Issues and Trends in Instructional Technology: Despite Lean Times, Continued Interest and Opportunity in K-12, Business, and Higher Education

Abstract

This chapter is comprised of four sections: Overall Developments, Corporate Training and Development, Higher Education, and K-12 Education; this chapter synthesizes the findings of major annual reports including ASTD’s 2010 State of the Industry Report, the EDUCAUSE Core Data Service Fiscal Year 2009 Summary Report, The ECAR study of undergraduate students and information technology, 2010; Education Week’s Technology Counts 2011, The New Media Consortium and the Consortium for School Networkings’ The 2011 Horizon Report: K-12 Edition, and Project Tomorrow’s Speak Up National Findings Report, The New 3 E’s of Education: Enabled, engaged, Empowered; How Today’s Students are Leverage Emerging Technologies for Learning. The authors describe the economy’s impact on instructional technology and comment on the importance of online learning, the use of mobile devices (particularly, tablet computing, smart phones, and e-readers), the current state of online learning, and the continued interest in and use of Web 2.0—collaborative environments, in particular.