If there is anything that we can say with confidence about “Growing Up Online”, it has generated a fair amount of discussion about the role of technology and the Internet in children’s lives. As the catalytic effect of social networking on the adolescent experience is under the light of public scrutiny for the next news cycle, we can rest assured that the nature of the discussion has changed.
Reactions are understandably mixed. Some express disappointment that the surface of a complex subject was skimmed, leaving unanswered the deeper questions about our culture yet still accenting just enough fear to grab viewers. Others, me included, are pleased that views like those of Danah Boyd and Anne Collier have made it to the popular media. There could have been much more fear mongering, much more parroting of the Luddite call to parents to throw their children’s computers out like Beatles records in 1966. We didn’t hear that.
Though to tell the truth, I expected to see a documentary on the role of technology on education. That was what I talked about through three conversations with the film-makers and the hour–long recorded interview. But in the end the subject of education was whittled down to cheating and entertainment, just a couple minutes in the entire program.
That’s fair of course, the film had a different focus, and education was just along for the ride. And they did include transcripts of the interviews on the companion site. Yet to those of us absorbed with education, those of us convinced it is the most ignored national security threat facing our country, those of us who have found our lives and learning transformed by new tools of communication and information, those of us who feel lucky to watch humanity go through the initial stages of the greatest change it has ever experienced, those of us who teach, were left wanting more.
We do have this one consolation; we have our own media and marketplace of ideas as well. As I watched the story grow over the weekend and overflow in my aggregator, I marveled at the way church groups, mother’s clubs, and teachers told each other to watch and then discussed it afterwards. Were they talking about the role of technology in education this way last week? What remains to be seen though is how the discussion generated by this program will be taken up by the education community as a whole. How will individual teachers, administrators and dare I say, state legislators, join this conversation?
Maybe throwing cheating and entertaining into the mix causes just enough spark to get more people involved. As this issue evolves, those of us who think we see the true potential and need to change are going to have to work harder than ever. Technology not only changes the “how” we teach, it also changes the “what” we teach. And it’s not going to be easy to convince people that memorizing US history is not learning US history.
John Chambers, the CEO of Cisco Systems has impeccable timing. In a column from Forbes he writes “Technology hasn’t simply changed the way we obtain and share information; it has changed the very nature of what we need to know in order to be effective.”….”we are going to have to have the courage to break patterns and approach this in an entirely different way. We might even need to explore some things that make us uncomfortable.”
Let’s hope this first step into a national conversation about technology in education starts that exploration.
Steve,
I found this link of Blue Skunk where I commented on his post. I am gad I read through your interview because I was left slightly annoyed at the dichotomy set up between you as the technology advocate and the English teacher as the luddite, and yet when you read the interviews neither of you were as extreme as all that. I am a teacher librarian working in a district that prides themselves on their technology, no matter how often I point out the flaws, and what we are missing. It feels to me as if our leadership has no true understanding of what is out there, what we should expect, and what our students expect. We are second tier, maybe even third, and we don’t even know it. My husband works at the same site as I do and I calld him in to see your classroom – he was a little jealous, despite assuring me he can teach Physics with a rubber band and a paper clip. Technology, and new platforms and software are tools that we can use to improve student learning, and if we think critically about how and not just jump on the current bandwagon we can achieve some interesting, and inspiring results. I was most interested in your interview about the idea of synthesis, a skill not taught particularly well in schools. This is what I work on most with the juniors – researching different ideas to create their own knowledge. I wish that had been more clear in your discussion about cheating in the TV program. So often we view cheating as this singular thing, but it is much more complex, and incumbent on teachers to work on designing lessons less likely to provide the opportunity for straightforward cheating. (Still the kid who didn’t “have 27 hours in the day” to read, and spent hours on line broke my heart a little bit – I love reading and want to share that passion with my students. )
I have spent a lot of time in the past couple days mulling over the many criticisms, kudos, and issues that the FRontline piece raised. I have also recommended it to other people, and asked people who watched it to go read the interviews for a more complete picture.
Mary Ann
Steve,
Thanks for your thoughtful comments here. I just finished reading your full interview on the PBS site, and it was definitely diferent from what was presented on Frontline. Here in Minnesota, we are following events in an afluent suburb, where students who were photographed drinking in photos on Facebook were suspended from school activities. The comment from the son of your PTO president regarding the concert photos were nearly identical to some of the comments from the students in Eden Prairie.
I agree with you that students need to be taught responsible use of the tools available to them, and I wish you the best of luck in your efforts!
Thanks Mary Ann, some of us feel as though we were “set up” in a sense. The student’s comment about reading ” if there was 27 hours in a day” was made in reference to reading for pleasure, which was not included in the film. He is a bright, well-spoken, curious student who, it should be remembered attends the Coast Guard Academy, he’s no academic slouch. At least my complete interview was included at the web site.
Tell you husband that the most effective tools are not really in the classroom. Although I used the SMART board for the lesson in the film, the lesson was really based in Flickr and Moodle which are both free. If you have some bright, willing people in the district’s tech department, there are exciting alternatives in Open Source.
Thanks for the Frontline story – I’ll forward it to our student paper, who have just learned a lesson in media bias – the hard way.