On The Development Value Of Educational Technology

Looking back into the history of the world, countless miracles and dreams are realized by technology. Therefore, it's inevitable for us to perceive information technology as an evolutionary factor leading to the fulfillment of our educational orientations and expectations. With the wide application of the information techniques in the educational practice, it has caused waves of profound innovations in educational concepts and its daily practices. However, it's unlucky that the revolution of technical support education hankered after by technology idealists, hasn't turned up yet. The technology idealists believe in the huge and doubtless value of technology application in education, so they are certain that technology is the dominant force of educational revolution. On the other side, the technology pessimists suspect value of technology in education, for they can prove the value of educational technology is extremely limited or sometimes even negative. Is it worthwhile to adopt the educational technology? Against the backdrop of technology especially information technology make available in the field of education widely , educational informatization has become irreversible trend, with which we can do nothing but to admit as it is, we must think it over that what is the value of educational technology on earth?If trying to seek the answer to the question, firstly we must probe the history and reality of the development in educational technology, most of all, the problems in theory and practice of educational technology should be pointed out. After detailedly analyzing the past and present, I think the central cause of misunderstanding the value of educational technology lies in the erroneous understanding towards the essence of educational technology and mishandling the relationship between technology and education, technology and human beings. Therefore, it requires us to cognize the essence of educational technology from both standpoints of the essence of technology and relationship between technology and education; it also requires us to analyze the value of educational technology from the standpoint of advancing mankind development, at the same time, it is of great significance to investigate how educational technology can enhance the development of teachers' and students' perception of its own values.This thesis investigates educational technology from the perspective of the philosophy of technology. It analyzes the essence and value of educational technology by mainly using the related cognitive theories in the technological essence and value for reference. Through analyzing the meaning and essence of technology, the author considers that: from the connotation, educational technology is a sum of embodied technology and intelligent technology to meet the requirements of teaching and learning; from the essence, educational technology is an embodiment of essential strength, a mode for modern education to display and uncover truth, a medium and concrete form for technical rationality to expand in the field of education. Though analyzing the technologic values, the author raises that the true sense of the value in educational technology is to promote mankind development, so its essence of value is the value of development. Educational technology must be applied from the standpoint of promoting human development, which is the origin of the value in educational technology and judgment basis to see whether its value realizes or not in the end. In all the design, development, application, extension, etc of educational technology, the first place should be taken by human development, which is also the only measure value to evaluate every product, tool and activity. This thesis also elucidates the value duality in educational technology towards teachers and students, and expounds the strategy of educational technology development value realization, through analyzing the relationship between educational technology and teachers and students.This thesis analyzes and criticize the concepts of technological determinism, instrumentalism of technology, instrumental rationality, etc ,which exist widely in the field of educational technology, the author also believes that educational technology is immensely valued, we should pay more attention to the construction of the value in educational technology at the same time criticizing it. The technological rational essence of educational technology should be treated dialectically, because technological rationality is the unification of instrumental and value rationality. Educational technology should be designed and made use of at the precondition of carrying forward the value rationality. It needs to be prevented the extrusion of value rationality caused by overexpansion of instrumental rationality and the utter denial of technological rationality caused by over-exaggerated negative aspects in educational technology.The thesis is composed of seven parts: The exordium mainly poses the problems and analyzes the existing circumstances, research thinking and methods are introduced in it, too; in chapter one, the author reveals the process of the evolution in educational technology and the changes in technical awareness, proposes the important meaning of the essence of educational technology and the research in value problem, puts forward that the research of educational technology value must point to mankind and mankind development, by analyzing the past and present of educational technology; chapter two is based upon the understanding of technological essence, it analyzes dialectically the interaction relationship between technology and education, and thoroughly discusses the connotation and essence of educational technology, elucidates the essence of educational technology from the perspective of philosophy of technology; chapter tree is based upon axiology of technology, it carries on the discussion to the problems of laden value and value duality in educational technology, it also has critical reflection on the technical rationality of instruction technology to designate that the value measure of educational technology is human development in education, the concern of educational technology is growth and development, the design and application of educational technology is for the purpose of human development; chapter four has a critical analysis on the relationship between technology and teachers, it expounds the interaction between teachers and educational technology, the acts on the development of teachers, what technologies should be mastered by teachers and how to use them well; chapter five analyzes the negative effects towards students from educational technology, it discussed the roles of educational technology from the factors of students' life boundaries, experience mode and learning process. It also analyzes from two aspects: the positive role of educational technology to develop information literacy of students and the revolution to learning style; the last part is a summary, which gives prospects to the future trend of the problem research in educational technology value.