Abstract
The research into the use of educational technology to date shows widely varying, inconclusive and often contradictory results. For example, Dillon and Gabbard (1998) conducted a survey of quantitative studies, searching under the keywords “hypermedia” and “hypertext” (thus missing any research that did not have these words in the title). They netted 97 articles and were able to select 25 for detailed review. Their general verdict was that “the value of hypermedia in pedagogy is limited” (p. 345). They further noted that the variables involved are enormously complex, and that identifying relevant variables and controlling them is especially difficult in this area. In another survey of the research literature, Kirkpatrick and Cuban (1998) divided studies into “positive”, “mixed”, and “negative”, and came up with roughly equal numbers in each category. Thus, research on the benefits of computers is rather equivocal. The reasons for this are not very difficult to find. The role of technology in education is changing so fast that, as Mandinach and Cline report, “new and flexible methodologies are needed to capture the effects of [technology-based] learning environments on teaching, learning, and classroom dynamics” (1997).
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van Lier, L. (2002). A Tale of Two Computer Classrooms. In: Leather, J., van Dam, J. (eds) Ecology of Language Acquisition. Educational Linguistics, vol 1. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0341-3_3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-0341-3_3
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