Becta Government & partners – Research – Introduction – Emerging technologies for learning
‘Emerging technologies for learning’ aims to help readers consider how emerging technologies may impact on education in the medium term. The publications are not intended to be a comprehensive review of educational technologies, but offer some highlights across the broad spectrum of developments and trends. It should open readers up to some of the possibilities that are developing and the potential for technology to transform our ways of working, learning and interacting over the next three to five years.An interesting quote from the publication:
“Although the effortless use of technology by this generation may be striking,
appearances are often deceptive. While this generation shows no fear of technology,
‘digital comfort’ does not necessarily mean technology proficiency – particularly
with academic tools. When queried, students often advise, “Don’t assume we can
plug a formula into Excel. Or that we know how a wiki works. Sometimes it is just
new to us.”24 Nor does comfort with technology equate to a full appreciation of
issues such as intellectual property, privacy or security. When asked, most students
confess, “Sometimes we just don’t think about what we’re doing online.”
post—and then making it fit right—can take more time than the post itself. If you’re not committed to Photoshop or its open-source alternative, GIMP, free online image editing site Picnik is a good bet, both for its right-click Firefox extension and its integration with Flickr. If you’ve got a whole set of pictures to post up, you can try the Windows-only ImageResizer, or for an elegant solution, use the export-and-resize functionality of Picasa. (For more on finding reusable images, see our six ways to find reusable media. 
