Emerging Technology…
Document sharing is an emerging technology in our area. ©Google Docs and ©Microsoft SkyDrive are online non proprietary programs that allow document sharing and groups to work on a project simultaneously. Students can also see the progress of peer group members in real time as they work. Some of the challenges associated with the technology is ease of access from various educational sites that may not have high speed internet and with SkyDrive, a Microsoft affiliated email address is necessary to be able to edit the document. We have had similar problems with ©Google Docs. Students have had problems accessing the documents unless they have ©Google accounts.
The societal or target market need that this technology meets is the team based atmosphere for work. Many industries are advocating the need for employees that can work as a team and make decisions that will holistically benefit the team.
This technology would be so much better if the email stipulations were not there. If the permissions were relaxed so that anyone with any email address could gain access and edit the shared documents, the pitfalls we and others have experienced in this area would be eliminated
I never thought Google docs as an emergent technology. Good post here. I think that you are correct with the problems of schools not having high speed internet. I am a lucky person because I teach in both the high school and community college; we have high speed internet in Albuquerque. So, to fix those problems, I took out a loan, purchased some old TC1100 HP Tablets, and my classes can then have the school's high speed internet.
ReplyDeleteI would also say that the institutions need to provide their employees some professional development in the operation of the technology the employee is expected to work with.
Nice Post.