Technology: The Role Of Technology In Education

According to the Oxford Dictionary, technology can be defined as the application of scientific knowledge for practical purposes, in industries and many other fields especially education. Technology is commonly thought of in terms of gadgets, instruments, machines and devices...most (educators) will defer to technology as computers (Muffoletto, 1994). Technologies are things created by humans to make work easier and solve problems. It’s integral to everything we do, big or small. We can find examples of technology in our homes and personal spaces, in industry, in business and in the medical profession too. It might seems like all technology is only electronic, but that’s just most modern technology. In fact, a hammer or the

At the end of the World War Two the U.S. Army started using overhead projectors for training, and their use became common for lecturing, until being largely replaced by electronic projectors and presentational software such as PowerPoint around 1990 (Dunn.J, 2011). The next technology to capture the interest of educators was the computer. Some of the earliest work on instructional applications of computing took place in the 1950s and the 1960s, but these efforts had little impact on schools. It was not until the 1980s, and the appearance of microcomputers, that many educators and public officials became enthusiastic about computers. By January 1983, computers were being used for instructional purposes in 40 percent of all elementary schools and 75 percent of all secondary schools in the United States. However, this percentage can be misleading too. In most cases, students had only limited access to computers, often in a computer laboratory and only for an hour or so a week. In 1995 the Office of Technology Assessment estimated that the optimum ratio of computers to students was five to one, and by the year 2000 the National Center for Educational Statistics reported that there was, in fact, an average of one computer for every five students, with 97 percent of schools having Internet connections. There are many examples of the evolution of technology over the years. In 1650, The Horn-Book was introduced. The Horn-Book is a wooden paddle with printed lessons and this were popular in the colonial era. Perhaps this is where fraternities got the idea. On the paper there was usually the alphabet and a religious verse, which children would copy to help them learn how to write. Still going strong to this day, the chalkboard is one of the biggest inventions in terms of educational technology.