NJALA UNIVERSITY

DEPARTMENT OF PHYSICS AND COMPUTER SCIENCE

MSc TELECOMMUNICATION SYSTEM

RESEARCH METHOD

THIRD SEMESTER TERM PAPER

PREPARED FOR:

DR. HAMZA

PREPARED BY:

ARTICLE REVIEW:

THE USE OF THE INTERNET IN HIGHER EDUCATION

EMERALD JOURNAL ISSUE: PAGE NUMBER: 168-180, PUBLISH: 2005

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Abstract

Computer and the internet are a great resource for classroom teachers. Teachers can find
suggestions, lesson plans, practical support, information and materials through the internet.
There is so much that students can do with the Internet. Not only can they communicate with
international students, they can gain from others' knowledge and experiences, participate in
chat rooms, share ideas and solutions and learn about the many diverse cultures out there.
Teachers can adjust to the different learning styles and in the classroom. They can also set
their own pace of teaching. Individual teaching techniques can become more available, which
has been proven to be a factor in student achievement.

Overview
This article was about a study to explore academics experiences of using ICTs for teaching
and learning in order to provide a clearer vision of where it is appropriate to use new
technologies in higher education and to develop strategies to support existing initiatives and
ensure the successful development and implementation of future technological. In this article,
the author describes that there are a range of individual, practical and cultural factors that
shape academics use of new technologies for teaching and learning. Two factors that are
likely to influence academics use of ICTs in teaching and learning are the institutional and
disciplinary contexts. Thus, this study was set out to investigate the potential similarities and
differences of academics use of new technologies for teaching and learning both within and
across three disciplines namely English, Law and Nursing.

A description of the methodology

In this article, the author came up with four research questions that focused to be discussing
in this article. The questions are: How ICTs are being used in teaching and learning? What
are the motivations of academics to adopt ICTs in teaching and learning? What are the
difficulties they have encountered when using these technologies for their students? What are
the factors that may influence the further adoption of new technologies in higher education?
To conduct research in this study, three discipline focus groups were held with academics
from English, Law and Nursing that used ICTs to teach their students.

From the article, it was established that five participants from each group were traditional
academic who carried out typical teaching, research and administrative responsibilities. The
remaining two members had slightly different roles and responsibilities within their own
institutions.

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After conducted discussions by the researcher, analysis and results were made to answer the
questions that have been raised before. For the first question, the author found that the most
common ways participants used ICTs for teaching and learning was to provide students with
access to a range of online resources, often including online discussion boards with some
participants using more advanced multimedia to provide webcast of lecturers, simulations and
problem based learning exercises. For the second research question, the author found that in
all the focus group, the participants’ main motivation for using ICTs was to enhance the
educational experience for their student in some ways. It was clear from the discussions that
for all subjects the decision to utilize ICTs was based on educational and not technological.
The author also found that the difficulties encountered by the academic when using ICTs for
teaching and learning. For the overall, the discussions in each of the three groups were
overwhelmingly positive and lack of the time was an issue for the majority of the participants
in each group. In this article, the author found that the factors influencing the adoption of
ICTs for teaching and learning and this will answer the fourth question. The factor was split
into for areas that are the institutional level, the school or department level, the staff level and
the other factors.

Evaluation
The author has adequately established the significance of the research questions. Based on
studies that have been conducted, the authors have discussed and make some analysis and
also explanation of the study. From this article, the author already state that the most common
use of ICTs in all subjects was to provide students with access to a range of online resource
and this is the discussions that have been made and one of the significance of the research
questions. The methods of the data collection and analysis appropriate to the research
questions. This is because the approach that was used in this study was qualitative. To get the
data collection, a group discussion was conducted and recorded into a tape and notes. After
that, the tape was transcribed and the resulting transcripts were analyzed in accordance with
the principles from the qualitative method. The study did not find any significant
methodological weakness in the study to find the answer. In my opinion, this study has been
done in a small scale and this is exploratory study.

From my own perspective, further research is required that will be sampled in such a way as
to ensure that the findings can be generalized to all academics in all institutions in Africa.

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Discussion of implications

According to the author, an interesting finding arising from the analysis is the high level of
agreement within each of the three groups. Due to the very different institutional and
department contexts within which the individuals work, their different roles and the different
aspects of the discipline they teach, it was anticipated that there would be a great deal of
different amongst academics even among those who are using ICTs to teach the same
discipline which is not obviously apparent in the analysis.

According to Barron & Orwig, 1995, the internet is a large source of reference materials and
data required for all types of educational activities in studying and learning directly in
management of educational systems and in scientific and methodical work.

Conclusion
In my opinion, one of the reasons the internet is so important in education is because of the
wealth of information that the internet contains. The internet has become very useful in the
field of education and every news information is available online so teachers and students can
update themself any time according to their own needs and time table. The biggest source for
online information for education is the encyclopaedia and it is available online and any one
can use it to get desired information. One of the most important advantages of the internet in
the area of information is the increased accessibility of reference materials and data for all
categories of users. With the use of the internet is widely used in education, there is a
possibility to decrease the gap in the quality of information provided for education between
developed and developing countries.

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References

1. The Use of the Internet in the Higher Education Name of the journal: Emerald Issue:
2 Volume: 57 Page number: 168-180 Year Publish: 2005 1.
2. Barron &Orwig, G. Multimedia Technologies for Training, 1995