Key question: What can we usefully learn from an analysis of published research in educational ICT over the past 20 years?

Much has been published in the educational technology research journals over the past twenty years. Individual authors cite earlier research to locate their work in the on-going story of their field, but this can miss changes in the wider landscape. What tends not to happen is the overview of the trends, appearances, disappearances, continuities and discontinuities within such journals’ content. Sometimes flurries of publication represent a particular interest in emergent technologies as reflected in the Gartner ‘Hype Cycle’ (Gartner, online), but there are also longer-term, underlying and enduring themes, reflecting continuities in learning and pedagogy.

In 2011 three of the authors of this submission undertook an analysis of one journal, to mark the first twenty years of publication. We aimed to identify themes and patterns in the articles, ‘reflecting a period of on-going change in educational technologies and their role in teacher education and development’ (Denning et al. 2011:263). Here we build on that experience by taking a larger sample of educational technology journals over the same time period, to conduct a similar analysis. However, we aim not simply to chart the history, but also to widen the context to consider the implications for the future from this moment.

Thus the objectives are to:

• place our key question (above) in the moment of change in social, economic, political and cultural contexts, reflecting the interests of European and other networks;
• analyse a sample of international, peer-reviewed journals prominent in the educational ICT research communities;
• demonstrate the possibilities of using data mining tools in this context; 
• articulate‘useful learning’ for practitioners, researchers and policy makers to make decisions informed by memory, experience and scholarship;
• underline the importance of continued research in educational technologies through presenting a snapshot of the ‘state of play’ at a time of increasing globalisation and marketisation.

Our motivation arises from our interest in not forgetting ‘the story so far’ about learning and teaching in the technology-enabled rush into the future. We are cautious that educational technologiesshould be embraced for good reasons, and not just ‘because powerful groups may be redefining our major educational goals in their own image’ (Apple 1992:120). The educational marketplace offers lucrative openings for opportunistic selling, and we are alert to the danger of ‘fads and fashions’ (Maddux and Cummings 2004).

As ex-classroom teachers and now teacher educators, researchers, writers and reviewers in the field, the authors are contributing to, and carrying the story forward (eg. Fisher et al 2006, Loveless 2011). We recognise that we are in a moment of educational change in a wider climate of economic crisis, which challenges educational research on points of principle and politics, as well as evidence and practice. As researchers we draw widely on sociocultural theory; specifically here we focus on the importance of a historical view as encapsulated by Engeström’s principle of historicity, itself a principle of wider cultural-historical activity theory (Engeström 2001).

Apple, M. (1992) Is the new technology part of the solution or part of the problem in education? In J. Beynon and H. Mackay Eds. Technological Literacy and the Curriculum. London: The Falmer Press. 105-124 Denning, T., Fisher, T and Higgins, C. (2011) From cradle to brave new world: the first 20 years of developing a research field in new technologies and teacher education, as reflected in the pages of JITTE/TPE. In Technology, Pedagogy and Education 20(3). 263-288 Engeström, Y. (2001) Expansive learning at work: toward an activity theoretical reconceptualization. In Journal of Education and Work, 14(1). 133-156 Fisher, T., Higgins, C. and Loveless, A. (2006) Teachers learning with digital technologies. Bristol: Futurelab Gartner, Inc. (Undated) Hype Cycle Research Methodology, available at http://www.gartner.com/technology/research/methodologies/hype-cycle.jsp Loveless, A. (2011) Technology, pedagogy and education: reflections on the accomplishment of what teachers know, do and believe in a digital age. In Technology, Pedagogy and Education 20(3). 301-316 Maddux, C. and Cummings, R. (2004) Fad, fashion, and the weak role of theory and research in information technology in education. In Journal of Technology and Teacher Education, 12(4). 511-533