CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the Study

Munesh (2014) opines that education has over the years been a vehicle by which change takes place both socially and economically. Fifty years down the line, higher education systems have increasingly emerged to meet the demands of quality education for all. Information and Communication Technology (ICT) has played a key role in this growth of higher education worldwide. Arledge (n.d) insists that if society paves way for technology to penetrate into education, then the educational world can move with a kind of speed that has never occurred before this age and time. This means that the use of ICT is fast becoming an everlasting phenomenon.  The pace at which technology is transforming lives globally demands that there is a clarion call for nations trailing behind the change to close the gap.

Tomei (2005) stated that educational institutions, acknowledging the impact technology is making on society, are putting a lot of mechanisms in place to ensure that curricula and classroom facilities are set in a manner in order to bridge the existing technology gap in teaching and learning. He reiterated that, this restructuring process demands effectual endorsement of technologies into existing situation in order to offer learners with understanding of precise subject areas, to support significant learning and to augment proficient productivity.

Research has it that the amalgamation of technology conveys radical changes in teaching methodology.

Scrimshaw (2004) asserts that the change can only be felt when ICT use is skewed towards students-centered form of teaching and learning and not necessarily just in its introduction in the school. Integration of ICT provides the tool needed by the information knowledge society. Thus, teachers are tasked more importantly to integrate ICT to equip learners in this digital age. (Alberta & Learning, 2000; Kearns & Grant, 2002; Loveless & Dore, 2002).

Steketee, (2006) maintains that, integrating ICT into regular classroom instruction supports teacher trainers to present a realistic clarification to the trainees the inventive means of teaching and learning. Thus, the application of technology in Colleges of Education in Ghana will not merely augment classroom practices but also empower trained teachers to use these technologies in their own classrooms to enrich their lessons and also empower the young ones they impart knowledge into. Although some countries such as United States, Australia, Japan, Malaysia and Philippines have made great strides in   ICT integration in education, others are still striving to do same. Bitter and Pierson (2005) indicated that various countries have even fashioned proficiency principles for technological use. Nonetheless, integrating ICT in education is a multifaceted procedure of educational change and the degrees of integration in many countries is tremendously diverse and in most cases very restricted (Kirschner & Selinger, 2003, Loveless & Dore, 2002, Scrimshaw, 2004). Different factors account for this limitation.

1.2 Statement of The Problem

Khirwadkar (2007) opines that learners are influenced greatly to make do with technology when their teachers comfortably employ different forms of technology in their instruction. Consequently, teacher trainers in the Colleges of Education need to be exposed to various techniques of utilizing ICT in lesson planning and delivery during their training in order to enable them implement and transfer the concept to the trainees to enhance their learning.

Due to the rapid growth and development of ICT, there is an increasing change in the way things are done in this era (21st century). Information and Communication Technology ICT is becoming very crucial in our daily lives and in our educational structure. Therefore, as suggested by Buabeng-Andoh (2012), the urge to use ICT by educational institutions to teach the skills and knowledge students need for the 21st century is ever increasing. This study had therefore become necessary because the Colleges of Education in our country, Ghana which train our basic level teachers lack the necessary interventions that make ICT use effective in teaching and learning. A visit to Accra College of Education, St Theresa’s and Mount Mary Colleges of Education indicated that most tutors still use the marker and whiteboard for teaching and learning. Mount Mary College of Education used to be a training college solely for the training of French Teachers for basic schools. Until the year 2000, the school used a language laboratory, televisions and radios to complement the teaching and learning of French. Currently, the college is not using these facilities on regular basis. The reason being that the college now studies other courses apart from French and for that matter, these facilities are no longer use. However, the college has a computer laboratory furnished with computers. This means that instruction can be enriched with the use of the computers. But as to whether the educators use these ICT tools to teach and access information relevant to the training of teachers in all areas of the curriculum is a question yet to be answered. This study hence seeks to discover the factors that influence the integration of ICT in instructional delivery in Mount Mary College of Education.

It is only during ICT lessons that the trainees have a feel of the use of computers in a computer laboratory. This study wishes to bring out what the real issues are on the ground that hinders the effective use of ICT and what can be done to improve the situation there.   The Government ICT connectivity project covered 38 Colleges of Education (formerly Teacher Training Institutions) in addition to other educational institutions including Senior High Schools with computing infrastructure. The schools were provided with computers, printers, scanners, projectors and servers under a programme labelled: “ICT school connectivity project”. (“Ghana launches National ICT College of Education connectivity”-2010) However, one may want to find out if the provision made by government was adequate and as to whether these ICT tools are being used to achieve the purpose for which they were provided especially in instructional delivery.

1.3 Objectives 

The main objective was to explore issues that sway the amalgamation of ICT in instructional delivery in Colleges of Education.

The specific objectives were:

1. To examine factors that influence the integration of ICT into subjects being taught by trainers at Mount Mary College of Education.
2. To evaluate the role of administrators in influencing trainers’ use of ICT in instructional delivery at Mount Mary College of Education.
3. To propose/proffer an alternative framework by which trainers could effectively use ICTs in instructional delivery at Mount Mary College of Education.