Task 1 : The importance of ICT

Current society cannot be understood without the use of ICTs, and so it happens with education. They have become a fundamental piece to produce a methodological change leading to achieve a significant improvement of educational quality and results. Since digital competence has become a basic and cross-curricular element whose teaching needs to be included in every subject, it is vital for students to become familiar with new technologies and the internet, and to learn how to use them with total responsibility. ICTs are, therefore, tools that must guarantee universal accessibility, allowing teachers to personalize English education and adapt it to the needs of each student. In order to achieve this goal, our secondary school offers a good display of elements that facilitate the use of ICTs during lessons (computer with projector, internet access in every classroom, several digital whiteboards, several computer classrooms…). The use of ICTs in the English classroom benefits the teaching-learning process for the following reasons:
 • They allow a real linguistic practice (real, direct an efficient communicative exchanges) and include the use of a great variety of authentic materials so that students can experiment with the contents they are learning.

 • They allow the use of sensory and interactive materials.

 • They facilitate the contextualization of linguistic samples used during the lessons.

• They enhance motivation, creativity and autonomy of students in their learning processes.

• They maximize the possibilities of responding to the diversity of students and their needs in a more efficient way. With regard to first foreign languages, technological elements will be very useful for the students in their process of acquiring and reinforcing the required skills. In the action of teaching English, they contribute to the acquisition of a deeper and more direct cultural and linguistic knowledge of the English-speaking countries and, on the other hand, they help us to include in our lessons resources to secure a higher level of response to diversification and a contribution to the motivation and the encouragement of the students in their communicative approach to English.