TEACHERS' EXPECTATIONS OF THE IMPACT OF E-LEARNING ON KUWAIT'S PUBLIC EDUCATION SYSTEM

Social Behavior and Personality, 2006 by Aldhafeeri, Fayiz, Almulla, Mohammed, Alraqas, Bandar

- Understanding the basic hardware of the computer is essential for students' learning.

- Students should be able to demonstrate basic computer use.

The instrument was piloted to verify its reliability and to estimate the response rate of the main test. After the pilot test, some modifications were applied to the original instrument. Cronbach alpha was used to measure the internal consistency, based on the average interitem correlation, for the questions of the six sections that constitute the questionnaire. The reliability of the instrument for the six competency areas overall was 0.98, which is high according to Burns (2000).

To ensure the validity of the instrument, a copy of the questionnaire (complete booklet) was sent to the chairman of the steering committee of E-learning applications in Kuwait to be submitted to the members of the committee to judge its appropriateness and alliance with the objectives of the E-learning project in Kuwait. The members of the committee, who are educationalists and academics responsible for E-learning implementation in Kuwait, have approved the validity of the instrument used in this study. Other researchers from Kuwait University were asked to comment on the validity of the instrument.

PROCEDURE

The data collection process took place during the autumn term of the 2002/2003 academic calendar. Respondents to this study were selected from a range of teachers in the public schools of Kuwait. The sampling procedure employed in the current study was a classified sampling according to: grade span, school gender (schools in Kuwait are segregated by gender), and school districts (the Kuwait educational system is divided into six school districts).

Based on the above classifications, six schools were randomly selected from each of the six school districts in Kuwait. Three of the six were boys' schools, and the others were for girls. Two of the six schools were elementary, two intermediate, and two secondary. Six hundred questionnaires were distributed, with a response rate of 83%.

The respondents to the study seemed to reply thoughtfully and carefully. For that objective to be achieved, a process for increasing teachers' awareness about - and readiness for - E-learning implementation in schools has been guided mainly by the steering committee of E-learning implementation in Kuwait. Before the questionnaire reached the schools, the Ministry of Education arranged presentations, seminars, training workshops, and newsletters about the E-learning project. Moreover, teachers' involvement in fostering the E-learning environment in schools was encouraged. Letters were sent to every school in Kuwait urging teachers to make contributions to the E-learning project through submitting educational software, electronic materials and lessons, or even ideas to enrich the development of an E-learning system. These contributions were collected and rearranged by the Center of Information Technology at the Ministry of Education of Kuwait. In addition, the Ministry of Education requested every teacher in Kuwait to hold an International Computer Driving License (ICDL) as a preparation step for E-learning use in schools. These initiatives made the respondents to the current study conscious of the nature of the questionnaire and motivated them to convey their thoughts about E-learning implementation in schools.