Why Educational Technology Is Paramount

Educational technology is in the classroom and the home. It has become a staple of our children's educational experience, and it will continue to be so for the foreseeable future. It has been proven that when teachers use appropriate tools, they can enhance their teaching by giving students access to information outside of what would traditionally be taught in school.
Nowadays, people are more knowledgeable about what technology is. Technology can be anything with internet capability. It can be laptops, phones, flash drives, iPads, etc. 


The impact of technology on education
The world is changing. Technology has become an integral part of our everyday lives. Among the many benefits, it also offers new opportunities for learning and collaboration in the classroom setting while providing a personalized experience to students that allows them to be more engaged in their education.
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To our students of today, it might seem hard to imagine a time when children did not have smartphones. But the rise of modern technology in education has been so rapid, especially over the last ten years, that nowadays norm can seem revolutionary. Educational technology is reinventing how learning is done, who learns and what they can learn.

What is Education 4.0?
Education 4.0 is an education reform policy directed at digital continual learning. It requires equipping educational institutions with the technology and resources to support the current pace of global development, as well as providing tools for online, asynchronous learning.

According to a report by the World Economic Forum, Many of today’s children will work in new job types that do not yet exist, with an increased premium on both digital and social-emotional skills in the coming years. The gap between education and jobs is further widened by limited innovation in learning systems, which were largely designed to mirror factory-style growth models. The Fourth Industrial Revolution has made it imperative that education systems adapt. At the same time, school closures caused by the COVID-19 crisis have further exposed the existing inadequacies of education systems around the world.

Without action, the next generation will be unprepared for the needs of the future, creating risks for both productivity and social cohesion. There is an opportunity for public and private sector leaders to reset primary and secondary education systems and co-design content and delivery that deliver on children’s needs for the future. The Education 4.0 initiative aims to better prepare the next generation of talent through primary and secondary education transformation. And key to this is to follow Edtech trends.

‍Major trends of Education 4.0

‍1) A more personalized learning:
Education 4.0 will also enable personalized learning for students depending on their capabilities. This means that above-average students will be challenged with tasks that are difficult as compared to students who are below average. This implies that there will be individual learning processes for each student. It will surely have a positive impact as it will enable students to learn at their pace. This will result in a better understanding of the concepts and an overall better result. It will also help teachers to identify the strengths and weaknesses of each student individually and guide them accordingly.

2) Accelerate remote learning opportunities
The cornerstone of Education 4.0 is making learning available anywhere, anytime with the set of eLearning tools that promote remote and self-paced learning. The Active Blended Learning (ABL) concept is picking up, where students get to be actively involved in learning beyond classrooms. This way, they end up mastering both practical and experiential learning.

3)    Choice of education tools
A part of Education 4.0 will be the technology/devices used by students to gain an education. While every subject has its own set of knowledge and information that the students can grasp, the road to attaining this knowledge can vary. This means that the students will be able to choose the tools and techniques through which they want to acquire this knowledge. Techniques like blended learning, BYOD (Bring Your Device), and flipped classrooms are a few examples of this.

4)    Data Analysis
There are greater insights into the students learning journey with data analytics and reporting in Education 4.0. The statistical analysis allows teaching staff to learn where students exactly stand and guide them appropriately.

5)    Project-based learning
The project-driven approach that Education 4.0 supports helps students learn in a fun and interesting way! It shuns theoretical knowledge and prompts students to learn time management skills, organizational skills, collaborative skills, time management skills, much needed for their employment for the road ahead.

6)    Field-specific experience
As technology integration in specific domains facilitates more efficiency; the education curriculum will now accommodate more skills that require human knowledge and personal interaction. This will result in more emphasis on imparting field-specific knowledge to the students within the existing courses. This means that schools will now provide more opportunities for students to obtain real-world skills that are relevant to the prospecting job opportunities. Thus, the school curriculum will now include enhanced subject knowledge that can help students with their future internships, projects, etc. 

7)    Easy and Accurate Exam pattern
A more practical way of assessment comes into place with Education 4.0. There are both online and offline assessments and students get assessed on projects, assignments, and fieldwork.

If you haven't considered educational technology yet, I challenge you to seek out ways that it may benefit your child(ren) or students.