Historical Evolution of Instructional Technology in Teacher Education Programs: A Ten-Year Update

The content and emphasis of the introductory technology courses for undergraduate preservice teachers has historically been examined, with the earliest study conducted by Stracke in 1932. In an attempt to identify trends in the course DeKieffer conducted a series of studies over ten year intervals, in 1947, 1957, 1967, and 1977. In 2000 the first in a similar series of ten-year studies was conducted, and this 2010 study is the first update to that study. Results indicate that the introductory technology course has gone through a particularly dynamic era recently, with nearly half of all topics appearing as new in 2010. Of particular note among the new topics are SMART Boards and Web 2.0 technologies such as Blogs, Wikis, and Professional and Social Networking Sites.