HISTORY OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY & INFORMATION AND COMMUNICATION TECHNOLOGY

The development of Educational Technology can be traced even during the early beginning of men’s effort to
live. Would you believe that technology could be traced as early as Stone Age?

 Stone Age

The Stone Age technology could be shown by the ignition of fire by rubbing two stones, handmade weapons,
manufacturing, utensils made of stones and the use of clothing out of animal skin. Furthermore, the Stone Age
people also develop conoe-ship technologies which enable them to travel across ocean. They learned informally
about the ocean currents, weather conditions, sailing techniques astro navigation and star maps. Further
technology was shown by producing polished stone tools using hard rock which became a prelude to the mining
industry.

 Bronze Age

This period showed the development of agricultural technology, fishing techniques, domesticating animals and
establishments of permanent homes instead of going from one place to another. The people also developed
metal technology using copper and bronze.

 Iron Age

During this age, people made progress by resorting to iron melting technology since iron was cheaper than
bronze. The Iron Age was the last period prior to the discovery of writing.

 Educational Technology during the period of Ancient Civilization

Paul Saettler (2004) traced the development of educational technology during the ancient civilization when the
tribal priests bodies of knowledge and ancient culture, and introduced sign writing or pictographs to record or
transmit information. Instructional technique was found in every stage of human civilization based on the
number of investigation and evidence. Technology of instruction was found to be more complex in highly
advance culture, and social behavior. Likewise diverse significant shift in educational values, goals or objectives
led to diverse technology of instruction.

The greatest advances in technology and engineering came with the rise of the ancient civilization which
stimulated and educated people and society in the world to adopt new ways of living and governance. Example
of this is the Harrapan civilization.

The Chinese civilization contributed technology like paper, seismological detectors, matches, Iron Plough,
suspension bridge, natural gas as fuel, magnetic compass, gun powder among others. With the invention of
paper, came their first step towards development of educational technology by further culturing different
handmade paper products as mean of visual aids.

Another language-related technology was the ancient Egyptian language which one of the longest surviving and
used language in the world. Their script was made up of pictures of the real things like birds, animals different
tools, etc. these pictures are popularly called Hieroglyph. Their language was made up of above 500 Hieroglyphs
which are known as Hieroglyphic. The stone monuments or a tomb which are discovered and rescued later on
provides the evidence of existence of many forms of artistic hieroglyphic in ancient Egypt.

 Educational Technology during Medieval and Modern Period

Paper and pulp paper making process which was developed in China during early 2 nd century A.D., was carried to
the middle east and was spread to the Mediterranean by the Muslim conquests. Evidence supports that a paper
mill was also established in Sicily in the 12 th century. The discovery of spinning wheel increased the productivity
of thread making process to a great extent and when Lynn White (1907) added the spinning wheel with
increasing supply of rags, this led to the production of cheap paper, which was a prime factor in the
development of printing technology.

The invention of printing press took place in approximately 1450 A.D. by Johannes Gutenberg (1468) a German
inventor. This event was prime development factor in the history of educational technology to convey the
instruction as per the need of complex and advanced technology cultured society.
 During the pre-industrial phases, when the industry was at the handwork or artisan level the instructional
process utilized gadgets like the slate, the hornbook, the blackboard and chalk. During this time, only textbooks
were used with a few illustrations. Educational technology during those times was associated with simple aids
like charts and pictures.

In 1873, Educational Technology paved its way to be known audio-visual education when an international
exhibition held in Vienna showcased the winning American exhibition of maps, charts, textbooks and other
equipment. This was followed by Maria Montessori (Aug. 31, 1870 – May 6, 1952), an internationally renowned
child educator, when she introduced the Montessori Method, which developed graded design activities to
provide for proper sequencing of subject matter for each individual learner.

This effort marked the beginning of the dynamic educational technology. Modern educational technology
flourished as an extension of Montessori’s idea prepared child centered environment.

Earlier than Montessori’s innovation, Charles Babbage’s (1791-1871) design of general purpose computing
device laid the foundation of the modern computer in 1883.

The art of teaching recommended for the application of knowledge derived from behavioral psychology to
classroom procedures along with the use of automated teaching devices.

In 1929, the first practical use of television broadcast was done in Germany. The Olympic Games in 1936 were
shown in television in Berlin. Then open circuit television began to broadcast in 1950. In 1960, television was
used in education.

.in 1943, the first computing machine was design by Babbage. In 1946, Dr. Omar Khayyam Moore developed a
talking type tutorial computer aided instruction (CAI). Since 1974, computers are interestingly used in schools,
colleges, and Universities. In the beginning of 19 th century, there were noteworthy changes in the field of
education. British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC), right from its start of school broadcasts in 1920 had maintain
rapid pace in making sound contribution to formal education. In the USA, by 1952, 20 states has the provision
for educational broadcasting, parallel to this time about 98% of the school in United Kingdom were equipped
with radios and they were regular daily programs.

In 1956, Benjamin Bloom from USA introduced the taxonomy of educational objectives through his publication,
“The Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, The Classification of Educational Goals, Handbook 1: Cognitive
Domain.”

Educational technology begun in 1960 from America and Russia and now, it reached England, Europe and India.

In 1961, Micro teaching technique was first adopted by Dwight W. Allen and his co-worker at Stanford University
in USA.

Electronic is the technology being developed in the beginning of the 21 st century. Broadband internet access
became popular and occupied almost all the important offices and educational places and even in common
places in developed countries.

Today’s classroom is more likely to be a technology lab, a room with rows of students using internet connected
or WI-FI (wireless fidelity) enable laptops to be used by students. Rapid technological changes in the field of
education have created new ways to teach and to learn. Technological changes also motivated the teachers to
access a variety of information on a global scale via the internet, to enhance their lessons as well to make them
competent professional in their area of concern.

Educational technology is a multifaceted and integrated process which are applied and used by people,
procedures, ideas, devices, and organizations. The technology use is based on specific needs and requirements
of education to address education-related problems to facilitate the implementation, evaluation of programs
about human learning.

 Five stages of Educational Technology:

 Stage 1

The first stage of educational technology is associated with the use of aids like charts, maps, symbols, models,
specimens, and concrete materials. Educational technology referred to audio-visual aids which activated human
sense as forms of leanings.
 Stage 2

These stages refer to the introduction of electronics through the sophisticated hardware and software. This
stage also shows the use of varied audio-visual gadgets like projector, tape recorder radio and TV which mark
changes in the educational scenario. These gadgets were used for effective presentation in lectures and lessons.

 Stage 3

Third stage of educational technology revolved around the use of communication enhancement equipment to
promote mass media of instructional purposes. Computer-assisted Instruction (CAI) became an important
component of instruction.

 Stage 4

These stage exemplified individualized teaching and learning with the use of programmed learning and
instructions. It created a new approach to educational technology with the introduction of self-learning based
on self-instructional materials and teaching machines.

 Stage 2

This last stage is influenced by the concept of system engineering or system approach which focuses on
language laboratories, teaching machines, programmed instruction, multimedia technologies and the use of
computer in instruction. According to it, educational technology is a systematic way of designing, carrying out,
and evaluating the total process of teaching and learning in terms of specific objectives based on research.
(http://blitzlondon.blogspot.com/2012/10/history-of-educational-technology.html)

 History of ICT in Education

The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) uses the term ICT’s or
Information and Communication Technologies to describe “… the tools and processes to access, retrieve, store,
organize, manipulate, produce, present and exchange information by electronic and other automated means.
These include hardware, software and telecommunications in the forms of personal computers, scanners, digital
cameras, phones, faxes, modems, CD and DVD players and recorders, digitized video, radio and television
programs, database and multimedia programs” (UNSECO Bangkok, 2003, 9.75; Anderson, p.5)

Historical context is important to better understand the evolution of ICT in education.

From the history of media, we know that new forms never replace the old one. Television did not kill radio, and
internet did not kill TV. New forms of media rather complement the old ones, but do not countervail them. This
naturally leads to greater choice for people, but also causes fragmentation.

 Five Phases of Using Computers in Education:

1. Late 1970’s – Early 1980’s: Programming, Drill, and Practice

This is the era when computers were beginning to be used in school. It was in the early years of 1980’s when
teachers were teaching “ADP” in class which stands for automated data processing using Nokia MikroMikko.

The pedagogical reason to teach programming was not to train programmers, but to develop students’ logic
and math skills. There were also software developed by teachers for simple drills and practice exercises for
math and language learning.

2. Late 1980’s – Early 1990’s: Computer Based Training (CBT) with Multimedia

Later, the multimedia computers, with advanced graphics and sound came to the market. It was an
improvement of the drill and practice exercise which failed to teach the students that much due to the
absence of multimedia which contains colors and animation that motivate the students to do the exercises.

This was known as the golden era of CD-ROM’s and multimedia computers which contributed a lot to
students’ learning.
3. Early 1990’s: Internet-Based Training (IBT)

The third wave of using computers in education came with the adoption of the World Wide Web (WWW).
The failures of CD-ROM’s were deemed to the challenges to update the content in the CD-ROM’s. Since
information changes so fast, the internet became a rich source of the expanding knowledge in giving
Internet-based Training. But again without multimedia, all one could do on the internet were early
experiments with animations, videos and audios. It was noticed that merely clicking and reading e-learning
course materials online didn’t make people very smart.

Later, users of IBT found it not to be pedagogical, cost and time efficient because after going through the
IBT, very little learning occurred.

4. Late 1990’s – Early 2000: E-Learning

Improvements were made on the IBT in the late 1990’s and early 2000in the form of e-learning. The e-
learning industry was built; even though it was not proven that anyone (except the IT managers) needed
these products. The markets for e-learning courses and especially for Learning Management System (LMS)
were created. An enormous number of websites, articles and companies made it clear to all concerned with
education that this is something that they must be involved in. the pedagogical thinking around the e-
learning is closely related to the CBT. The point is to deliver courses for students. Later on, the learning
platform developers have become more aware that learning requires social activities among the learners
themselves.

5. Late 200: Social Software + Free and Open Content

In the late 2000, social software and free and open content marked a real breakthrough in the field of
educational technology. Blogs and Wikis have already brought web back to its original idea: simple tool for
personal notes that are easily accessible and even editable by peers and your potential peers.

The pedagogical thinking behind the social software and the free and open content can be rooted to the
social constructivist theory and cultural-historical psychology. “Any true understanding is dialogic in nature”.
Mikhail Bakhtin (1895-1975) and Lev Vygotsky (1896-1934) wrote that “all higher (mental) functions
originate as actual relations between human individuals.”

Learning with computers is not only about programming or drill and practice, nor about multimedia, nor
about fast updating or cost-efficiency – It is all about people sharing ideas.