INTEGRATION OF ICTs IN TEACHER EDUCATION PROGRAMS IN PAKISTAN Shawana Fazal, Dr Muhammad Iqbal Majoka, Dr Saeed Khan, Hazara University Mansehra,Pakistan Project supervised and funded by USAID,Teacher Education Project for Pakistan

INTRODUCTION The use of ICTs has been recognized by governments and education systems as a very important tool to bring advancement and improvement in the teaching learning process (Plump, Anderson, Law, & Qualex, 2009). The use of ICTs in instructional programs has changed the classroom situation and teacher’s role. This wave of change in technology has also knocked the door in the developing countries like Pakistan. The integration of ICTs in teacher education programs is one of the examples of such reformation efforts.

BACKGROUND It was the first time that the Government of Pakistan realized the importance of ICTs and reflected its integration in teacher education programs as policy matter in the National Education Policy 2009. For implementation, the Higher Education Commission Pakistan introduced the course “ICTs in Education” for Associate Degree in Education (ADE) and B. Ed (E) programs. Use of ICTs was integrated in the contents of different courses of these programs. This process was supported by USAID, Teacher Education Project for Pakistan. The increasing role of ICTs as a learning tool could cause problems for pupils who have less experience of technology or have less affinity with ICTs. Differences between pupils with different social-economic backgrounds are also mentioned in this respect but scarcely any research has been done on this (Sutton, 1991; Volman & Van Eck, 2001).

Cont: The course “ICTs in Education” was implemented for ADE/B. Ed (E) classes in 2010-11 for the first time. In this situation, it was vital to explore how successfully this course was implemented and ICTs were integrated in the pioneer institutions, so as to have baseline information for further improvement in the implementation process.

Research Questions This study was focused to investigate: i) How the physical resources and infrastructure has contributed to implementation and integration of ICTs? ii) How the different background characteristics of learners have added to implementation and integration of ICTs in the program? iii) What role the teacher educators’ biographic characteristics have played in this regard?

Theoretical Framework of the Study A large number of world learning institutions have incorporated Information and communications technologies (ICTs) as an integral part of their teaching learning process (Juang et. al., 2008; Friedman et. al., 2009; Ismail et. al., 2010). Teacher education has seen rapid development and international transformation due to the emergence of new technologies and new challenges to educate students (Moon, 2004a), this has resulted in restructuring and rearrangement of teaching methodology by educational institutions to better prepare their students for the future challenges (Auerswald & Magambo, 2006). The continuous need based support in the form of training, encouragement, access and resources to teacher is very crucial for assisting them in adjusting with these new technologies and efficiently using them to improve the teaching and learning in the classroom (McDougald, 2009).

Use of ICTs in all types of curricula has been the need of time for effective teaching in the perspective of globalization. An efficient pre-service training for implementing and integrating ICTs in education can empower the school teachers for this purpose. There has been no widespread, systematic effort to determine how teachers’ biographic and characteristics (who must be in the vanguard of integrating ICTs into education) are associated with the integration and implementation of ICTs in instruction; how students’ knowledge and skills are affected by provision of ICTs tools in the institution.

Methodology Mixed method research design was adopted to conduct this study. Demographic profile surveys for each head, teacher educators as well as for the students who had recently completed the “ICTs in Education course” were administered. Signed consent forms informing participants of their rights and voluntary participation were secured. The data was drawn from the surveys for heads and prospective teachers, semi-structured interviews for teacher educators, and classroom observation for different courses. The data was analysed quantitatively and qualitatively. It was focused on probing the process of implementation of the course “ICTs in Education” and integration of ICTs in teacher training programs of ADE and B. Ed (Elementary) in seven institutions of KP and Punjab provinces of Pakistan, possibly having different characteristics.

Data Collection Process Each sample institution was visited thrice. In first visit, consent forms and heads survey forms were administered. In the second visit, students’ survey forms were administered and the teachers who had been involved in teaching the course “ICTs in Education” were interviewed. In the third visit, on the average three classrooms of the target class of ADE and B.Ed (Ele.) were observed using observation checklist.

Data Analysis Data was entered into SPSS after proper coding of the quantitative data. In qualitative data, the themes were identified and allocated suitable codes. It was the aim of study to examine the effect of similarities and contrasts of the cases(institutions), the teacher, students intake, course material were the commonalities where as sources of differences likely to create variation in the cases included different pre-requisite physical facilities (building, UPS, generator, availability of electricity etc.) relevant physical infrastructure (computer labs, multi-media, ICTs resources etc.) and technical human resource (supporting staff available to facilitate faculty, teachers’ training etc.).

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