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KEYNOTE

June 22
Educational Reform by Means of Information and Communications Technology
Takashi Sakamoto, National Institute of Multimedia Education, Japan

In traditional education, students belong to only one school and passively learn from teachers through information transmission such as lectures and classroom demonstrations, along with a few opportunities for active participation such as Q&A periods or experiments and practice sessions.

This type of education is still effective for learning some fundamental and systematic knowledge within the academic disciplines. However, this kind of education is no longer effective enough to prepare citizens who are able to cope with the complicated problems of the rapidly changing societies of the 21st century.

Students need to develop the skills that will enable them to continue to learn during their whole lives, so that they can adapt to future societies and also contribute to creating new societies. They need to learn how to: collect, compare, select and edit useful information and to produce and transmit new information; they must be able to accept feedback from others and revise information and circulate it again. Through these activities, students will develop skills in finding needed resources and acquire new knowledge and competence for problem discovering and solving.

Using information and communications technology, we could enlarge these activities world wide, overcoming borders of countries, universities, schools and academic subjects, and also barriers of even time and location. Each student could select the best course or even the best school or university in the world, according to his/her own interests, by means of internet, satellite and multimedia technology.

Virtual universities, virtual courses, multimedia packages, and web sites supported by educational institutions, governments, industries, and others are providing good information resources for students.

Information and communications technology is reforming education. Recent examples of internet use in schools, satellite use in universities, new types of multimedia development and also tasks for promoting educational reform by means of information and communications technology will be described.

Takashi Sakamoto Director-General, National Institute of Multimedia Education http://www.nime.ac.jp

Recent Affiliations 1987 Professor of Educational Systems Technology, Department of Systems Science, Graduate School, Tokyo Institute of Technology 1992 Vice President, National Center for University Entrance Examinations 1996 Director-General, National Institute of Multimedia Education Professor Emeritus Tokyo Institute of Technology National Center for University Entrance Examinations Member Science Council of Japan Central Council for Education (MESC) University Council (Specialist Member) (MESC) Council for Lifelong Learning (Specialist Member) (MESC) Institute of Information Technology in Education (Governing Board, UNESCO) Board Member of New Profit Institute Center for Educational Computing Japan Association for the Promotion of Educational Technology Japan Institute of Research for Educational Material and Culture Research Institute for the Educational Studies Center for the Research on Learning software Information Foundation for Developing Human Competence Academic and Professional Society President, Japanese Association of Educational Technology Societies Author 150 Academic Papers (incl,45 English or foreign language) 140 Research Reports 210 Books (incl,11 single Author and 30 English) 110 Edited Books 400 Papers at Conference (incl, 40 International) 600 Papers in non-Academic Journals Editorial Board for International Journals Computeres & Education (Pergamon) Journal of Computer Assisted Learning (Blackwell Science) Journal of Interactive Learning Research (AACE) International Journal of Communication, Information and Education (New) International School Psychology Industry and Higher Education (IP Publishing) Experience as a consultant World Bank (Mass Media and Education) Asia Bank UNESCO