Barriers to the effective use of technology in education

Naturally, there will always be barriers to the effective use of technology in education. The main barrier could be age. Technology has not always been involved within education, and older teachers may be at a disadvantage because they will not be used to using technology within their teaching. Age has been discovered to have an important effect on a person's acceptance of technology in education (Tarhini, Hone and Liu, 2014), identifying age as a potential barrier. For younger learners, technology has been a natural part of their lives, but for mature learners, it may be a barrier to their learning. For example, I have no issues with using virtual learning environments, but an older student may struggle, placing them at a disadvantage with regards to writing and submitting assignments. Despite this, Wang, Wu and Wang (2009) argue that age did not have an effect on intentions of using e-learning systems, however older participants' motivation and self-efficacy was lower, suggesting that the main barrier to technology for older learners is confidence. To overcome this, it could be proposed that extra-curricular courses in ICT for mature learners may be beneficial in education, in order to overcome the barrier of age.

            Gender has also been identified as a potential barrier to the use of technology in education. A recent study found that female teachers found the use of technology to be more challenging than male teachers (Teo, Fan and Du, 2015), although there were no gender differences in their positive attitudes towards using technology in education. It could be implied that women may require additional support in ICT, although this type of intervention may be difficult to create.

            A further possible barrier may be socio-economic status. For example, some learners may not be able to afford a home computer or other devices such as iPads and smartphones. This would immediately place them at a disadvantage throughout education, which could lead to them not performing as well as students who own the appropriate devices to complete assignments at home or on the go. A divide has been found between students of a high and low socio-economic status with regards to digital literacy, suggesting that a barrier to technology in education could be related to socio-economic status (Ritzhaupt et al, 2013). However, this study was conducted in Florida, therefore its results cannot be generalised to the UK education system. A way of overcoming this potential barrier could be to ensure that there are enough digital devices in educational institutions to enable students without computers at home to have access to online learning.

            Other potential barriers could include peer groups, resistance to change, a lack of motivation, and many other individual barriers. Overall, barriers to the effective use of technology in education are many, but as it continues to develop, the barriers could become less prominent.

 

References

Tarhini, A., Hone, K., and Liu, X. (2014). Measuring the moderating effect of gender and age on e-learning acceptance in England: A structural equation modelling approach for an extended technology acceptance model. Journal of educational computing research, 51(2), p.163-184.

 

Teo, T., Xitao, F., and Jianxia, D. (2015). Technology acceptance among pre-service teachers: Does gender matter? Australasian journal of educational technology, 31(3), p.235-251.

 

Ritzhaupt, A.D., et al. (2013). Differences in student information and communication technology literacy based on socio-economic status, ethnicity, and gender: Evidence of a digital divide in Florida schools. Journal of research on technology in education, 45(4), p.291-307.

 

Wang, Y. S., Wu, M. C., and Wang, H. Y. (2009). Investigating the determinants and age

and gender differences in the acceptance of mobile learning. British Journal of

Educational Technology, 40(1), p.92-118.