The Compton's Encyclopedia has this as a definition for the word Electronics:

Television, stereophonic recording and playback, the computer, robots, and space probes are all products of a single basic technology: electronics. Electronics is the use of electricity to control, communicate, and process information. Its products have caused greater changes in everyday life than those of any other technology in the second half of the 20th century.

One of the most important inventions that improved electonics devices was the transistor. It was invented in 1948 by an American scientist, William B. Shockley.

The next improvement to electonics was the invention of the intergrated circuit. This was first made in 1959. Integrated circuits are still the basic building block for most electronic devices including computers.

These were invented because the need to make better radios and other machines meant using bigger and bigger electrical components that took large amounts of electricity and generated a lot of heat. The first computer was like that and filled a whole building. It wasn't even as fast as a pocket calculator.

Here are a few samples of transistors and integrated circuits. Show them to the rest of your class.

Thank you for your question.

Excerpted from Compton's Interactive Encyclopedia. Copyright (c) 1994, 1995, 1996 SoftKey Multimedia Inc. All Rights Reserved