Today's Generation: Computers in Everyday Life

Today's Generation: Computers in Everyday Life

*Computer Use In* The Classroom By Melanie Granger Computers are an integral part of our everyday life. We use them when we go to work, use a credit card, check out a book at a library, get a drivers license etc. They have also become the source of one of the biggest controversies in education in recent years. Some people believe that computers have no place in the classroom and that they inhibit imagination and cognitive functions in young children while others believe just the opposite. Most people agree that computers should be placed in high school settings as they can greatly facilitate classroom learning and independent study. {text:bookmark-start} {text:bookmark-end} A Brief Overview of the Computer A computer is a logical machine that accepts input from a user, processes it according to specific rules and produces output (Provenzo 17). This is where we get the term "garbage in, garbage out". This means that if we give the computer incorrect information we will get incorrect conclusions from the machine. Computers usually come equipped with a monitor, hard drive to store the information, some kind of transportable storage medium (a floppy disk drive or CD-ROM drive), a keyboard, speakers and mouse. You can get other peripherals to accompany the computer such as a DVD-ROM drive to play movies, a CD-RW drive to create your own CD's, a printer, a scanner and others. The types of peripherals you choose to go with your computer should reflect your own needs and capabilities. This is where many schools go wrong when trying to equip their classrooms with computers. They don't always take into account the needs or capabilities of the students or the knowledge, or lack thereof, possessed by the teacher. Computers can be used for a variety of things including games, word processing, managing databases, as desktop publishers, illustrators, and presentation tools (Provenzo 61-72). This is where one of the biggest advantages to having a computer for both the...

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