History of Educational Tech

By enyeny
  • 200,000 BCE

    Oral Communication

    Oral Communication
    One of the earliest means of formal teaching was oral – though human speech – although over time, technology has been increasingly used to facilitate or ‘back-up’ oral communication. In ancient times, stories, folklore, histories and news were transmitted and maintained through oral communication, making accurate memorization a critical skill, and the oral tradition is still the case in many aboriginal cultures.
  • 1400 BCE

    Written Communication

    Written Communication
    Text or writing has also played an important part in education for a long time. According to the Bible, circa the 7th century BC, Moses used carved stone to impart the 10 commandments in the form of writing. Despite Socrates' aversion to writing, written means of communication make analytic, extended chains of reasoning and argument more accessible.
  • Broadcasting and Video

    Broadcasting and Video
    In the 1920s, the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) began broadcasting educative radio programs for schools. The BBC's first adult education radio broadcast was a presentation on Insects in Relation to Man in 1924, and in the same year, J.C. Stobart, the new Director of Education at the BBC, pondered in the magazine Radio Times about a "broadcasting university" (Robinson, 1982). Television was originally utilized in education in the 1960s, for schools and general adult education.
  • Computer Technologies

    Computer Technologies
    In essence the development of programmed learning aims to computerize teaching by organizing information, testing learners' knowledge, and give quick feedback to learners, all without the use of humans except for the design of hardware and software. In 1954, based on the principle of behaviorism, B.F. Skinner began experimenting with teaching machines that used programmed learning. One of the first examples of computer-based learning was Skinner's teaching machines.
  • Social Media

    Social Media
    Although social media are a subset of computer technology, their evolution deserves its own chapter in the history of educational technology. Blogs, wikis, YouTube videos, mobile devices such as phones and tablets, Twitter, Skype, and Facebook are all examples of social media technology.
  • A paradigm Shift

    A paradigm Shift
    A paradigm shift is defined as "an important change that happens when the usual way of thinking about or doing something is replaced by a new and different way." The tremendous speed of technological advancement, as well as our everyday engagement in technology-based activities, differentiates the digital era from all earlier epochs. As a result, the Internet's influence on education might be described as a paradigm shift, at least in terms of educational technology.