الأسبوع 2 · المحور الأول، الدرس ٢ «تطور التكنولوجيا»: عصور التكنولوجيا الأربعة وسرعة الكتابة · 3 دروس
2
From printing presses to satellites
ICT P4 Term 1, Theme 1: pp. 14–17
GoalSay how some inventions helped people record and share information.
New words
invention · a new thing that someone makes for the first timeprinting · making many copies of the same pagescalculator · a machine that does sums for us
Explanation
Inventions change how people keep and share information. Before printing, every book was copied by hand, which took a very long time. A printing process could make many copies of the same page, so more people could read. An early calculator made of gears could add numbers for people. Later, electricity let people talk over long distances with the telephone and send voices by radio. The first digital computers were as big as a room, but later computers became small enough for a desk or a lap. Satellites and GPS help us find places, and email sends a message in seconds.
Worked examples
A scribe copies one book by hand in many weeks. A printing process makes a hundred copies of one page in a day. More copies means more readers.
Mariam’s grandfather says that in his childhood a telephone call used a wire. The voice travelled as electricity along the wire, so he could talk to a cousin in another city.
A letter to a friend in another country takes days. An email takes seconds. That is a big change in how fast we share news.
Class activity
Invention cards. Make four cards from paper: printing, telephone, personal computer, satellite. On the back of each card, write which age it belongs to (Mechanical, Electro-Mechanical or Electronic) and one sentence about how it helps people share information. Shuffle the cards and let a partner sort them into the three ages.
Practice
1
Printing made it easy to make many copies of something. Of what?
Books (many copies of the same pages).
2
Put these in order, oldest first: A laptop, B printed book, C telephone. Say the letters.
B, C, A. The printed book is Mechanical, the telephone is Electro-Mechanical, the laptop is Electronic.
3
How big were the first digital computers?
As big as a room.
4
Which is faster for sending news to a friend far away: a letter or an email? Why?
An email, because it arrives in seconds, while a letter travels for days.
