The document provides an autobiographical timeline of the author's experiences with educational technology from kindergarten through college and his vision for how technology could be used in the classroom. It describes some of the early technologies the author encountered like coloring books, typewriters, and early computers. It also outlines a modeling software called STELLA that could be used to simulate natural systems and discusses using one laptop per student as a vision for the future classroom. The author believes the challenge is engaging students with technology and that learning requires effort from both teachers and students.

1. Technology and Me A personal timeline of educational technology

3. My definition of educational technology Technology in general is an intelligent use of material means to achieve a well-understood objective. Educational technology is differentiated by the goal of improving the skills or understanding of one or more human beings.

5. Kindergarten technology I filled numerous coloring books—sales samples given to me by my uncle, who was a traveling salesman for a the large local printing firm. (See next slide.)

6. High school technology A major industry in my hometown was a large printing works. In seventh grade I learned to set type from a font using a composing stick like this.

7. College technology I typed all my papers on a Smith Corona Galaxy like this (only tan, not blue).

10. With STELLA® one can experiment to study the effects different parameters have on the system Introducing a hungry species can lead to collapse of its food supply followed by its extinction in that environment. If the species does not tax food resources too much, its population may establish a cyclic balance with the species and its food supply rising and falling in turns.