deeply, pursuing curiosity, and exploring and expanding intelligence as students build "mental models" with which they can visualize connections between ideas on any topic.
Individual growth plans, developed jointly by the student, parents and teacher can encourage the development of intrapersonal intelligence. Technology supports such plans with electronic records, videotaped interviews, and multimedia portfolios of student work.

Connecting Students to a Changing World

The following quotes were taken from Connecting Students to a Changing World: A Technology Strategy for Improving Mathematics and Science Education. A Statement by the Research and Policy Committee of the Committee for Economic Development 1995:

"Fortunately, the same rapid technological changes that have made these new workplace competencies so important and greater knowledge of mathematics and science so critical also provide new and effective tools to help raise the knowledge and skills of teachers and the achievement of students."

Better Students Through Technology

Visit the site http://www.cast.org/stsstudy.html and learn more about the following:
The Role of Online Communications in Schools: A National Study" is a report of a study conducted by CAST (Center for Applied Special Technology), and independent research and development organization, and sponsored by the Scholastic Network and Council of the Great City Schools.

The study compared the work of 500 students in fourth-grade and sixth-grade classes in seven urban school districts (Chicago, Dayton, Detroit, Memphis, Miami, Oakland, and Washington, DC) with and without online access. Results show significantly higher scores on measurements of information management, communication, and presentation of ideas for experimental groups with online access than for control groups with no online access. Is technology making an impact on education?


"Technology is making a significant, positive impact on education. Important findings in these studies include:
Educational technology as demonstrated a significant positive effect on achievement. Positive effects have been found for all major subject areas, in preschool through higher education, and for both regular education and special needs students. Evidence suggests that interactive video is especially effective when the skills and concepts to be learned have a visual component and when the software incorporates a research-based instructional design. Use of online telecommunications for collaboration across classrooms in different geographic locations has also been show to improve academic skills.
Education technology has been found to have positive effects on student attitudes toward learning and on student self-concept. Students felt more successful in school, were more motivated to learn and have increased self-confidence and self-esteem when using computer-based instruction. This was particularly true when the technology allowed learners to control their own learning.
The level of effectiveness of educational technology is influenced by the specific student population, the software design, the teacher’s role, how the students are grouped, and the level of student access to the technology.
Students trained in collaborative learning, had higher self esteem and student achievement.
Introducing technology into the learning environment has been shown to make learning more student-centered, to encourage cooperative learning, and to stimulate increased teacher/student interaction.
Positive changes in the learning environment brought about by technology are more evolutionary than revolutionary. These changes occur over a period of years, as teachers become more experienced with technology.
Courses for which computer-based networks were use increased student-student and student-teacher interaction, increased student-teacher interaction with lower-performing students, and did not decrease the traditional forms of communication used. Many student who seldom participate in face-to-face class discussion become more active participants online.
Greater student cooperation and sharing and helping behaviors occurred when students used computer-based learning that had students compete against the computer rather than against each other.
Small group collaboration on computer is especially effective when student have received training in the collaborative process.



Research Showing Impact of TechnologyInstitute for the Transfer of Technology to Education
1680 Duke Street
Alexandria, VA 22314
(703) 838-6722
http://www.nsba.org/itte
Education Resources Information Center (ERIC)
c/o. Access ERIC
1600 Research Boulevard
Rockville, MD 20850
(800) 538-3742
http://www.aspensys.com/eric
Office of Educational Technology
U.S. Department of Education
600 Independence Ave., SW
Washington, D.C. 20202
(800) 872-5327
http://www.ed.gov/Technology
North Central Regional Technology Education Consortium
Educational Laboratory
1900 Spring Road
Suite 300
Oak Brook, IL 60521
(630) 218-1051
http://www.ncrel.org/ncrtec
International Society for Technology in Education
1787 Agate Street
Eugene, OR 97403-1923
(541) 346-4414
Effective Practice: Computer Technology in Education
Order at (800) 336-5191
Committee for Economic Development
477 Madison Ave.
New York, NY 10022
(212) 688-2063 ext. 212
Connecting Students to a Changing World: A Technology Strategy for Improving Mathematics and Science Education
Software Publishers Association
1730 M. Street, NW
Washington, D.C. 20036
(202) 452-1600
Analysis of research findings available in Report on the Effectiveness of Technology in Schools ‘95-’96
http://www.spa.org
American School Board Journal March 1993
"Asking the Right Questions" Saul Rockman
Midcentral Educational Laboratory
Impact of Technology/Additional Resources
http://www.mcrel.org/connect/impact.html

The Social Impact of Technology

There is no doubt that technological change brings about social change. The Industrial revolution saw many people displaced from their land, to find work in crowded city factories. Serfdom was abolished and the population shifted from villages to the cities. Strong family ties, self sufficiency and the right to occupy land were replaced with uncertain tenancy of land, dependency on trade and a weakening of the family unit.

Economically, goods and money abounded, and trade flourished. The merchant class profited from the wealth that was generated on the backs of the displaced population of urban workers. Children were sent to work in factories, in order for families to make enough money to live. The peasant class worked long hard hours in poor conditions with no security. The Industrial revolution led to the alienation of the working class and although many union battles have since led to the adoption of better working conditions, the effects of the Industrial revolution remain. The family unit is even more vulnerable today with soaring divorce rates, high rates of teenage suicide, most of society are either heavily mortgaged to banks or paying high rents, and no one can be self-sufficient in a world governed by free trade.

Advances in technology, is generally not equitably shared within society. People with money have more opportunity to aquire technology, which enables them to acquire even more wealth. It is also important to remember that war has been and will continue to be the driving force for technology and innovation. Power and wealth are intrinsically tied together.

Technology leads to greater social economic division. Laborers are viewed as commodities and expendable. Technology leads to alienation because it can create jobs that require no specialist knowledge.

To date, since the industrial revolution we have seen technology used to the detriment of society. The right to occupy land has become a privelege that must be worked for and earned and now the battle is on to control all the world's food and textiles through genetically modified seeds and animals. The insidious part of GM is that there is no recall once it is released into the environment. Salmon that will grow ten times faster than normal salmon will destroy river systems, as their unfair genetically modified advantage will see all smaller life forms extinguished, and genetically modified crops that are dependent on pesticides will contaminate organic, heritage seeds that have sustained people for thousands of years. Seeds will no longer be able to be harvested and replanted but the farmer will have to buy new seed every year from GM seed makers. This fight is more important that the fight over open source because it involves the right of people everywhere to have clean, safe food that has not been genetically altered. Essentially GM is a tax on everyone because a patent will be on every seed and seeds are made to be sterile the following year. This is something to become angry about. The greedy corporations and individuals that want control over our food, water and land, do not care about the irreversible damage to the environment. people and animals that they cause.

We have the right to eat tomatoes that are free of fish DNA, meat and milk that is free of human DNA, pigs that haven't been grown to harvest anthrax antibodies. They will never be able to prove the safety of GM food and no long term studies have been done. Nor will GM solve the problem of soil erosion, and pollution of rivers from artificial fertilizers and pesticides. Only a return to responsible organic and biodynamic farming practices will solve these problems. The 50 harmful effects of GM food Courts are not keen to pursue pesticide makers for poisoning farmers, or GM seed makers for monopolizing the world's seeds through patents, (through genetic engineering that not only renders the seed worthless for replanting the next year but also contaminates non-GM crops by cross pollination. Already the majority of the world's seed stock is controlled by a handful of corporations - see http://www.cqs.com/50harm.htm and http://www.seedsavers.net )

The internet in its current form was developed as a free exchange of information, unregulated by any one government or owned by any one person or company. In its raw form it was the playground of hackers and computer geeks, who challenged the status quo. It brings about a new era, the technological revolution. The free flow of information, has brought about technological advances at an unprecedented rate and has made many rich and brought companies who failed to adapt to a standstill.

How will this technological revolution impact on our society? If the industrial revolution is any thing to go by, there will be winners and losers to technological revolution.

E-commerce will affect the middle man and allow direct trade with consumers. Efficiency brings about lower prices for the consumer, but it is more accurate to argue that efficiency brings about greater wealth for shareholders, directors and owners. The intrinsic weave of social interactions of trade, can be disentangled and made into a horizontal supply chain. E-commerce will create efficiencies that effectively remove the need for a long supply chain but at the expense of social relationships.


The effect of e-commerce, and the internet will impact on every society on the earth. Already, the barriers of trade between individuals in different countries are non-existent. Company contact details are searchable through powerful search engines, and trade can commerce between two individuals who would otherwise never have met. The internet dissolves national boundaries, and the consequences for cities that have developed as centers of administration and trade will be disastrous, if they do not embrace the technological advances in communication and trade that the internet brings. While at the same time, free trade means fierce competition without the protection of award wages. People are reduced to consumers and suppliers.

Resisting the tide of technological change is impossible. Of course it is possible to do business without a website or email or mobile phone or a fax machine. People have been doing business well before any of these gadgets were invented. But business today is about competition, and technology is about leverage. Technology can lead to alienation if it is not widely dispersed in society. The Industrial age saw the concentration of technology in the hands of the rich and powerful, allowing them to dominate and subdue the population into harsh working conditions and the social impact of the internet and computers is only just beginning, will it challenge the status quo or will it lead to greater population control?

The latter is probably more likely, and many will look on this time as the golden age of the internet. Already technology like digital TV is being pushed in the guise of better quality but the benefits to those who own the systems is that they will be able to track what you watch, when you watch it, whether or not you switch off an ad, and perhaps even whether that pizza ad makes you pick up the phone and call for a pizza. Knowledge is power, and with access to tapping phone lines, reading emails, reading your credit card statements, knowing by GPS where you are by tracking your mobile phone, it can be a scary world, if all that knowledge and power were to be used to oppress and control.

On the upside, technology has made the developed world a richer place to the detriment of the environment. Machines have allowed people to move away from physical work, so that now in Australia there is 100,000 accountants and 85,000 farmers. Perhaps, technology has gone too far, and there are more people counting beans than growing them !

Impact of technology on government

The legal system is dependent on local jurisdictions under common law. Historically, one has to remember that before the age of the internet, airplanes and telephones, the vast majority of business was done locally. Technology has rapidly changed the way people do business but there has not adapted to the changes. There is no one body that governs international trade.

What are the implications?

If you buy a product from a local supplier in your State, and it turns out that the item is faulty, you can go back to your supplier to work out repair or replacement and if they don't help you, you can take the matter to local Trades office or file legal action in your state. If however, you buy a product outside your jurisdiction, you must file a claim in the State, where the supplier is located. You can only use a lawyer in the State where you file your action, your local llawyer can only act as a consultant and has no authority to represent you in court or to serve papers.

Therefore, we have a world which is governed by local laws and yet the businesses and individuals are now actively trading outside of their local area.

Governments are trying to make laws about content on the internet but have no jurisdiction to enforce those laws. This has created havens in small developing countries, that are happy to accept companies that want to run online gambling websites that may be outlawed in their jurisdiction or companies that wish to reduce their tax liabilities by opening up bank accounts in developing countries.

We see arising now a homogenizing of local laws on issues like SPAM, and even sending a international letter from anywhere in the world involves the completion of almost identical forms, Governments are making agreements, in an attempt to be relevant in a world where people are able to trade more freely and where digital communication has enabled businesses to work, almost without physical boundaries.

Business names and the Internet

In the beginning, it was easy to start a new business. You would go to your local business registration office in your State and apply for a business name. If it was taken, you would choose another name. Most people do not realize that a business name is only valid for the State that it is registered in and the only way to protect your business name is to incorporate a company. In Australia, you would lodge forms with ASIC to incorporate a company and you then have rights to use your business name exclusively in Australia and its territories.

However, with the birth of the internet, your Australian company name may be the same as the name of a company overseas.

This has resulted in legal action being taken, as companies tussle of business names and the rights to use those names and a court system that is unable to deal effectively with international disputes over business names and has resulted in greater costs to people who want to start a business as they must register multiple domain names, take about international trademarks and find a name that has not already been taken. Even if they contact lawyers to register all the domain names and trademarks to avoid disputes(both local and international), legal action can still be taken against them. And when it comes to justice, money wins almost every time, unless companies want to relocate to safe havens in developing countries where they cannot be pursued in court.

Solar-Powered Future

EFFORTS TO DRIVE DOWN COSTS REMAIN PARAMOUNT, WHILE OVERCAPACITY MAY DOOM SOME SOLAR CELL MAKERS.


September,09 swept in with good news for Solyndra Inc. The maker of cylindrical solar photovoltaic panels was announced as the recipient of a $535 million loan guarantee from the U.S. Department of Energy to finance construction of the first phase of its second solar panel manufacturing facility.

This loan guarantee is the first issued under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. Vice President Joe Biden, who announced the loan finalization, identified it as "part of the unprecedented investment this administration is making in renewable energy."

Solar projects seem to make news almost daily. Just ahead of the Solyndra announcement, for example, e Solar in August unveiled its 5-megawatt Sierra Sun Tower solar power plant, and Solient Energy opened a pilot production facility capable of producing 1 megawatt of solar panels annually, the company said.

In the USA more than 62,000 new solar thermal and solar electric installations were completed in 2008, up 16% over the previous year, according to the Interstate Renewable Energy Council. On a global scale, capacity is expected to boom in 2009. Research firm Display Search has forecast solar cell producing capacity growing by 56% in 2009.

That capacity growth has a potential downside. DisplaySearch forecasts a 17% drop in PV module demand in 2009, with a recovery beginning in 2010. For now that means Charles Annis says "the PV industry is currently experiencing an enormous over-supply that is causing rapid price erosion and potentially setting the stage for the failure of multiple cell manufacturers".
At the heart of solar energy research is the drive to reduce manufacturing costs. Researchers at the DOE's Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the University of California at Berkeley report they have demonstrated a way to fabricate efficient solar cells from low-cost, flexible materials. The design grows optically active semiconductors in arrays of nano-scale pillars. The nano-pillar array offers a greater surface to collect light than two-dimensional solar cells.

Meanwhile, solar company Sky Fuels has teamed with the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to develop the Sky Trough Parabolic Trough Solar Concentrating Collector. Designed for utility-sized power generation, this innovation allows Sky Trough to reduce installed costs by 35%, according to the NREL. And at Kansas State University, professor Ryszard Jankowiak has received a grant to study photosynthetic complexes from a type of bacteria. The research could one day aid in the development of devices that more efficiently convert solar energy into electricity.



Quantum 'trampoline' to test gravity
WAY TO TEST THE STRENGTH OF GRAVITY WITH HIGH ACCURACY

To test theories such as general relativity, the strength of gravity is measured precisely using ensembles of supercold atoms falling in a vacuum chamber. These ensembles are called "Bose-Einstein condensates".

BECs act in a quantum-mechanical wave-like fashion and interfere with each other. The interference pattern depends on the paths the atoms take, so gravity's effect on how fast they fall can be calculated by analysing the pattern with an interferometer. The longer the fall, the more precise the measurement – but the harder it is to keep the ensemble intact.

"The longer your interferometer, the more precise is your measurement," says Thomas Bourdel of the Charles Fabry Institute of Optics in Palaiseau, France. "But you are limited by the size of your apparatus."

Now Philippe Bouyer of the Institute of Optics in Palaiseau, France, along with Bourdel and colleagues have increased the fall time with a "quantum trampoline".

In a microscopic chamber, they fired a specially designed laser pulse at the falling BECs. The pulse affected the BECs in the same way that a crystal lattice can affect light: since the atoms exhibit wave-like behaviour, they can be diffracted in a similar way to light in a crystal.

By tuning the laser, the team were able to split up the wave, causing some of its components to bounce upwards. When the parts fell back down, the laser was pulsed so they split again, and so on. Eventually the parts recombined in an interference pattern.

The device is less precise than existing atom interferometers, but the team plan to improve precision markedly by, for instance, using lighter atoms. Lighter atoms like helium and lithium will levitate for longer after each bounce than heavier atoms. This has the same effect as creating a longer interferometer with heavier atoms.



SOLAR SAILING
DESPITE EARLIER FAILURES, THE PLANETARY SOCIETY IS GEARING UP TO TEST ANOTHER SOLAR SAIL IN SPACE IN A YEAR

Earlier this week, the Planetary Society, a space advocacy group in Pasadena, California, received an anonymous donation to build and launch a small solar-sail driven spacecraft.

The Society hopes to launch the sail in about a year as part of a three-stage plan to demonstrate the viability of solar sail propulsion, which has never been tested in orbit. The group says it is the only practical technology that might be used for interstellar travel, since the light generates a small but constant pressure that should accelerate a sail to high speeds over time.

New Scientist caught up with Louis Friedman, the organization's executive director, to find out more about the promise and challenge of solar sailing.

A solar sail is a device that collects sunlight and transfers the energy of the sunlight to the momentum of the spacecraft. It uses pure light, reflecting off the sail, so you want a large area to collect a lot of photons and you want it highly reflective so you get a high efficiency of them bouncing off. We use aluminised mylar.

Solar Sail:

Solar sails (also called light sails or photon sails) are a form of spacecraft propulsion using the radiation pressure of light from a star or laser to push enormous ultra-thin mirrors to high speeds.
According to the Einstein relation, E = pc, photons have momentum, and hence light reflecting from a surface exerts a small amount of radiation pressure. In 1924, the Russian space engineer Friedrich Zander proposed that, since light provides a small amount of thrust, this effect could be used as a form of space propulsion requiring no fuel. Gathered across a large area, this thrust can provide significant acceleration. Over time, this acceleration can build considerable speed.

Changing course can be accomplished in two ways. First, the sail can allow gravity from a nearby mass, such as a star or planet, to alter its direction. Second, the sail can tilt away from the light source. This changes the direction of acceleration because any force applied to a sail's plane pushes at an angle perpendicular to its surface. Smaller auxiliary vanes can be used to gently pull the main sail into its new position.
The Idea:

The pressure of sunlight was noted by the early pioneers who discovered light. Felix Tisserand and others noted how light pressure affected comet [tails] back in the 19th century. The use of light to propel a spacecraft, that idea was invented by Fridrich Tsander and Konstantin Tsiolkovsky back in the Soviet Union in the 1920s. But it wasn't until the 1970s that anyone thought about practically doing it. Solar pressure force has been measured on spacecraft many times and it's been used in manoeuvres, but never as the single force to propel your way around in space.



VIRTUAL GRAPHICS CONTACT LENS
A CONTACT LENS FITTED WITH AN LED AND THE CIRCUITRY TO HARVEST POWER FROM RADIO WAVES IS THE FIRST STEP TOWARDS A NEW KIND OF HEAD-UP DISPLAY

A contact lens that harvests radio waves to power an LED is paving the way for a new kind of display. The lens is a prototype of a device that could display information beamed from a mobile device.

Realising that display size is increasingly a constraint in mobile devices, Babak Parviz at the University of Washington, in Seattle, hit on the idea of projecting images into the eye from a contact lens.

One of the limitations of current head-up displays is their limited field of view. A contact lens display can have a much wider field of view. "Our hope is to create images that effectively float in front of the user perhaps 50 cm to 1 m away," says Parviz.

His research involves embedding nanoscale and microscale electronic devices in substrates like paper or plastic. He also wears contact lenses. "It was a matter of putting the two together," he says.

Fitting a contact lens with circuitry is challenging. The polymer cannot withstand the temperatures or chemicals used in large-scale microfabrication, Parviz explains. So, some components – the power-harvesting circuitry and the micro light-emitting diode – had to be made separately, encased in a biocompatible material and then placed into crevices carved into the lens.

One obvious problem is powering such a device. The circuitry requires 330 microwatts but doesn't need a battery. Instead, a loop antenna picks up power beamed from a nearby radio source. The team has tested the lens by fitting it to a rabbit.

Parviz says that future versions will be able to harvest power from a user's cell phone, perhaps as it beams information to the lens. They will also have more pixels and an array of microlenses to focus the image so that it appears suspended in front of the wearer's eyes.

Despite the limited space available, each component can be integrated into the lens without obscuring the wearer's view, the researchers claim. As to what kinds of images can be viewed on this screen, the possibilities seem endless. Examples include subtitles when conversing with a foreign-language speaker, directions in unfamiliar territory and captioned photographs. The lens could also serve as a head-up display for pilots or gamers.

Mark Billinghurst, director of the Human Interface Technology Laboratory, in Christchurch, New Zealand, is impressed with the work. "A contact lens that allows virtual graphics to be seamlessly overlaid on the real world could provide a compelling augmented reality experience," he says. This prototype is an important first step in that direction, though it may be years before the lens becomes commercially available, he adds.

The University of Washington team will present their prototype at the Biomedical Circuits and Systems (BioCas 2009) conference at Beijing later this month.



CAMERA CAN FOLLOW FIRING NEURONS
Slow motion just got a whole lot slower, with a camera sensor able to film action at 1 million frames per second.

The black and white device is quick enough to capture impulses hurtling through firing nerve cells, and its resolution is good enough to film the microsecond-long pulse-like nerve signals that speed through networks of neurons at up to 180 kilometres per hour.

Capturing frames that last one-millionth of a second requires great sensitivity to light, as well as precise timing. The device uses an array of single-photon detectors, or SPADs, each hooked up to a tiny stopwatch. The stopwatch records when the SPAD is hit by an incoming photon, with an accuracy of around 100 picoseconds.

Wider view:

Each SPAD and its timer together act as a single-pixel camera, a setup that has been used for several years, says Edoardo Charbon at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands.

Charbon is the coordinator of the pan-European Megaframe project, which is the first to make a silicon chip that combines many such devices into a image sensor. The chip works like the one in a digital camera and so can snap whole objects, not just tiny spots like individual SPADs. The current chip contains an array of 1024 SPADs and stopwatches: "No one has operated so many on a single chip before," says Charbon.


Short exposure:

Each Megaframe image is captured in just a few nanoseconds, and the device itself can capture one image per microsecond, or 1 million frames every second. "If every pixel was hit by a photon every microsecond, then you could measure 1024 million photons per second – that's one gigameasurement every second," says Charbon. In reality, however, not enough photons collide with SPADs to give such resolution.

The sensor could be fitted with a conventional camera lens, for example in mobile gadgets, says Charbon. But for now the team has attached it to a microscope to capture the firing of neurons. They use a technique called fluorescence lifetime imaging microscopy. It exploits the fact that, when illuminated, some molecules absorb photons before discharging the energy shortly afterwards in a second photon of another colour.

The Megaframe sensor detects those emitted photons and measures how long they take to appear after the initial photon is absorbed. This can reveal the properties of the emitting molecule. "The distribution varies in a predictable way depending on the local environment – for instance, the calcium concentration," Charbon says.

Because the ion channels in neurons fire when there is a build-up of calcium around them, the technique offers a way to monitor neuron activity. And because the chip can handle up to 1024 photons at the same time, it can record a moving image of the neuron to show exactly how a nerve signal travels through it.

Speed of thought:

Using the Megaframe chip to capture a million images a second, it will be possible to "film" the impulses moving around a small network of neurons, says Charbon.

Carl Petersen at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne used a previous generation of the chip, containing fewer SPADs, to "film" similar processes. "This new chip will be extremely useful," he says.

Neuroscientist Alessandro Esposito at the University of Cambridge is excited about the new perspectives Megaframe could provide.

He says the new chip can map events so fast-moving that currently they can only be recorded by electrical measurements which give no spatial information. "The Megaframe impact on lifetime sensing will be momentous," he says. It could, for instance, lead to a better understanding of the molecular basis of cancer.



LETS SEE THROUGH WALLS: Transparent wall
AUGMENTED REALITY SYSTEM LETS YOU SEE THROUGH WALLS

If only drivers could see through walls, blind corners and other dangerous road junctions would be much safer. Now an augmented reality system has been built that could just make that come true.

The prototype uses two cameras: one that captures the driver's view and a second that sees the scene behind a view-blocking wall. A computer takes the feed from the second camera and layers it on top of the images from the first so that the wall appears to be transparent.

This makes it simple to glance "through" a wall to see what's going on behind it. But the techniques needed to combine them were challenging to develop, says Yaser Sheikh of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania.

Altered images:

The view of the hidden scene needs to be skewed so that it looks as if it were being viewed from the position of the person using the system. The system does this by spotting landmarks seen by both cameras: the one seeing the hidden view and the one with the same view as the user.

Sheikh and his colleagues also had to develop software that transforms moving objects in the images to avoid distortion.

Ultimately, the team want to build the system into a car. An onboard video processor would tune into a wireless feed from a roadside camera with a view of the hidden scene, such as a stretch of road behind a blind corner, and project the image of the hidden scene onto the windscreen rather than a monitor.

The project is funded by Denso, a car parts manufacturer based in Kariya, Japan.

Future view:

"It's an interesting peek into the future," says Bruce Thomas of the University of South Australia in Adelaide. He points out that many cities already have networks of CCTV cameras that could provide footage of hidden scenes.

Such a network could be supplemented by images from cameras mounted on many cars, says Shiekh. The Carnegie team is working on software that integrates feeds in footage from such sources into the system.

But Thomas adds that several formidable hurdles will have to be cleared before the technology can be used on public highways. Fast, powerful data processing and communication would be required to make the system work usefully in a moving car in real time.



BREATH FRESH AIR, TRANSFORMS STEM CELLS
BREATH OF FRESH AIR AND TRANSFORMS YOUR STEM CELLS

Mimicking the environment experienced by cells in the windpipe is enough to transform stem cells into a range of different lung cells. Such "physical" techniques could be used to create specialized tissues when growth factors alone aren't enough.

Lindsey Van Haute of the Free University of Brussels (VUB) in Belgium and colleagues spread human embryonic stem cells onto a porous membrane. The cells were fed from beneath by nutrients and from above by a fluid that encouraged them to multiply. Removing two chemicals from the growth fluid kick started differentiation.

Four days later, the team removed the fluid covering the cells, leaving them open to the air while still being sustained and supported from below, as they would be in the trachea. After 24 days the cells had developed surface proteins that identified them as specific types of lung cell, including alveolar cells, which allow the exchange of gases, and cilia, which expel bacteria and dirt.

Physical influence:

"Our study proves differentiation into lung cells is influenced by physical forces," says Van Haute. Previously, stem cells have been made to differentiate into lung cells using a cocktail of different growth factors, but Haute says using physical forces might be simpler.

"Physical forces are certainly a factor in getting the lung lining to be fully functional," says Anne Bishop at Imperial College London, who has made alveolar cells from mouse stem cells using growth factors alone. "But I find it difficult to believe that raw stem cells would differentiate through to these uncommon types of cells solely in response to physical forces."

Haute's team plans to use the cells they created to study lung diseases, such as cystic fibrosis. Such cells might one day be used to treat people with damaged lung tissue, but only if the cells can be made from a person's own tissue. This could be done by converting the cells first into induced pluripotent stem cells.

Digital Revolution Short Film Competition - the shortlist announced

The Digital Revolution short film competition has closed for entries and we have spent some fantastic hours watching and short-listing the entries to present to the judges next week to deliberate and find two winners.

We have to extend a huge thank you to all those creative and skilled individuals who put forward their films for the competition. We provided the rushes, but you have all provided a tremendous amount of effort and imagination to create a superb collection of films to genuinely enjoy viewing.

The shortlist of people whose film entries are going forward to the final judging stage are as follows:

Dimitra Nikitaki - Young People and Social Media
Alexander Urazov - Digital Revolution Trailer
Richard Adamson - Press Play To Start
Tom Dixon - Trailer for Digital Revolution
Naomi Desautels - The Internet: How It Is Planning To Overthrow The World And Kill Us All
Tamsin Comrie - Internet as Religion
Alex Hudd - The Digital Revolution
Matthew Keats - Future Web
Paul Wright - 01010010011001010111011001101111011011000111010101110100011010010110111101101110
Paul Carpenter - Digital Revolution Trailer
Steve Dean - Trapped in a Web
Tero Hiltunen - Craving Communication
Edward Sludden - Digital De-evolution
Mayowa Ojo - BBC The Web Promo

The shortlist will be taken to a judging panel consisting of BBC Factual Executive Producers Nick Mirsky and Dominic Crossley-Holland, and BBC Factual Multiplatform Executive Producer Julian Phillips, who will assess each film based on the judging criteria.

Winners will be contacted on 12 or 13 January 2010. If a selected entrant cannot be contacted after reasonable attempts have been made to do so, the BBC reserves the right to offer the prize to the next best entry.

Update

Our competition winners have now been contacted. If you were shortlisted and haven't heard from us, unfortunately you are not one of the winners. However, thanks for entering the competition, and do watch this space - all the shortlisted films and trailers will be published on the blog in due course.


Digital Revolution series title decided at last: The Virtual Revolution


Thanks for all your suggestions for a name for 'Digital Revolution'. It's taken a bit longer than we'd hoped, but as we've outlined here, we now have our series title: 'The Virtual Revolution'.

Let us know what you think!


Cassetteboy and Barry Pilling mash-up the message for the BBC Digital Revolution Short Film Competition


Masters of the video mash-up, Cassetteboy and Barry Pilling, have joined the Digital Revolution team to make mirth and entertainment with the Digital Revolution downloadable content, and hopefully provide some inspiration of ways in which you can use our content for the Digital Revolution Short Film Competition.

Please note that these short films were commissioned by us to provide inspiration - they aren't entered into the competition.

First up, Cassetteboy, whose fast-cutting mash-up videos are (in)famous around the web, applies his signature techniques to the Digital Revolution rushes to offer a unique collection of mashed statements about the web:
Next, Barry Pilling uses his stop-motion approach to create a brilliant interpretation of the Digital Revolution content - telling the multiplatform story in a literally multiplatform

You just knew they'd never be able to resist using Stephen Fry saying "LOL".

So hopefully this has whetted your appetites for the rushes and fanned the flames of your your creative fires to get involved with our short film competition.

Digital Revolution has been releasing rushes sequences from the ongoing production for you to watch, embed, download and re-use for your own video, and we thought it would be fun to run a competition for you to make a short film about the series themes or a trailer for the series as a whole. We've made our own little mash-up to explain this further:


In order to see this content you need to have both Javascript enabled and Flash installed. Visit BBC Webwise for full instructions. If you're reading via RSS, you'll need to visit the blog to access this content.


Your short film or trailer could win a promo spot on the BBC Homepage and be seen by hundreds of thousands of people. The winners will also be invited to attend a documentary masterclass at the BBC and meet with a BBC Multiplatform Commissioning Executive. Just make something that educates, informs and entertains. You can find more of the details of the competition on the Digital Revolution Competition page.

After today (7 December 2009) we won't be uploading any further video rushes sequences until after the competition closes - 3 January 2010. So what you find on the rushes page is everything we will be putting up for use in the competition.

In fact, since we've been uploading more and more rushes sequences over the last couple of weeks, you have more rushes to play with than Cassetteboy or Barry Pilling had. So what are you waiting for? Get mashing!