Teaching with Digital Gadgets: Attitude and Hindrance in Public Secondary Schools in Rungwe District, Mbeya-Tanzania

Abstract

Digital gadgets (e.g. personal computers, tablets, iPads, and smartphones) were found advantageous in revolutionizing the provision of education. Tanzania's government is implementing digital gadgets in teaching by allocating gadgets to schools to integrate technology and the education sector to meet global changes. Alike digital gadgets have multiplied in schools, anxiety has also elevated. This study sought to examine teaching with digital gadgets: attitude and hindrance in public secondary schools in Rungwe district, Mbeya-Tanzania. The study adopted a convergent parallel mixed research design. The study targeted teachers, heads of schools and the District Secondary Education Officers (DSEO). Both probability and non-probability sampling were employed to sample schools and 166 participants. Data were collected through questionnaires and an interview guide. Quantitative data were scrutinized using descriptive statistics with the support of Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) version 20 and qualitative data were organized, coded and assessed with the aid of the word clouds program to determine the key themes. The study revealed that teachers are enthusiastic to use digital gadgets due to access of varieties of teaching resources, easier for teachers to prepare teaching notes, offer new ways of teaching, update students’ information and integration teachers into the digital world. Also, the study revealed that digital illiteracy, technical problems, cost of internet service, and low internet connectivity hamper teaching with digital gadgets. The study recommended that building capacity for teachers on digital skills, establishing a local area network in each school, enabling access to hasty internet, teachers' involvement in self-awareness to a variety of digital technologies and establishing a digital learning cluster can assist to overthrow the hindrance.