REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE

Gadgets

A gadget is a small tool or device which has a particular useful function and purpose. Gadgets
tend to be unique than standard technology. In today’s life, tasks are maximized with the use of
modern gadgets. It is easier to accomplish daily tasks and people are also able to do work with
efficiency. One cannot even dare to imagine life without smart phones, cell phones, laptops,
tablets, iPods and so on (Tech Crates, 2012). Today’s gadgets are one of the ways to make life
more comfortable and easier. Shy (2010) says that no one can deny the fact that gadgets have
not only simplified the lives of people but also made them more comfortable and elegant.
Indeed, these gadgets really made a huge impact in people’s lives and became part of it.

Gadgets used in Learning

According to Gammuac (2013), today’s classrooms are equipped with the latest technology to
enhance instruction. Smartphone use in the classroom is still somewhat controversial, but the
Calgary Board of Education actually encourages it as a learning tool. In an interview with CTV,
Queen’s University National Scholar and Associate Professor Sidney eve Matrix compared the
situation to when calculators were first used by students in the classroom. “We had a whole
new level of computational skill, and now we’re going to have a whole new level of mobile
digital skills when we turn to mobile learning on the handhelds.”

Technology users are moving towards being more mobile, and teachers and students are a
significant part of that trend. On 2013, Lenovo, the world’s top PC vendor reported that they
sold more Smartphone and tablets than PCs for the first time ever. Calgary-based SMART
Technologies’ SMART Boards are popular with both teachers and students. Teachers can
project presentations onto the SMART Boards and they can write, touch and interact with their
content. Document cameras are also a fun way for teachers to show students new and
interesting ways of looking at objects. Whether they are zooming in on the smaller details of a
3D object, or observing science experiments, students can share an equal view of the lesson –
without crowding the teacher’s desk. Whether a student is listening to his own music while
studying, or a teacher is playing an audio book to her students, mp3 players are an increasingly
common sight in schools. Both teachers and students can make full use of mp3 players in their
school activities (Gammuac, 2013).

Providing computers to schools increases the technology skills of teachers and students in both
the developed and the developing world. Laptop programs increase students' engagement with
academic work and school, improve technology skills, and have positive effects on students'
writing. Research in many nations suggests that laptop programs will be most successful as part
of comprehensive initiatives that also address changes in education goals, curricula, teacher
training, and assessment (Zucker & Light 2009).

Related Studies

The evolution of technology has dramatically changed society. An endless number of people all
over the world use modern technology. Of the most profound changes in the past decade has
been the widespread proliferation of information and communications technologies (UNICEF,
2011). The growth of technology has changed the world, which in turn has changed the daily
lives of adolescents.

Dehmler (2009) asserts that children ans students today are growing up in an interconnected,
networked world. The youth have unprecedented access to modern technologies and use them
in expected and unexpected ways. Teens all over the world are growing up in a world in which
the Internet, cell phones, text messaging, television and video games, and other technologies
dominate their communication and are an integral part of everyday life.

New media technologies and a number of important studies were conducted in the 2000’s on
the impact of children’s intellectual development, and various aspects of using such
technologies. Many researches were conducted aimed to organize understanding the change
that took place by using these technologies, and to explore the conversion in children’s
behaviour and focused to discover-what extent children feel aggression, and how they react by
using these modern technologies e.g. video games, mobile phones with various applications
embedded using via Internet with Wi-Fi connections video games consoles and internet.

Gross (2009) described in his article that people are very frequent in use of media and modern
technologies in communication at home or at work and feel hard to survive in the absence of
modern means of communications. With the advent rapid new technologies; digital societies
are shaping all across and people are relying mainly on these resources from information,
education, and entertainment to social interaction.The same are shaping social attitude in
dealing with each other. The reformed digital cultures and multi resources of communications
have severe effects on human beings especially on children; who have the immediate capacity
of learning. Technologies usability among youngsters and adolescent such as TV, Internet,
mobile phones are common particularly in developed countries (Gross, 2009).

A number of factors influence student learning and instructional practices when implementing
computer technology in the classroom, and it has been demonstrated that a correlation
between increased computer usage and learning outcomes exists (Bebell & Kay, 2010). Though
it has been demonstrated that implementations and computer use have an effect on a variety
of student outcomes; the central question, and ultimate measure for many educators, is: What
is the impact on student achievement?
Cavanaugh, Dawson, and Ritzhaupt (2011) stated there are three key elements that influence
the impact of laptop computing on student achievement. These include (a) systematic support,
(b) professional development, and (c) changes in teaching practices. In their study, they
examined the impact of laptop computing on teaching practices and student achievement in
eleven Florida school districts over one school year. The study collected data from both urban
and rural K-12 schools with no emphasis on content area or grade level. Data collection from
observations, document analysis, interviews and teacher inquiry were used to develop an
account of the laptop implementation’s impact. Findings from their study showed the impact
of laptops on student achievement as being inconclusive, due to inconsistent performance
results. Though most of the classes in the study showed positive impacts from laptop use, some
classes had negative results, which were attributed to students not knowing how to use the
laptops or being comfortable using them.

Technologies enhanced learning (TEL) aims to design, develop and test socio-technical
innovations that will support and enhance learning practices of both individuals and
organizations. It is therefore an application domain that generally covers technologies that
support all forms of teaching and learning activities. Since information retrieval (in terms of
searching for relevant learning resources to support teachers or learners) is a pivotal activity in
TEL, the deployment of recommender systems has attracted increased interest. This chapter
attempts to provide an introduction to recommender systems for TEL settings, as well as to
highlight their particularities compared to recommender systems for other application domains
(Koper et al., 2010).

One study that was conducted to determine whether Wiki technology would improve students’
writing skills in a college English as a foreign language writing class showed benefits to using
Wiki technology. Students were invited to join a Wiki page where they would write and 5 post
passages and then read and respond to the passages of their fellow classmates. Students
participating in the study reported that their receiving immediate feedback from the instructor
was a benefit of using this form of technology. Students in the study also reported learning
vocabulary, spelling, and sentence structure by reading the work of their classmates (Lin &
Yang, 2011).

Another study found that integrating technology and peer-led discussions of literature can
produce increased student engagement and motivation. Technology used in these small group
discussions of literature includes wikis, online literature circles, and online book clubs. With
these technologies, students were able to connect with readers from other schools, states, and
even other countries. This type of technology is an assessable and motivational way to expose
students to other ideas and cultures. These online literature discussions have the ability to
create a sense of community and foster positive social interaction (Coffey, 2012).
The use of technology in education has significantly aided students in performing their school-
related tasks. Clegg and Bailey (2008) assert that with the utilization of mobile devices such as
laptops and tablet computers, the learning process for the students become more fun and
conducive due to the user-interactivity and appealing visuals present in these learning tools.
Additionally, a vast collection of learning games and applications exist for these mobile devices,
and as a matter of fact, there are about 96,000 educational applications available (App Store
Metrics, 2013). The data collected by Apps in Education (2012) confirmed that the subject areas
covered by these applications include Mathematics, Sciences, Grammar and Spelling and Arts
and Humanities (Clegg & Bailey, 2008).

In the Philippines, President Benigno Aquino announced during the launch of the country’s K-12
curriculum that the government eyes the use of tablet computers in public schools in lieu of
traditional textbooks (Enterprise Innovation, 2012). Furthermore, there exist various programs
by the government, non-government organizations and private corporations in the Philippines
that aim to provide one laptop computer per child. With the presence of laptops in the
classrooms, students become more engaged and involved in school-related activities (Oquias,
2011).