We are living in a world where everything is in rapid phase, a world where everything seems to be as instant as instant coffee, where the only precious things are love and happiness.
In order to achieve our own happiness, people developed different tools that will help them attain their dreams and aspirations in life. People created various apparatuses that would provide them faster way to keep in touched with their loved ones and easier mode of living which, at present, we referred to as technology.
Technology has been defined as the manner of accomplishing a task especially using technical processes, methods, or knowledge (Merriam-Webster, 1997). On the other hand, The Concise English Dictionary insists that it is also the application of knowledge to the practical aims of human life or to changing and manipulating the human environment.
With this fast approaching globalization, technology became one of the partners of humanity in improving our lives especially in minimizing human labor due to machines and tools as products of technology.
Technology offered a lot of potentials for man to live in the fullest, but in the process, it has produced negative effects on the sustainability of our environment. Its improper utilization resulted to excessive waste materials that threaten the existence different life forms on earth, including humanity.
There are different hazards technology poses not just on our environment but also in human behavior. Rifkin (2000), insisted that technology, especially in using computers, can also be harmful to our behavior as we tend to become immoral because of its sexual and violent contents.
In education, it is utilized to provide meaningful learning experiences to pupils. While learning takes place, the real meaning of technology was realized and served its real purpose which is to serve not harm the people.
Today's technology offered adolescents a bridge from concrete to abstract thinking, enabling them to observe and create multiple representations of mathematical ideas: numerically, graphically, and symbolically (Jarrett, 1998).
Technology provided another way for teachers to respond to students' diversity in terms of intelligence and learning styles through the use of various materials that would satisfy the students’ need by engaging them in tactile, visual, and auditory activities through the use of multimedia materials.
With the use of multimedia materials, new ideas and knowledge are produced in multi-level learning personally experienced by the child in the four corners of classroom as part of the products of technology.
Technology is considered as one of the best buddy of teachers in honing the child holistically. It is nice to see how pupils learn and develop in the three domains of learning but attaining this goal can’t be easily achieved.
There are many factors that affect technology implementation, especially in urban schools (Means, Penuel, & Padilla, 2001) which includes (1) lack of technology infrastructure, (2) lack of technical support, (3) teacher discomfort with technology, etc.
It is indeed true that technology has been very useful to us. It helped our ancestors built civilization and developed various things that will help us live comfortably, but, it could also be the very reason for people to perish at any moment when we abuse this product of our creative minds.
Bibliography
Rifkin, J. (2000). The age of access: How the shift from ownership to access is transforming capitalism. East Rutherford: Penguin Group USA.
Jarrett, D. (1998). Integrating technology into middle school mathematics: It's just good teaching. Portland, OR: Northwest Regional Educational Laboratory.
Means, B., Penuel, W.R., & Padilla, C. (2001). The conected school: Technology and learning in high school. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.
Merriam-Webster. (1997). The Merriam-Webster Dictionary. Merriam-Webster, Incorporated.
