APPLICATION OF MODERN TECHNOLOGY INTO THE CLASSROOM TEACHING-LEARNING PROCESS BY THE IN-SERVICE GRADUATE TEACHERS IN SRI LANKA

Abstract

Sri Lankan school system heavily depends on the government school system with the free education from primary school to university level (only for undergraduate level). By the end of the year 2016, the total number of government teachers in Sri Lanka was 232,555 and they were divided into several categories as graduate teachers (99,724), trained teachers (127,857), untrained teachers (2,426), trainee teachers (1887) and other teachers (661). The Ministry of Education is trying to promote modern technology in Sri Lankan education system in many ways. The objectives of the study were to check the gender wise in-service graduate teachers’ qualifications with regard to modern technology, find out gender wise graduate teachers’ resources related to modern technology, investigate the practical use of modern technology for classroom teaching- learning process and look into the possible challenges which may rise when in-service graduate teachers implement modern technology into classroom teaching. Data was collected by a questionnaire (whole sample 558 graduate teachers) and a semi structure interview schedule (10% of the total sample 56). Data was analyzed by using both methods qualitative (descriptive) and quantitative (percentages). Majority of the graduate teachers had followed at least one computer training programme. Majority of the teachers expressed their willingness to follow a computer course. Majority of the teachers possessed a mobile phone which could access the Internet. In addition to this many of them had own laptop or desktop. Majority of the graduate teachers used the Internet from home. Many teachers had used radio/ cassette recorders as modern technical devices. Many teachers said that they have electricity (87%) and computers (52%) in their schools. Even though, majority of the teachers said that, they were not given the phone (61%) or the Internet facilities (67%) from school. Following recommendations were made for the study; in-service graduate teachers should be given more opportunities and facilities for computer training, graduate teachers should be encouraged to use available modern technical devices for the classroom and they should be given necessary training to use them appropriately, teachers should be given more opportunities to use the Internet in schools.

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