twenty years of edtech by technovore
Briggs (2014, para. 2) in her blog, The Evolution of Learning Technologies, provided valuable insight into the meaning of educational technology. The word technology comes from the two Greek words; Techne means art, skill, craft, or the way, manner, or means by which a thing is gained. Logos means word or expression by words. According to Briggs, educational technology are things such as skills or information, acquired through training. Education technology can be traced back to the ancient times of the Egyptians and Romans when oral and written communications are the technologies of that era.
The printing press was invented in Europe in the 15th century. The mass distribution of written documents due to the explosion of the printing press, as Bates asserted, has compelled people to become literate and analytical, which led to the rapid expansion of formal education (2015, “history of educational technology,” para. 6.2.2). Distance education arose in the 19th century when improvements in the transportation and the affordability of postal services emerged. Fast forward to the 20th century; radio, TVs, and computer-based training with multi-media were considered as innovations in education and to the present time of eLearning, MOOCS, mobile learning, and online social learning.
The evolution in educational technology has been successful in reaching a vast population of learners. These resulted in flourishing people’s ability to learn, be inspired, and creative to build a better world. On the other hand, progress has been slow in shifting the teaching model. Leinonen’s (2005, para. 13) blog post about the history of ICT in education, demonstrates educators’ propensity to mix the old paradigm with the new ones. In one of the examples, he indicated that the application of the computer drill and practice are still heavily present in today’s’ eLearning design. These exercises only help with learners’ short-term memory and not much for gaining a deeper understanding of the subject at hand. Would I consider this as unsuccessful? Probably not. What I learned from this is educational technology, and learning models are iterative. New digital tools will emerge to replace or transform the old ones, but at the end of the day, learning is about people. It is about sharing ideas.
References
Bates, Tony (2015). Teaching in a Digital Age. Retrieved from https://opentextbc.ca/teachinginadigitalage/
Briggs, Saga (2014, December 17). The Evolution of Learning Technologies [Blog post]. Retrieved from http://www.opencolleges.edu.au/informed/features/the-evolution-of-learning-technology/
Leinonen, Teemu (2005, June 23). (CRITICAL) History of ICT in Education- And Where we are heading? [Blog post]. Retrieved from https://teemuleinonen.fi/2005/06/23/critical-history-of-ict-in-education-and-where-we-are-heading/
Technovore (n.d.). Twenty years of EdTech. [Picture]. Retrieved from https://ccsearch.creativecommons.org/photos/4dbcdc79-61dd-46b8-9f63-501060238693
“at the end of the day, learning is about people. It is about sharing ideas.”
Well said Sharon and a comment that makes me reflect on what it is we are all striving to achieve.
Imparting knowledge from one person to another and in so doing, elevate those that come after us.
Owen
Hi Owen, thank you for your comments. I think we are all in this together in the MALAT program to grow and strive to excel so we can impart our learnings to others and reciprocally learn from them as well.
Hi Sharon, I enjoyed your blog and couple of things really resonated with me. I quote, “Learning models are iterative and its about people and sharing ideas.”
We assume the learning process as being integrated into
the task accomplishment [Dutke 87, 295f.; Paul 95, 168]. A substantial part of learning does not happen during the training but during task performance.
The other important aspect of this discourse is Learning is knowledge dependent. Skills learning can be described as “consisting of three stages: often called the cognitive, associative and autonomous stages. Unless the transition to the last stage i.e autonomous stage becomes Second Nature, these processes need to be repeated quite a few times before they become ingrained.
Keep the ideas and conversation rolling.
References
Brockmann. R (1990). Writing better Computer User Documentation: From Paper to Hypertext. New York: John Wiley & Sons, 1990.
Dutke (1987). When the introductionary period is over: Learning while doing one’s job. In: M. Frese, E. Ulich, W. Dzida (Eds.): Psychological Issues of Human-Computer Interaction in the Workplace. Amsterdam: Elsevier Science Publishers B.V. (North-Holland), 1987, 295-310.
O’Malley (1986). Helping Users Helping Themselves. In: D.A. Norman, S.W. Draper (eds.): User Centered System Design. New Perspectives on Human-Computer Interaction. Hillsdale, N.J., London: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Publishers, 1986, 377-398.
Oppermann (1994), Adaptive User Support. Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, 1994.
I agree with your thoughts. In any skills training, the best method to learn is through practice, just like learning how to play the piano or martial arts.
What a great post Sharon! I agree with Owen, I just love your last sentence.
It is quite interesting how there have been more adaptions to blended learning designs (some in person and some online). For example, with accounting courses, it has been an extremely slow transition for Universities to offer fully online courses. They feel like there should be face-to-face learning sessions. Yet, the business and actual practice is done completely on a computer.
Great post Sharon, thanks for sharing!
Thanks, Leigha. You are so right! It seems slow progress for formal education to catch up on what the learners want, but here we are on a fully online program and learning more about edtech. 🙂 As I read more about the history and the future of our field, I’ve noticed a pattern from all three authors: Reiser, Weller, and Watters, and that is we need to be patient with the progress. It is an iterative process, and the rich history of our field will influence its future.
Sharon,
So true. You have captured the challenge of technology: how we must change our thinking about learning, and not just imprint our patterns, habits and preconcieved ideas on the new technology. Our thinking must evolve as the technology evolves.
So true Jeff. I think it is important to have an adaptive mindset as we continue to face new opportunities and challenges with edtech.
Thank you for your feedback. 🙂