Talk:Educational technology

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To-do list for Educational technology: edit · history · watch · refresh
  1. Confirm what educational technology actually is. The Januskewski book (reference in the article) appears to be a good source.
  2. Expand the history section.
  3. Expand the existing sections under "Theories and practices" (if still relevant) and incorporate the listed wikilinks into the text.

Contents

[edit] Cleanup request

I have added a Cleanup request for this page. Specific issues include writing in first person, irrelevant links, and links that are not formatted correctly. Rculatta 05:37, 28 July 2005 (UTC)

It seems to me that a complete re-write is warranted. There seems to be no structure or coherence to the current entry. Is it good form and appropriate to begin this? There is a stub page called Education Technology (travers) Travers 13:01, 2 October 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Clean-up

I have cleaned up this page. It is now rather thin on content, but I think it now looks like a Wikipedia article, rather than a notice board.

A remaining problem is the existence of the two other sites with similar names: Education technology and Educational Technology.

Alan Pascoe 21:28, 5 November 2005 (UTC)

I took out the section on Gardner's Multiple Intelligences. The problem with schools adopting the Multiple Intelligence materials for instructional purposes is that there doesn’t exist a body of scholarly research to support spending the hundreds of thousands of dollars (or millions) wasted on Multiple Intelligence and it certainly doesn't need to be included in our definition of Ed Tech. Multiple intelligences is not necessarily a bad theory; rather, the tie to education is not mature enough for schools to have jumped on the bandwagon. Much money is being spent with very little to show in the classroom. Further, the research that exists on the implementation of multiple intelligences demonstrates that the money being spent is not justified. Of course students have varied learning styles that should be recognized, but taking it a step beyond to multiple intelligences is not instructionally validated.

Sean Lancaster known here as --Jayhawksean 03:44, 6 August 2007 (UTC)


I think this article could use some proof reading. --Pdienstm (talk) 00:56, 24 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Redirects

I have placed Redirects on Educational Technology and Education technology. I have also created Education Technology and placed a redirect on that.

Alan Pascoe 23:45, 6 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Very long "See also" list

With 29 entries the "See also" list has become quite long. Can it be meaningfully shortened/structured/replaced with categorization? I am not knowledgable enough in the field to do this myself, I'm afraid. --Tobias Bergemann 10:34, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I intend to move these links to sub-headings under Theories & Practices.
Alan Pascoe 19:16, 10 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] External links in pre-November 2005 version

I have reviewed the external links that were present in the last version prior to November 2005 (18:20 19 October 2005). Though still not directly relevant to the Educational technology page, they are relevant to the Technology Integration page, so I have placed them there.

Alan Pascoe 16:28, 12 November 2005 (UTC)

[edit] Influencial Educational Technologies

It would be interesting to add a section to the article that describes the most influential educational technologies of today, their effectiveness in different instructional scenarios, the impact they have had in changing traditional models of designing and delivering educational experiences, their advantages and disadvantages.

Valeria Pietz 19:22, 10 December 2005 (UTC)

Yes, I agree. Actually, any part of the body of the article could do with development. I see from your user page that you have professional knowledge of the subject. The article needs people like you to develop it. Prior to November, I had no knowledge of the subject. I think I have laid the groundwork for a good article, but it is difficult for me to make significant further progress. Alan Pascoe 20:26, 11 December 2005 (UTC)

If you had no knowledge about this topic prior to November, you are doing great. Unfortunately, this is "crunch" time for me as we are getting all online courses ready for the spring semester.

What might be worth adding to the article is a brief paragraph on Learning Management Systems. (Blackboard and WebCT), now merged, are among the most important players.

Other types of technologies that could be introduced in the article are Camtasia, video clips, audio clips. All technologies that are used more and more extensively, especially in distance education.

Also, virtual reality might be worth mentioning. I am somewhat familiar with Activeworlds, but I am sure that there are several other VR software packages out there that are used for educational purposes.

Valeria Pietz 05:37, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

Thanks for the info. I'll see what I can do. Alan Pascoe 23:38, 12 December 2005 (UTC)

[edit] What about adult education?

The second paragraph of this article suggests that educational technology solely relates to K-12 education, but what about adult education such as corporate training, higher education and military training? I have a lot of "book" knowledge about the subject, but I doubt I'm qualified to edit the entry at this point!—Preceding unsigned comment added by Rdiane1 (talk • contribs)

Indeed. This was actually one of the aims of the second paragraph, to point out that ET is not just about school education, the other being that it is not just about electronics and networking. If you can think of better wording, go ahead and change it. Alan Pascoe 21:42, 29 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Merge with ?

Instructional technology almost is a repeat of this page. Looking further Technology Integration has many elements of the other two. This request is growing as I contemplate it. Somehow these three pages should become consistent. I'm a newbie so I'm not sure how to proceed. On my user page I have a very rough outline on what I mean. --Rberkey 14:18, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

I think it needs to be established first if Educational Technology and Instructional Technology really are the same thing. The problem with this page is that no-one has yet established what Educational Technology is. I did find references to two books on the subject, which I added to the Further Reading section. The entry for the Januskewski book on Google Book Search indicates that this would be a good place to start. My recommendation is that someoene gets hold of a copy. Unfortunately, only three libraries in Britain hold this book, and none of them are convenient for me. There are, however, 223 libraries in the United States holding copies -- is one of them convenient for you? Alan Pascoe 19:53, 17 July 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Debatepedia.org: technology in education debate link

Is an external link appropriate to the debate page on Debatepedia on the question of whether technology is beneficial in education idebate.org?—Preceding unsigned comment added by Debaterx (talk • contribs)

Added. Jayhawksean

The website as a whole fails our external links guidelines, being a relatively new and lightly edited open wiki. I really think it should be removed. -- SiobhanHansa 02:39, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Constructivism section

Since the sections on behaviorism and cognitivism are only briefly summarized and do not include criticisms, I thought it was appropriate to keep the same level of detail for constructivism. I don't think you need to get into the controversies around any of these theories here; let's leave those debates in the full articles instead of copying them onto every article that mentions constructivism.

Also, constructivism is called a learning theory even in the title of the Wikipedia article. Dlewis3 does not personally agree with that idea and says it's a philosophy instead. Although I've asked him in the past for a citation for that argument, he has not yet provided one, so that falls under original research. However, I do recognize that it's controversial, so I'm compromising it and calling it "a learning theory or educational philosophy."WeisheitSuchen (talk) 03:56, 24 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Behaviorism is Problematic

"While still very useful this philosophy of learning has lost favor with many educators. But Behavioral learning theory (e.g Classical Conditioning and Operant conditioning) is still very useful to explain lower level unconscious implicit memory and learning." is mostly what I have left.

Behaviorism has nothing to do with the concept of implicit memory, and little to do with the unconscious (although Skinner deals with it in About Behaviorism). Implicit memory is a cognitive construct not found in Pavlov, Watson, Skinner, or any other learning theorist (of the behaviorist schools) I am aware of.

There are no source citations for any of this as well.

This appears to be the kind of summary you'd expect from some secondary text which doesn't really know behaviorism very well. Pavlov, Skinner and Thorndike had very little in common, and I have added the Skinnerian efforts - which aren't very Thorndikian or Pavlovian. They are, interestingly, based on his theory of Verbal Behavior. Thus, it is a kind of proof of the applicability of verbal behavior outside of the laboratory, and to humans - both claims to the contrary repeatedly asserted by Skinner's critics. Amusing. --Michaelrayw2 (talk) 03:57, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

I made one small change (moving Skinner from a 3rd level heading to a 4th level heading so it's under behaviorism). I don't know how much we really need to get into all the different theories in the history of behaviorism for this article. Michaelrayw2, could you do a one paragraph summary overview of behaviorism, perhaps with one sentence each for Pavlov, Skinner, and Thorndike? I think that would be sufficient for an article that isn't really focused on any of these theories. I think it would be fine for you to scrap the section and start over. My knowledge of behaviorism is fairly thin, so any help you could give would be greatly appreciated! WeisheitSuchen (talk) 04:11, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
Afaik Pavlov & Thorndike were minor players in educational technology. It is a mistake to think that they represent some continuous line of learning theory. See Mecca Chiesa's book on how radically different Skinner is from the other behaviorists. Skinner did have an extensive influence on educational technology, which this article is about. If anything Pavlov and Thordike should be dropped, and PI, PSI, etc. should be mentioned as they had some traction for awhile and still a bit of a legacy (PSI has picked up with the trends in distance learning I've read). --Michaelrayw2 (talk) 10:25, 26 December 2007 (UTC)
Well, I think if I had tried to pretend I knew anything about behaviorism, it would be obvious that I was faking it now. :) Sorry about that; I really am not at all familiar with the history. Your suggestion of adjusting the section based on what is most relevant to ed tech sounds perfect. Cut the stuff that isn't relevant and focus on what is. You know what you're doing, and I trust your judgment. Thanks for enlightening me!WeisheitSuchen (talk) 14:55, 26 December 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Moved comment

This comment was added to the article text by [[Special:Contributions/Beth-Dodd|Beth-Dodd] on February 7, 2008. I'm moving it here, as it's really a discussion point and not article text.

(Comment) While I do not doubt that Saettler's book is comprehensive, and perhaps the "most comprehensive", anything published in 1990 has to be largely out of date as is the technology of that time.

WeisheitSuchen (talk) 03:25, 8 February 2008 (UTC)

[edit] 2008 Definition of the field

I added the AECT 2008 definition of the field... could be controversial...maybe not.

--Dlewis3 (talk) 22:13, 17 March 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Merge with Advanced learning technology

The Advanced learning technology article lacks the substance to stand on its own. As it is a subset of educational technology, it seems reasonable to append it as a section in this article.

Neelix (talk) 15:55, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

Actually, after removing the copyrighted material from that article, I'm not even sure if it's worth salvaging. The entire Advanced learning technology article seems to have been taken from this site, with some small paraphrasing done to remove the references to the specific organization. If you're up to creating some actual content from multiple sources, that's fine, but otherwise I would rather see the Advanced learning technology information deleted entirely. Even what I left is clearly from that source, but at least there was a passing attempt to paraphrase it. WeisheitSuchen (talk) 18:29, 5 April 2008 (UTC)

I agree with WeisheitSuchen that the Advance learning technology information should probably just be deleted entirely. Jayhawksean (talk) 03:19, 7 April 2008 (UTC)