HE 510
September 7, 2012
History of Technology in Higher Education
We are living in the time of the information boom. Never before has information been so abundant and easy to find. To many students it seems like a hassle to search for information on a computer. Could you imagine finding all of your information by flipping pages of books, magazines, and news papers in a library? “Technology is treated as a tool to help accomplish a complex task rather than a subject of study for its own sake.
The Magic Lantern The first technological tools use in the classroom was the Magic Lantern in 1870. The magic lantern projected images that were printed on glass plates. The first college …show more content…
This is the cousin of the motion picture projector. The filmstrip projector was used to show educational films in classrooms before videocassette tapes, DVD’s and MP3s. Teachers could pause filmstrip projectors for class discussions by turning a knob. Thomas Edison predicted that with the advent of projected images" books will soon be obsolete in schools; scholars will soon be instructed through the eye" (Vision of Learning: A History of Classroom Projectors 2013). A filmstrip is a spooled roll of 35 mm positive film with approximately thirty to fifty images arranged in sequential order. Like 16 mm film, a filmstrip was inserted vertically down in front of the projector aperture, rather than horizontally as in a slide projector. Therefore, the frame size is smaller than normal 35 mm film. Two image frames of a filmstrip take up the same amount of space as a single 35mm frame, including its guard band, so that a 25 exposure 35mm film can contain fifty filmstrip …show more content…
The first models were originally used by the police for criminal profiles and in the United States Military for training and lectures. The body of the overhead projector is a large box containing a bright lamp and fan which functions to cool the device. On the top of the box is a clear lens platform that light passes through in order to reach the lenses above the box. Hovering over the fan and box is a long neck with one or two mirror lenses. These lenses catch the light coming from the bottom of the device and project it toward a board or blank canvas resembling a flat map. Many recent models provide a doughnut size plastic wheel for adjusting the lenses of the projector for the preference of the user. The overhead projector was a huge success in education. Notes and lectures could be prepared before the