The Effects of Demographic Factors on High School Science Educators’ Technology Use

Abstract

Several studies have been done to identify the impacts of educators’ demographic factors on their use of technology in the classroom. In this study, the participants of a random sample of full-time high school science educators across 46 states were surveyed. All the data was obtained through an online, closed-ended survey via the Qualtrics website. We did send a survey to 3000 science educators and 104 completed it. Findings showed that there are no significant relationships between science educators’ demographic factors and self-efficacy, tool use, or professional development for the variety of technology tools given in this study. Although our research considered all possible demographic factors about self-efficacy, the use of technology tools in the classroom, and/or their professional development experience, no significant relationship between these variables was found. To continue to examine demographics’ impacts on educator self-efficacy levels with technology, future researches need to involve class observations and interviews of educators using technology while teaching. Observational studies would better assess educator efficacy levels and the extent to which teachers are involved with different types of professional development and how demographics affect those levels.

Keywords

• science educator
• technology tools
• demographic factors

References

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