-By Harshil Gala
The Covid-19 pandemic has disrupted the world around us like never before. Like many other aspects of life, the education sector too has witnessed a massive disruption. The pandemic has given birth and accelerated the pace of new trends’ adoption in the education sector. The segment has witnessed penetration of technology like never before. Be it online hybrid schools, video lessons, 2D and 3D methods in teaching – the conventional teaching methods have seen a massive disruption. While technology has taken the front seat in the Covid-era education system, it doesn’t mean teachers’ significance has been lost.
Author George Couros, in his book, “The Innovator’s Mindset”, famously said, “Technology will never replace great Teachers, but in the hands of great teachers, it’s transformational.” Technology can augment the process of learning, but it cannot replace teachers. A good teacher can leverage the advantage of technology during his or her teaching to ensure and implement creativity, critical thinking, time management and collaboration among students. In short, the teacher can leverage technology to develop skills among the students that are essential for the future.
In the pandemic-era we have seen multiple examples of how modern technology is bridging the gap between teachers and students to ensure a seamless learning process. In this process, teachers are being empowered to enhance their productivity and creativity, while the students who lag in conventional teaching methods are receiving enhanced focus. This is enhancing the holistic development of students.
Information and Communication Technology (ICT) that enables educators or teachers to improve their productivity and creativity has immense potential to bring a change in Indian classrooms. Online teaching apps such asTopClass, Teachmint or ClassPlus drawing investor interest testify the notion. Our offering TopSchool gives administrators, teachers, and students access to timetables and content curriculum 24x/7.
According to a research by The Business Research Company, increasing levels of internet penetration are driving Artificial Intelligence (AI), Augmented Reality (AR) and Virtual Reality (VR) applications in education, leading to 40% growth. The global VR in education market size is expected to increase from $6.37 billion in 2021 to $8.66 billion in 2022 at a CAGR of 36%. The market is expected to grow to $32.94 billion in 2026 at a CAGR of 39.7%. This shows how ICT penetration in education is growing. But despite such a high growth projection, it can never come close to the knowledge and life experience of a teacher.
It has been proven time and again that teachers bring about a change that no technology can replace. A teacher not just imparts knowledge or information with facts and figures, but leads, guides, facilitates and mentors a student with humane touch. The ICT in education system should not drive the teachers but the teachers should be able to drive the ICT for a holistic development of the students.
In an era when digital transformation with the advent of big data, digital literacy and data literacy are becoming increasingly essential for the stakeholders of the education system, the technology should be developed to allow the teachers to be more productive in order to help the students to become future ready through new innovative learning methods.
Education in the future will require demonstrating how technology can be used to students’ advantage as well as teach future generations how to handle problems that arise from it. It can certainly bring a much-needed change in the traditional education system and address the flaws to make it better.
To conclude it can be said that technology can never replace a great teacher. But a good teacher can always use technology to become better at teaching.
The author is CEO, eSense Learning.