DON MARIANO MARCOS MEMORIAL STATE UNIVERSITY

SOUTH LA UNION CAMPUS

Agoo, La Union

COLLEGE OF GRADUATE STUDIES

TM 327 ADVANCED INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY

AND MANAGEMENT SYSTEMS

RANDOLF M. AGUP
Ph.D. in Mathematics Education

SEEDING THE CLOUD: CREATING NEW OPPORTUNITIES FOR LEARNING

Water resources are increasingly taxed by exploding demand and continued population
growth. In response, the scientific community have come up with weather modification,
commonly known as cloud seeding, which is explained by Weather Modification Inc. (n.d.) as the
application of scientific technology that can enhance a clouds ability to produce precipitation.

As generation changed, the word cloud has gained another meaning and now used as a
metaphor for the Internet.

With the growing population of netizens, those active participants in the online community
(Merriam-Webster, n.d.), the cloud undergoes continuous seeding to cater the increasing needs and
demands of its users.

The concept of cloud computing started in the early 1960s at the Massachusetts Institute
of Technology (MIT) with the vision of an On-line community of people. Computers should
facilitate communications between people and be a support for human decision processes.

The Cloud

The cloud has a universal appeal for most people since it was commercialized. Different
people approach the concept of the cloud with different mindsets, but a huge fact is that the cloud
has developed as an electronic medium at the world stage.

It is the global connection between the computers, the super highway of the information
in the world and is generally referred to as the networks of the networks (Singh, 2016). We have
become dependent on it for our daily routines, may it be in shopping, mailing, reading the news,
looking up for movie reviews, etc. We depend on the different cloud services because we have
told ourselves that it has made our lives easier.

The cloud has introduced improvements in technology, communication, and online

entertainment, but it is also incredibly useful for education purposes as well. The development of
Internet technologies has raised the education level in all countries and it has changed the way
students are being taught at schools. (Sharma, 2016).

We advocate the use of internet technologies within the classroom. Internet applications
respond to students and other peoples questions in real time. Students are seeing Google as a new
teacher and the Internet as a school.

Cloud-based Education

In the realm of education, I think that the cloud can be a great source of information.
Research can be easily planned and implemented for the benefit of both students and educators.

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 Moreover, the cloud is also a great research tool. I think that all students at the university
level should be proficient at using it. These skills are better learned when taught from a young age;
therefore, the sooner the students are taught to use the cloud the faster the students will pick it up
and be able to learn to reap its benefits. The cloud is a public forum and as such, it is accessible to
all kinds of people.

The generation X, those who were born in the 60s and 70s (Business Dictionary, n.d.),
usually mentions how technology changed the way we do it now in comparison to the old days.
The classic graduation speech joke of thanking Wikipedia and Google for our degrees is more
becoming reality than humor. One cannot deny that the tolerance levels for lack of knowledge
have dropped, and Google it has become one of the go-to responses to someones query. This is
the byproduct of having easy access to an immeasurable wealth of information.

I am sure everyone who graduated at any time before hitting the millennium would
remember writing a paper at some point in their life, whether that was for high school or university,
and surely did a lot of page-turning in search for excerpts, sources, and information relevant to the
topic. This is hardly the case anymore, with just simply flip opening a laptop, automatically
connects onto the nearest Wi-Fi Hotspot, then youre all set to go. Google will welcome you with
a plethora of options to search through, may that be a journal or simply a book review, the results
take less than a fraction of a second to be listed and ready to be read.

It is given that the cloud is a great research and information tool. However, one must be
taught to be critical on researching on the cloud and in such could help them be more critical
overall. We need to teach technology using skills to our students. We also need to teach them
critical analysis techniques so that they can be able to differentiate between trustworthy sources
and shady ones. This is a skill that needs to be systematically taught just as we teach reading,
writing, and arithmetic.

Continuous Learning in the Cloud

When shall we stop learning? Well, we should not. Information acquired in a university
will only get us in the front door. A professional in the field of medicine, information technology,
engineering, and finance and marketing will say that it is a rule that you must keep yourself up-to-
date with your sector if you want to keep up with the competition. It is partly the reason why new
books are introduced every 1 to 2 years for university students as new methods emerged and comes
new techniques to be accustomed to. And as for the workplace, it is the reason why training is not
just something being done for the first month joining a company, but it is a process that takes place
again and again whenever new developments come out in someones respective field.

Being trained means being valuable, and ones value is further increased by the quality of
training he/she receives. Kaplanis (2013) has cited the reason why Apple, Dell, and other
technological giants offer trainings all-year-round, it is because they believe their staff deserves to
have their resources anytime, with the ability to review and even go back to refresh their memory
on things they have already received qualifications on. It is about a company valuing its employees
as much as it is embracing the different nature of people, some of which learn better by reading,
hearing, or writing, meaning they need extra time to pause, rewind, and develop their pace as they
go. What used to be a users manual that could be taken home can now fit in the pocket and lives
on the cloud.

Rapid development of the Internet introduced learning in virtual distance forms. As it is

everyones responsibility for his/her education, it is expected that the one who wants to learn
something will be able to find someone who would provide the best instruction on the Internet. If
it really happened, Brdika (2003) believes that it would probably influence the higher forms of
education. Some people claim that it could be the end of classical stone universities.

In education, the cloud can provide support in various types of learning: expository, active,
and interactive (Means, Toyama, Murphy, Bakia & Jones, 2009). The different kind of learners
are more easily accommodated. Interactive learning inspires youth to partake. The cloud offers a

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customizable learning experience particularly for adults as teaching them is a more complex
process. Adults now have alternatives to being taught in a class, can now learn anywhere, anytime.
Kids that were once thought to be unsuitable for school now have ways to find interest in
learning. Teaching aids such as videos and other supporting material can all be bundled together
online.

New information is directly funneled to the learner in the cloud, instead of having to issue
new versions of the same material. What used to be costly is now inexpensive; money saved can
fuel the creative part of teaching. These online materials allow people to re-evaluate their
knowledge, even if they have already acquired a qualification.

The fact that certain individuals use the cloud for interactive learning does not mean that it
yields better learning results. In the same manner, certain universities, departments, or degree plans
placing a much higher emphasis on interactive Internet uses may give rise to inequality between
the students whose institutional framework encourages these uses and those that study in
environments that do not.

Studies on technology have reached a certain consensus that individuals, more than
exploring the new possibilities that technology offers, tend to use it to do things they already did
without it, but more effectively and/or extensively. (DiMaggio, Hargittai, Celeste, & Shafer 2004).

In the study of Castao, Duart, and Vinuesa (2015), results show that the students most
skilled in Internet usage use this technology for interactive learning regardless of whether the
environment in which they study recognizes this interaction or not. Also, in the virtual model, the
students most motivated in learning make greater use of interactive Internet regardless of the
benefit it offers them in terms of academic performance. It has also been indicated that among the
youngest students there is a greater trend toward interactive Internet usage. This fact reflects a
cultural change in Internet usage where young people are increasingly adopting online interaction
as part of their lives and extrapolating this dynamic to learning. On the other hand, older students
do not have this culture of online interaction and are inclined to traditional and unidirectional
learning.

Furthermore, age plays a role in the gender breach: women use interactive Internet for
learning more, but only at older ages. This difference is not observed among the youth. This result
coincides with the international evidence that posits that in the younger generations the digital
gender breach is decreasing, and therefore certain uses are converging (OECD, 2007). Therefore,
the interactive internet habit should be extended to groups that use it least, regardless of their skill
level, the older students especially men. Moreover, promote among the youngest students,
extracurricular Internet usage habits linked to communication and online work, without linking
them only to leisure activities. In this manner, the students will bring their habits into the academic
world.

Online learning must be the greatest revolution in contemporary education. It made a huge
change in the system and opened great opportunities for everyone who wants to learn something.

Lifelong learning must now be a part of everyones career plans. In todays job market,
taking online courses help workers remain competitive while not having the need to take time off
from their jobs. Learning has changed for everyone, as iPads join the classroom to help kids with
learning difficulties, computers are standard equipment in class, and University classrooms are
called Smart-Classes for having computer equipment directly connected to the board.

While technological advancements have been happening for the last 30 years, the cloud
has singlehandedly revolutionized how learning is facilitated, more than the radio or television
ever could. We are in the early days of online learning. The possibilities are limitless.

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References:

Brdika, B. (2003). The ways of application of the internet to education. Retrieved November 4,
2017, from http://it.pedf.cuni.cz/~bobr/role/ch56.htm

Business Dictionary (n.d.). Generation X. Retrieved November 4, 2017, from

www.businessdictionary.com/definition/Generation-X.html

Castao, J., Duart, J., & Vinuesa, T. (2015). Determinants of internet use for interactive learning:
An exploratory study. Retrieved November 4, 2017, from
https://naerjournal.ua.es/article/viewFile/v4n1-4/121

Dimaggio, P., Hargittai, E., Celeste, C., & Shafer, S. (2004). From unequal access to differentiated
use. Retrieved November 4, 2017, from http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/summary?
doi: 10.1.1.85.6001

Kaplanis, D. (2013, July 12). How internet changed the learning process. Retrieved November 4,
2017, from Talent LMS: https://www.talentlms.com/blog/how-the-internet-changed-the-
learning-process/

Means, B., Toyama, Y., Murphy, R., Bakia, M., & Jones, K. (2009). Evaluation of evidence-based
practices in online learning: A meta-analysis and review of online learning studies.
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practices/finalreport.pdf

Meriam-Webster (n.d.). Netizen. Retrieved November 3, 2017, from https://www.merriam-

webster.com/dictionary/netizen

OCDE (2007). ICTs and gender. Working party on the information economy. Retrieved November
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Sharma, V. (2016, February 16). Importance of internet in education at schools. Retrieved

November 4, 2017, from Klient Solution Technology:
http://www.klientsolutech.com/importance-of-internet-in-education-at-schools/

Singh, K. (2016, June 19). What are the capabilities of internet? Retrieved November 3, 2016,
from MBA Official: http://www.mbaofficial.com/mba-courses/information-
technology/what-are-the-capabilities-of-internet/

Spilling, P. & Lundh, Y. (2004). Features of the internet history. Retrieved November 3, 2017,
from
http://www.usit.uio.no/om/organisasjon/sst/stab/ansatte/bness/tilkoplet/web/7/src/pal-
spilling-yngvar-lundh-features-of-the-internet-history.pdf

Weather Modification (n.d.). Cloud seeding. Retrieved November 3, 2017, from

www.weathermodification.com/cloud-seeding.php

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