Forty years of computers and education

Abstract

For forty years the relationship between computers and education has been engaged in a headlong journey, full of ups and downs, wild swerves to right and left, somehow both exhilarating and frightening, sometimes in tandem but at others barely still holding hands. The engine of the technologies keeps changing while the driver is sometimes a discipline, learners, or the teacher. The landscape passed along the way includes fleeting glimpses of beautiful but unconquerable mountains followed by attractive rivers with treacherous currents. The population is sometimes persuaded by innovators to come along for the ride, and then suddenly they embark on their own journey into an entirely different valley. The paper analyses this journey along the TC3 twin track of education with and about information and communication technologies, using evidence from its publications and debates, organisational structure and the influence of individuals. The presentation, from one who is neither a computer scientist nor mathematician, will aim to portray a particular perspective on this roller-coaster relationship.