How Technology Revolutionized The Education Industry

The world is witnessing the birth of a technologically rich era where researchers and creators have innovated several interesting technologies that have tremendously made life easier for a person.

Like other industries, the education industry is also widely impacted by technology. Many technology innovations have changed the way education is delivered, making it easy for students to understand complex questions and solve various problems easily.

This blog will introduce and brief you about the changes that happened in the education industry due to technology and also tell you how it helped in creating a great future.

Table of Contents

History of Technological Developments in Education

The traces of education can be found in every civilization and can date back to the Stone Age. At that time, people used to teach each other how to make a weapon or ignite fire in a woods. Since then, education has developed in astonishing ways.

In the colonial years, people used horn-books to learn and educate youngsters. These were wooden paddles that had printed lessons on them. Early people used these items to help students learn verses.

After 200 years of modernization, in the 1870s, the magic lantern was invented that worked similar to modern-day projectors. By the end of World War I in 1918, more than 8000 such lamps were circulating in Chicago. This lantern looked similar to a video camera and projected images from transparent plates.

By the end of 1890, Chalkboards were introduced, making it easy for teachers to explain concepts to students easily. By the 1930s, overhead projectors came into the market, which projected digital images on a screen.

Moreover, with storage devices such as memory cards, people can store more images and use them in projectors to display images and files to explain a particular concept to people.

The Modern Era of Education

The development in technology was moving at a good pace, but with the introduction of the Covid virus in 2020, over 1.6 billion students were affected in 180+ countries. This makes 88% of children worldwide drop out or witness a pause in their studies.

Many institutions had the same rigid teaching method that they have been following since past which can make adapting to new situation difficult. And when the virus impacted the whole world in 2020, it forced schools and other educational institutions to change the way they teach.

Soon after some time, many institutions started conducting online classes using technology, such as Google Meet and Zoom. As a result, more people joined these classes and continued learning in a new way.

According to a report, the number of college students in 1930 was 1 million, which rose to 21.6 million in 2012. Seeing this massive jump in the students’ enroling in colleges, it is safe to assume that technological development plays a vital part in it.

How Does Technology Improves the Learning Experience?

Ease of information

A major and most noticeable benefit of using technology is the ease of information. With numerous development and improvement in the field of technology, information has become a commodity.
You can access information from any corner of the world with ease. Many websites and applications provide a wonderful source of information where people can search and read about any particular topic and gain more insights on them.

Increased collaboration and communication

With the introduction of technology, distance means nothing. For example, if you have a team spread across the world, but want to collaborate and work on a single project, you can get on a video call or organize a group meeting with them.
As the internet and laptops are available in every corner of the world, communicating with your team is no longer a problem.
If you had to send text in older times or relay any information, you had to wait days or even months for your information to reach them. But now, you can send a text to someone located in the other corner of the world in a matter of seconds.

Personalized learning

As the world is becoming more advanced, people need to change the way they deliver education. However, one thing that everyone can agree on is that no one has the same way of learning.
So, to create a diverse and personalized learning environment, foundations such as Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation, and EDUCAUSE have contributed to the development of the education system using modern technology that personalizes the whole education experience for an individual.
This helps students to learn more easily and gain a personalized learning experience. These technology features, individuals personal profile that contains information, such as strengths, weakness, interest, hobbies, and more.

Curiosity driving content

Technology such as AR and VR are the game-changers. These technology either brings the virtual world to the real world or takes a person to the virtual world. And when talking about the virtual world, the sky is the limit! These technologies can create and show anything that a person can imagine, from dinosaurs to extraterrestrial lives.
Although AR and VR have a great future, the devices still have a far way to go before they can be used in education. However, many companies have had success in some matters so you can expect some great game-changing news in the near future.
Other than AR and VR, smart classrooms are also one of the popular current stage technology that many institutions use that features a big screen where you can interact and show live visual demos to students and make the whole learning experience more enjoyable.

Competent teaching

When learning with such brilliant technology feels amazing, imagine how teaching would feel! Technology provides content creators and teachers to explore new ways of teaching students.
This increases competency in teachers and helps them leverage the power of technology to create enjoyable and more interactive content.

Technology provides a great opportunity for people to learn and is extremely helpful in remotely teaching students, which otherwise could lead to an increase in learning poverty, especially in low-income economies.

Using modern techs and software doesn’t stop with teaching and learning. It can also inspire the younger generation to learn and innovate new techs to make education and learning an enjoyable experience for people of all age groups.