History of Instructional Technology

first school museum opens in St. Louis

1905

these museums served as the central administrative units for visual instruction. They distributed slides, films, study prints, charts and a lot of other instructional material.

Visual Education

1908

During this time period, the motion picture projector was one of the first media devices used in schools. The focus in schools was more on "media" which is why the visual instruction movement became popular.

Instructional films

1910

The first catalog of instructional films was published in 1910. A school in NY later was one of the first school systems to adopt films for regular instructional use.

Thomas Edison

1913

Edison proclaimed that books will no longer be used in schools, and we will teach human knowledge using the motion picture.

Department of visual instruction

1932

One of the most significant events following the great depression was the merging of three existing national professional organizations for visual instruction. As a result, leadership was placed within one organization called the DVI.

Cone of Experience

1946

Edgar Dale introduced the cone of experience. He further elaborated on the ideas of visual instruction and explained the relationships of different types of visual and audio media.

Television for Intruction

1952

One of the most important factors of the audiovisual movement was the interest in television to deliver instruction. The Federal Communications Commission set aside 242 channels for educational purposes.

Bloom's Taxonomy

1956

The purpose of this was to promote higher forms of thinking in education instead of just memorizing.

Shifting Terminology

1970

In the early 1970's, the terms educational technology and instructional technology began to replace audiovisual instruction to describe the application of media for instructional purposes.

IBM

1981

IBM introduced its first personal computer. Time magazine named this computer "Man of the Year" in 1982.

Computers for instruction

1983

During the 1980's there was a lot of interest in using computers for instruction. Computers were being used in 40% of all elementary schools and more than 75% of all secondary schools.

Apple

1984

Apples Mac becomes available in 1984 by Steve Jobs.

Toshiba

1985

Toshiba released its first mass market consumer laptop in 1985.