THE ROLE OF INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY IN A STUDENT’S LIFE.

Ø  Easy access and proximity to educational materials: with the help of Information Technology, students can easily access books, journals, and research notes online, websites such as www.jstor.org, www.obooko.com, www.amazon.com and google scholars, etc. Unlike in the olden days when students had to borrow books from a physical library for a specific period, with information technology, a student has access to lots of libraries in the world thereby paving way for easy access to research materials. Library mobile apps are currently provided in smart phones.

Ø  Ability to study from anywhere: e-learning has unlocked many boundaries for students. It is far more cheaper, easier and quickest means of acquiring knowledge, with the aid of google, ask, about search engines respectively, students are equipped with lots of information in their specific areas of interest. This has led to a popular saying; ‘if you are in doubt, google it out’. Even youtube.com, is a good source of visual education as it is filled with lots of visual materials to aid our knowledge. The power of www.youtube.com can never be underestimated!!!

Ø  Access to software applications to make Learning Easier: a lot of software applications are made available today in the information technology market such as the Microsoft office consisting of popular softwares such as Microsoftword, powerpointpresentation, excel, for arrangement and organisation of data. Computer aided design softwares are also available such as autocad, archicad, Revit, etc thereby making architectural and layout design easier for the students both those that are artistic and those that are not. Another software application that is of great importance is the Microsoft Encarta which serves as an offline source of information for research purposes. The google earth to mention but a few is another important software that can be used to determine locations. The importance of information technology to students cannot be taken for granted.