The Visual Education Section or Unit was in existence from around the period of World War 11 1939-45. It was formalised by the Director of Education in Barbados, an Englishman whose name was Howard Hayden.  Hayden arrived in the island on October 4th, 1943 to take up the post of Director of Education.  In 1945 in an effort to revolutionize teaching methods in Barbados, Hayden introduced the use of visual aids into the teaching process.

The responsibilities of the Visual Education section in this early period were to:

1. administer visual aids in schools
2. awaken a greater consciousness of the value of visual aids by providing guidance to elementary and secondary school teachers in the use of various kinds of visual aids.

Organised as a subsection of the Department of Education the Visual Education Section was located along with the Department of Education at the Old Bay Street Boys School where the Government Information Service is now located.

The Visual Education Film Unit started its operations in 1950 as a component of the Visual Education Section. The Visual Education Film Unit worked in collaboration with the Mobile Cinema and showed all films produced by that Unit. Their first film was produced in 1951 and was entitled 'Give your child a chance'.

From the section's inception an itinerary service was established whereby officers carried visual aids to the schools on a request basis. The Mobile Cinema was also involved in this practice and materials would be delivered by the Unit to the schools. The Mobile Cinema Unit not only made live presentations to the schools but was a source of entertainment to the communities across Barbados.

The current Audio Visual Aids Department (now renamed Media Resource Department) was brought into being by an Act of Parliament in 1969.  The Mobile Cinema Units were handed over to the Government Information Service (GIS), as the Audio Visual Aids Department undertook new and innovative technological advancements in Education Radio and Education Television (ETV).

The political directorate and leaders in Education at the time recognised that the Visual Aids Section of the Ministry of Education was unable to carry out its mandate as the nature of production required an autonomous department that could manage its own finances and make decisions at short notice.

The department's main role was to supply video and audio materials to the schools through an itinerary service.  In addition the officers and technical personnel would prepare audio programmes which were aired on Barbados Redifussion and CBC Television.

With the onset of television production, Education Television programmes were produced at the ETV studio at Government Hill. The reprographics section complemented these programmes with print materials such as exercises, posters and diagrams.  In recent years the reprographics section was expanded to include the production of manuals, books and booklets as requested from various sections of the ministry.