If you could choose three people as the most prominent people in educational technology, who would you select? This is the question I posed to one of my classes. I gave no ground rules. We have no text book with a chapter that discussions this. It’s wide open.
Pick three and give the reasons for selecting each.
If you think about this question in a different context, it could be easy to answer. Name the three most important people in the history of American government. In technology, it would be easier to list the three most important people in the world of personal computers or in the development of the Internet.
Educational technology is more obscure. The entry in Wikipedia wasn’t created until 2005, four years after most topics were entered. There is no standard introductory text that is used in edtech. In fact, most of the people I know in this field are self-taught.
It will be interesting to see the names that make the list.
![Dum Dum Dum Dum Da Dum Dum Da Dum [406/1000]](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7197/6854417645_0612db02f1_t.jpg "Dum Dum Dum Dum Da Dum Dum Da Dum [406/1000]")
![Manual Aperture [405/1000]](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7055/6849853919_313cb31dae_t.jpg "Manual Aperture [405/1000]")
![Big Tree Beside Road [404/1000]](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7151/6844404451_6d2eb083df_t.jpg "Big Tree Beside Road [404/1000]")
![Night Lights [403/1000]](http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7184/6844370787_1f6ab62b3f_t.jpg "Night Lights [403/1000]")
1. Seymore Papert – Grandfather of technology education. Most of what you see pedagogically in edtech today can be traced to his writings. He was by far the most prolific researcher and his work with LOGO was very influential.
2. B. F. Skinner – While mostly know for his study of psychology and as the poster child for behaviorism his writings on teaching machines in the 1960s sparked the imagination of both educators and programmers alike. While his writings are pedagogically opposed to the constructionist philosophy of Papert he laid the foundation or rather created the spark for much of what we do today, especially with online content delivery systems.
3. David Warlick – An educator first, this guy seems to be on everyone’s blogroll and could be seen as having his finger on the pulse of the current edtech community. His calm demeanor and non-intimidating speaking style has made him the perfect spokesman for the web 2.0 digital revolution in education.
1. Will Richardson-Will has taken the ball and ran with it. He has gone out to the trenches to speak the gospel of technology integration (and makes good $$ doing it-but is well worth it). http://weblogg-ed.com/
2. Alan November-I first saw Alan in 1992. He was ahead of his time in speaking of problem solving and higher order thinking skills.
3. TBA-we still have a long way to go…