ICT in education in Portugal : a review of 15 years of research

Abstract

ICT in education has developed in Portugal since mid 70s. Although it was integrated in teacher education curricula, a definite impulse in the field can be traced to the beginning of the post-graduation teacher training courses in the end of the 80s. Many research studies in the field have developed since then. Nevertheless, there has neither been a systematic survey of the research studies being carried out so far, nor a meticulous analysis of its contents and evolution. However we know that such work is needed if we want ICT in education domain to be recognised by other educational partners and departments in Portugal. This has been the main goal of the project we present here: 460 Portuguese papers which were published between 1985 and 2000 were analysed. More than a simple portrait of what has been and is now ICT in education in our country, we believe that the analysed data point out interesting cues that should promote ‘food for thought’ and a wide debate among all our research community.