Information technology in the National Curriculum: a view from Scotland

Abstract This paper examines the proposals for Information Technology (IT) in current curriculum developments in England and Wales and in Scotland. It points out significant differences between the pattern of curriculum developments in these two parts of the United Kingdom, noting in particular, that developments under the heading of The National Curriculum do not apply in Scotland. Nevertheless, IT developments in Scotland have many similarities to those in the rest of the UK and it is from this shared experience that a view is offered as to whether the proposals under The National Curriculum will allow IT to reach its full potential to shape the curriculum and to improve learning and teaching styles. Among the issues considered are the interplay between IT and the curriculum, the impact of IT on learning and teaching and the fundamental question as to whether the system—pupils, teachers, staff management and staff development arrangements—are likely to be able to respond to the National Curriculum proposals.     

Research needs in CAL

Abstract The demise of MEP, and the arrival of MeSU as its successor, naturally provoke thoughts about the directions that future research and development for IT in education should take. This paper explores current research styles, and argues that the problems of developing and disseminating CAL appropriate to the production of desirable educational outcomes in class are unlikely to be solved by current approaches. Successful innovation requires more than enthusiastic teachers, careful laboratory studies, and a collection of regional information offices. There are urgent research needs for more studies of CAL in representative classrooms, and for studies of the implications of the socio-administrative structure of schools on the accessibility of computing resources. On a larger scale, work is needed that links CAL to major on-going curriculum development programmes, such as new GCSE curricula.     

The Emperor’s new clothes? A meta-study of education technology policies in Ireland,North and South (1996–2006)

In this paper, we asked whether or not it matters if policy direction for embedding digital technology in education is aligned with the locus of control of curriculum reform and of teachers’ professional development. We created a simple control:choice framework with which to analyse and compare approaches to education technology policy and the interaction of technology with curriculum and professional development in Northern Ireland and in the south of Ireland. While we expected to find harmony between technology provision and educational change, we did not discover it. We concluded that different approaches are not necessarily at odds and their interplay is more complex.     

高职软件技术专业教学及与认证考试相结合的研究

软件专业技术认证是进入软件行业的"敲门砖"。由国际著名软件企业或者行业组织颁发的职业证书,证明了你具有某种软件技术技能,为国际承认并通用。本文概述了目前主要的软件专业的认证考试,并阐述了高职软件技术专业教学如何与认证考试相结合。     

基于“五化”模式的专业课程创新创业人才培养研究与实践

“计量仪器与检测”课程是陕西国防工业职业技术学院一流建设专业“机械产品检测检验技术”专业的专业核心课,服务于该专业的核心职业岗位。2015年5月《中国制造2025》提出,坚持“创新驱动、质量为先”的基本方针。课程作为职业教育的核心单元,肩负着人才培养的重担。构建该课程的创新创业体系、培养高素质产品检测人才、培养具有国际交流和竞争力的创新型人才,是《中国制造2025》发展战略的重要基础和关键环节。以“计量仪器与检测”课程教学活动为载体,提出了“课程架构项目化、教学模式理实一体化、教学内容应用化、教学手段信息化、课程教学双语化”的“五化”模式下创新创业人才培养与实践。提升专业内涵建设和技术技能人才培养水平、提高学生创新创业能力、明确高素质技能型人才的培养目标,构建高职院校国际视角下创新创业人才培养课程体系。     

Computer education in secondary schools: an electronic survey

Abstract This paper describes a survey of computer use in secondary education carried out through the Times Network for Schools using a form of electronic questionnaire. The survey was a small part of a much larger project, the 'Skills for the Future' project, which is investigating the links between information technology (IT) in education and in employment. Although the nature of the sample inevitably means that the results are biased towards schools whose involvement in IT is above average, the survey does pose some interesting questions — particularly when its findings are compared and contrasted with those of the DES survey of 500 secondary schools at the end of 1985. The results of the survey indicated that Computer Studies is still dominant within the secondary curriculum, although many schools see the use of IT across the curriculum as their main goal. This paper highlights some of the factors preventing the diffusion of IT into the areas of the secondary curriculum it has seldom reached.     

高职网络技术专业毕业生就业满意度调查分析

对高职网络技术专业125名毕业生就业满意度跟踪调查,从就业情况、首次就业成功因素、专业课程内容设置、专业教师教学水平、专业教学管理、专业技能重要性、运用专业技能熟练程度、对职业资格证书的意见等九个方面进行分析,为教学改革提供依据。研究大学生就业能力结构及其对就业结果的影响,对调整课程设置与教学内容,构建以能力为核心的课程体系具有重要意义。     

基于项目驱动的高职IT实训平台开发

实训平台能提升IT从业人员的工作能力和企业的管理水平,用于高职院校的人才培养使毕业生的职业能力得到有效锻炼。该文从教学实践出发,设计了计算机技术IT实训平台建设方案,为职业教育的实训平台开发提供新的思路。     

Provision of Records Created in Networked Environments in the Curricula of Institutions of Higher Learning in Africa

The importance of curriculum development on archives and records management in the digital era, especially on the African continent, cannot be overemphasized. While many universities in the global hub have included studies on all aspects of archives and records management programs with many emphasizing records created in networked environments, the same cannot be said about universities on the African continent. In Africa, education and training of archives and records professionals can be traced back several decades. Archives and records practitioners in Africa’s different countries have, over the years, taken varying paths to attain their professional qualifications. This study outlines progress on an ongoing study by InterPARES Trust Africa Team that examines the curricula in different African educational institutions and investigates the extent to which they address the increasingly complex environment that includes the management of digital records in networked environments. It is hoped that the study will inform curriculum development and review in the area of digital records at the institutions of higher learning in Africa.     

Computer use during primary school teaching practice: a survey

Abstract The National Curriculum for England and Wales specifies a number of programmes of study and attainment targets relevant to Information Technology. New regulations to be introduced for teacher training courses specify compulsory elements related to the effective use of computers in class. This study reports a survey of 109 student teachers who were asked about their experiences of IT on their first teaching practice. It revealed a rather low spontaneous use of computers, a focus on a narrow range of software, which emphasized practice of basic skills. The course which these students are following fails to meet new requirements, and teachers were ill-prepared to face the rigours of the National Curriculum; nevertheless, some positive lessons were learned from the study. While non-users identified a lack of confidence and basic skill as the major reason for not using IT in class, users reported high pupil enjoyment, few problems using IT, and gains in personal confidence as a result of their classroom experiences. It is concluded that future courses should focus initially on the development of personal confidence, and should encourage the early use of IT in teaching practice, if we are to avoid the situation where new entrants to the teaching profession simply add to the pool of teachers in need of training in the use of IT.     

色彩教学中创作意识引导的意义

文章结合毕业创作课程的体会,从毕业创作的"果"反思色彩教学中的"因",将毕业创作课程发现的问题进行"因果"反思,提出为什么要在色彩教学中引导学生的创作意识。通过在色彩教学过程中的思考与实践,探讨如何能更好地引导以增强学生的创作意识。文章认为基础教学与创作脱离,会导致学生缺少在绘画实践和主观情感表达的领悟,教学的最终目的是通过课程训练来开发学生的创造性思维,增进绘画技能的同时也应多关注学生自身表达的欲望。     

Naked into the World: IT experiences on a final primary school teaching practice—a second survey

Abstract This study reports a survey of 103 student teachers who were asked about their experiences of IT on their final teaching practice. Data are related to those from an earlier survey of the same group of students on their first teaching practice. The use of IT was higher than before, but still unacceptably low. A large majority of students will graduate with no classroom experience of databases and other applications software; a significant number will graduate without any classroom experiences using IT whatsoever. The patterns of IT use in class were most disappointing. A predominant use was for pupils to work on tasks unrelated to lesson plans, often practising basic skills.
Those students who had taken a course in computer studies were more confident in their use of IT, made more use of IT in class, and experienced fewer technical problems than students who had not taken this course. However, students who had taken this course were no more likely to use a computer in class than those who had not. Students who do use IT in class reported increased confidence and a desire to make greater use of IT in the future. It is concluded that compulsory courses on the educational uses of IT, and use of IT early in teaching practice will help improve the current unacceptable situation, so long as they address the problem of ensuring appropriate classroom use of IT by students.     

Analysing four types of IT sourcing decisions in the context of scale, client/supplier interdependency and risk mitigation

The main thrust of the article is to distinguish between four types of IT sourcing decision: total outsourcing; multiple-supplier sourcing; joint venture/strategic alliance sourcing; and insourcing. To illustrate each type, detailed case histories are used that analyse the reasons why specific IT sourcing decisions were adopted. Here, we consider total outsourcing at the London Stock Exchange; multiple-supplier sourcing at ICI plc; joint venture project sourcing at CRESTCo Ltd; and insourcing at the Royal Bank of Scotland. The trend towards outsourcing is increasing in all industrial and commercial sectors. However, client organizations need to become more aware of some of the pitfalls, particularly in respect of large-scale outsourcing deals to single or multiple suppliers. This is because the move to IT outsourcing engenders the need to develop new capabilities and skills to manage complex commercial contracts. We therefore conclude that, while many IT outsourcing contracts followed rationalization, cost-cutting and disappointing results from in-house IT provision, short-termism and current uncertainties over market, business and political conditions pose problems for many organizations in deciding future outsourcing arrangements.     

Students’ perceptions of creativity in learning Information Technology (IT) in project groups

This paper explores students’ perceptions of creativity in learning Information Technology (IT) in project groups and the implications of better educating creative IT students for the future. Theoretically, the extension of social psychology research into creativity lays the basis of bringing creativity, learning and IT education into one framework. Empirically, qualitative interviews were carried out with 48 students from three disciplines, including Computer Science (n = 16), Electronic Systems (n = 15) and Medialogy (n = 17) at Aalborg University (AAU) in Denmark, which has a tradition of using problem-based learning (PBL) in student project groups. According to the findings, the students’ perceptions of creativity reflect their domain-related conceptualization and tacit learning experience, with different levels of confidence of being creative persons. As IT plays multiple roles in developing students’ creativity, it can be regarded as a ‘learning partner’. This implies that in the future creativity should be taught more explicitly, helping students to become creative IT talents as a part of their professional identity. It also requires teaching efforts to build a learning environment that stimulates creativity more effectively through more interactions between learners, learning tasks and learning tools.     

Distributed Apprenticeship in Online Communities

Supporting learning in online communities is an important direction for the future of human–computer interaction as people increasingly leverage social technologies to support professional growth and development. However, few have studied how people leverage the socio-technical affordances of online informal workplace communities to develop professional skills in the absence of dedicated expert guidance. We draw from theories of apprenticeship to introduce an emergent theory of distributed apprenticeship, which outlines how community expectations of transparency and mutual support allow for instruction to be directed by a distributed network of nonexperts. We develop distributed apprenticeship through a qualitative study of crowdfunding entrepreneurs, where novices leverage social interactions with community members to develop a wide range of entrepreneurial skills. We then generalize distributed apprenticeship to other workplace contexts and provide design implications for online communities where people develop professional skills with minimal dedicated formal guidance.     

Home, School, Borrowed, Public or Mobile: Variations in Young Singaporeans' Internet Access and Their Implications

This paper studied uneven Internet access amongst young people in Singapore. The study finds that young Singaporeans access the Internet mainly through home, school, borrowed, public, and mobile sources, with different implications for each type of Internet access. For those with home or mobile access, Internet use was routinised and often intense, even burdensome and distracting on occasions. For those who relied on borrowed, school, or public access, intermittent use appeared adequate but hampered their ability to hone online skills to the levels of their peers. The study also finds that although systematic incorporation of IT into the national curriculum can encourage parity in basic exposure to online skills, developing greater Internet proficiency is more likely with home Internet access.     

Role of Universities in IT Education in India

In the wake of the information technology (IT) revolution, the paper describes the changing role of universities to promote IT education in India to generate qualitative and competitive manpower in the face of the mushrooming of private institutions in the field of IT. The rapid growth of private teaching initiatives reflects inadequacies of the public educational system to the needs of the emerging IT environment, especially considering the high prices charged by private training. It is pointed out that the emerging knowledge society and the economy are not going to be based on IT alone, but will depend on the development of both IT and basic research in domain areas. Any policy on IT education should ensure that basic disciplines are not ignored. Universities should develop new and innovative programmes for students from different basic disciplines to give training for high-end jobs. To promote IT education a new innovative concept of earning while learning has recently been introduced. Some of the initiatives started by Delhi University to modify/improve course programmes for IT education are highlighted, looking at the needs of the industry.     

Difficulties in integrating the IT qualification test and training curriculum

There is a serious shortage of information technology (IT) engineers in Japan. Two closely related projects to solve the problem have been running at a goverment level: the Information Technology Engineers Examination (ITEE) and an educational material development activity nicknamed the CAROL project. ITEE is an official assessment test system of IT skills that has been run by the government since 1969. It attracts a large number of applicants and is recognized as an effective measure for hiring by Japanese management. CAROL consist of a curriculum and a set of computer-assisted instruction (CAI) courseware for entry-level IT engineers. The project has been active to achieve the CAROL curriculum, CAROL courseware development, and necessary revisions since 1986. The courseware propagation began in 1988. It initially focused on vocational schools, which had been the most significant suppliers of new IT hiring.With several years of experience in the two parallel projects, we have recognized that they are not achieving the expected objectives. The experience is the god discipline of ITEE and the traditional curriculum of CAROL do not match.The two systems for IT engineer development dearly need an integrated scheme. The inegration will not be easy because ITEE has a long history, with a large number of applications (some 500,000 in 1990). The CAROL project has to accept the requirements of Japanese vocational schools, which are the major portion of the expected customers. Moreover, they are not a part of official education and are not regulated by the government.The 20-year-old ITEE has to develop a new discipline that reflects the innovation of IT technology and the growth of the IT industry.A revision of the CAROL system is necessary so that it reflects the requirements of the real world and the new educational techniques.The objective of this paper is to discuss the problems of integrating the two projects so that they can work together toward the common objective with better efficiency.     

IT人才教育中的人文素质培养

根据目前校园里的一些现象,分析IT专业培养过程中人文教育内容和方法的缺失,提出树立"不教示教"为核心的人文素质教育理念。阐述以走出校园,业余兼职,走进企业,走进社区等多种形式来塑造IT专业学生人文品质的方法。这种方法在实践中取得良好成效。     

Implications of an experimental information technology curriculum for elementary students

The information technology (IT) of today forms an integral part of everyday living, thus the nurture of children’s IT awareness early in life is crucial. Young children have an innate curiosity for IT which suggests that in the school environment it can easily be integrated with other subjects in thematic and interdisciplinary curriculum. This quasi-experimental study used the Technology Foundation Standards for Students of the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE) project on National Educational Technology Standards (NETS) as the basis to design a thematic and interdisciplinary IT curriculum for elementary students. A total of 1273 elementary students and 12 computer teachers were separated into either a control or experimental group. After one academic year, students’ final scores in English, mathematics, science, social studies, and art were gathered and compared. Statistical analysis indicated that there were significant differences in the experimental group’s academic scores. Findings also suggested that an interdisciplinary curriculum design opened opportunity for collaborative work and cohesiveness among faculty. Further longitudinal studies are recommended to examine the long-term implications of a thematic and interdisciplinary IT curriculum design.