Edtech

History of Educational Technology

By reneeM
  • Period: 470 BCE to 399 BCE

    Socractes' Socratic Method

    Socrates introduced the Socratic Method sometime during his lifetime (Saettler, 2004, 26)
  • Period: 450 BCE to 400 BCE

    Sophists Era

    Elder Sophists (first instructional technologists) laid the foundation for educational technology by "[systematically analyzing] subject matter and [organizing ] teaching materials" and introduced the practice of mass instruction as well as expository lecture, group discussion, and rhetorical analysis (Saettler, 2004, p.46).
  • Period: 1079 to 1142

    Pierre Abelard

    Pierre Abelard added logic along with "philosophy and] theology]" to Sophists' work to develop a different approach or "attitude" about learning (Saettler, 2004, p.46)
  • 1120

    Yes or No and the Scholastic Method

    Abelard's Sic et Non (Yes or No) which helped develop his scholastic method (Saettler, 2004, p.27)
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    Johann Comenius

    "First true forerunner of modern educational technology" (Saettler, 2004, p.31)
  • Comenius' Great Didactic

    Comenius' Great Didactic provided theory and practice "for every phase of instruction" (Saettler, 2004, p.29)
  • Period: to

    Johann Pestalozzi

    He aimed to "psychologize" instruction by using natural human development to organize educational process (Saettler, 2004, p.36)
  • Period: to

    Lancasterian System Arrived in NY

    Lancasterian System operating in NY and laid the foundation for free public school (Saettler, 2004, p.33)
  • Pestalozzanisim Arrives in US

    Pestalozzanisim, including object teaching, arrives in US (Saettler, 2004, p.39)
  • US Kindergarten

    Margarethe Meyer Schurz brought Friedrich Froebel's Kindergarten to the US (Saettler, 2004, p.43)
  • Instructional Films in Public Schools

    "The public school system of Rochester, NY, became the first to adopt films for regular instructional use." (Reiser, 2001a, p.55)
  • Period: to

    Audiovisual Instruction Movement

    Audiovisual Instruction Movement (Reiser, 2001a, p.56)
  • National Education Association Created

    National Education Association, which would later become AECT, was created (Reiser, 2001a, p.56)
  • Teaching Machine Invented (Personal Contribution)

    Sidney Pressey invented a teaching machine, what is now considered a rudimentary LMS, that "resembled a typewriter with a window that could administer questions. One window was used to show the question and the other one to fill in the answer" (Knowly, 2020). Reference Knowly. (2020, July 8). History of LMS. EasyLMS. https://www.easy-lms.com/knowledge-center/lms-center/history-of-lms/item10401
  • Visualizing the Curriculum

    Hoban et al wrote Visualizing the Curriculum which argued that audiovisual materials are valued for their realism and ability to concretize subject matter (Reiser, 2001a, p.56)
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    World War II

    In the US, the war spurred and fostered development of instructional media, including tools like overhead and film projectors, and hundreds of training films (Reiser, 2001a, p.57).
  • Period: to

    Post War Research

    After the war, researchers studied the aspects of the audiovisual efforts during to determine which methods could help design AV materials (Reiser, 2001a, p.57)
  • BF Skinner's Empiral Approach to Instructional Materials

    "Skinner stated that such materials, called programmed instructional materials, should present instruction in small steps, require overt responses to frequent questions, provide immediate feedback, and allow for learner self-pacing" (Reiser, 2001b, p.59)
  • Bloom's Taxonomy

    "Benjamin Bloom and his colleagues published the Taxonomy of Educational Objectives " (Reiser, 2001b, p.59)
  • Sputnik Launched

    After Sputnik launched, US "poured millions of dollars into improving math and science education in the United States." (Reiser, 2001b, p.61)
  • Learning Objectives

    "[Robert] Mager popularized the use of [learning] objectives with his 1962 book, Preparing Objectives for Programmed Instruction " (Reiser, 2001b, p.59)
  • Formative vs Summative

    Distinguished formative from summative evaluations (Reiser, 2001b, p.61)
  • Standardizing Instructional Material Evaluation

    Susan Markle "created standard procedures for evaluating instructional materials during and after the design process" (Reiser, 2001b, p.61).
  • Educational Technology is Named

    "The terms educational technology and instructional technology began to replace audiovisual instruction to describe the application of media for instructional purposes." (Reiser, 2001a, p.59)
  • First Desktop Computer (Personal Contribution)

    Hewlett Packard made the first desktop computer, changing how and where people can interact with potential digital instructional materials (Knowly, 2020). Reference
    Knowly. (2020, July 8). History of LMS. EasyLMS. https://www.easy-lms.com/knowledge-center/lms-center/history-of-lms/item10401
  • Open Education Resources (Personal Contribution)

    Beginning of the use and distribution of open educational resources (EBSCO, n.d.). References
    EBSCO. (n.d.). The history and future of open educational resources in academic libraries. EBSCOpost. Retrieved October 30, 2022, from https://www.ebsco.com/blogs/ebscopost/history-and-future-open-educational-resources-academic-libraries
  • Period: to

    Instructional Design Education

    Many graduate programs and instructional improvement centers were created to help teachers use instructional materials and practices more effectively (Reiser, 2001b, p.61)
  • Computers in Schools

    "Computers were being used for instructional purposes in more than 40% of all elementary schools and more than 75% of all secondary schools in the United States" (Reiser, 2001a, p.59)
  • Teletheory

    Gregory Ulmer conceptualized teletheory as a means of using the television medium to teach expert concepts to nonexpert audiences (Ulmer, 1989). Reference
    Ulmer, G. L. (1989). Teletheory: Grammatology in the Age of Video. Routledge.
  • Internet Access in Half of US Schools

    Internet access in 50% of US schools and one computer for every nine students in US schools (Reiser, 2001a, p.60)
  • Internet & Computer Access in Schools Increases

    Internet access in 90% of US schools and one computer for every six students (Reiser, 2001a, p.60)
  • Formal Training on Computers

    Fourteen percent of all formal training was delivered via computers (Reiser, 2001a, p.60)
  • IMS and SCORM (Personal Contribution)

    "Some standards and models were designed for course management systems such as the Instructional Management System Standards (IMS 2003) and Sharable Content Object Reference Model (SCORM 2003) by the Advanced Distributed Learning community" (qtd in Sulun, 2018). Reference
    Sulun, C. (2018). The evolution and diffusion of learning management systems: The case of Canvas LMS [EBook]. In A. Correia (Ed.), Driving educational change: Innovations in action. Ohio State Pressbooks.