essay on building self reliant learners through technology

REALIZING THE PROMISE:

Leading up to the 75th anniversary of the UN General Assembly, this “Realizing the promise: How can education technology improve learning for all?” publication kicks off the Center for Universal Education’s first playbook in a series to help improve education around the world.

It is intended as an evidence-based tool for ministries of education, particularly in low- and middle-income countries, to adopt and more successfully invest in education technology.

While there is no single education initiative that will achieve the same results everywhere—as school systems differ in learners and educators, as well as in the availability and quality of materials and technologies—an important first step is understanding how technology is used given specific local contexts and needs.

The surveys in this playbook are designed to be adapted to collect this information from educators, learners, and school leaders and guide decisionmakers in expanding the use of technology.  

Introduction

While technology has disrupted most sectors of the economy and changed how we communicate, access information, work, and even play, its impact on schools, teaching, and learning has been much more limited. We believe that this limited impact is primarily due to technology being been used to replace analog tools, without much consideration given to playing to technology’s comparative advantages. These comparative advantages, relative to traditional “chalk-and-talk” classroom instruction, include helping to scale up standardized instruction, facilitate differentiated instruction, expand opportunities for practice, and increase student engagement. When schools use technology to enhance the work of educators and to improve the quality and quantity of educational content, learners will thrive.

Further, COVID-19 has laid bare that, in today’s environment where pandemics and the effects of climate change are likely to occur, schools cannot always provide in-person education—making the case for investing in education technology.

Here we argue for a simple yet surprisingly rare approach to education technology that seeks to:

• Understand the needs, infrastructure, and capacity of a school system—the diagnosis;
• Survey the best available evidence on interventions that match those conditions—the evidence; and
• Closely monitor the results of innovations before they are scaled up—the prognosis.

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The framework.

Our approach builds on a simple yet intuitive theoretical framework created two decades ago by two of the most prominent education researchers in the United States, David K. Cohen and Deborah Loewenberg Ball. They argue that what matters most to improve learning is the interactions among educators and learners around educational materials. We believe that the failed school-improvement efforts in the U.S. that motivated Cohen and Ball’s framework resemble the ed-tech reforms in much of the developing world to date in the lack of clarity improving the interactions between educators, learners, and the educational material. We build on their framework by adding parents as key agents that mediate the relationships between learners and educators and the material (Figure 1).

Figure 1: The instructional core

Adapted from Cohen and Ball (1999)

As the figure above suggests, ed-tech interventions can affect the instructional core in a myriad of ways. Yet, just because technology can do something, it does not mean it should. School systems in developing countries differ along many dimensions and each system is likely to have different needs for ed-tech interventions, as well as different infrastructure and capacity to enact such interventions.

The diagnosis:

How can school systems assess their needs and preparedness.

A useful first step for any school system to determine whether it should invest in education technology is to diagnose its:

• Specific needs to improve student learning (e.g., raising the average level of achievement, remediating gaps among low performers, and challenging high performers to develop higher-order skills);
• Infrastructure to adopt technology-enabled solutions (e.g., electricity connection, availability of space and outlets, stock of computers, and Internet connectivity at school and at learners’ homes); and
• Capacity to integrate technology in the instructional process (e.g., learners’ and educators’ level of familiarity and comfort with hardware and software, their beliefs about the level of usefulness of technology for learning purposes, and their current uses of such technology).

Before engaging in any new data collection exercise, school systems should take full advantage of existing administrative data that could shed light on these three main questions. This could be in the form of internal evaluations but also international learner assessments, such as the Program for International Student Assessment (PISA), the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS), and/or the Progress in International Literacy Study (PIRLS), and the Teaching and Learning International Study (TALIS). But if school systems lack information on their preparedness for ed-tech reforms or if they seek to complement existing data with a richer set of indicators, we developed a set of surveys for learners, educators, and school leaders. Download the full report to see how we map out the main aspects covered by these surveys, in hopes of highlighting how they could be used to inform decisions around the adoption of ed-tech interventions.

The evidence:

How can school systems identify promising ed-tech interventions.

There is no single “ed-tech” initiative that will achieve the same results everywhere, simply because school systems differ in learners and educators, as well as in the availability and quality of materials and technologies. Instead, to realize the potential of education technology to accelerate student learning, decisionmakers should focus on four potential uses of technology that play to its comparative advantages and complement the work of educators to accelerate student learning (Figure 2). These comparative advantages include:

• Scaling up quality instruction, such as through prerecorded quality lessons.
• Facilitating differentiated instruction, through, for example, computer-adaptive learning and live one-on-one tutoring.
• Expanding opportunities to practice.
• Increasing learner engagement through videos and games.

Figure 2: Comparative advantages of technology

Here we review the evidence on ed-tech interventions from 37 studies in 20 countries*, organizing them by comparative advantage. It’s important to note that ours is not the only way to classify these interventions (e.g., video tutorials could be considered as a strategy to scale up instruction or increase learner engagement), but we believe it may be useful to highlight the needs that they could address and why technology is well positioned to do so.

When discussing specific studies, we report the magnitude of the effects of interventions using standard deviations (SDs). SDs are a widely used metric in research to express the effect of a program or policy with respect to a business-as-usual condition (e.g., test scores). There are several ways to make sense of them. One is to categorize the magnitude of the effects based on the results of impact evaluations. In developing countries, effects below 0.1 SDs are considered to be small, effects between 0.1 and 0.2 SDs are medium, and those above 0.2 SDs are large (for reviews that estimate the average effect of groups of interventions, called “meta analyses,” see e.g., Conn, 2017; Kremer, Brannen, & Glennerster, 2013; McEwan, 2014; Snilstveit et al., 2015; Evans & Yuan, 2020.)

*In surveying the evidence, we began by compiling studies from prior general and ed-tech specific evidence reviews that some of us have written and from ed-tech reviews conducted by others. Then, we tracked the studies cited by the ones we had previously read and reviewed those, as well. In identifying studies for inclusion, we focused on experimental and quasi-experimental evaluations of education technology interventions from pre-school to secondary school in low- and middle-income countries that were released between 2000 and 2020. We only included interventions that sought to improve student learning directly (i.e., students’ interaction with the material), as opposed to interventions that have impacted achievement indirectly, by reducing teacher absence or increasing parental engagement. This process yielded 37 studies in 20 countries (see the full list of studies in Appendix B).

Scaling up standardized instruction

One of the ways in which technology may improve the quality of education is through its capacity to deliver standardized quality content at scale. This feature of technology may be particularly useful in three types of settings: (a) those in “hard-to-staff” schools (i.e., schools that struggle to recruit educators with the requisite training and experience—typically, in rural and/or remote areas) (see, e.g., Urquiola & Vegas, 2005); (b) those in which many educators are frequently absent from school (e.g., Chaudhury, Hammer, Kremer, Muralidharan, & Rogers, 2006; Muralidharan, Das, Holla, & Mohpal, 2017); and/or (c) those in which educators have low levels of pedagogical and subject matter expertise (e.g., Bietenbeck, Piopiunik, & Wiederhold, 2018; Bold et al., 2017; Metzler & Woessmann, 2012; Santibañez, 2006) and do not have opportunities to observe and receive feedback (e.g., Bruns, Costa, & Cunha, 2018; Cilliers, Fleisch, Prinsloo, & Taylor, 2018). Technology could address this problem by: (a) disseminating lessons delivered by qualified educators to a large number of learners (e.g., through prerecorded or live lessons); (b) enabling distance education (e.g., for learners in remote areas and/or during periods of school closures); and (c) distributing hardware preloaded with educational materials.

Prerecorded lessons

Technology seems to be well placed to amplify the impact of effective educators by disseminating their lessons. Evidence on the impact of prerecorded lessons is encouraging, but not conclusive. Some initiatives that have used short instructional videos to complement regular instruction, in conjunction with other learning materials, have raised student learning on independent assessments. For example, Beg et al. (2020) evaluated an initiative in Punjab, Pakistan in which grade 8 classrooms received an intervention that included short videos to substitute live instruction, quizzes for learners to practice the material from every lesson, tablets for educators to learn the material and follow the lesson, and LED screens to project the videos onto a classroom screen. After six months, the intervention improved the performance of learners on independent tests of math and science by 0.19 and 0.24 SDs, respectively but had no discernible effect on the math and science section of Punjab’s high-stakes exams.

One study suggests that approaches that are far less technologically sophisticated can also improve learning outcomes—especially, if the business-as-usual instruction is of low quality. For example, Naslund-Hadley, Parker, and Hernandez-Agramonte (2014) evaluated a preschool math program in Cordillera, Paraguay that used audio segments and written materials four days per week for an hour per day during the school day. After five months, the intervention improved math scores by 0.16 SDs, narrowing gaps between low- and high-achieving learners, and between those with and without educators with formal training in early childhood education.

Yet, the integration of prerecorded material into regular instruction has not always been successful. For example, de Barros (2020) evaluated an intervention that combined instructional videos for math and science with infrastructure upgrades (e.g., two “smart” classrooms, two TVs, and two tablets), printed workbooks for students, and in-service training for educators of learners in grades 9 and 10 in Haryana, India (all materials were mapped onto the official curriculum). After 11 months, the intervention negatively impacted math achievement (by 0.08 SDs) and had no effect on science (with respect to business as usual classes). It reduced the share of lesson time that educators devoted to instruction and negatively impacted an index of instructional quality. Likewise, Seo (2017) evaluated several combinations of infrastructure (solar lights and TVs) and prerecorded videos (in English and/or bilingual) for grade 11 students in northern Tanzania and found that none of the variants improved student learning, even when the videos were used. The study reports effects from the infrastructure component across variants, but as others have noted (Muralidharan, Romero, & Wüthrich, 2019), this approach to estimating impact is problematic.

A very similar intervention delivered after school hours, however, had sizeable effects on learners’ basic skills. Chiplunkar, Dhar, and Nagesh (2020) evaluated an initiative in Chennai (the capital city of the state of Tamil Nadu, India) delivered by the same organization as above that combined short videos that explained key concepts in math and science with worksheets, facilitator-led instruction, small groups for peer-to-peer learning, and occasional career counseling and guidance for grade 9 students. These lessons took place after school for one hour, five times a week. After 10 months, it had large effects on learners’ achievement as measured by tests of basic skills in math and reading, but no effect on a standardized high-stakes test in grade 10 or socio-emotional skills (e.g., teamwork, decisionmaking, and communication).

Drawing general lessons from this body of research is challenging for at least two reasons. First, all of the studies above have evaluated the impact of prerecorded lessons combined with several other components (e.g., hardware, print materials, or other activities). Therefore, it is possible that the effects found are due to these additional components, rather than to the recordings themselves, or to the interaction between the two (see Muralidharan, 2017 for a discussion of the challenges of interpreting “bundled” interventions). Second, while these studies evaluate some type of prerecorded lessons, none examines the content of such lessons. Thus, it seems entirely plausible that the direction and magnitude of the effects depends largely on the quality of the recordings (e.g., the expertise of the educator recording it, the amount of preparation that went into planning the recording, and its alignment with best teaching practices).

These studies also raise three important questions worth exploring in future research. One of them is why none of the interventions discussed above had effects on high-stakes exams, even if their materials are typically mapped onto the official curriculum. It is possible that the official curricula are simply too challenging for learners in these settings, who are several grade levels behind expectations and who often need to reinforce basic skills (see Pritchett & Beatty, 2015). Another question is whether these interventions have long-term effects on teaching practices. It seems plausible that, if these interventions are deployed in contexts with low teaching quality, educators may learn something from watching the videos or listening to the recordings with learners. Yet another question is whether these interventions make it easier for schools to deliver instruction to learners whose native language is other than the official medium of instruction.

Distance education

Technology can also allow learners living in remote areas to access education. The evidence on these initiatives is encouraging. For example, Johnston and Ksoll (2017) evaluated a program that broadcasted live instruction via satellite to rural primary school students in the Volta and Greater Accra regions of Ghana. For this purpose, the program also equipped classrooms with the technology needed to connect to a studio in Accra, including solar panels, a satellite modem, a projector, a webcam, microphones, and a computer with interactive software. After two years, the intervention improved the numeracy scores of students in grades 2 through 4, and some foundational literacy tasks, but it had no effect on attendance or classroom time devoted to instruction, as captured by school visits. The authors interpreted these results as suggesting that the gains in achievement may be due to improving the quality of instruction that children received (as opposed to increased instructional time). Naik, Chitre, Bhalla, and Rajan (2019) evaluated a similar program in the Indian state of Karnataka and also found positive effects on learning outcomes, but it is not clear whether those effects are due to the program or due to differences in the groups of students they compared to estimate the impact of the initiative.

In one context (Mexico), this type of distance education had positive long-term effects. Navarro-Sola (2019) took advantage of the staggered rollout of the telesecundarias (i.e., middle schools with lessons broadcasted through satellite TV) in 1968 to estimate its impact. The policy had short-term effects on students’ enrollment in school: For every telesecundaria per 50 children, 10 students enrolled in middle school and two pursued further education. It also had a long-term influence on the educational and employment trajectory of its graduates. Each additional year of education induced by the policy increased average income by nearly 18 percent. This effect was attributable to more graduates entering the labor force and shifting from agriculture and the informal sector. Similarly, Fabregas (2019) leveraged a later expansion of this policy in 1993 and found that each additional telesecundaria per 1,000 adolescents led to an average increase of 0.2 years of education, and a decline in fertility for women, but no conclusive evidence of long-term effects on labor market outcomes.

It is crucial to interpret these results keeping in mind the settings where the interventions were implemented. As we mention above, part of the reason why they have proven effective is that the “counterfactual” conditions for learning (i.e., what would have happened to learners in the absence of such programs) was either to not have access to schooling or to be exposed to low-quality instruction. School systems interested in taking up similar interventions should assess the extent to which their learners (or parts of their learner population) find themselves in similar conditions to the subjects of the studies above. This illustrates the importance of assessing the needs of a system before reviewing the evidence.

Preloaded hardware

Technology also seems well positioned to disseminate educational materials. Specifically, hardware (e.g., desktop computers, laptops, or tablets) could also help deliver educational software (e.g., word processing, reference texts, and/or games). In theory, these materials could not only undergo a quality assurance review (e.g., by curriculum specialists and educators), but also draw on the interactions with learners for adjustments (e.g., identifying areas needing reinforcement) and enable interactions between learners and educators.

In practice, however, most initiatives that have provided learners with free computers, laptops, and netbooks do not leverage any of the opportunities mentioned above. Instead, they install a standard set of educational materials and hope that learners find them helpful enough to take them up on their own. Students rarely do so, and instead use the laptops for recreational purposes—often, to the detriment of their learning (see, e.g., Malamud & Pop-Eleches, 2011). In fact, free netbook initiatives have not only consistently failed to improve academic achievement in math or language (e.g., Cristia et al., 2017), but they have had no impact on learners’ general computer skills (e.g., Beuermann et al., 2015). Some of these initiatives have had small impacts on cognitive skills, but the mechanisms through which those effects occurred remains unclear.

To our knowledge, the only successful deployment of a free laptop initiative was one in which a team of researchers equipped the computers with remedial software. Mo et al. (2013) evaluated a version of the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) program for grade 3 students in migrant schools in Beijing, China in which the laptops were loaded with a remedial software mapped onto the national curriculum for math (similar to the software products that we discuss under “practice exercises” below). After nine months, the program improved math achievement by 0.17 SDs and computer skills by 0.33 SDs. If a school system decides to invest in free laptops, this study suggests that the quality of the software on the laptops is crucial.

To date, however, the evidence suggests that children do not learn more from interacting with laptops than they do from textbooks. For example, Bando, Gallego, Gertler, and Romero (2016) compared the effect of free laptop and textbook provision in 271 elementary schools in disadvantaged areas of Honduras. After seven months, students in grades 3 and 6 who had received the laptops performed on par with those who had received the textbooks in math and language. Further, even if textbooks essentially become obsolete at the end of each school year, whereas laptops can be reloaded with new materials for each year, the costs of laptop provision (not just the hardware, but also the technical assistance, Internet, and training associated with it) are not yet low enough to make them a more cost-effective way of delivering content to learners.

Evidence on the provision of tablets equipped with software is encouraging but limited. For example, de Hoop et al. (2020) evaluated a composite intervention for first grade students in Zambia’s Eastern Province that combined infrastructure (electricity via solar power), hardware (projectors and tablets), and educational materials (lesson plans for educators and interactive lessons for learners, both loaded onto the tablets and mapped onto the official Zambian curriculum). After 14 months, the intervention had improved student early-grade reading by 0.4 SDs, oral vocabulary scores by 0.25 SDs, and early-grade math by 0.22 SDs. It also improved students’ achievement by 0.16 on a locally developed assessment. The multifaceted nature of the program, however, makes it challenging to identify the components that are driving the positive effects. Pitchford (2015) evaluated an intervention that provided tablets equipped with educational “apps,” to be used for 30 minutes per day for two months to develop early math skills among students in grades 1 through 3 in Lilongwe, Malawi. The evaluation found positive impacts in math achievement, but the main study limitation is that it was conducted in a single school.

Facilitating differentiated instruction

Another way in which technology may improve educational outcomes is by facilitating the delivery of differentiated or individualized instruction. Most developing countries massively expanded access to schooling in recent decades by building new schools and making education more affordable, both by defraying direct costs, as well as compensating for opportunity costs (Duflo, 2001; World Bank, 2018). These initiatives have not only rapidly increased the number of learners enrolled in school, but have also increased the variability in learner’ preparation for schooling. Consequently, a large number of learners perform well below grade-based curricular expectations (see, e.g., Duflo, Dupas, & Kremer, 2011; Pritchett & Beatty, 2015). These learners are unlikely to get much from “one-size-fits-all” instruction, in which a single educator delivers instruction deemed appropriate for the middle (or top) of the achievement distribution (Banerjee & Duflo, 2011). Technology could potentially help these learners by providing them with: (a) instruction and opportunities for practice that adjust to the level and pace of preparation of each individual (known as “computer-adaptive learning” (CAL)); or (b) live, one-on-one tutoring.

Computer-adaptive learning

One of the main comparative advantages of technology is its ability to diagnose students’ initial learning levels and assign students to instruction and exercises of appropriate difficulty. No individual educator—no matter how talented—can be expected to provide individualized instruction to all learners in his/her class simultaneously . In this respect, technology is uniquely positioned to complement traditional teaching. This use of technology could help learners master basic skills and help them get more out of schooling.

Although many software products evaluated in recent years have been categorized as CAL, many rely on a relatively coarse level of differentiation at an initial stage (e.g., a diagnostic test) without further differentiation. We discuss these initiatives under the category of “increasing opportunities for practice” below. CAL initiatives complement an initial diagnostic with dynamic adaptation (i.e., at each response or set of responses from learners) to adjust both the initial level of difficulty and rate at which it increases or decreases, depending on whether learners’ responses are correct or incorrect.

Existing evidence on this specific type of programs is highly promising. Most famously, Banerjee et al. (2007) evaluated CAL software in Vadodara, in the Indian state of Gujarat, in which grade 4 students were offered two hours of shared computer time per week before and after school, during which they played games that involved solving math problems. The level of difficulty of such problems adjusted based on students’ answers. This program improved math achievement by 0.35 and 0.47 SDs after one and two years of implementation, respectively. Consistent with the promise of personalized learning, the software improved achievement for all students. In fact, one year after the end of the program, students assigned to the program still performed 0.1 SDs better than those assigned to a business as usual condition. More recently, Muralidharan, et al. (2019) evaluated a “blended learning” initiative in which students in grades 4 through 9 in Delhi, India received 45 minutes of interaction with CAL software for math and language, and 45 minutes of small group instruction before or after going to school. After only 4.5 months, the program improved achievement by 0.37 SDs in math and 0.23 SDs in Hindi. While all learners benefited from the program in absolute terms, the lowest performing learners benefited the most in relative terms, since they were learning very little in school.

We see two important limitations from this body of research. First, to our knowledge, none of these initiatives has been evaluated when implemented during the school day. Therefore, it is not possible to distinguish the effect of the adaptive software from that of additional instructional time. Second, given that most of these programs were facilitated by local instructors, attempts to distinguish the effect of the software from that of the instructors has been mostly based on noncausal evidence. A frontier challenge in this body of research is to understand whether CAL software can increase the effectiveness of school-based instruction by substituting part of the regularly scheduled time for math and language instruction.

Live one-on-one tutoring

Recent improvements in the speed and quality of videoconferencing, as well as in the connectivity of remote areas, have enabled yet another way in which technology can help personalization: live (i.e., real-time) one-on-one tutoring. While the evidence on in-person tutoring is scarce in developing countries, existing studies suggest that this approach works best when it is used to personalize instruction (see, e.g., Banerjee et al., 2007; Banerji, Berry, & Shotland, 2015; Cabezas, Cuesta, & Gallego, 2011).

There are almost no studies on the impact of online tutoring—possibly, due to the lack of hardware and Internet connectivity in low- and middle-income countries. One exception is Chemin and Oledan (2020)’s recent evaluation of an online tutoring program for grade 6 students in Kianyaga, Kenya to learn English from volunteers from a Canadian university via Skype ( videoconferencing software) for one hour per week after school. After 10 months, program beneficiaries performed 0.22 SDs better in a test of oral comprehension, improved their comfort using technology for learning, and became more willing to engage in cross-cultural communication. Importantly, while the tutoring sessions used the official English textbooks and sought in part to help learners with their homework, tutors were trained on several strategies to teach to each learner’s individual level of preparation, focusing on basic skills if necessary. To our knowledge, similar initiatives within a country have not yet been rigorously evaluated.

Expanding opportunities for practice

A third way in which technology may improve the quality of education is by providing learners with additional opportunities for practice. In many developing countries, lesson time is primarily devoted to lectures, in which the educator explains the topic and the learners passively copy explanations from the blackboard. This setup leaves little time for in-class practice. Consequently, learners who did not understand the explanation of the material during lecture struggle when they have to solve homework assignments on their own. Technology could potentially address this problem by allowing learners to review topics at their own pace.

Practice exercises

Technology can help learners get more out of traditional instruction by providing them with opportunities to implement what they learn in class. This approach could, in theory, allow some learners to anchor their understanding of the material through trial and error (i.e., by realizing what they may not have understood correctly during lecture and by getting better acquainted with special cases not covered in-depth in class).

Existing evidence on practice exercises reflects both the promise and the limitations of this use of technology in developing countries. For example, Lai et al. (2013) evaluated a program in Shaanxi, China where students in grades 3 and 5 were required to attend two 40-minute remedial sessions per week in which they first watched videos that reviewed the material that had been introduced in their math lessons that week and then played games to practice the skills introduced in the video. After four months, the intervention improved math achievement by 0.12 SDs. Many other evaluations of comparable interventions have found similar small-to-moderate results (see, e.g., Lai, Luo, Zhang, Huang, & Rozelle, 2015; Lai et al., 2012; Mo et al., 2015; Pitchford, 2015). These effects, however, have been consistently smaller than those of initiatives that adjust the difficulty of the material based on students’ performance (e.g., Banerjee et al., 2007; Muralidharan, et al., 2019). We hypothesize that these programs do little for learners who perform several grade levels behind curricular expectations, and who would benefit more from a review of foundational concepts from earlier grades.

We see two important limitations from this research. First, most initiatives that have been evaluated thus far combine instructional videos with practice exercises, so it is hard to know whether their effects are driven by the former or the latter. In fact, the program in China described above allowed learners to ask their peers whenever they did not understand a difficult concept, so it potentially also captured the effect of peer-to-peer collaboration. To our knowledge, no studies have addressed this gap in the evidence.

Second, most of these programs are implemented before or after school, so we cannot distinguish the effect of additional instructional time from that of the actual opportunity for practice. The importance of this question was first highlighted by Linden (2008), who compared two delivery mechanisms for game-based remedial math software for students in grades 2 and 3 in a network of schools run by a nonprofit organization in Gujarat, India: one in which students interacted with the software during the school day and another one in which students interacted with the software before or after school (in both cases, for three hours per day). After a year, the first version of the program had negatively impacted students’ math achievement by 0.57 SDs and the second one had a null effect. This study suggested that computer-assisted learning is a poor substitute for regular instruction when it is of high quality, as was the case in this well-functioning private network of schools.

In recent years, several studies have sought to remedy this shortcoming. Mo et al. (2014) were among the first to evaluate practice exercises delivered during the school day. They evaluated an initiative in Shaanxi, China in which students in grades 3 and 5 were required to interact with the software similar to the one in Lai et al. (2013) for two 40-minute sessions per week. The main limitation of this study, however, is that the program was delivered during regularly scheduled computer lessons, so it could not determine the impact of substituting regular math instruction. Similarly, Mo et al. (2020) evaluated a self-paced and a teacher-directed version of a similar program for English for grade 5 students in Qinghai, China. Yet, the key shortcoming of this study is that the teacher-directed version added several components that may also influence achievement, such as increased opportunities for teachers to provide students with personalized assistance when they struggled with the material. Ma, Fairlie, Loyalka, and Rozelle (2020) compared the effectiveness of additional time-delivered remedial instruction for students in grades 4 to 6 in Shaanxi, China through either computer-assisted software or using workbooks. This study indicates whether additional instructional time is more effective when using technology, but it does not address the question of whether school systems may improve the productivity of instructional time during the school day by substituting educator-led with computer-assisted instruction.

Increasing learner engagement

Another way in which technology may improve education is by increasing learners’ engagement with the material. In many school systems, regular “chalk and talk” instruction prioritizes time for educators’ exposition over opportunities for learners to ask clarifying questions and/or contribute to class discussions. This, combined with the fact that many developing-country classrooms include a very large number of learners (see, e.g., Angrist & Lavy, 1999; Duflo, Dupas, & Kremer, 2015), may partially explain why the majority of those students are several grade levels behind curricular expectations (e.g., Muralidharan, et al., 2019; Muralidharan & Zieleniak, 2014; Pritchett & Beatty, 2015). Technology could potentially address these challenges by: (a) using video tutorials for self-paced learning and (b) presenting exercises as games and/or gamifying practice.

Video tutorials

Technology can potentially increase learner effort and understanding of the material by finding new and more engaging ways to deliver it. Video tutorials designed for self-paced learning—as opposed to videos for whole class instruction, which we discuss under the category of “prerecorded lessons” above—can increase learner effort in multiple ways, including: allowing learners to focus on topics with which they need more help, letting them correct errors and misconceptions on their own, and making the material appealing through visual aids. They can increase understanding by breaking the material into smaller units and tackling common misconceptions.

In spite of the popularity of instructional videos, there is relatively little evidence on their effectiveness. Yet, two recent evaluations of different versions of the Khan Academy portal, which mainly relies on instructional videos, offer some insight into their impact. First, Ferman, Finamor, and Lima (2019) evaluated an initiative in 157 public primary and middle schools in five cities in Brazil in which the teachers of students in grades 5 and 9 were taken to the computer lab to learn math from the platform for 50 minutes per week. The authors found that, while the intervention slightly improved learners’ attitudes toward math, these changes did not translate into better performance in this subject. The authors hypothesized that this could be due to the reduction of teacher-led math instruction.

More recently, Büchel, Jakob, Kühnhanss, Steffen, and Brunetti (2020) evaluated an after-school, offline delivery of the Khan Academy portal in grades 3 through 6 in 302 primary schools in Morazán, El Salvador. Students in this study received 90 minutes per week of additional math instruction (effectively nearly doubling total math instruction per week) through teacher-led regular lessons, teacher-assisted Khan Academy lessons, or similar lessons assisted by technical supervisors with no content expertise. (Importantly, the first group provided differentiated instruction, which is not the norm in Salvadorian schools). All three groups outperformed both schools without any additional lessons and classrooms without additional lessons in the same schools as the program. The teacher-assisted Khan Academy lessons performed 0.24 SDs better, the supervisor-led lessons 0.22 SDs better, and the teacher-led regular lessons 0.15 SDs better, but the authors could not determine whether the effects across versions were different.

Together, these studies suggest that instructional videos work best when provided as a complement to, rather than as a substitute for, regular instruction. Yet, the main limitation of these studies is the multifaceted nature of the Khan Academy portal, which also includes other components found to positively improve learner achievement, such as differentiated instruction by students’ learning levels. While the software does not provide the type of personalization discussed above, learners are asked to take a placement test and, based on their score, educators assign them different work. Therefore, it is not clear from these studies whether the effects from Khan Academy are driven by its instructional videos or to the software’s ability to provide differentiated activities when combined with placement tests.

Games and gamification

Technology can also increase learner engagement by presenting exercises as games and/or by encouraging learner to play and compete with others (e.g., using leaderboards and rewards)—an approach known as “gamification.” Both approaches can increase learner motivation and effort by presenting learners with entertaining opportunities for practice and by leveraging peers as commitment devices.

There are very few studies on the effects of games and gamification in low- and middle-income countries. Recently, Araya, Arias Ortiz, Bottan, and Cristia (2019) evaluated an initiative in which grade 4 students in Santiago, Chile were required to participate in two 90-minute sessions per week during the school day with instructional math software featuring individual and group competitions (e.g., tracking each learner’s standing in his/her class and tournaments between sections). After nine months, the program led to improvements of 0.27 SDs in the national student assessment in math (it had no spillover effects on reading). However, it had mixed effects on non-academic outcomes. Specifically, the program increased learners’ willingness to use computers to learn math, but, at the same time, increased their anxiety toward math and negatively impacted learners’ willingness to collaborate with peers. Finally, given that one of the weekly sessions replaced regular math instruction and the other one represented additional math instructional time, it is not clear whether the academic effects of the program are driven by the software or the additional time devoted to learning math.

The prognosis:

How can school systems adopt interventions that match their needs.

Here are five specific and sequential guidelines for decisionmakers to realize the potential of education technology to accelerate student learning.

1. Take stock of how your current schools, educators, and learners are engaging with technology .

Carry out a short in-school survey to understand the current practices and potential barriers to adoption of technology (we have included suggested survey instruments in the Appendices); use this information in your decisionmaking process. For example, we learned from conversations with current and former ministers of education from various developing regions that a common limitation to technology use is regulations that hold school leaders accountable for damages to or losses of devices. Another common barrier is lack of access to electricity and Internet, or even the availability of sufficient outlets for charging devices in classrooms. Understanding basic infrastructure and regulatory limitations to the use of education technology is a first necessary step. But addressing these limitations will not guarantee that introducing or expanding technology use will accelerate learning. The next steps are thus necessary.

“In Africa, the biggest limit is connectivity. Fiber is expensive, and we don’t have it everywhere. The continent is creating a digital divide between cities, where there is fiber, and the rural areas.  The [Ghanaian] administration put in schools offline/online technologies with books, assessment tools, and open source materials. In deploying this, we are finding that again, teachers are unfamiliar with it. And existing policies prohibit students to bring their own tablets or cell phones. The easiest way to do it would have been to let everyone bring their own device. But policies are against it.” H.E. Matthew Prempeh, Minister of Education of Ghana, on the need to understand the local context.

2. Consider how the introduction of technology may affect the interactions among learners, educators, and content .

Our review of the evidence indicates that technology may accelerate student learning when it is used to scale up access to quality content, facilitate differentiated instruction, increase opportunities for practice, or when it increases learner engagement. For example, will adding electronic whiteboards to classrooms facilitate access to more quality content or differentiated instruction? Or will these expensive boards be used in the same way as the old chalkboards? Will providing one device (laptop or tablet) to each learner facilitate access to more and better content, or offer students more opportunities to practice and learn? Solely introducing technology in classrooms without additional changes is unlikely to lead to improved learning and may be quite costly. If you cannot clearly identify how the interactions among the three key components of the instructional core (educators, learners, and content) may change after the introduction of technology, then it is probably not a good idea to make the investment. See Appendix A for guidance on the types of questions to ask.

3. Once decisionmakers have a clear idea of how education technology can help accelerate student learning in a specific context, it is important to define clear objectives and goals and establish ways to regularly assess progress and make course corrections in a timely manner .

For instance, is the education technology expected to ensure that learners in early grades excel in foundational skills—basic literacy and numeracy—by age 10? If so, will the technology provide quality reading and math materials, ample opportunities to practice, and engaging materials such as videos or games? Will educators be empowered to use these materials in new ways? And how will progress be measured and adjusted?

4. How this kind of reform is approached can matter immensely for its success.

It is easy to nod to issues of “implementation,” but that needs to be more than rhetorical. Keep in mind that good use of education technology requires thinking about how it will affect learners, educators, and parents. After all, giving learners digital devices will make no difference if they get broken, are stolen, or go unused. Classroom technologies only matter if educators feel comfortable putting them to work. Since good technology is generally about complementing or amplifying what educators and learners already do, it is almost always a mistake to mandate programs from on high. It is vital that technology be adopted with the input of educators and families and with attention to how it will be used. If technology goes unused or if educators use it ineffectually, the results will disappoint—no matter the virtuosity of the technology. Indeed, unused education technology can be an unnecessary expenditure for cash-strapped education systems. This is why surveying context, listening to voices in the field, examining how technology is used, and planning for course correction is essential.

5. It is essential to communicate with a range of stakeholders, including educators, school leaders, parents, and learners .

Technology can feel alien in schools, confuse parents and (especially) older educators, or become an alluring distraction. Good communication can help address all of these risks. Taking care to listen to educators and families can help ensure that programs are informed by their needs and concerns. At the same time, deliberately and consistently explaining what technology is and is not supposed to do, how it can be most effectively used, and the ways in which it can make it more likely that programs work as intended. For instance, if teachers fear that technology is intended to reduce the need for educators, they will tend to be hostile; if they believe that it is intended to assist them in their work, they will be more receptive. Absent effective communication, it is easy for programs to “fail” not because of the technology but because of how it was used. In short, past experience in rolling out education programs indicates that it is as important to have a strong intervention design as it is to have a solid plan to socialize it among stakeholders.

Beyond reopening: A leapfrog moment to transform education?

On September 14, the Center for Universal Education (CUE) will host a webinar to discuss strategies, including around the effective use of education technology, for ensuring resilient schools in the long term and to launch a new education technology playbook “Realizing the promise: How can education technology improve learning for all?”

file-pdf Full Playbook – Realizing the promise: How can education technology improve learning for all? file-pdf References file-pdf Appendix A – Instruments to assess availability and use of technology file-pdf Appendix B – List of reviewed studies file-pdf Appendix C – How may technology affect interactions among students, teachers, and content?

About the Authors

Alejandro j. ganimian, emiliana vegas, frederick m. hess.

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Self-Regulated Learning: What It Is, Why It Is Important and Strategies for Implementing It

Self-regulated learning (SRL) is a respected educational approach which encourages students to take control of their own unique learning journey. In this approach, students are guided through the process of effectively planning , monitoring , and reflecting on their work. There are a number of key advantages of this approach, including improved academic performance , better time management , and higher levels of motivation . The concept of SRL gained prominence in the 1980s and draws on various theoretical perspectives, such as constructivism , cognitive theory, and Vygotsky’s theory of the Zone of Proximal Development . This article aims to introduce teachers to the approach and offers practical advice on facilitating self-regulated learning in the classroom (2).

What is Self-Regulated Learning?

Self-regulated learning is partly about self-control but, more significantly, it is also about having an active and personal involvement in your own education. Instead of passively following instructions, students are encouraged to use special thinking and motivational strategies to improve their ability to learn. Furthermore, they can also have agency to improve their own learning environments to match their unique needs (1).

The fact that SRL can be personalised is one of its key benefits, allowing students to decide on the type of instruction that suits them best. By being proactive in this way, students take responsibility for their own learning. This approach, therefore, is useful not just in academic settings but also in daily skills like time management and goal setting. Overall, self-regulated learning empowers students to be more effective learners and active participants in their own educational journey (3).

See also: Adaptive Learning: What is It, What are its Benefits and How Does it Work?

Strategies to teach self-regulation

Teaching self-regulation to students is not just about telling them what to do. Instead, teachers can incorporate teaching of specific practical methods into their lessons. This section offers strategies for teachers to help students become more proactive and successful in their learning.

Active Thinking about Learning Strategies

Teachers can help students think more actively about effective learning strategies. When planning a syllabus, allocate time before an assessment to guide students to consider the type of questions they will face, the resources they will need, and how to use those resources. This helps students plan effectively and make good use of study materials. For example, before a science exam, the teacher could guide students on which topics to focus on and how to use resources effectively for revision. This helps students plan their study time better.

Model Goal-Oriented Behaviour

Show students how to set goals and break them down into smaller tasks with deadlines. For instance, if students are required to watch a video asynchronously, set a viewing deadline followed by a small quiz. This helps students better plan and monitor their own learning habits. Ideally, this should be done earlier in the course in order to encourage good habits later.

Incorporate Frequent Discourse on Self-Regulation

Talk to your students about the SRL approach. Make self-regulation a regular topic in the classroom. This can start from conducting a survey before the first class in order to find out about students’ previous learning approaches. Subsequently, early in the course, teachers can describe self-regulated learning skills and their benefits, before referring back to this in later lessons.

Planning Classwork

Encourage students to spread their work over time instead of cramming it all in at once. Use tools like digital timesheets to help students monitor their study habits. This kind of reflection can help them become more aware of how much and how well they are learning.

Explicit Strategy Discussion

Label and discuss strategies openly during classroom activities. For instance, during a class discussion, encourage students to share the strategies they used to understand the material. As an example, after students have read a difficult scientific article for homework, you could ask them how they managed to understand the key points. Some might say they drew diagrams to visualise the concept, while others might have made flashcards for memorisation. Highlighting these different approaches not only validates each student’s method but also exposes the class to a variety of strategies they may not have used before. This becomes a learning opportunity for everyone, improving their toolkit for understanding difficult texts in the future (4).

Feedback and Reflection

Provide constructive feedback on how students are doing in relation to course goals. Encourage them to think about which learning strategies worked or did not work for them. If a dedicated digital space can be created for reflection, this might help students structure how they engage with self-evaluation. Also, while it takes a bit of extra work, providing a rubric for assignments to help students understand what is expected can help them plan and evaluate their own work accordingly.

Using caution and best judgement

By bringing in these techniques, teachers can help students become more aware of their learning processes and adapt their strategies for more effective learning. The idea is that these methods equip students with the self-regulatory skills useful not just in academic tasks but also in daily life. However, when promoting self-regulated learning strategies, teachers must be careful not to overwhelm students with too many methods all at once. Instead, introduce strategies gradually to allow time for understanding. Also, avoid a one-size-fits-all approach, as each student’s learning style is unique. When possible, teachers should think critically about whether the strategies are actually helping students or instead causing additional stress (5). Lastly, it is vital to give students room to make mistakes and learn from them, rather than strictly dictating how they should manage their learning. Ideally, students need to feel a strong sense of agency in their learning progress.

See also: How Can We Align Learning Objectives, Instructional Strategies, and Assessments?

The Cycle of Self-Regulated Learning

The self-regulated learning cycle (illustrated in the diagram below) is a framework that emphasises the role of the student in their own learning process. While students are the main actors, teachers, as previously mentioned, also play a very important role as guides and coaches. This approach aligns well with established educational theories like constructivism, which emphasises the learner’s role in building their own knowledge.

1. Plan, Set Goals, and Lay Out Strategies

Before getting started with a task, students should be encouraged to spend time planning. Not all students will be enthusiastic and for some it might feel like a step backward. However, in reality this can help students make more efficient use of their time and effort. As a simple example, if students are assigned a research paper, the planning phase could include a decision to spend the first week on researching and the second week on writing, or students could be asked to create a mind-map based on the essay question.

What can teachers do to help students through this phase?

In the planning phase, teachers should encourage students to evaluate the characteristics of the task, asking them to consider if it is similar to tasks they have previously completed and how much time it might require. Next, teachers can prompt students to set clear goals, and to consider if they think the research can be completed by the end of the week. To achieve these goals, students should be encouraged to outline specific strategies, asking them if they will need to visit the library or consult online resources. Finally, students can be taught to set realistic expectations by questioning what outcomes they are aiming for, taking into account past performance and the effort they are willing to put in (6).

Here, the teacher’s role is akin to that of a ‘ scaffolder ‘ in Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development. Teachers should aim to provide the right amount of support to help students reach their potential.

See also: Situated Learning Theory

2. Monitor Performance through the use of targeted strategies

Once the planning is complete, students move into the execution phase. This is where they put their plan into action, and it is important for students to monitor their performance to see if their plan is working. For example, if a student finds that reading a textbook in a noisy dorm room is not working for them, a change of location to a quieter library might be needed.

In the phase where students are putting their plan into action, teachers can still play a significant role. They can encourage students to engage in self-observation by asking them to identify strategies that are effective and those that are not. Teachers can also guide students to prepare for potential obstacles, encouraging them to think in advance about possible challenges and ways to overcome them. Lastly, students can be motivated to remain committed to new strategies, even when they feel uncomfortable or unfamiliar at the outset. This monitoring phase is similar to the strategies of metacognitive theory, encouraging awareness and understanding of one’s own thought processes (7).

3. Reflect on Performance

As all teachers will be aware, reflection is crucial. Rather than just focusing on grades, students should assess how well they did in relation to their initial goals. If, in the past, a student aimed for a ‘B’ but ended up with a ‘C’, they should consider what went wrong and how to improve.

In the reflection phase, teachers should help students gain insights into their performance. For example, teachers can guide students to evaluate their own efforts and the effectiveness of their chosen strategies. A good idea here is to set up some kind of learning journal with space for students to reflect on specific tasks at specific times. In these journals, students can be encouraged to consider whether the strategies they used brought about the hoped-for results. Moreover, teachers can instruct students to connect any poor outcomes to unsuccessful strategies or insufficient effort, rather than allow students to blame it on an inherent lack of ability. Reflection is a vital component of experiential learning theories, such as Kolb’s Learning Cycle , where experiences lead to observations and reflections, which can then progress into future planning and actions (8).

By integrating the above steps into your teaching practice, you can help students to take control of their learning, which can then set them up for success both academically and in other aspects of life.

See also: Problem-Based Learning (PBL)

Why is self-regulation important?

As has been described in this article, self-regulated learning can facilitate both effective learning and personal growth. It can empower students to improve their academic performance by promoting self-reflection. Through this self-assessment and resource management, it is hoped that students can develop a more refined understanding of how to tackle learning tasks and improve their study techniques. To be clear, we are not simply talking about better grades. This approach can also positively influence a student’s mental well-being, allowing them to feel more in control of their performance and experience less stress, especially during exams.

The significance of SRL can become even more pronounced at the college level. University courses often present greater challenges and have less educator oversight compared to high school. Unfortunately, many students start higher education without the necessary learning skills, which can result in some of them feeling outclassed by their peers. Implementing SRL earlier in their academic journeys can level the playing field for these students, helping them become more confident and self-reliant.

Moreover, the current trend of remote learning also shows the importance of SRL. The virtual classroom setting requires even more planning and self-direction due to the fact that online courses are often less structured. In these challenging times, when students are often dealing with stress, having strong self-regulation skills can give them a sense of self-efficacy, and, as mentioned earlier, this positive mindset is not just helpful for the current academic setting but continues to be beneficial long after graduation.

See also: Kirkpatrick Model: Four Levels of Learning Evaluation

In summary, self-regulated learning is more than just a modern education concept. On some levels, it can be described as a set of life skills that has been valued, perhaps informally, throughout history for its positive impact on behaviour and skill acquisition. Furthermore, this approach is deeply embedded in cognitive learning theory, emphasising the active role of students in shaping their own educational outcomes. By employing a set of coherent learning strategies, students can positively affect their own cognition, motivation, and behaviour.

Importantly, teachers serve as the all-important facilitators in this process, not only passing on academic strategies but also empowering students with self-regulation techniques that improve their overall learning. Whether this is in a traditional classroom or a remote setting, these skills can help students become more responsible and effective learners. In an ever-changing educational landscape, the role of self-regulated learning is increasingly central, helping students become well-rounded, resilient individuals, better prepared to navigate the challenges of academic life and beyond.

• Zimmerman, B. J. (2002). Becoming a self-regulated learner: An overview. Theory into Practice, 41(2), 64-70.
• Burman, Jeremy T.; Green, Christopher D.; Shanker, Stuart (September 2015). “On the Meanings of Self-Regulation: Digital Humanities in Service of Conceptual Clarity” (PDF). Child Development. 86 (5): 1507–1521. doi:10.1111/cdev.12395.
• Butler, Deborah L.; Winne, Philip H. (1995). “Feedback and Self-Regulated Learning: A Theoretical Synthesis”. Review of Educational Research. American Educational Research Association (AERA). 65 (3): 245–281. doi:10.3102/00346543065003245. ISSN 0034-6543.
• Winne, Philip H.; Perry, Nancy E. (2000). “Measuring Self-Regulated Learning”. Handbook of Self-Regulation. Elsevier. pp. 531–566. doi:10.1016/b978-012109890-2/50045-7.
• Zimmerman, Barry J (1989). “A social cognitive view of self-regulated academic learning”. Journal of Educational Psychology. 81 (3): 329–339. doi:10.1037/0022-0663.81.3.329.
• Williams, Peter E.; Hellman, Chan M. (1 February 2004). “Differences in Self-Regulation for Online Learning Between First- and Second-Generation College Students”. Research in Higher Education. 45 (1): 71–82. doi:10.1023/B:RIHE.0000010047.46814.78.
• Jansen, R. S., Van Leeuwen, A., Janssen, J., Jak, S., & Kester, L. (2019). Self-regulated learning partially mediates the effect of self-regulated learning interventions on achievement in higher education: A meta-analysis. Educational Research Review, 28, 100292.
• Carter Jr, R. A., Rice, M., Yang, S., & Jackson, H. A. (2020). Self-regulated learning in online learning environments: strategies for remote learning. Information and Learning Sciences, 121(5/6), 321-329.

I am a professor of Educational Technology. I have worked at several elite universities. I hold a PhD degree from the University of Illinois and a master's degree from Purdue University.

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Topic 7: Educational Technology

Technology and self reliance.

Technology is the application of science to address the problems of daily life, from hunting tools and agricultural advances, to manual and electronic ways of computing, to today’s tablets and smartphones. (Photo (a) courtesy of Wikimedia Commons; Photo (b) courtesy of Martin Pettitt/flickr; Photo (c) courtesy of Whitefield d./flickr; Photo (d) courtesy of Andrew Parnell/flickr; Photo (e) courtesy of Jemimus/flickr; Photo (f) courtesy of Kārlis Dambrāns/flickr)

It is easy to look at the latest sleek Apple product and think technology is a recent addition to our world. But from the steam engine to the most cutting-edge robotic surgery tools, technology has described the application of science to address the problems of daily life. We might look back at the enormous and clunky computers of the 1970s that had about as much storage as an iPod Shuffle and roll our eyes in disbelief. But chances are thirty years from now our skinny laptops and iPods will look just as archaic.

What Is Technology?

While most people probably picture computers and cell phones when the subject of technology comes up, technology is not merely a product of the modern era. For example, fire and stone tools were important forms that technology developed during the Stone Age. Just as the availability of digital technology shapes how we live today, the creation of stone tools changed how premodern humans lived and how well they ate. From the first calculator, invented in 2400 B.C.E. Babylon in the form of an abacus, to the predecessor of the modern computer, created in 1882 by Charles Babbage, all of our technological innovations are advancements on previous iterations. And indeed, all aspects of our lives today are influenced by technology. In agriculture, the introduction of machines that can till, thresh, plant, and harvest greatly reduced the need for manual labor, which in turn meant there were fewer rural jobs. This led to the urbanization of society, as well as lowered birthrates because there was less need for large families to work the farms. In the criminal justice system, the ability to ascertain innocence through DNA testing has saved the lives of people on death row. The examples are endless: technology plays a role in absolutely every aspect of our lives.

Technological Inequality

Some schools sport cutting-edge computer labs, while others sport barbed wire. Is your academic technology at the cusp of innovation, relatively disadvantaged, or somewhere in between? (Photo courtesy of Carlos Martinez/flickr)

As with any improvement to human society, not everyone has equal access. Technology, in particular, often creates changes that lead to ever greater inequalities. In short, the gap gets wider faster. This technological stratification has led to a new focus on ensuring better access for all.

There are two forms of technological stratification. The first is differential class-based access to technology in the form of the digital divide. This digital divide has led to the second form, a knowledge gap , which is, as it sounds, an ongoing and increasing gap in information for those who have less access to technology. Simply put, students in well-funded schools receive more exposure to technology than students in poorly funded schools. Those students with more exposure gain more proficiency, which makes them far more marketable in an increasingly technology-based job market and leaves our society divided into those with technological knowledge and those without. Even as we improve access, we have failed to address an increasingly evident gap in e-readiness —the ability to sort through, interpret, and process knowledge (Sciadas 2003).

Since the beginning of the millennium, social science researchers have tried to bring attention to the digital divide , the uneven access to technology among different races, classes, and geographic areas. The term became part of the common lexicon in 1996, when then Vice President Al Gore used it in a speech. This was the point when personal computer use shifted dramatically, from 300,000 users in 1991 to more than 10 million users by 1996 (Rappaport 2009). In part, the issue of the digital divide had to do with communities that received infrastructure upgrades that enabled high-speed Internet access, upgrades that largely went to affluent urban and suburban areas, leaving out large swaths of the country.

At the end of the twentieth century, technology access was also a big part of the school experience for those whose communities could afford it. Early in the millennium, poorer communities had little or no technology access, while well-off families had personal computers at home and wired classrooms in their schools. In the 2000s, however, the prices for low-end computers dropped considerably, and it appeared the digital divide was naturally ending. Research demonstrates that technology use and Internet access still vary a great deal by race, class, and age in the United States, though most studies agree that there is minimal difference in Internet use by adult men and adult women.

Data from the Pew Research Center (2011) suggests the emergence of yet another divide. As technological devices gets smaller and more mobile, larger percentages of minority groups (such as Latinos and African Americans) are using their phones to connect to the Internet. In fact, about 50 percent of people in these minority groups connect to the web via such devices, whereas only one-third of whites do (Washington 2011). And while it might seem that the Internet is the Internet, regardless of how you get there, there’s a notable difference. Tasks like updating a résumé or filling out a job application are much harder on a cell phone than on a wired computer in the home. As a result, the digital divide might mean no access to computers or the Internet, but could mean access to the kind of online technology that allows for empowerment, not just entertainment (Washington 2011).

Mossberger, Tolbert, and Gilbert (2006) demonstrated that the majority of the digital divide for African Americans could be explained by demographic and community-level characteristics, such as socioeconomic status and geographic location. For the Latino population, ethnicity alone, regardless of economics or geography, seemed to limit technology use. Liff and Shepard (2004) found that women, who are accessing technology shaped primarily by male users, feel less confident in their Internet skills and have less Internet access at both work and home. Finally, Guillen and Suarez (2005) found that the global digital divide resulted from both the economic and sociopolitical characteristics of countries.

Use of Technology and Social Media in Society by Individuals

Do you own an e-reader or tablet? What about your parents or your friends? How often do you check social media or your cell phone? Does all this technology have a positive or negative impact on your life? When it comes to cell phones, 67 percent of users check their phones for messages or calls even when the phone wasn’t ringing. In addition, “44% of cell owners have slept with their phone next to their bed because they wanted to make sure they didn’t miss any calls, text messages, or other updates during the night and 29% of cell owners describe their cell phone as ‘something they can’t imagine living without’” (Smith 2012).

While people report that cell phones make it easier to stay in touch, simplify planning and scheduling their daily activities, and increase their productivity, that’s not the only impact of increased cell phone ownership in the United States. Smith also reports that “roughly one in five cell owners say that their phone has made it at least somewhat harder to forget about work at home or on the weekends; to give people their undivided attention; or to focus on a single task without being distracted” (Smith 2012).

A new survey from the Pew Research Center reported that 73 percent of adults engage in some sort of social networking online. Facebook was the most popular platform, and both Facebook users and Instagram users check their sites on a daily basis. Over a third of users check their sites more than once a day (Duggan and Smith 2013).

With so many people using social media both in the United States and abroad, it is no surprise that social media is a powerful force for social change. You will read more about the fight for democracy in the Middle East embodied in the Arab Spring in Chapters 17 and 21, but spreading democracy is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to using social media to incite change. For example, McKenna Pope, a thirteen-year-old girl, used the Internet to successfully petition Hasbro to fight gender stereotypes by creating a gender-neutral Easy-Bake Oven instead of using only the traditional pink color (Kumar 2014). Meanwhile in Latvia, two twenty-three-year-olds used a U.S. State Department grant to create an e-petition platform so citizens could submit ideas directly to the Latvian government. If at least 20 percent of the Latvian population (roughly 407,200 people) supports a petition, the government will look at it (Kumar 2014).

Online Privacy and Security

As we increase our footprints on the web by going online more often to connect socially, share material, conduct business, and store information, we also increase our vulnerability to those with criminal intent. The Pew Research Center recently published a report that indicated the number of Internet users who express concern over the extent of personal information about them available online jumped 17 percent between 2009 and 2013. In that same survey, 12 percent of respondents indicated they had been harassed online, and 11 percent indicated that personal information, such as their Social Security number, had been stolen (Rainie, Kiesler, Kang, and Madden 2013).

Online privacy and security is a key organizational concern as well. Recent large-scale data breaches at retailers such as Target, financial powerhouses such as JP Morgan, the government health insurance site Healthcare.gov, and cell phone providers such as Verizon, exposed millions of people to the threat of identity theft when hackers got access to personal information by compromising website security.

For example, in late August 2014, hackers breached the iCloud data storage site and promptly leaked wave after wave of nude photos from the private accounts of actors such as Jennifer Lawrence and Kirsten Dunst (Lewis 2014). While large-scale data breaches that affect corporations and celebrities are more likely to make the news, individuals may put their personal information at risk simply by clicking a suspect link in an official sounding e-mail.

How can individuals protect their data? Numerous facts sheets available through the government, nonprofits, and the private sector outline common safety measures, including the following: become familiar with privacy rights; read privacy policies when making a purchase (rather than simply clicking “accept”); give out only the minimum information requested by any source; ask why information is being collected, how it is going to be used, and who will have access it; and monitor your credit history for red flags that indicate your identity has been compromised.

Net Neutrality

The issue of net neutrality, the principle that all Internet data should be treated equally by Internet service providers, is part of the national debate about Internet access and the digital divide. On one side of this debate is the belief that those who provide Internet service, like those who provide electricity and water, should be treated as common carriers, legally prohibited from discriminating based on the customer or nature of the goods. Supporters of net neutrality suggest that without such legal protections, the Internet could be divided into “fast” and “slow” lanes. A conflict perspective theorist might suggest that this discrimination would allow bigger corporations, such as Amazon, to pay Internet providers a premium for faster service, which could lead to gaining an advantage that would drive small, local competitors out of business.

The other side of the debate holds the belief that designating Internet service providers as common carriers would constitute an unreasonable regulatory burden and limit the ability of telecommunication companies to operate profitably. A functional perspective theorist might point out that, without profits, companies would not invest in making improvements to their Internet service or expanding those services to underserved areas. The final decision rests with the Federal Communications Commission and the federal government, which must decide how to fairly regulate broadband providers without dividing the Internet into haves and have-nots.

Technology is the application of science to address the problems of daily life. The fast pace of technological advancement means the advancements are continuous, but that not everyone has equal access. The gap created by this unequal access has been termed the digital divide. The knowledge gap refers to an effect of the digital divide: the lack of knowledge or information that keeps those who were not exposed to technology from gaining marketable skills.

Technology today is changing very rapidly and it is impossible to know everything. Ten years ago I felt I had a handle on most of the latest and greatest technologies for educators, but not anymore. Things are evolving at a rate that is hard to comprehend, but I don’t get upset with this notion because I have developed my own confidence that I can figure out anything if it is necessary. In other words, as educators we need to be self-reliant because no will be there to hold our hand as we go through our teaching career.

How does this apply to you?  Your future administrators will tell you to use certain technologies in the classroom and expect that you will figure out how to use them on your own. When faced with a technology challenge, I suggest you look for answers on your own before seeking assistance.

Some Suggestions On How To Be Self Reliant

Youtube – The answer to understanding new concepts, tasks, problems, challenges etc. may be found on Youtube. For example, if you didn’t know how to double space a Word document you could search Youtube for the answer.  There is no guarantee that you will find the right answer on Youtube, but if can often help you get started. When an education student asks me a question regarding something technology-related, the first thing I do is do a Youtube search for the answer.

Google – This is the old standby, but it still can help us figure out problems we are having with technology. Once again, there is a lot of misinformation online, but with regard to technology, there are are a lot of wonderful resources that can help you.

Your School’s Library – Your school’s library may have resources to help you find the answers you are looking for. Many librarians are technology savvy and may know the answer or at know how to find the answer.

Training Courses – Be proactive and ask for training. While other educators may complain that they can’t find answers, you should see if training is available.

Of course these suggestions aren’t the ‘end all, be all’, but it can help point you in the right direction before you run to your, supervisor, mentor teacher, professor, principal for advice.

One of the best qualities a student OR educator can have is the ability to be self-reliant. Learn how not rely on others to spoon feed you every step of the way. If you always need to be spoon fed information, you will NOT survive in today’s competitive technology-driven world.

• Introduction to Sociology 2e. Authored by : OpenStax CNX. Provided by : Download for free . Located at : http://cnx.org/contents/02040312-72c8-441e-a685-20e9333f3e1d/Introduction_to_Sociology_2e . License : CC BY: Attribution
• Jerome Bruner . Located at : https://brunerwiki.wikispaces.com/ . License : CC BY-SA: Attribution-ShareAlike

Using technology to empower students and turn them into critical thinkers

Mar 23, 2017

[[read-time]] min read

Editor’s note: Google for Education Premier Partners are working with schools to host the ExploreEDU event series , where schools can share their first-hand experiences with other educators. Today’s guest author is Kyle Black, a high school English teacher from First Philadelphia Preparatory Charter School , which hosted an ExploreEDU event on March 21-22 with Promevo . To see if there’s an event near you, visit the ExploreEDU site .

In a world dominated by technology, a good education depends on digital know-how—in addition to problem solving, clear communication and organizational skills. Students need both digital and soft skills to guide them through college, into the workplace and beyond.

In my five years on the job, here’s what I’ve learned about teaching a generation of students to use technology in responsible and impactful ways:

1. Empower students to take control of their learning

2. quiz students often to assess understanding.

3. Turn feedback into a critical thinking exercise

It’s common for students to accept a teacher’s revisions to their work without considering why specific changes are made. By making the feedback process interactive, students are encouraged to think critically before accepting edits at face value. For example, when I’m reviewing essays or creative writing, I often suggest incorrect or ridiculous changes using comments and suggested edits in Google Docs —and my students know this type of feedback is coming. Typically, half of my edits will require students to think deeply before hitting the “accept” button. It forces them to play a more active role in their learning, and to constantly challenge ideas.

I believe that teaching students digital and critical thinking skills matters more than teaching them how to ace a test. To prepare students for lifelong success, we must encourage them to brainstorm new ideas and embrace the new tools at their fingertips.

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A Self-Reflection Framework for Technology Use by Classroom Teachers of Young Learners

Sharla snider, ph.d texas woman’s university, usa sharon hirschy collin college, usa, peer-reviewed paper： vol 2, num 1 - june 2009.

This paper highlights the key components of a developmentally supportive approach to technology use and integration for teachers of young learners. The impact of electronic technology on the growth and development of the young child, professional positions on the use of technology by young children as well as research findings suggesting best practices are addressed. Specific consideration is given to the use of technology tools within classroom and home settings including a framework for self-reflection, shaped by standards promulgated by the International Society for Technology in Education. This framework is intended for classroom teachers to use in the decision-making process related to technology use and the young child. The information in this paper benefits early childhood professionals and preservice teachers in the following areas: classroom management, technology use within the curriculum, developmentally appropriate practice, and working with parents.

Framing Technology Use with Young Learners for Classroom Teachers

Technology can be defined as the use of tools and methods to create and produce. Technology has been around since the first person dug a hole using a stick. ‘Everyday technology’ (Carr, 2001), such as crayons, paper, and scissors, is universally accepted as positive for children’s development. However, the developmental appropriateness of electronic technologies, including TV, MP3 players, video games, and computers is questionable (Vandewater, et al., 2007). Today’s technological tools continue to evolve in increasing complexity, including modalities for usage. Children and youth spend more time with technology than most other pursuits, many times multi- tasking with more than one form of technology (Roberts & Foehr, 2008).

Emerging technologies provide more avenues for children to be involved in media. Technology that previously did not involve younger children has reached down into their midst. For example, virtual reality media Web sites like Webkinz, combined with the appeal of stuffed animals purchased at local stores, now offers greater access for pre-readers and is appealing to young children (Buckleitner, 2008; Hindo, 2007). Research findings (Downes, 2005; Marsh, 2004; Mitchell & Dunbar, 2006) and positions of professional groups (International Society for Technology in Education, 2007, 2008; National Association for the Education of Young Children, 1996; Southern Early Childhood Association, 2004) provide a beginning blueprint for integrating and monitoring technology use with young children while considering the realities of these powerful tools within the classroom and home environments.

In thinking about the evolution of these tools and in light of current tool usage by young children, several questions arise. What are the effects of current technology on a young child’s development? How can teachers assist children in using technology tools in ways that support natural inquiry and a fluidity in thinking and learning? What are the best methods to bridge the home-school connection to help parents in the decision-making process and use of technology in the home?

This paper explores these questions by reviewing research findings regarding the impact of technology on the growth and development of the young child from a ‘whole’ child perspective while specific to the cognitive, physical, and social-emotional developmental domains. Research findings as well as recommendations from professional organizations are utilized to present information on how early childhood professionals can adjust their use of technology tools to more fully support children in their care while bridging this support to the home environment. A framework constructed from these recommendations is presented for classroom teachers to use in self-reflection and the decision-making process related to technology use and the young child.

What are the Effects of Technology on a Young Child’s Development?

Physical development.

According to accepted reports, such as Zero to Six: Electronic Media in the Lives of Infants, Toddlers and Preschoolers , children under the age of 6 spend an average of two hours a day watching television – equivalent to the amount of time they spend playing outside, and more than they spend interacting with books (Rideout, Vandewater, & Wartella, 2003). Research suggests that young children who watch more television than that recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics (2001) manifest attention problems as they mature (Christakis et al., 2004) and they tend to have irregular sleep patterns (Thompson & Christakis, 2005). And yet, there are indications that almost half of children under 2 watch television, contrary to the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendations (Certain, Kahn, & Kahn, 2002).

In addition to possible attention and sleep problems caused by television use, research has linked obesity to the use of electronic media by young children (Dennison, Erb, & Jenkins, 2002; Faith, et al., 2001; Landhuis, Poulton, Welch, & Hancox, 2008). This link is perhaps the most alarming effect of the use of electronic media by today’s youth. Other forms of technology have also been scrutinized. Children’s use of MP3 players has caused concerns about hearing loss in young children who may use them inappropriately (Portnuff, 2006). In addition to possible hearing loss, electronic media can impact both large and small motor development. The use of computer and video games has been associated with problems of the neck, tendons, and associated muscle issues with the hands (Ramos, James, & Bear-Lehman, 2005). There are concerns about the ergonomics of the computer environment, such as improperly positioned computers and keyboards. The implications are that television, video games, and computer usage by children can have negative consequences and that such usage must be carefully monitored (Healy, 2004).

Are there any positive effects on physical development? There can be. Positive effects of the use of computers on eye-hand coordination have been reported (Li & Atkins, 2004; Nir-Gal & Klein, 2004; Plowman & Stephen, 2005). Other positive effects include the use of children’s music, television programming, and videos that encourage dancing and movement as children watch television. Findings indicate a positive effect on young children’s physical activity and motivation to become engaged through and by electronic media (Zachopoulou, Tsapakidou, & Derri, 2004). It is clear that while there can be positive effects, most of the research gives significant cause to be concerned and highlights the need to monitor carefully children’s use of electronic media to enhance physical development.

Social-Emotional Development

There is evidence that the use of computers with partners or in small groups correlates with increases in positive and more elaborate dramatic play, social interactions, and problem-solving (Brooker & Siraj-Blatchford, 2002; Lomangino, Nicholson, & Sulzby, 1999). Children build connections and share experiences when sharing computers and interacting together. They also benefit socially, emotionally, and cognitively from shared interactions when teachers are involved with children while using technology (Plowman & Stephen, 2007).

Children see computers as both play and learning tools (Yelland, 1999) and use them as such. A lack of appropriate guidance from teachers and the creation of inappropriate computer learning environments do not support the optimal environment that encourages developmental play (Olgun, Bayhan, & Yelland, 2002; Plowman & Stephen, 2005, 2007) Classrooms where children’s learning is supported and facilitated appropriately and where they are encouraged to solve problems and work together using developmentally appropriate software provides positive social benefits for children (Tsantis, Bewick, & Thouvenelle, 2003). Teachers should guard against situations that promote a lack of activity or interaction between children such as the use of headphones while at the computer or the overuse of television.

The American Academy of Pediatrics strongly recommends against television and computers usage for children under 2. However, adults who care for children do not always follow this advice. A widely referenced report (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2006) indicated that 61 percent of children under 2 use electronic media and 42 percent watch every day. Parents report that media has become a critical tool in busy homes, enabling parents to complete domestic tasks while the children watch television. These parents state that their children learn from educational television and videos and they are a necessary component of family life.

Vandewater, Bickham, and Lee (2006) found that the more time children spent watching television, the less time they interacted with the family – particularly with infants and toddlers – and the less time they spent in creative play. Perhaps a proper understanding of the consequences of television watching for young children is absent. Or perhaps there are other components of children’s television habits that actually contribute in different ways to healthy functioning in our current society, both in the home and school setting.

There is one area that all experts seem to agree on: the negative effects of violence on young children. Violent media, including movies, TV, video games, and music, correlate with lower self-esteem, verbal and physical aggression, and poorer outcomes for children (Anderson et al., 2003; Anderson, Carnagey & Eubanks, 2003; Carnagey et al., 2007; Fleming & Rickwood, 2001; Funk, Buchman & Germann 2000). The younger the child, the more effects violent media has on growth and development (Paik & Comstock, 1994). It is critical that exposure to violent media is limited. Children’s emotional and social development is tied to the interactions around them. If their interactions occur primarily with media only, particularly violent media, there may be negative consequences for physical and mental development (Healy, 2004). However, when children engage and interact with others through various forms of media, emotional and social development may be enhanced (Downes, 2005; Marsh 2004; Mitchell & Dunbar, 2006). The defining variable relates to media that promotes a positive, non-violent context. Additionally, interactions with supportive adults while engaging with this type of media can have positive implications (Hill, 2004; Downes, 2002).

Cognitive Development

When examining the effects of technology on cognitive development, it becomes apparent that the type of technology exposure makes a difference. Young children can gain cognitively from child-oriented educational and informational programs through all forms of electronic broadcasts (Moses, 2008). Children over the age of 2 exposed to these types of modalities perform better on cognitive tests and achieve more in academic endeavors in school than those who do not watch such programs (Wright et al., 2001). There is a vast amount of research available on educational television programs such as Sesame Street (Fisch, 2004; Garrsion & Christakis, 2005; Moran, 2006). The research indicates that most educational television provides positive outcomes for children. However, there seems to be a critical mass. Too much of any type of television appears to be problematic. There are also indications that children who watch general television programming do less well academically (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2005). Children over the age of 2 demonstrate larger vocabularies and expressive language when exposed to certain types of television programming. Programs such as Dragon Tales , Blue’s Clues , Clifford , and Arthur , that talk and interact more directly with child viewers were correlated with an increase while other types of programming, such as Teletubbies in which little language is used were correlated with lower language development (Linebarger & Walker, 2005).

Appropriate computer usage also makes a difference. According to Vernadakis, Avgerinos, Tsitskari, and Zachopoulou (2005): “Results demonstrated a significant contribution of computer use in the classroom as a learning tool” (p. 103). Children with access to computers in child- or home-care situations show greater academic and cognitive ability including flexibility, abstract thinking, and vocabulary – as long as the software is open-ended (Nir-Gal & Klein, 2004; Shields & Berham, 2000).

However, the same correlation with cognitive ability is not found for video and electronic games (Li & Atkins, 2004). Children’s literacy and writing abilities are enhanced by open-ended software, such as Kid Pix and Kidspiration , along with appropriate scaffolding by teachers and parents (Boltman & Druin, 2001; Goldberg, Russell, & Cook, 2003). Children who can use a program to tell or create stories benefit from their use. Learning centers, where there are open-ended (rather than drill-and-practice) software and opportunities to explore the computer, provide positive cognitive outcomes (Plowman & Stephen, 2005). Teachers who incorporate computers in the classroom and who provide adult support and interactive experiences with other children, provide an enriched learning environment for children (Mitchell & Dunbar, 2006). It appears critical, however, that teachers take an active role.

Professional Positions

Based on current research findings, position statements have been made by many leading organizations concerned with the development and learning of young children. The American Academy of Pediatrics (2001) has released several position statements relating to different forms of media and their use with young children. The Academy advises that children over the age of 2 should watch no more than two hours of television a day. Children under 2 should not watch any television. They have been particularly vocal in expressing concerns about the impact of media on obesity in young children (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2003) issuing a public policy statement warning of the risks of obesity for children heavily engaged in the use of electronic technology and encouraging parents to remove television from children’s bedrooms and to limit media usage.

One leading professional organization focused on the care and education of young children is the National Association for the Education of Young Children. In 1996, this organization issued a position statement recognizing both the positive and negative influences that media have on children’s development (NAEYC, 1996). Its conclusions were that it is the responsibility of teachers and parents to be informed and controlling of their children’s media use and that technology should be used in ways that are appropriate to the developmental level of the child. This professional organization holds firm to its position and uses this statement to govern best practices today as evidenced by a recent publication by this organization (NAEYC, 2008).

In 1998, the International Society for Technology in Education presented standards for students and teachers that identify how technology should be used with student and what students should know. These standards have been further refined to address the complexities of emerging technologies and rapidly changing technology in the report “National Educational Technology Standards for Students: The Next Generation (ISTE, 2007). What students should know and be able to do to learn effectively and live productively in an increasingly digital world.” Among the foundation of these standards are guiding elements and performance indicators for all learners no matter the age, such as:

• creativity and innovation
• communication and collaboration
• research and information fluency
• critical thinking and problem solving
• digital citizenship
• technology operations and concepts

These standards for students were followed in a recent publication from this organization with parallel standards as well as performance indicators for teachers. These standards and indicators focus on the use technology as both teaching and learning tools (ISTE, 2008) while keeping involved in the forward momentum that is technological evolution in an information age.

The importance of standards of practice for educators and parents is evident in the fact that the leading professional organizations in pediatrics, early childhood education, and educational technology have all developed statements. It is clear that children are being affected significantly through their interactions with electronic media at increasingly younger ages. Teachers and parents can help make this a positive impact. Given the current research findings and professional positions regarding the use of technology by children under the age of 8, specific recommendations to teachers and parents can be made.

Implications for Supporting Young Learners in the Classroom

As supported through the tenets of appropriate practice of educating young children, a wide variety of experiences, including the use of electronic technologies, are paramount. Young children benefit from a constructivist approach to learning that emphasizes the processes inherent in any learning situation as they construct their own understandings. This approach advocates for classroom environments and curricula rich with a wide variety of activities and meaningful opportunities to manipulate, collaborate, and investigate the natural phenomena that constitute their world. Teachers can include technological tools and the access to information they provide as a part of the natural learning environment, especially when children seek solutions to authentic problems. Integration of technology into the curriculum rather than as a curriculum ‘add-on’ is key to constructivist teaching and learning. Critical to this integration is a mindfulness to provide equal access to both genders while employing sensitivity to the benefits for learners with exceptional needs.

A Reflective Framework

While many teachers are aware of these suggestions, this task is not always easily accomplished. Daily, teachers must examine what they want children to learn and what children want to learn and incorporate technology as one of many tools to accomplish those goals. Technology should be one of many methods employed, one that is equally important, not more or less, as the use of dramatic play and other manipulatives in a classroom. The main question teachers should ask is: How can I assist children in using technology tools in ways that support natural inquiry and help them become more fluid in their thinking and learning?

To answer this question, teacher can check to see if they are: (1) providing a wide variety of experiences; (2) solving authentic problems; and (3) ensuring equal and supportive access. The following questions are offered as a self- reflection framework to ensure that teachers meet the technical realities of children living in an information age.

Providing a Wide Variety of Experiences:

• Have I chosen media that involve multiple senses and diverse learning styles and perspectives?
• Are the computers in my classroom established within learning centers in which children can explore and utilize the tools independently and collaboratively?
• Am I selecting software that bridges real-world connections?
• Am I overusing drill and practice software programs?
• Have I provided a variety of technology, including computers, electronic games, online content, digital cameras, tape recorders, music, and video as part of the natural learning environment?
• Am I aware of my own technological limitations and am I working to ensure I don’t transfer these to the learning opportunities in my classroom?
• Am I aware of the realities of what young children do and do not know about technology in their own worlds both outside and inside the classroom?

Solving Authentic Problems:

• Am I offering opportunities to use a wide variety of resources, including electronic modalities, while solving authentic problems?
• Do I model and encourage my students to use the computer as a tool for learning?
• Am I using the computer as part of the “real work” or as a reward after the “real work” is completed?
• Do I integrate technology use with classroom instruction matching the use to classroom objectives?
• Do I limit the use of television, videos, and other electronic media to instances when it is appropriate for the classroom objectives?
• Do I communicate with parents regarding any media that has been utilized?

Ensuring Access – Equal and Supportive:

• Have I selected software that supports student collaboration instead of competition? Collaboration supports learning and social interaction. Software that works from a competitive nature distracts students by focusing on extrinsic values.
• Have I allowed for equitable computer time and use of other technology for all students, paying attention to children who do not get to work with these tools?
• Have I identified adaptive devices to assist children with special needs?
• Am I current on professional development? Do I have a plan?
• Have I let my administrator know of my specific needs so that I can make technology work in my classroom for students?
• Do I expect professional development to support my own learning?
• Am I familiar with the philosophy and mission statements of the various educational organizations regarding technology and young children?
• Do I use this information to engage peers, parents, and administrators?

Thinking of Tools within Classroom Contexts

Often it is necessary to “see” what the various uses of technology “look like” in the reality of the classroom. This provides a stronger conceptualization to a guiding framework. Imagine this: You have entered a preschool classroom where several children are gathered around a computer talking animatedly about the elements they want to include in the picture they are designing. In the center of the room, a few children use a digital camera to take a picture of the tower they just built. A small group of children gathers with the teacher around a computer where she is showing a video clip of a cow being milked and talking about it with them. The children become excited about what happens to the milk after it leaves the cow. The teacher starts to capture the children's comments and questions in a word-processing document while they talk. From this list, she helps them compose questions to send to the "Ask the Scientist" Web site. Later, she arranges a virtual field trip to a dairy farm for her students and begins structuring the child-initiated class project.

You leave this room and enter the classroom next door. Here, children are engaged in individual and small group activities including a center-based exploration of natural objects collected that morning. The teacher uses a digital camera to take pictures of completed work on the wall. A child interrupts to inquire about one of the nature objects. The teacher provides the child with the correct term for the object and continues to take pictures of the completed class work. The classroom computer, covered with a dust cloth, sits on a table behind the teacher’s desk.

Many preschoolers know how to use technology. Even when they are not focused on the tools themselves, this awareness is a part of the development of their sense of self within various contexts (Downes, 2005). The way that children use language gives us clues on how they make sense of their world. Listening in on the first classroom you might hear children talking about ’burning’ a CD to save their creations or ’Googling’ an idea on the computer to increase their depth of inquiry. They are giving new meanings to words being used to help understand and utilize technology (Labbo, 2005; McGee et al., 2006).

In the second classroom, you see technology being used by the adult to document learning. The technology is used solely by the teacher rather than as a meaningful learning tool with the child as part of the decision-making process that is learning. The teacher could have improved the learning situation by engaging in conversation with the child and connecting the child's question to the natural objects they collected. He could have extended this opportunity for learning even further through the use of technology to further explore the child’s question.

These examples highlight not only the missed and embraced opportunities of using technology tools to create inquiry and document learning but also the changing nature of the context itself. Technology today is in every part of children’s lives in increasingly accessible forms with multi-functional and interactive features (Plowman & Stephen, 2005; Vanderwater et al., 2007). Yet, many times, these tools are absent or misused within the preschool classroom. These tools can also be misused in the home environment, but rarely are they absent. At home, children watch television, play video games, care for electronic pets, and use the computer to expand beyond the walls of their homes. Many young children extend the care of a favorite stuffed animal by creating realities and identities online through social networks such as Club Penguin . It is hard to compete with these novelties, if competition is warranted, to motivate children to learn. There are strategies that teachers can use as part of their personal framework to support parents in the use of technology in the home while building connections between the classroom and the home environment.

Supporting Parents in Using Technology in the Home

What are the best methods to bridge the home-school connection in relationship to supporting parents in the decision making process and use of technology? Teachers can help parents understand the importance of using technology to support literacy and overall development while setting realistic goals and expectations (Shields & Berham, 2000). Most importantly, teachers can help parents understand the importance of balancing technology use, including ‘screen time’, with meaningful opportunities for active engagement in learning. It is equally important for teachers to consider the social-cultural context of the home (Siu & Lam, 2005) when making recommendations.

When thinking about how to advise parents on technology use with sensitivity to the home culture, it is useful to answer two frequent questions: (1) how will technology impact and/or improve my child’s thinking and learning? and (2) what technology should we use at home? It is important to help parents understand that these tools do not replace more traditional tools, like crayons, clay, and blocks. Rather, these can be used together with media to enrich and support the learning and creative process.

Impact on Child’s Thinking and Learning

Teachers can help parents to understand that television exposure before age 2 can be detrimental to a child’s language development (Zimmerman, Christakis, & Meltzoff, 2007). They can also teach parents how to provide opportunities for children over 2 to get involved with education television and video programs, particularly those that encourage activity. Some programs, such as Sesame Street routinely present segments that invite children to get up and move or dance. Many programs, such as Dora the Explorer and Blues Clues (Linebarger & Walker, 2005) engage children by having characters act as if they are speaking to the child, which involves them and improves vocabulary. In keeping with the recommendations of various professional organizations, teachers should stress the importance of monitoring the amount of television and video programs that children watch and balancing these activities with active learning experiences.

It has been suggested that the use of developmentally supportive software can enhance school readiness for young children (Li Atkins & Stanton, 2006). In helping parents choose supportive software for use at home, teachers can provide reviews by early childhood professionals. Many times, the library media specialist or technology liaison within the school setting can be a valuable resource for this information.

The most important consideration is that teachers should help parents learn to rely on recommendations of experts as these can facilitate the purchase of software that is purposeful and appropriate. The type of software that teachers help parents choose and the way they engage the child are also critical (Plowman & Stephen, 2005). Open-ended software allows the child to make more than one choice and attain more than one outcome. Programs that use drawing allow children to make a variety of choices and that send children along different paths in the software depending on their choices are open-ended programs. Much of today’s software is drill-and-practice, where there is one right answer and the child receives a ‘reward’ – usually in the form of a new game, or a character commenting ’good job’. These software packages may be quite visually attractive with a variety of experiential activities, but they encourage limited problem-solving. Open-ended software allows children to use their imagination and encourages the use of creativity.

Technology Tools to Use at Home

Teachers can help parents become familiar with the technology services offered by schools and what policies are in place for technology use. If aware of the manner in which these tools are utilized in the schools as well as the content children are investigating, parents can be better software consumers and improve the ways they utilize Internet access and other technology. Parental appeal and/or the latest fads should not drive technology purchases or the manner in which young children are given access. Teachers can model communication with electronic tools by providing information and interactivity with parents through school web sites, class blogs, and wikis. Parents should be encouraged to involve their young children in daily activities that rely on technology in the home, using these opportunities to discuss how and why those tools are used.

At the same time, parents should monitor the use of electronic tools and media by young children to ensure safe and appropriate use and exposure to content. It is paramount that teachers help parents understand the importance of ensuring their child is safe from offensive and violent programming and Internet concerns. Without supervision, a child could be unintentionally exposed to inappropriate Web sites and media images not conducive to healthy social-emotional development (Anderson et al., 2003; Anderson & Pempek, 2005).

Young children should receive exposure to the tools of their world within all of the contexts of their daily experiences. They are exposed to computers at school, and to computers, digital devices, and televisions daily in their homes. Early childhood professionals and informed parents can make a positive difference in the lives of children by knowing how to utilize technology appropriately and support young children’s use of electronic media. Developmentally appropriate uses of technology enhance children’s physical, intellectual, emotional, and social development, but when technology is used inappropriately, children suffer negative consequences.

The question is not whether technology affects children, but how can we scaffold children’s experiences in ways that create positive effects on their development? The home and school of today are enriched by many elements of electronic media and technology tools that increase opportunities for communication. These tools can be used in positive ways, such as in the first part of the classroom scenario, to support student development. This depends on the manner in which teachers and parents provide developmentally supportive and appropriate experiences while being cognizant of the need for children to experience all the tools of their world. By using a framework, such as the one presented in this article, teachers can use ongoing self-reflection to move closer to the successful use of technology with young learners.

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Empowering Students Through Technology: Teaching Strategies for Digital Literacy

In today’s world, technology plays a significant role in education. Teachers need to incorporate technology in their teaching to help students become digitally literate, a skill that is essential for success in the 21st century. Digital literacy refers to the ability to use technology effectively, understand and evaluate information, and communicate and collaborate with others. This article aims to explore teaching strategies that educators can use to empower students through technology and enhance their digital literacy skills.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Benefits of Technology in Education

Integrating technology in education offers several benefits to both students and teachers. For students, technology provides access to a vast amount of information, making learning more engaging and personalized. Students can also collaborate with their peers and teachers in real time, providing a more interactive and dynamic learning experience. For teachers, technology enables them to differentiate instruction and provide feedback in a more efficient and effective way. Additionally, technology allows teachers to track and assess student progress, identify areas for improvement, and tailor instruction to meet the needs of individual students.

Teaching Strategies for Digital Literacy

1. project-based learning.

Project-based learning (PBL) is a teaching strategy that emphasizes real-world problem-solving skills and encourages students to collaborate, think critically, and communicate effectively. PBL can be enhanced through the use of technology, allowing students to research, create, and present their projects using digital tools. By integrating technology in PBL, students can develop digital literacy skills, such as evaluating online sources, creating multimedia presentations, and collaborating with peers using online tools.

2. Flipped Classroom

The flipped classroom model is a teaching strategy that reverses the traditional classroom model, with students watching videos or reading materials outside of class and engaging in collaborative activities and discussions during class time. The flipped classroom model can be enhanced through the use of technology, allowing students to access instructional materials online and collaborate with their peers using online tools. This teaching strategy provides students with the flexibility to learn at their own pace, promotes active learning and critical thinking, and enables teachers to provide personalized feedback to individual students.

3. Gamification

Gamification is a teaching strategy that uses game-based elements to make learning more engaging and enjoyable. By integrating technology in gamification, students can access educational games and simulations that help them develop digital literacy skills, such as problem-solving, critical thinking, and decision-making. Gamification can also be used to promote collaboration among students and provide them with opportunities to compete and earn rewards for their achievements.

4. Digital Storytelling

Digital storytelling is a teaching strategy that combines storytelling with digital media, allowing students to create multimedia narratives using text, images, and videos. By integrating technology into digital storytelling, students can develop digital literacy skills, such as creating and editing multimedia content, evaluating online sources, and communicating effectively. Digital storytelling can also be used to promote collaboration among students and provide them with opportunities to share their stories with others.

Implementing Technology in Education

While the benefits of technology in education are clear, implementing technology in the classroom requires careful planning and consideration. Here are some key factors to keep in mind when implementing technology in education:

1. Access to Technology

Before implementing technology in the classroom, educators need to ensure that students have access to the necessary technology. This includes hardware such as computers and tablets, as well as software and online tools. Additionally, educators need to consider issues of equity and ensure that all students have equal access to technology, regardless of their background or socioeconomic status.

2. Teacher Training and Support

Integrating technology in the classroom requires teachers to have the necessary training and support to use technology effectively. Educators need to be familiar with the technology they are using, understand how to integrate it into their teaching, and be able to troubleshoot any technical issues that may arise. Providing teachers with ongoing professional development and support can help ensure the successful integration of technology in the classroom.

3. Curriculum Alignment

Technology should be used as a tool to enhance the curriculum, rather than as a replacement for traditional teaching methods. Educators need to align the use of technology with learning objectives and ensure that technology is used in a meaningful and purposeful way. This can be achieved by carefully selecting digital tools and resources that align with the curriculum and provide opportunities for students to develop digital literacy skills.

4. Digital Citizenship and Online Safety

Incorporating technology in education also requires a focus on digital citizenship and online safety. Educators need to teach students how to use technology responsibly and ethically, including issues such as online privacy, cyberbullying, and digital footprints. Additionally, educators need to ensure that students are using technology in a safe and secure manner, including implementing appropriate security measures and monitoring student activity online.

Technology has the potential to transform education and provide students with a more engaging and personalized learning experience. However, the successful integration of technology in the classroom requires careful planning and consideration. By providing students with access to technology, providing teachers with training and support, aligning technology with the curriculum, and promoting digital citizenship and online safety, educators can empower students to develop the digital literacy skills they need to succeed in the 21st century.

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Are Students Becoming Too Reliant on Technology?

The internet has been hailed as one of the greatest inventions of the modern age; a magical gateway to information, communication and resources unlike anything we could previously have dreamed of. Many have claimed that it is the greatest single technological advance for education, as it opens up opportunities for studying, discovering and learning that were hitherto unimaginable. But as time goes by and the first generation of students to truly grow up with modern internet technology from birth reach their teenage years, some have started to question whether students’ over-reliance on technology could be more of a burden than a blessing…

The internet provides students with the enormous advantage of a world of information at their fingertips. The simple act of tapping a search term into a keyboard can deliver a Google-selected list of hundreds of relevant articles in under a second – a far cry from the hours students would spend leafing through library books and journals in days gone by.

But with the internet’s ease of access come disadvantages too – false and inaccurate information is easily disseminated and it can be difficult to accurately trace sources or corroborate information. Meanwhile, the sheer volume of research materials online can make it ‘too easy’ for students to find the information they need, allowing them to compile an entire roster of facts by copying and pasting without actually having to understand or analyse the information they are sifting through at all. Whilst a student twenty years ago would have had to read and digest a huge amount of information in order to put together a report on tree frogs, for example, using different sources for different parts of the project, a modern student would be able to discover everything they needed to know from a single internet site, picking up little knowledge in the process.

Communication

With the rise and rise of fantastic technological solutions for communication, from mobile phones to iPads to Skype and Facebook, a wealth of education opportunities have become available to modern students. Pupils from UK secondary schools can now hold online debates with a class of their contemporaries in the United States or beyond, whilst projects like class blogs, interactive group webpages and programs to design interactive online animations have allowed educational communication to blossom.

But at the same time, some argue that the over-reliance of modern teenagers on technology and devices such as mobile phones and laptops is taking its toll in other areas of education. Literacy and writing skills are said to be suffering as children write less and less longhand and text message expressions take precedence over traditional grammar. Simple communication skills and vital understanding of personal interaction are also said to be suffering , as young people spend increasing amounts of time online and communicate using their keyboards rather than face-to-face. Reliance on such methods of communication could be deeply detrimental to their ability to form healthy relationships with others in the long-run, concerned critics say, whilst they also open up dangerous possibilities of cyber-bullying and the persecution of young people online.

Another major flaw of teenagers’ over-reliance on modern technology is the ease with which students are able to plagiarise others’ work, whether intentionally or even without realising it. The more students come to rely on Wikipedia and Google to answer their homework questions, the less they are required to use their own minds to come up with independent thoughts and opinions. Instead, they are able to simply click, copy and paste.

The Solution?

It is clearly facetious to suggest the abandonment of technology in education, as the wealth of opportunities it provides to students is undeniable. But perhaps as we teach our children to use their electronic devices and internet access to learn and discover, we should also concentrate on encouraging them to develop as far as possible in other arenas too . E-communication is a fantastic resource but it should not be a substitute for face-to-face interaction and time spent outside with friends. Online research is an invaluable tool, but should be complimented by studying in libraries and reading books as well. And interactive learning and online teaching can be brilliant experiences, but they must not replace the vital dialogue and bond between teacher and pupil. By ensuring that our students remain educated in interpersonal and ‘real-world’ skills as well as electronic know-how, we can best prepare them to make the most of the opportunities technology has to offer without suffering any of the potentially detrimental consequences.

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Creating Self-Reliant Opportunities through Enterpreneurial and Functional Educational Technology: A Panacea for Nigeria's Youth Unemployment

2014, Journal of Education and Practice

In this rapidly changing world, the quest for self-reliance through education has always been the desire of many nations especially in the present face of global economic challenge. This has triggers many countries of the world to re-evaluate their position and question their roles as nations and consider investing heavily in education. Consequently, repeated call for massive reform of current educational practices has consistently been the dream of many Nigerians and has resulted in an increasing recognition of entrepreneurial and functional educational technology as a panacea to the clarion call. This paper examined the concepts of entrepreneurship and functional educational technology. It further highlighted how Nigeria youth unemployment can be solved through entrepreneurial and functional educational technology as well as the entrepreneurship skills in a functional educational technology for self reliance. Keywords: Innovations, Creativity, Self -reliance, entrepreneurship

Related Papers

Jonathan Ishaya

Abstract This paper titled “The role of Entrepreneurship education and technology in the development of education in Nigeria” aimed at unveiling the potential of entrepreneurship education and technology in economic development of Nigeria. Since entrepreneurship is a key driver to every economic development, therefore there is need for entrepreneurship education in all educational institutions most especial the tertiary institutions in the country. The paper ex-rayed the challenges of entrepreneurship education and the need for technological development in Nigeria. It was concluded that focusing on the development of a skilled workforce and the expansion of human capacities through high quality systems of entrepreneurship education which is fundamental for helping youths and graduates to be self-employed and stop depending solely on white collar jobs. Recommendations were made based on the fact that the Vice Chancellors, Rectors and Provost overseeing the affairs of the universities, polytechnics and colleges of education should invest massively in training of specialists in the field of entrepreneurship educations and the federal government should give more concern to technological advancement to our country through entrepreneurship education. KEYWORDS: Entrepreneurship education, technological Advancement, Tertiary institutions, Economic development.

ANYEBE MONDAY

One of the biggest challenges of Nigeria today is youth unemployment. Nigeria, being the giant of Africa has the largest number of youths who are yet to be properly mobilized and empowered for gainful economic activities. This can only be tackled through Entrepreneurship Education which involves teaching and learning of the needed skills, values, attitudes and knowledge that equip one to become self-reliant through being a good citizen who is an effective manager, value agent and risk bearer of business undertakings. Therefore, this paper discusses Entrepreneurship education and unemployment reduction in Nigeria, problems facing education and its graduate and ways of addressing this problems so that our national and human resources will be properly employed for economic emancipation, so as to turn our youths into job creators and not job seekers.

Happy james

International Journal of Teaching and Education

Joshua Mamman

International Journal of Advanced Academic Research

Akinpade Oyejoke

In a developing nation, entrepreneurship education has been and would likewise continue to be a great economic stimulation to serve as a remedy to the youth unemployment in Nigeria. This paper focused on entrepreneurship education as a remedy to youth unemployment. Some issues discussed include the youth unemployment, causes of youth unemployment, effects of youth unemployment, the concepts of entrepreneur, importance of entrepreneurship education as a remedy to youth employment, as well as often encountered challenges of entrepreneurial education and the strategies/solutions for effective entrepreneurship education. On the basis of these and other auxiliary discourses, conclusion was reached and recommendations were raised for consideration. These include a call for all stakeholders to allow the entrepreneurship education to reach out to the youth, regardless of theirethnic, cultural, religious, geographical or political affiliations by establishing good scheme aimed at encouraging...

Chidiogo Okpara

Introduction: In Nigeria, unemployment is a very serious problem combating all the states. Although accurate statistical data are lacking, local media reports however indicate that half of the Nigerian population of about 150 million are youths and that about 95% of them are unemployed. Idleness, decadence of economic stagnation and poverty have driven a large percentage of them into robbery, prostitution and violence. Nwachukwu and Nwamuo (2010) noted that when youths are not gainfully employed either in the public or private sector of the economy, they become very vulnerable to criminalities such as kidnapping, armed robbery, and many other social vices which are a menace to the society. In the same vain Ewumi, and Owoyale (2012) noted that one of the many pressing challenges facing Nigeria today is youths unemployment with the ripple effect of their resort to violent crime. All forms of antisocial vices are traceable to the unemployed youths. In order to address this issue of unemployment, the Federal as well as the State governments have made some efforts through some agencies by creating skills acquisition programmes, yet many graduates and even postgraduates degree holders are still parading fine and quality certificates without employment either by public or private organizations. As a result of this, the importance of entrepreneurship development of the economy has received increased attention in Nigeria in the recent time. The Federal Government of Nigeria since 1960 has put in place different kind of institutional frame work to promote small scale enterprises in the country. These include the establishment of industrial development centers (IDCS), the Small Scale Industries Credit Scheme (SSICS), Credit Guidelines to Financial Institution (CGFI), Working For Yourself/Entrepreneurship Development Programme (WFYP/EDP), National Economic Reconstruction Fund (NERF) and the Endorsement of Micro-finance Banking System (EMBS) whose duty is to give loans to enable their customers establish small scale businesses. All these are geared towards the promotion of entrepreneurship. Entrepreneurship, in this context, is seen as the process of discovering new ways of combining resources and becoming aware of business ownership as an option or viable alternative, by developing ideas for business; learning the process of becoming a business owner, undertaking the training to acquire the skills required to establish and develop business. It includes the practical application of enterprising qualities such as initiative, innovation, creativity and risk-taking into the work environment (either in self employment or employment in small start-up firms) using appropriate skills necessary for success in that environment and culture. The entrepreneur is often referred to as the agent of social, economic and technological development. The formal processes of equipping the entrepreneur with necessary insight and skill are through formal education, entrepreneurial training and development. Training is considered as the organized procedure by which people learn knowledge and/or skills for definite purpose (Bench, 1975). The objective of training is to cause changes in behaviour of the trained. It should be noted that training means to guide someone through instruction and drill for skills acquisition. Learning is another related concept which means the human process by which skills, knowledge, habits and attitudes are acquired and utilized in such a way that behaviour is modified. Thus education as used here is inclusive of training and learning process (Ogundele & Kio, 2002) and the essence of these training is for development. Development at the individual level according to Rodney (2005) is the increase in skill and capacity, greater freedom, creativity, self-discipline responsibility and material well being. The achievement of any of these aspects of personal development is directly related to the state of the society as a whole. At the level of social groups, development implies an increasing capacity to regulate both internal and external relationship. Rodney (2005) is of the view that the tool with which men work and the manner in which they organise their labour are important indices of social development. He further noted that development when used exclusively in economic sense, refers to how members of a society increase, jointly exercise their capacity for subduing the environment. Capacity here is dependent on the extent to which they understand the laws of nature (science), technological know-how and organisation of work which are assisted by the processes of formal education,

Udeme Usanga

Nigeria's growing unemployment situation and how it increasingly dwindle the growth and development potentials of the country is worrisome. Official figures from the Bureau of statistics that 20% (about 30million), which still did not include 40million other Nigerian youths captured in World Bank statistics in 2009, are unemployed. This means that out of the 150 million Nigerians, 50% are unemployed, or worse still, at least 71% of Nigerian youths are unemployed. This paper focuses on tackling unemployment through entrepreneurship education as the way to get out of joblessness and poverty in Nigeria. It examined the role and contributions of entrepreneurial education, mindset and skills development to employment generation in Akwa Ibom and Ebonyi States, Nigeria. It is obvious from the paper that youths found great value in skills acquisition because the fight against poverty cannot be won by just receiving money from rich people every day, rather take from them wealth-job creating skills for self-sustenance. Government should make entrepreneurship sellable to the people by inculcating it into the educational curriculum at every strata of the educational sector from the primary school to tertiary levels and those that have dropped-out-of formal employment and also utilize a re-modeled NYSC scheme to educate the youths more on the importance, essence and need for entrepreneurship development especially on a practical basis and then find a means of supporting these entrepreneurship projects cutting across all spheres of the country. Government should also create enabling environment for entrepreneurship to thrive by ensuring social security and adequate infrastructural facilities.

International Journal of Academic Management Science Research (IJAMSR) ISSN: 2643-900X Vol. 7 Issue 3, March - 2023, Pages: 55-58

Akinpelu Kolade

The study examined the relationship between entrepreneurship education and unemployment among the youth in Nigeria. It adopts a descriptive research design which was conducted randomly among the selected final year students in the Faculty of Business and Management Studies which consist of three departments namely Accountancy, Banking and Finance, and Business Administration and Management. The questionnaire was the major instrument used to gather the relevant information. The study revealed that entrepreneurship was found to be positive and significant in reducing unemployment among the youth if properly implemented and therefore conclude that skill acquisition through entrepreneurship education should be a continuous process in the curriculum of higher institutions of learning in Nigeria in an attempt to reduce the level at which graduates wait endlessly for white collar jobs that do not exist and government should provide an enabling environment through the provision of security, electricity, and availability of raw materials that will promote the local production of good and serve as encouragement for the young entrepreneurs.

GRADUATE RESEARCH PAPER

WAHAB F A T A I Kayode

The development of a nation is a function of the level of the resourcefulness of the people which to a great extent, relates to the level of quality of education in that nation. Such progress or development could only occur when an individual in the society is economically engaged and per capital income is enhanced. This could only be possible when government educational policies are geared towards a functional education that can lead to job creation and also self reliance. Entrepreneurship education is a means through which government could attain such development in the society. Therefore, this paper examines how the role of entrepreneurship education and how it could help in job creation in Nigeria. The challenges of quality entrepreneurship education were also discussed. This research work, therefore examined the need for entrepreneurial education as a tool for reducing unemployment rate among secondary school students and the study was carried out in selected secondary schools within Asa L.G.A of Kwara State. The objectives of the study were to investigate the need for entrepreneurship education and its significance in the reduction of unemployment rate among secondary school students in Asa L.G.A of Kwara State. And also to determine the strength of entrepreneurship education in developing the entrepreneurial skills. The methodology adopted was a mixed analysis of quantitative and qualitative parameters based on the survey design which relied on primary and secondary sources of gathering data, through the use of questionnaires. One hundred and sixty five (165) questionnaires were administered. The study adopted simple random sampling technique. The data was analyzed and presented using tables and percentages. The findings of this study suggests that there should be a paradigm shift from general education to entrepreneurship education in the present realities for the need to develop entrepreneurial skills, empower Nigerian youths and create business opportunities particularly for secondary school graduates and at the same time ameliorate some socio-economic problems, unemployment and other social vices prevalent among unemployed youths. Therefore, formalized entrepreneurial training can enhance acquisition of relevant skills for self-employment and self reliant. The study recommends that there should be a working partnership, bridging the gap between the educational institutions and the industry. Nigerian Educational Research and Development Council (NERDC), Federal and State Ministry of Education in collaboration with Centre for Entrepreneurship Development in Nigeria should make more deliberate efforts to identify entrepreneurship as strategic attempt to address youth unemployment. This could be done by cultivating and promoting entrepreneurship culture among students as a remedy to escalating unemployment challenges.

Nigeria like most developing nations of the world is faced with myriad of problems ranging from poverty, unemployment, ethno-religious conflicts, to diseases among others. These situations pose great challenges to the very existence of individuals in most developing nations thereby calling for the training of educated men and women who can function effectively in the society in which they live. Information from media and day to day experiences reiterates the high rate of graduates unemployment in Nigerian. This problem is said to be traceable to the disequilibrium between labour market requirements and lack of essential employable skills by the graduates. This paper therefore examines the importance of entrepreneurship education as tool for reducing the alarming trend of graduates’ unemployment in the country. The methodology of research adopted is content analysis. The paper concludes by suggesting ways of boosting job and wealth creation through entrepreneurship education in Niger...

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What does Emerson say about self-reliance?

In Emerson's essay “ Self-Reliance ,” he boldly states society (especially today’s politically correct environment) hurts a person’s growth.

Emerson wrote that self-sufficiency gives a person in society the freedom they need to discover their true self and attain their true independence.

Believing that individualism, personal responsibility , and nonconformity were essential to a thriving society. But to get there, Emerson knew that each individual had to work on themselves to achieve this level of individualism. 

Today, we see society's breakdowns daily and wonder how we arrived at this state of society. One can see how the basic concepts of self-trust, self-awareness, and self-acceptance have significantly been ignored.

Who published self-reliance?

Ralph Waldo Emerson wrote the essay, published in 1841 as part of his first volume of collected essays titled "Essays: First Series."

It would go on to be known as Ralph Waldo Emerson's Self Reliance and one of the most well-known pieces of American literature.

The collection was published by James Munroe and Company.

What are the examples of self-reliance?

Examples of self-reliance can be as simple as tying your shoes and as complicated as following your inner voice and not conforming to paths set by society or religion.

Self-reliance can also be seen as getting things done without relying on others, being able to “pull your weight” by paying your bills, and caring for yourself and your family correctly.

Self-reliance involves relying on one's abilities, judgment, and resources to navigate life. Here are more examples of self-reliance seen today:

Entrepreneurship: Starting and running your own business, relying on your skills and determination to succeed.

Financial Independence: Managing your finances responsibly, saving money, and making sound investment decisions to secure your financial future.

Learning and Education: Taking the initiative to educate oneself, whether through formal education, self-directed learning, or acquiring new skills.

Problem-Solving: Tackling challenges independently, finding solutions to problems, and adapting to changing circumstances.

Personal Development: Taking responsibility for personal growth, setting goals, and working towards self-improvement.

Homesteading: Growing your food, raising livestock, or becoming self-sufficient in various aspects of daily life.

DIY Projects: Undertaking do-it-yourself projects, from home repairs to crafting, without relying on external help.

Living Off the Grid: Living independently from public utilities, generating your energy, and sourcing your water.

Decision-Making: Trusting your instincts and making decisions based on your values and beliefs rather than relying solely on external advice.

Crisis Management: Handling emergencies and crises with resilience and resourcefulness without depending on external assistance.

These examples illustrate different facets of self-reliance, emphasizing independence, resourcefulness, and the ability to navigate life autonomously.

What is the purpose of self reliance by Emerson?

In his essay, " Self Reliance, " Emerson's sole purpose is the want for people to avoid conformity. Emerson believed that in order for a man to truly be a man, he was to follow his own conscience and "do his own thing."

Essentially, do what you believe is right instead of blindly following society.

Why is it important to be self reliant?

While getting help from others, including friends and family, can be an essential part of your life and fulfilling. However, help may not always be available, or the assistance you receive may not be what you had hoped for.

It is for this reason that Emerson pushed for self-reliance. If a person were independent, could solve their problems, and fulfill their needs and desires, they would be a more vital member of society.

This can lead to growth in the following areas:

Empowerment: Self-reliance empowers individuals to take control of their lives. It fosters a sense of autonomy and the ability to make decisions independently.

Resilience: Developing self-reliance builds resilience, enabling individuals to bounce back from setbacks and face challenges with greater adaptability.

Personal Growth: Relying on oneself encourages continuous learning and personal growth. It motivates individuals to acquire new skills and knowledge.

Freedom: Self-reliance provides a sense of freedom from external dependencies. It reduces reliance on others for basic needs, decisions, or validation.

Confidence: Achieving goals through one's own efforts boosts confidence and self-esteem. It instills a belief in one's capabilities and strengthens a positive self-image.

Resourcefulness: Being self-reliant encourages resourcefulness. Individuals learn to solve problems creatively, adapt to changing circumstances, and make the most of available resources.

Adaptability: Self-reliant individuals are often more adaptable to change. They can navigate uncertainties with a proactive and positive mindset.

Reduced Stress: Dependence on others can lead to stress and anxiety, especially when waiting for external support. Self-reliance reduces reliance on external factors for emotional well-being.

Personal Responsibility: It promotes a sense of responsibility for one's own life and decisions. Self-reliant individuals are more likely to take ownership of their actions and outcomes.

Goal Achievement: Being self-reliant facilitates the pursuit and achievement of personal and professional goals. It allows individuals to overcome obstacles and stay focused on their objectives.

Overall, self-reliance contributes to personal empowerment, mental resilience, and the ability to lead a fulfilling and purposeful life. While collaboration and support from others are valuable, cultivating a strong sense of self-reliance enhances one's capacity to navigate life's challenges independently.

What did Emerson mean, "Envy is ignorance, imitation is suicide"?

According to Emerson, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to you independently, but every person is given a plot of ground to till. 

In other words, Emerson believed that a person's main focus in life is to work on oneself, increasing their maturity and intellect, and overcoming insecurities, which will allow a person to be self-reliant to the point where they no longer envy others but measure themselves against how they were the day before.

When we do become self-reliant, we focus on creating rather than imitating. Being someone we are not is just as damaging to the soul as suicide.

Envy is ignorance: Emerson suggests that feeling envious of others is a form of ignorance. Envy often arises from a lack of understanding or appreciation of one's unique qualities and potential. Instead of being envious, individuals should focus on discovering and developing their talents and strengths.

Imitation is suicide: Emerson extends the idea by stating that imitation, or blindly copying others, is a form of self-destruction. He argues that true individuality and personal growth come from expressing one's unique voice and ideas. In this context, imitation is seen as surrendering one's identity and creativity, leading to a kind of "spiritual death."

What are the transcendental elements in Emerson’s self-reliance?

The five predominant elements of Transcendentalism are nonconformity, self-reliance, free thought, confidence, and the importance of nature.

The Transcendentalism movement emerged in New England between 1820 and 1836. It is essential to differentiate this movement from Transcendental Meditation, a distinct practice.

According to the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, Transcendentalism is characterized as "an American literary, political, and philosophical movement of the early nineteenth century, centered around Ralph Waldo Emerson." A central tenet of this movement is the belief that individual purity can be 'corrupted' by society.

Are Emerson's writings referenced in pop culture?

Emerson has made it into popular culture. One such example is in the film Next Stop Wonderland released in 1998. The reference is a quote from Emerson's essay on Self Reliance, "A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds."

This becomes a running theme in the film as a single woman (Hope Davis ), who is quite familiar with Emerson's writings and showcases several men taking her on dates, attempting to impress her by quoting the famous line, only to botch the line and also giving attribution to the wrong person. One gentleman says confidently it was W.C. Fields, while another matches the quote with Cicero. One goes as far as stating it was Karl Marx!

Why does Emerson say about self confidence?

Content is coming very soon.

Self-Reliance: The Complete Essay

Ne te quaesiveris extra."

Man is his own star; and the soul that can Render an honest and a perfect man, Commands all light, all influence, all fate ; Nothing to him falls early or too late. Our acts our angels are, or good or ill, Our fatal shadows that walk by us still." Epilogue to Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Man's Fortune Cast the bantling on the rocks, Suckle him with the she-wolf's teat; Wintered with the hawk and fox, Power and speed be hands and feet.

Ralph Waldo Emerson left the ministry to pursue a career in writing and public speaking. Emerson became one of America's best known and best-loved 19th-century figures. More About Emerson

Ralph Waldo Emerson Self Reliance Summary

The essay “Self-Reliance,” written by Ralph Waldo Emerson, is, by far, his most famous piece of work. Emerson, a Transcendentalist, believed focusing on the purity and goodness of individualism and community with nature was vital for a strong society. Transcendentalists despise the corruption and conformity of human society and institutions. Published in 1841, the Self Reliance essay is a deep-dive into self-sufficiency as a virtue.

In the essay "Self-Reliance," Ralph Waldo Emerson advocates for individuals to trust in their own instincts and ideas rather than blindly following the opinions of society and its institutions. He argues that society encourages conformity, stifles individuality, and encourages readers to live authentically and self-sufficient lives.

Emerson also stresses the importance of being self-reliant, relying on one's own abilities and judgment rather than external validation or approval from others. He argues that people must be honest with themselves and seek to understand their own thoughts and feelings rather than blindly following the expectations of others. Through this essay, Emerson emphasizes the value of independence, self-discovery, and personal growth.

What is the Meaning of Self-Reliance?

I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were original and not conventional. The soul always hears an admonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. The sentiment they instill is of more value than any thought they may contain. To believe your own thought, to think that what is true for you in your private heart is true for all men, — that is genius.

Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universal sense; for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost,—— and our first thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the Last Judgment. Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highest merit we ascribe to Moses, Plato, and Milton is, that they set at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men but what they thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam of light that flashes across his mind from within, more than the luster of the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without notice his thought because it is his. In every work of genius, we recognize our own rejected thoughts: they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.

Great works of art have no more affecting lessons for us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impression with good-humored inflexibility than most when the whole cry of voices is on the other side. Else, tomorrow a stranger will say with masterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all the time, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion from another.

There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at the conviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide; that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; that though the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corn can come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of ground which is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is new in nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nor does he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, one character, one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preestablished harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify of that particular ray. We but half express ourselves and are ashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may be safely trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it be faithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest by cowards. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into his work and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise, shall give him no peace. It is a deliverance that does not deliver. In the attempt his genius deserts him; no muse befriends; no invention, no hope.

Trust Thyself: Every Heart Vibrates To That Iron String.

Accept the place the divine providence has found for you, the society of your contemporaries, and the connection of events. Great men have always done so, and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the absolutely trustworthy was seated at their heart, working through their hands, predominating in all their being. And we are now men, and must accept in the highest mind the same transcendent destiny; and not minors and invalids in a protected corner, not cowards fleeing before a revolution, but guides, redeemers, and benefactors, obeying the Almighty effort, and advancing on Chaos and the Dark.

What pretty oracles nature yields to us in this text, in the face and behaviour of children, babes, and even brutes! That divided and rebel mind, that distrust of a sentiment because our arithmetic has computed the strength and means opposed to our purpose, these have not. Their mind being whole, their eye is as yet unconquered, and when we look in their faces, we are disconcerted. Infancy conforms to nobody: all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five out of the adults who prattle and play to it. So God has armed youth and puberty and manhood no less with its own piquancy and charm, and made it enviable and gracious and its claims not to be put by, if it will stand by itself. Do not think the youth has no force, because he cannot speak to you and me. Hark! in the next room his voice is sufficiently clear and emphatic. It seems he knows how to speak to his contemporaries. Bashful or bold, then, he will know how to make us seniors very unnecessary.

The nonchalance of boys who are sure of a dinner, and would disdain as much as a lord to do or say aught to conciliate one, is the healthy attitude of human nature. A boy is in the parlour what the pit is in the playhouse; independent, irresponsible, looking out from his corner on such people and facts as pass by, he tries and sentences them on their merits, in the swift, summary way of boys, as good, bad, interesting, silly, eloquent, troublesome. He cumbers himself never about consequences, about interests: he gives an independent, genuine verdict. You must court him: he does not court you. But the man is, as it were, clapped into jail by his consciousness. As soon as he has once acted or spoken with eclat, he is a committed person, watched by the sympathy or the hatred of hundreds, whose affections must now enter into his account. There is no Lethe for this. Ah, that he could pass again into his neutrality! Who can thus avoid all pledges, and having observed, observe again from the same unaffected, unbiased, unbribable, unaffrighted innocence, must always be formidable. He would utter opinions on all passing affairs, which being seen to be not private, but necessary, would sink like darts into the ear of men, and put them in fear.

These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faint and inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is in conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society is a joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the better securing of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the liberty and culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs.

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. He who would gather immortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but must explore if it be goodness. Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shall have the suffrage of the world. I remember an answer which when quite young I was prompted to make to a valued adviser, who was wont to importune me with the dear old doctrines of the church. On my saying, What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I live wholly from within? my friend suggested, — "But these impulses may be from below, not from above." I replied, "They do not seem to me to be such; but if I am the Devil's child, I will live then from the Devil." No law can be sacred to me but that of my nature. Good and bad are but names very readily transferable to that or this; the only right is what is after my constitution, the only wrong what is against it. A man is to carry himself in the presence of all opposition, as if every thing were titular and ephemeral but he. I am ashamed to think how easily we capitulate to badges and names, to large societies and dead institutions. Every decent and well-spoken individual affects and sways me more than is right. I ought to go upright and vital, and speak the rude truth in all ways. If malice and vanity wear the coat of philanthropy, shall that pass? If an angry bigot assumes this bountiful cause of Abolition, and comes to me with his last news from Barbadoes, why should I not say to him, 'Go love thy infant; love thy wood-chopper: be good-natured and modest: have that grace; and never varnish your hard, uncharitable ambition with this incredible tenderness for black folk a thousand miles off. Thy love afar is spite at home.' Rough and graceless would be such greeting, but truth is handsomer than the affectation of love. Your goodness must have some edge to it, — else it is none. The doctrine of hatred must be preached as the counteraction of the doctrine of love when that pules and whines. I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when my genius calls me. The lintels of the door-post I would write on, Whim . It is somewhat better than whim at last I hope, but we cannot spend the day in explanation. Expect me not to show cause why I seek or why I exclude company. Then, again, do not tell me, as a good man did to-day, of my obligation to put all poor men in good situations. Are they my poor? I tell thee, thou foolish philanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent, I give to such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong. There is a class of persons to whom by all spiritual affinity I am bought and sold; for them I will go to prison, if need be; but your miscellaneous popular charities; the education at college of fools; the building of meeting-houses to the vain end to which many now stand; alms to sots; and the thousandfold Relief Societies; — though I confess with shame I sometimes succumb and give the dollar, it is a wicked dollar which by and by I shall have the manhood to withhold.

Virtues are, in the popular estimate, rather the exception than the rule. There is the man and his virtues. Men do what is called a good action, as some piece of courage or charity, much as they would pay a fine in expiation of daily non-appearance on parade. Their works are done as an apology or extenuation of their living in the world, — as invalids and the insane pay a high board. Their virtues are penances. I do not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is for itself and not for a spectacle. I much prefer that it should be of a lower strain, so it be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering and unsteady. Wish it to be sound and sweet, and not to need diet and bleeding. The primary evidence I ask that you are a man, and refuse this appeal from the man to his actions. For myself it makes no difference that I know, whether I do or forbear those actions which are reckoned excellent. I cannot consent to pay for a privilege where I have intrinsic right. Few and mean as my gifts may be, I actually am, and do not need for my own assurance or the assurance of my fellows any secondary testimony.

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think.

This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual life, may serve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness. It is the harder, because you will always find those who think they know what is your duty better than you know it. The easy thing in the world is to live after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.

The objection to conforming to usages that have become dead to you is, that it scatters your force. It loses your time and blurs the impression of your character. If you maintain a dead church, contribute to a dead Bible-society, vote with a great party either for the government or against it, spread your table like base housekeepers, — under all these screens I have difficulty to detect the precise man you are. And, of course, so much force is withdrawn from your proper life. But do your work, and I shall know you. Do your work, and you shall reinforce yourself. A man must consider what a blindman's-buff is this game of conformity. If I know your sect, I anticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. Do I not know beforehand that not possibly can he say a new and spontaneous word? With all this ostentation of examining the grounds of the institution, do I not know that he will do no such thing? Do not I know that he is pledged to himself not to look but at one side, — the permitted side, not as a man, but as a parish minister? He is a retained attorney, and these airs of the bench are the emptiest affectation. Well, most men have bound their eyes with one or another handkerchief, and attached themselves to some one of these communities of opinion. This conformity makes them not false in a few particulars, authors of a few lies, but false in all particulars. Their every truth is not quite true. Their two is not the real two, their four not the real four; so that every word they say chagrins us, and we know not where to begin to set them right. Meantime nature is not slow to equip us in the prison-uniform of the party to which we adhere. We come to wear one cut of face and figure, and acquire by degrees the gentlest asinine expression. There is a mortifying experience in particular, which does not fail to wreak itself also in the general history; I mean "the foolish face of praise," the forced smile which we put on in company where we do not feel at ease in answer to conversation which does not interest us. The muscles, not spontaneously moved, but moved by a low usurping wilfulness, grow tight about the outline of the face with the most disagreeable sensation.

For nonconformity the world whips you with its displeasure. And therefore a man must know how to estimate a sour face. The by-standers look askance on him in the public street or in the friend's parlour. If this aversation had its origin in contempt and resistance like his own, he might well go home with a sad countenance; but the sour faces of the multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause, but are put on and off as the wind blows and a newspaper directs. Yet is the discontent of the multitude more formidable than that of the senate and the college. It is easy enough for a firm man who knows the world to brook the rage of the cultivated classes. Their rage is decorous and prudent, for they are timid as being very vulnerable themselves. But when to their feminine rage the indignation of the people is added, when the ignorant and the poor are aroused, when the unintelligent brute force that lies at the bottom of society is made to growl and mow, it needs the habit of magnanimity and religion to treat it godlike as a trifle of no concernment.

The other terror that scares us from self-trust is our consistency; a reverence for our past act or word, because the eyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit than our past acts, and we are loath to disappoint them.

But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? Why drag about this corpse of your memory, lest you contradict somewhat you have stated in this or that public place? Suppose you should contradict yourself; what then? It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely on your memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bring the past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever in a new day. In your metaphysics you have denied personality to the Deity: yet when the devout motions of the soul come, yield to them heart and life, though they should clothe God with shape and color. Leave your theory, as Joseph his coat in the hand of the harlot, and flee.

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. — 'Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.' — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

I suppose no man can violate his nature.

All the sallies of his will are rounded in by the law of his being, as the inequalities of Andes and Himmaleh are insignificant in the curve of the sphere. Nor does it matter how you gauge and try him. A character is like an acrostic or Alexandrian stanza; — read it forward, backward, or across, it still spells the same thing. In this pleasing, contrite wood-life which God allows me, let me record day by day my honest thought without prospect or retrospect, and, I cannot doubt, it will be found symmetrical, though I mean it not, and see it not. My book should smell of pines and resound with the hum of insects. The swallow over my window should interweave that thread or straw he carries in his bill into my web also. We pass for what we are. Character teaches above our wills. Men imagine that they communicate their virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtue or vice emit a breath every moment.

There will be an agreement in whatever variety of actions, so they be each honest and natural in their hour. For of one will, the actions will be harmonious, however unlike they seem. These varieties are lost sight of at a little distance, at a little height of thought. One tendency unites them all. The voyage of the best ship is a zigzag line of a hundred tacks. See the line from a sufficient distance, and it straightens itself to the average tendency. Your genuine action will explain itself, and will explain your other genuine actions. Your conformity explains nothing. Act singly, and what you have already done singly will justify you now. Greatness appeals to the future. If I can be firm enough to-day to do right, and scorn eyes, I must have done so much right before as to defend me now. Be it how it will, do right now. Always scorn appearances, and you always may. The force of character is cumulative. All the foregone days of virtue work their health into this. What makes the majesty of the heroes of the senate and the field, which so fills the imagination? The consciousness of a train of great days and victories behind. They shed an united light on the advancing actor. He is attended as by a visible escort of angels. That is it which throws thunder into Chatham's voice, and dignity into Washington's port, and America into Adams's eye. Honor is venerable to us because it is no ephemeris. It is always ancient virtue. We worship it today because it is not of today. We love it and pay it homage, because it is not a trap for our love and homage, but is self-dependent, self-derived, and therefore of an old immaculate pedigree, even if shown in a young person.

I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity and consistency. Let the words be gazetted and ridiculous henceforward. Instead of the gong for dinner, let us hear a whistle from the Spartan fife. Let us never bow and apologize more. A great man is coming to eat at my house. I do not wish to please him; He should wish to please me, that I wish. I will stand here for humanity, and though I would make it kind, I would make it true. Let us affront and reprimand the smooth mediocrity and squalid contentment of the times, and hurl in the face of custom, and trade, and office, the fact which is the upshot of all history, that there is a great responsible Thinker and Actor working wherever a man works; that a true man belongs to no other time or place, but is the centre of things. Where he is, there is nature. He measures you, and all men, and all events. Ordinarily, every body in society reminds us of somewhat else, or of some other person. Character, reality, reminds you of nothing else; it takes place of the whole creation. The man must be so much, that he must make all circumstances indifferent. Every true man is a cause, a country, and an age; requires infinite spaces and numbers and time fully to accomplish his design; — and posterity seem to follow his steps as a train of clients. A man Caesar is born, and for ages after we have a Roman Empire. Christ is born, and millions of minds so grow and cleave to his genius, that he is confounded with virtue and the possible of man. An institution is the lengthened shadow of one man; as, Monachism, of the Hermit Antony; the Reformation, of Luther; Quakerism, of Fox; Methodism, of Wesley; Abolition, of Clarkson. Scipio, Milton called "the height of Rome"; and all history resolves itself very easily into the biography of a few stout and earnest persons.

Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under his feet. Let him not peep or steal, or skulk up and down with the air of a charity-boy, a bastard, or an interloper, in the world which exists for him. But the man in the street, finding no worth in himself which corresponds to the force which built a tower or sculptured a marble god, feels poor when he looks on these. To him a palace, a statue, or a costly book have an alien and forbidding air, much like a gay equipage, and seem to say like that, 'Who are you, Sir?' Yet they all are his, suitors for his notice, petitioners to his faculties that they will come out and take possession. The picture waits for my verdict: it is not to command me, but I am to settle its claims to praise. That popular fable of the sot who was picked up dead drunk in the street, carried to the duke's house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke's bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like the duke, and assured that he had been insane, owes its popularity to the fact, that it symbolizes so well the state of man, who is in the world a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason, and finds himself a true prince.

Our reading is mendicant and sycophantic. In history, our imagination plays us false. Kingdom and lordship, power and estate, are a gaudier vocabulary than private John and Edward in a small house and common day's work; but the things of life are the same to both; the sum total of both is the same. Why all this deference to Alfred, and Scanderbeg, and Gustavus? Suppose they were virtuous; did they wear out virtue? As great a stake depends on your private act to-day, as followed their public and renowned steps. When private men shall act with original views, the lustre will be transferred from the actions of kings to those of gentlemen.

The world has been instructed by its kings, who have so magnetized the eyes of nations. It has been taught by this colossal symbol the mutual reverence that is due from man to man. The joyful loyalty with which men have everywhere suffered the king, the noble, or the great proprietor to walk among them by a law of his own, make his own scale of men and things, and reverse theirs, pay for benefits not with money but with honor, and represent the law in his person, was the hieroglyphic by which they obscurely signified their consciousness of their own right and comeliness, the right of every man.

The magnetism which all original action exerts is explained when we inquire the reason of self-trust.

Who is the Trustee? What is the aboriginal Self, on which a universal reliance may be grounded? What is the nature and power of that science-baffling star, without parallax, without calculable elements, which shoots a ray of beauty even into trivial and impure actions, if the least mark of independence appear? The inquiry leads us to that source, at once the essence of genius, of virtue, and of life, which we call Spontaneity or Instinct. We denote this primary wisdom as Intuition, whilst all later teachings are tuitions. In that deep force, the last fact behind which analysis cannot go, all things find their common origin. For, the sense of being which in calm hours rises, we know not how, in the soul, is not diverse from things, from space, from light, from time, from man, but one with them, and proceeds obviously from the same source whence their life and being also proceed. We first share the life by which things exist, and afterwards see them as appearances in nature, and forget that we have shared their cause. Here is the fountain of action and of thought. Here are the lungs of that inspiration which giveth man wisdom, and which cannot be denied without impiety and atheism. We lie in the lap of immense intelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth and organs of its activity. When we discern justice, when we discern truth, we do nothing of ourselves, but allow a passage to its beams. If we ask whence this comes, if we seek to pry into the soul that causes, all philosophy is at fault. Its presence or its absence is all we can affirm. Every man discriminates between the voluntary acts of his mind, and his involuntary perceptions, and knows that to his involuntary perceptions a perfect faith is due. He may err in the expression of them, but he knows that these things are so, like day and night, not to be disputed. My wilful actions and acquisitions are but roving; — the idlest reverie, the faintest native emotion, command my curiosity and respect. Thoughtless people contradict as readily the statement of perceptions as of opinions, or rather much more readily; for, they do not distinguish between perception and notion. They fancy that I choose to see this or that thing. But perception is not whimsical, but fatal. If I see a trait, my children will see it after me, and in course of time, all mankind, — although it may chance that no one has seen it before me. For my perception of it is as much a fact as the sun.

The relations of the soul to the divine spirit are so pure, that it is profane to seek to interpose helps. It must be that when God speaketh he should communicate, not one thing, but all things; should fill the world with his voice; should scatter forth light, nature, time, souls, from the centre of the present thought; and new date and new create the whole. Whenever a mind is simple, and receives a divine wisdom, old things pass away, — means, teachers, texts, temples fall; it lives now, and absorbs past and future into the present hour. All things are made sacred by relation to it, — one as much as another. All things are dissolved to their centre by their cause, and, in the universal miracle, petty and particular miracles disappear. If, therefore, a man claims to know and speak of God, and carries you backward to the phraseology of some old mouldered nation in another country, in another world, believe him not. Is the acorn better than the oak which is its fulness and completion? Is the parent better than the child into whom he has cast his ripened being? Whence, then, this worship of the past? The centuries are conspirators against the sanity and authority of the soul. Time and space are but physiological colors which the eye makes, but the soul is light; where it is, is day; where it was, is night; and history is an impertinence and an injury, if it be anything more than a cheerful apologue or parable of my being and becoming.

Man is timid and apologetic; he is no longer upright; 'I think,' 'I am,' that he dares not say, but quotes some saint or sage. He is ashamed before the blade of grass or the blowing rose. These roses under my window make no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for what they are; they exist with God today. There is no time to them. There is simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. Before a leaf bud has burst, its whole life acts; in the full-blown flower there is no more; in the leafless root there is no less. Its nature is satisfied, and it satisfies nature, in all moments alike. But man postpones or remembers; he does not live in the present, but with reverted eye laments the past, or, heedless of the riches that surround him, stands on tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot be happy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present, above time.

This should be plain enough. Yet see what strong intellects dare not yet hear God himself, unless he speak the phraseology of I know not what David, or Jeremiah, or Paul. We shall not always set so great a price on a few texts, on a few lives. We are like children who repeat by rote the sentences of grandames and tutors, and, as they grow older, of the men of talents and character they chance to see, — painfully recollecting the exact words they spoke; afterwards, when they come into the point of view which those had who uttered these sayings, they understand them, and are willing to let the words go; for, at any time, they can use words as good when occasion comes. If we live truly, we shall see truly. It is as easy for the strong man to be strong, as it is for the weak to be weak. When we have new perception, we shall gladly disburden the memory of its hoarded treasures as old rubbish. When a man lives with God, his voice shall be as sweet as the murmur of the brook and the rustle of the corn.

And now at last the highest truth on this subject remains unsaid; probably cannot be said; for all that we say is the far-off remembering of the intuition. That thought, by what I can now nearest approach to say it, is this. When good is near you, when you have life in yourself, it is not by any known or accustomed way; you shall not discern the foot-prints of any other; not see the face of man; and you shall not hear any name;—— the way, the thought, the good, shall be wholly strange and new. It shall exclude example and experience. You take the way from man, not to man. All persons that ever existed are its forgotten ministers. Fear and hope are alike beneath it. There is somewhat low even in hope. In the hour of vision, there is nothing that can be called gratitude, nor properly joy. The soul raised over passion beholds identity and eternal causation, perceives the self-existence of Truth and Right, and calms itself with knowing that all things go well. Vast spaces of nature, the Atlantic Ocean, the South Sea, — long intervals of time, years, centuries, — are of no account. This which I think and feel underlay every former state of life and circumstances, as it does underlie my present, and what is called life, and what is called death.

Life only avails, not the having lived.

Power ceases in the instant of repose; it resides in the moment of transition from a past to a new state, in the shooting of the gulf, in the darting to an aim. This one fact the world hates is that the soul becomes ; for that forever degrades the past, turns all riches to poverty, all reputation to a shame, confounds the saint with the rogue, shoves Jesus and Judas equally aside. Why, then, do we prate of self-reliance? Inasmuch as the soul is present, there will be power, not confidence but an agent. To talk of reliance is a poor external way of speaking. Speak rather of that which relies, because it works and is. Who has more obedience than I masters me, though he should not raise his finger. Round him I must revolve by the gravitation of spirits. We fancy it rhetoric, when we speak of eminent virtue. We do not yet see that virtue is Height, and that a man or a company of men, plastic and permeable to principles, by the law of nature must overpower and ride all cities, nations, kings, rich men, poets, who are not.

This is the ultimate fact which we so quickly reach on this, as on every topic, the resolution of all into the ever-blessed ONE. Self-existence is the attribute of the Supreme Cause, and it constitutes the measure of good by the degree in which it enters into all lower forms. All things real are so by so much virtue as they contain. Commerce, husbandry, hunting, whaling, war, eloquence , personal weight, are somewhat, and engage my respect as examples of its presence and impure action. I see the same law working in nature for conservation and growth. Power is in nature the essential measure of right. Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdoms which cannot help itself. The genesis and maturation of a planet, its poise and orbit, the bended tree recovering itself from the strong wind, the vital resources of every animal and vegetable, are demonstrations of the self-sufficing, and therefore self-relying soul.

Thus all concentrates: let us not rove; let us sit at home with the cause. Let us stun and astonish the intruding rabble of men and books and institutions, by a simple declaration of the divine fact. Bid the invaders take the shoes from off their feet, for God is here within. Let our simplicity judge them, and our docility to our own law demonstrate the poverty of nature and fortune beside our native riches.

But now we are a mob. Man does not stand in awe of man, nor is his genius admonished to stay at home, to put itself in communication with the internal ocean, but it goes abroad to beg a cup of water of the urns of other men. We must go alone. I like the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching. How far off, how cool, how chaste the persons look, begirt each one with a precinct or sanctuary! So let us always sit. Why should we assume the faults of our friend, or wife, or father, or child, because they sit around our hearth, or are said to have the same blood? All men have my blood, and I have all men's. Not for that will I adopt their petulance or folly, even to the extent of being ashamed of it. But your isolation must not be mechanical, but spiritual, that is, must be elevation. At times the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you with emphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet door, and say, — 'Come out unto us.' But keep thy state; come not into their confusion. The power men possess to annoy me, I give them by a weak curiosity. No man can come near me but through my act. "What we love that we have, but by desire we bereave ourselves of the love."

If we cannot at once rise to the sanctities of obedience and faith, let us at least resist our temptations; let us enter into the state of war, and wake Thor and Woden, courage and constancy, in our Saxon breasts. This is to be done in our smooth times by speaking the truth. Check this lying hospitality and lying affection. Live no longer to the expectation of these deceived and deceiving people with whom we converse. Say to them, O father, O mother, O wife, O brother, O friend, I have lived with you after appearances hitherto. Henceforward I am the truth's. Be it known unto you that henceforward I obey no law less than the eternal law. I will have no covenants but proximities. To nourish my parents, to support my family I shall endeavour, to be the chaste husband of one wife, — but these relations I must fill after a new and unprecedented way. I appeal from your customs that I must be myself. I cannot break myself any longer for you, or you. If you can love me for what I am, we shall be the happier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I will not hide my tastes or aversions. I will so trust that what is deep is holy, that I will do strongly before the sun and moon whatever inly rejoices me, and the heart appoints. If you are noble, I will love you; I will not hurt you and myself by hypocritical attentions if you are not. If you are true, but not in the same truth with me, cleave to your companions; I will seek my own. I do this not selfishly, but humbly and truly. It is alike your interest, and mine, and all men's, however long we have dwelt in lies, to live in truth. Does this sound harsh today? You will soon love what is dictated by your nature as well as mine, and, if we follow the truth, it will bring us out safe at last. — But so you may give these friends pain. Yes, but I cannot sell my liberty and my power, to save their sensibility. Besides, all persons have their moments of reason, when they look out into the region of absolute truth; then will they justify me, and do the same thing.

The populace think that your rejection of popular standards is a rejection of all standard, and mere antinomianism; and the bold sensualist will use the name of philosophy to gild his crimes. But the law of consciousness abides. There are two confessionals, in one or the other of which we must be shriven. You may fulfil your round of duties by clearing yourself in the direct , or in the reflex way. Consider whether you have satisfied your relations to father, mother, cousin, neighbour, town, cat, and dog; whether any of these can upbraid you. But I may also neglect this reflex standard, and absolve me to myself. I have my own stern claims and perfect circle. It denies the name of duty to many offices that are called duties. But if I can discharge its debts, it enables me to dispense with the popular code. If anyone imagines that this law is lax, let him keep its commandment one day.

And truly it demands something godlike in him who has cast off the common motives of humanity, and has ventured to trust himself for a taskmaster. High be his heart, faithful his will, clear his sight, that he may in good earnest be doctrine, society, law, to himself, that a simple purpose may be to him as strong as iron necessity is to others!

If any man consider the present aspects of what is called by distinction society , he will see the need of these ethics. The sinew and heart of man seem to be drawn out, and we are become timorous, desponding whimperers. We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid of each other. Our age yields no great and perfect persons. We want men and women who shall renovate life and our social state, but we see that most natures are insolvent, cannot satisfy their own wants, have an ambition out of all proportion to their practical force, and do lean and beg day and night continually. Our housekeeping is mendicant, our arts, our occupations, our marriages, our religion, we have not chosen, but society has chosen for us. We are parlour soldiers. We shun the rugged battle of fate , where strength is born.

If our young men miscarry in their first enterprises, they lose all heart.

Men say he is ruined if the young merchant fails . If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges, and is not installed in an office within one year afterwards in the cities or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his friends and to himself that he is right in being disheartened, and in complaining the rest of his life. A sturdy lad from New Hampshire or Vermont, who in turn tries all the professions, who teams it , farms it , peddles , keeps a school, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a township, and so forth, in successive years, and always, like a cat, falls on his feet, is worth a hundred of these city dolls. He walks abreast with his days, and feels no shame in not 'studying a profession,' for he does not postpone his life, but lives already. He has not one chance, but a hundred chances. Let a Stoic open the resources of man, and tell men they are not leaning willows, but can and must detach themselves; that with the exercise of self-trust, new powers shall appear; that a man is the word made flesh, born to shed healing to the nations, that he should be ashamed of our compassion, and that the moment he acts from himself, tossing the laws, the books, idolatries, and customs out of the window, we pity him no more, but thank and revere him, — and that teacher shall restore the life of man to splendor, and make his name dear to all history.

It is easy to see that a greater self-reliance must work a revolution in all the offices and relations of men; in their religion; education; and in their pursuits; their modes of living; their association; in their property; in their speculative views.

1. In what prayers do men allow themselves! That which they call a holy office is not so much as brave and manly. Prayer looks abroad and asks for some foreign addition to come through some foreign virtue, and loses itself in endless mazes of natural and supernatural, and mediatorial and miraculous. It is prayer that craves a particular commodity, — anything less than all good, — is vicious. Prayer is the contemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view. It is the soliloquy of a beholding and jubilant soul. It is the spirit of God pronouncing his works good. But prayer as a means to effect a private end is meanness and theft. It supposes dualism and not unity in nature and consciousness. As soon as the man is at one with God, he will not beg. He will then see prayer in all action. The prayer of the farmer kneeling in his field to weed it, the prayer of the rower kneeling with the stroke of his oar, are true prayers heard throughout nature, though for cheap ends. Caratach, in Fletcher's Bonduca, when admonished to inquire the mind of the god Audate, replies, —

"His hidden meaning lies in our endeavours; Our valors are our best gods."

Another sort of false prayers are our regrets. Discontent is the want of self-reliance: it is infirmity of will. Regret calamities, if you can thereby help the sufferer; if not, attend your own work, and already the evil begins to be repaired. Our sympathy is just as base. We come to them who weep foolishly, and sit down and cry for company, instead of imparting to them truth and health in rough electric shocks, putting them once more in communication with their own reason. The secret of fortune is joy in our hands. Welcome evermore to gods and men is the self-helping man. For him all doors are flung wide: him all tongues greet, all honors crown, all eyes follow with desire. Our love goes out to him and embraces him, because he did not need it. We solicitously and apologetically caress and celebrate him, because he held on his way and scorned our disapprobation. The gods love him because men hated him. "To the persevering mortal," said Zoroaster, "the blessed Immortals are swift."

As men's prayers are a disease of the will, so are their creeds a disease of the intellect . They say with those foolish Israelites, 'Let not God speak to us, lest we die. Speak thou, speak any man with us, and we will obey.' Everywhere I am hindered of meeting God in my brother, because he has shut his own temple doors, and recites fables merely of his brother's, or his brother's brother's God. Every new mind is a new classification. If it prove a mind of uncommon activity and power, a Locke, a Lavoisier, a Hutton, a Bentham, a Fourier, it imposes its classification on other men, and lo! a new system. In proportion to the depth of the thought, and so to the number of the objects it touches and brings within reach of the pupil, is his complacency. But chiefly is this apparent in creeds and churches, which are also classifications of some powerful mind acting on the elemental thought of duty, and man's relation to the Highest. Such as Calvinism, Quakerism, Swedenborgism. The pupil takes the same delight in subordinating everything to the new terminology, as a girl who has just learned botany in seeing a new earth and new seasons thereby. It will happen for a time, that the pupil will find his intellectual power has grown by the study of his master's mind. But in all unbalanced minds, the classification is idolized, passes for the end, and not for a speedily exhaustible means, so that the walls of the system blend to their eye in the remote horizon with the walls of the universe; the luminaries of heaven seem to them hung on the arch their master built. They cannot imagine how you aliens have any right to see, — how you can see; 'It must be somehow that you stole the light from us.' They do not yet perceive, that light, unsystematic, indomitable, will break into any cabin, even into theirs. Let them chirp awhile and call it their own. If they are honest and do well, presently their neat new pinfold will be too strait and low, will crack, will lean, will rot and vanish, and the immortal light, all young and joyful, million-orbed, million-colored, will beam over the universe as on the first morning.

2. It is for want of self-culture that the superstition of Travelling, whose idols are Italy, England, Egypt, retains its fascination for all educated Americans. They who made England, Italy, or Greece venerable in the imagination did so by sticking fast where they were, like an axis of the earth. In manly hours, we feel that duty is our place. The soul is no traveller; the wise man stays at home, and when his necessities, his duties, on any occasion call him from his house, or into foreign lands, he is at home still, and shall make men sensible by the expression of his countenance, that he goes the missionary of wisdom and virtue, and visits cities and men like a sovereign, and not like an interloper or a valet.

I have no churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the globe, for the purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so that the man is first domesticated, or does not go abroad with the hope of finding somewhat greater than he knows. He who travels to be amused, or to get somewhat which he does not carry, travels away from himself, and grows old even in youth among old things. In Thebes, in Palmyra, his will and mind have become old and dilapidated as they. He carries ruins to ruins.

Travelling is a fool's paradise. Our first journeys discover to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. The Vatican, and the palaces I seek. But I am not intoxicated though I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions. My giant goes with me wherever I go.

3. But the rage of travelling is a symptom of a deeper unsoundness affecting the whole intellectual action. The intellect is vagabond, and our system of education fosters restlessness. Our minds travel when our bodies are forced to stay at home. We imitate, and what is imitation but the travelling of the mind? Our houses are built with foreign taste; Shelves are garnished with foreign ornaments, but our opinions, our tastes, our faculties, lean, and follow the Past and the Distant. The soul created the arts wherever they have flourished. It was in his own mind that the artist sought his model. It was an application of his own thought to the thing to be done and the conditions to be observed. And why need we copy the Doric or the Gothic model? Beauty, convenience, grandeur of thought, and quaint expression are as near to us as to any, and if the American artist will study with hope and love the precise thing to be done by him, considering the climate, the soil, the length of the day, the wants of the people, the habit and form of the government, he will create a house in which all these will find themselves fitted, and taste and sentiment will be satisfied also.

Insist on yourself; never imitate. Your own gift you can present every moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation, but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession. That which each can do best, none but his Maker can teach him. No man yet knows what it is, nor can, till that person has exhibited it. Where is the master who could have taught Shakespeare? Where is the master who could have instructed Franklin, or Washington, or Bacon, or Newton? Every great man is a unique. The Scipionism of Scipio is precisely that part he could not borrow. Shakespeare will never be made by the study of Shakespeare. Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much. There is at this moment for you an utterance brave and grand as that of the colossal chisel of Phidias, or trowel of the Egyptians, or the pen of Moses, or Dante, but different from all these. Not possibly will the soul all rich, all eloquent, with thousand-cloven tongue, deign to repeat itself; but if you can hear what these patriarchs say, surely you can reply to them in the same pitch of voice; for the ear and the tongue are two organs of one nature. Abide in the simple and noble regions of thy life, obey thy heart, and thou shalt reproduce the Foreworld again.

4. As our Religion, our Education, our Art look abroad, so does our spirit of society. All men plume themselves on the improvement of society, and no man improves.

Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other and undergoes continual changes; it is barbarous,  civilized, christianized, rich and it is scientific, but this change is not amelioration. For everything that is given, something is taken. Society acquires new arts, and loses old instincts. What a contrast between the well-clad, reading, writing, thinking American, with a watch, a pencil, and a bill of exchange in his pocket, and the naked New Zealander, whose property is a club, a spear, a mat, and an undivided twentieth of a shed to sleep under! But compare the health of the two men, and you shall see that the white man has lost his aboriginal strength. If the traveller tell us truly, strike the savage with a broad axe, and in a day or two, the flesh shall unite and heal as if you struck the blow into soft pitch, and the same blow shall send the white to his grave.

The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of his feet. He is supported on crutches, but lacks so much support of muscle. He has a fine Geneva watch, but he fails of the skill to tell the hour by the sun. A Greenwich nautical almanac he has, and so being sure of the information when he wants it, the man in the street does not know a star in the sky. The solstice he does not observe, the equinox he knows as little, and the whole bright calendar of the year are without a dial in his mind. His note-books impair his memory; his libraries overload his wit; the insurance office increases the number of accidents; and it may be a question whether machinery does not encumber; whether we have not lost by refinement some energy, by a Christianity entrenched in establishments and forms, some vigor of wild virtue. For every Stoic was a Stoic, but in Christendom, where is the Christian?

There is no more deviation in the moral standard than in the standard of height or bulk. No greater men are now than ever were. A singular equality may be observed between the great men of the first and of the last ages; nor can all the science, art, religion, and philosophy of the nineteenth century avail to educate greater men than Plutarch's heroes, three or four and twenty centuries ago. Not in time is the race progressive. Phocion, Socrates, Anaxagoras, Diogenes, are great men, but they leave no class. He who is really of their class will not be called by their name, but will be his own man, and, in his turn, the founder of a sect. The arts and inventions of each period are only its costume, and do not invigorate men. The harm of the improved machinery may compensate its good. Hudson and Behring accomplished so much in their fishing boats, as to astonish Parry and Franklin, whose equipment exhausted the resources of science and art. Galileo, with an opera-glass, discovered a more splendid series of celestial phenomena than anyone since. Columbus found the New World in an undecked boat. It is curious to see the periodical disuse and perishing of means and machinery, which were introduced with loud laudation a few years or centuries before. The great genius returns to essential man. We reckoned the improvements of the art of war among the triumphs of science, and yet Napoleon conquered Europe by the bivouac, which consisted of falling back on naked valor and disencumbering it of all aids. The Emperor held it impossible to make a perfect army, says Las Casas, "without abolishing our arms, magazines, commissaries, and carriages, until, in imitation of the Roman custom, the soldier should receive his supply of corn, grind it in his hand-mill, and bake his bread himself."

Society is a wave. The wave moves onward, but the water of which it is composed does not. The same particle does not rise from the valley to the ridge. Its unity is only phenomenal. The persons who make up a nation today, next year die, and their experience with them.

And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on governments which protect it, is the want of self-reliance. Men have looked away from themselves and at things so long, that they have come to esteem the religious, learned, and civil institutions as guards of property, and they deprecate assaults on these, because they feel them to be assaults on property. They measure their esteem of each other by what each has, and not by what each is. But a cultivated man becomes ashamed of his property, out of new respect for his nature. Especially he hates what he has, if he see that it is accidental, — came to him by inheritance, or gift, or crime; then he feels that it is not having; it does not belong to him, has no root in him, and merely lies there, because no revolution or no robber takes it away. But that which a man is does always by necessity acquire, and what the man acquires is living property, which does not wait the beck of rulers, or mobs, or revolutions, or fire, or storm, or bankruptcies, but perpetually renews itself wherever the man breathes. "Thy lot or portion of life," said the Caliph Ali, "is seeking after thee; therefore, be at rest from seeking after it." Our dependence on these foreign goods leads us to our slavish respect for numbers. The political parties meet in numerous conventions; the greater the concourse, and with each new uproar of announcement, The delegation from Essex! The Democrats from New Hampshire! The Whigs of Maine! the young patriot feels himself stronger than before by a new thousand of eyes and arms. In like manner the reformers summon conventions, and vote and resolve in multitude. Not so, O friends! will the God deign to enter and inhabit you, but by a method precisely the reverse. It is only as a man puts off all foreign support, and stands alone, that I see him to be strong and to prevail. He is weaker by every recruit to his banner. Is not a man better than a town? Ask nothing of men, and in the endless mutation, thou only firm column must presently appear the upholder of all that surrounds thee. He who knows that power is inborn, that he is weak because he has looked for good out of him and elsewhere, and so perceiving, throws himself unhesitatingly on his thought, instantly rights himself, stands in the erect position, commands his limbs, works miracles; just as a man who stands on his feet is stronger than a man who stands on his head.

So use all that is called Fortune. Most men gamble with her, and gain all, and lose all, as her wheel rolls. But do thou leave as unlawful these winnings, and deal with Cause and Effect, the chancellors of God. In the Will work and acquire, and thou hast chained the wheel of Chance, and shalt sit hereafter out of fear from her rotations. A political victory, a rise of rents, the recovery of your sick, or the return of your absent friend, or some other favorable event, raises your spirits, and you think good days are preparing for you. Do not believe it. Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles.

Which quotation from "Self-reliance" best summarizes Emerson’s view on belief in oneself?

One of the most famous quotes from Ralph Waldo Emerson's "Self-Reliance" that summarizes his view on belief in oneself is:

"Trust thyself: every heart vibrates to that iron string."

What does Emerson argue should be the basis of human actions in the second paragraph of “self-reliance”?

In the second paragraph of "Self-Reliance," Emerson argues that individual conscience, or a person's inner voice, should be the basis of human actions. He writes, "Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist." He believes that society tends to impose conformity and discourage people from following their own inner truth and intuition. Emerson encourages individuals to trust themselves and to act according to their own beliefs, instead of being influenced by the opinions of others. He argues that this is the way to live a truly authentic and fulfilling life.

Which statement best describes Emerson’s opinion of communities, according to the first paragraph of society and solitude?

According to the first paragraph of Ralph Waldo Emerson's " Society and Solitude, " Emerson has a mixed opinion of communities. He recognizes the importance of social interaction and the benefits of being part of a community but also recognizes the limitations that come with it.

He writes, "Society everywhere is in a conspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members." He argues that society can be limiting and restrictive, and can cause individuals to conform to norms and values that may not align with their own beliefs and desires. He believes that it is important for individuals to strike a balance between the benefits of social interaction and the need for solitude and self-discovery.

Which best describes Emerson’s central message to his contemporaries in "self-reliance"?

Ralph Waldo Emerson's central message to his contemporaries in "Self-Reliance" is to encourage individuals to trust in their own beliefs and instincts, and to break free from societal norms and expectations. He argues that individuals should have the courage to think for themselves and to live according to their own individual truth, rather than being influenced by the opinions of others. Through this message, he aims to empower people to live authentic and fulfilling lives, rather than living in conformity and compromise.

Yet, it is critical that we first possess the ability to conceive our own thoughts. Prior to venturing into the world, we must be intimately acquainted with our own selves and our individual minds. This sentiment echoes the concise maxim inscribed at the ancient Greek site of the Delphic Oracle: 'Know Thyself.'

In essence, Emerson's central message in "Self-Reliance" is to promote self-reliance and individualism as the key to a meaningful and purposeful life.

Understanding Emerson: "The American scholar" and his struggle for self-reliance.

Princeton University Press. ISBN 0-691-09982-0

Standford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

Other works from ralph waldo emerson for book clubs, the over-soul.

There is a difference between one and another hour of life, in their authority and subsequent effect. Our faith comes in moments; our vice is habitual.

The American Scholar

An Oration delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society, at Cambridge, August 31, 1837

Essays First Series

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A Summary and Analysis of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s ‘Self-Reliance’

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

‘Self-Reliance’ is an influential 1841 essay by the American writer and thinker Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-82). In this essay, Emerson argues that we should get to know our true selves rather than looking to other people to fashion our individual thoughts and ideas for us. Among other things, Emerson’s essay is a powerful rallying cry against the lure of conformity and groupthink.

Emerson prefaces his essay with several epigraphs, the first of which is a Latin phrase which translates as: ‘Do not seek yourself outside yourself.’ This axiom summarises the thrust of Emerson’s argument, which concerns the cultivation of one’s own opinions and thoughts, even if they are at odds with those of the people around us (including family members).

This explains the title of his essay: ‘Self-Reliance’ is about relying on one’s own sense of oneself, and having confidence in one’s ideas and opinions. In a famous quotation, Emerson asserts: ‘In every work of genius we recognise our own rejected thoughts; they come back to us with a certain alienated majesty.’

But if we reject those thoughts when they come to us, we must suffer the pangs of envy of seeing the same thoughts we had (or began to have) in works of art produced by the greatest minds. This is a bit like the phenomenon known as ‘I wish I’d thought of that!’, only, Emerson argues, we did think of it, or something similar. But we never followed through on those thoughts because we weren’t interested in examining or developing our own ideas that we have all the time.

In ‘Self-Reliance’, then, Emerson wants us to cultivate our own minds rather than looking to others to dictate our minds for us. ‘Nothing is at last sacred but the integrity of your own mind,’ he argues. For Emerson, our own minds are even more worthy of respect than actual religion.

Knowing our own minds is far more valuable and important than simply letting our minds be swayed or influenced by other people. ‘It is easy in the world to live after the world’s opinion’, Emerson argues, and ‘it is easy in solitude to live after our own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keeps with perfect sweetness the independence of solitude.’

In other words, most people are weak and think they know themselves, but can easily abandon all of their principles and beliefs and be swept up by the ideas of the mob. But the great man is the one who can hold to his own principles and ideas even when he is the one in the minority .

Emerson continues to explore this theme of conformity:

A man must consider what a blindman’s-buff is this game of conformity. If I know your sect, I anticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce for his text and topic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. Do I not know beforehand that not possibly can he say a new and spontaneous word? Do I not know that, with all this ostentation of examining the grounds of the institution, he will do no such thing? Do I not know that he is pledged to himself not to look but at one side, – the permitted side, not as a man, but as a parish minister?

He goes on:

This conformity makes them not false in a few particulars, authors of a few lies, but false in all particulars. Their every truth is not quite true. Their two is not the real two, their four not the real four; so that every word they say chagrins us, and we know not where to begin to set them right.

Emerson then argues that consistency for its own sake is a foolish idea. He declares, in a famous quotation, ‘A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines.’

Instead, great men change and refine their opinions from one day to the next, as new evidence or new ideas come to light. Although this inconsistency may lead us to be misunderstood, Emerson thinks there are worse things to be. After all, great thinkers such as Pythagoras, Socrates, and even Jesus were all misunderstood by some people.

Emerson also argues that, just because we belong to the same social group as other people, this doesn’t mean we have to follow the same opinions. In a memorable image, he asserts that he likes ‘the silent church before the service begins, better than any preaching’: that moment when everyone can have their own individual thoughts, before they are brought together by the priest and are told to believe the same thing.

Similarly, just because we share blood with our relatives, that doesn’t mean we have to believe what other family members believe. Rather than following their ‘customs’, ‘petulance’, or ‘folly’, we must be ourselves first and foremost.

The same is true of travel. We may say that ‘travel broadens the mind’, but for Emerson, if we do not have a sense of ourselves before he pack our bags and head off to new places, we will still be the same foolish person when we arrive at our destination:

Travelling is a fool’s paradise. Our first journeys discover to us the indifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I can be intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. I seek the Vatican, and the palaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, but I am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go.

Emerson concludes ‘Self-Reliance’ by urging his readers, ‘Insist on yourself; never imitate.’ If you borrow ‘the adopted talent’ of someone else, you will only ever be in ‘half possession’ of it, whereas you will be able to wield your own ‘gift’ if you take the time and effort to cultivate and develop it.

Although some aspects of Ralph Waldo Emerson’s argument in ‘Self-Reliance’ may strike us as self-evident or mere common sense, he does take issue with several established views on the self in the course of his essay. For example, although it is often argued that travel broadens the mind, to Emerson our travels mean nothing if we have not prepared our own minds to respond appropriately to what we see.

And although many people might argue that consistency is important in one’s thoughts and opinions, Emerson argues the opposite, asserting that it is right and proper to change our opinions from one day to the next, if that is what our hearts and minds dictate.

Similarly, Emerson also implies, at one point in ‘Self-Reliance’, that listening to one’s own thoughts should take precedence over listening to the preacher in church.

It is not that he did not believe Christian teachings to be valuable, but that such preachments would have less impact on us if we do not take the effort to know our own minds first. We need to locate who we truly are inside ourselves first, before we can adequately respond to the world around us.

In these and several other respects, ‘Self-Reliance’ remains as relevant to our own age as it was to Emerson’s original readers in the 1840s. Indeed, perhaps it is even more so in the age of social media, in which young people take selfies of their travels but have little sense of what those places and landmarks really mean to them.

Similarly, Emerson’s argument against conformity may strike us as eerily pertinent to the era of social media, with its echo chambers and cultivation of a hive mind or herd mentality.

In the last analysis, ‘Self-Reliance’ comes down to trust in oneself as much as it does reliance on oneself. Emerson thinks we should trust the authority of our own thoughts, opinions, and beliefs over the beliefs of the herd.

Of course, one can counter such a statement by pointing out that Emerson is not pig-headedly defending the right of the individual to be loudly and volubly wrong. We should still seek out the opinions of others in order to sharpen and test our own. But it is important that we are first capable of having our own thoughts. Before we go out into the world we must know ourselves , and our own minds. The two-word axiom which was written at the site of the Delphic Oracle in ancient Greece had it right: ‘Know Thyself.’

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Effects of self-regulated learning on cognitive engagement and learning achievement in online discussions

• Published: 20 August 2024

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• Zhi Liu 1 , 4 ,
• Ning Zhang 2 ,
• Taotao Long 3 ,
• Sannyuya Liu 1 , 4 &
• Xian Peng 5  

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Online discussions, as a critical interaction tool, have become increasingly popular among instructors and students who can share learning experience and psychological feelings by the means of discourse interactions. Self-regulated learning (SRL) and cognitive engagement are key elements of online learning, which are essential to helping students achieve high learning achievement. However, the relationship between these two elements and their impact on learning achievement are still unclear, which may hinder our understanding of student cognitive processing and psychological mechanism during online self-directed learning. To fill these gaps, this study designed an eight-week quasi-experiment in which students were grouped according to their self-reported SRL features (e.g., metacognitive skills, time management), and investigated the effects of SRL on cognitive engagement and learning achievement. The results showed that students in four SRL groups varied significantly in five dimensions of cognitive engagement within discussions over time. Weak regulators became less engaged over time and tended to share collected information and passively respond to peers, while self-regulators performed better overall and were able to actively think and elaborate their ideas to peers. Besides, SRL played a positive moderating role in the relationship between cognitive engagement and learning achievement, with self-regulators having the strongest moderating effect and better learning achievement. This study suggested that SRL can explain part of the variability in students’ cognitive engagement in online discussions. It also provided inspiration for educational researchers on the design of SRL interventions including the necessity to integrate support for weak self-regulators in online learning.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (Grant No. 2022ZD0117101), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 62377016, 62077017, 62307017, 61977030, 61937001), Hubei Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (2023AFA020).

National Key R&D Program of China (Grant No. 2022ZD0117101), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant Nos. 62377016, 62077017, 62307017, 61977030, 61937001), Hubei Provincial Natural Science Foundation of China (2023AFA020), the 2024 “AI+Examination and Evaluation” Special Teaching Reform Project of Central China Normal University (Grant No. CCNU24JG10), and the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (Grant No. CCNU24AI015).

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Liu, Z., Gao, Y., Zhang, N. et al. Effects of self-regulated learning on cognitive engagement and learning achievement in online discussions. Curr Psychol (2024). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12144-024-06445-z

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