Tahmina Mammadli

Critical Review
01/02/2021
Technology in Today’s Classroom: Are You a Tech-Savvy Teacher?

There is no doubt that technological developments have had a huge impact on daily lives of
people. One of the fields that has been immensely affected as a result of a technological boost in
the United States is education. Whether these effects are positive or negative is a topic of
constant debates among the representatives of educational community. In the article
“Technology in Today’s Classroom: Are You a Tech-Savvy Teacher?” Hicks (2011) claims that
technology has a beneficial influence on the educational system and addresses some of the issues
faced by teachers and students. The author also gives suggestions about technology for the
classroom participants. Hicks presents reasonable examples and effectively supports all the
points that are emphasized in the article.

The author argues that while students nowadays are extremely tech savvy, teachers, who did not
have access to technology when they were students, may often face some challenges. Being tech
savvy is now required from teachers, because they have to meet the needs of their students. The
standards of education have changed, and technology is now a necessity in the classroom.
According to Hicks teachers are generally resistant to technology for the following reasons: they
are afraid of “looking stupid” in front of their students; they are not trained in technological field;
they believe technology is not necessary. The author then focuses on the benefits of technology
in and out of the classroom. She claims that although children seem to be distracted by
technological devices, they actually receive as much information as the ones who seem totally
engaged. An experiment conducted among the 5-year-olds proves the given statement. Another
reason that technology is essential in the classroom is that children now are more likely to learn
by watching, rather than by listening to the lecture or reading from books. Learning by using
technology provides students with a more interesting and unique learning experience. Also,
technology is an efficient way to help students with disabilities or special needs expand their
academic ability. Hicks emphasizes that technology benefits teachers as well. It serves as an
opportunity to reduce time spent on unnecessary things, such as grading tests manually. Hicks
adds that technology should be used properly in the classroom: not out of necessity, but for a
specific purpose. The author concludes that the use of technology in educational system will rise
significantly in the next 20 years and teachers’ perspective on integrating technology into the
classroom will change. Additionally, suggestions, such as “Ask a student for help”, “Be patient”
and “learn as much as you can” are given to the teachers for using technology in their teaching
system.

In the article, Hicks lists several reasons why she believes that the integration of technology into
the educational system is crucial and beneficial. The reasons that the author presents are relevant,
and the given examples successfully support the ideas. One of the reasons that Hicks introduces
is that children nowadays are immensely impacted by technology in their everyday lives, and, as
a result, they are better at visual learning rather than at traditional ways of learning. It is hard to
disagree that the majority of children, now, are digital natives, and technology grabs their
attention quicker than books or lecture notes. The raw of rigorous experiments conducted among
the students have proven that there is a huge improvement in the pace of gathering information
when technological devices take place in the learning process (Mohammed, 2019). Moreover,
technology makes children get engaged in studying the particular subject. According to the
recent survey conducted among the students, the use of technology in the classroom makes
learning fun and children believe that it positively impacts their learning (Mourlam, DeCino,
Newland, Strouse, 2020). Hicks also points out that technology use may be beneficial in the
process of teaching students with disabilities or special needs. The students with special needs
are often required to be under constant teacher control; however, integrating technology into
their learning increases their feeling of independence, and lowers the anxiety level while
studying (Dikusar, 2018).

In conclusion, the article argues that technology has a beneficial influence on the students’
learning process and gives valid explanations for all the discussed points.

References

Hicks, S.D. (2011). Technology in Today’s Classroom: Are You a Tech-Savvy Teacher?

Saro, M. (2019). Is Technology Good or Bad for Learning?

Mourlam, D. J., DeCino, D. A., Newland, L. A., & Strouse, G. A. (2020). “It's fun!” using
students' voices to understand the impact of school digital technology integration on
their well-being. Computers & Education, 159, 104003.

Dikusar, A. (2018). The Use of technology in Special Education.