Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
questionnaire was handed to the participants before and after attending the school to
evaluate training and learning.
Before attending the surf school, the trainees were asked to scale their skills and
experiences with the Internet on five-point Likert scales. After the school, we asked the same
questions to measure the differences caused by the surf school.
Other questions addressed the barriers, which were assumed to hinder Internet usage
by older people, and the detailed goals of the school to lower these barriers. So, the older
people were asked anonymously, to what extent they have skills to handle a PC (PC literacy)
and to surf in the WWW (Internet literacy). Additionally, they were asked if they see a clear
purpose in using the Internet during their daily life, if they had enough opportunity to try the
Internet to get acquainted with it, and if they feel that they can handle the Internet without
fear. All answers were measured on five-point ordinal scales, where low values stand for low
extent of skills, opportunities, etc.
Figure 3 shows the answers the participants of “S3: Senior Surf School” gave before
the school started. Obviously, there was room to improve on all dimensions; the main
objective of the school was to address all five dimensions and to increase the respective
values.
After
attending the school, the respondents were asked to answer the same questions
again. The answers are summarized in Figure 4, and they show significant improvements in
all dimensions. Some of the assumptions concerning the school design were confirmed by
the results of the survey. So, the teaching program was, because of the lack of time, not
focused on PC literacy but directly on Internet literacy. Corresponding to this, the empirical
results that show the improvements along the dimension “Internet literacy” were higher than
along the dimension “PC literacy.”
Additionally, the participants were asked to judge the school in total, the program, the
trainer, and the organization. All grades were outstanding, and Figure 5 shows some results
Figure 3. Skills and opportunities before attending the school (low values ~ low skills, low
chances, etc.; n = 27-32)
