Using Information and Communication Technologies to Create Innovative Education Products for a New Generation (Lessons of the Recent Past and a Look at the Future)

Abstract

The authors have acquired extensive experience in creating, developing, and reviewing technology-based education materials since the 1990s. They worked on various projects under the auspices of the Russian National Training Foundation as well as for R&D organizations in the United States and Europe. Using their own expertise as well as data from the literature, the authors attempt to identify and characterize the issues and obstacles impeding the development of innovative education products that use information and communication technologies (ICT). The future goal of the authors is to provide a general set of principles and guidelines for determining when educational products are indeed innovative, and identify and describe the main trends in the development of ICT-based education materials. The current goal of this paper is to present the authors’ findings and observations to the developers who are creating the next generation of ICT-based education products, and the authors offer practical insights to help maximize the efficiency and usefulness of these resources in K-12 schools.