Wednesday, October 7, 2009

Students Leading the Way

Per Gina's recommendation, check out this story at USA Today, "College Technology 'Catching Up' with Students."

2 comments:

Bob said...

Though this article is looking through the lens of tech/ICT in the collegiate setting, I saw some real correlations to the secondary setting. First, the expectation that students will multitask is a double edge sword. Using their time to accomplish multiple goals is fantastic, but cheating and other illicit activities pose to large a threat in high school. I also find myself agreeing with Dean Bowen, that tech cannot replace discussion in an academic setting. What would have happened if Socrates and Plato did not lead open forum discussions and debates? We need to remember that not all communication is written or spoken.

Gina said...

I agree, Bob, that the interaction and the back and forth that occurs in the class is difficult to replicate in an online environment. I also like the challenge posed to "teach naked" so we do not merely use technology for the sake of using it. However, this article called all of us to move our use of technology from adminstrative to instructive. We cannot ignore that this generation of children does not know life without podcasts, YouTube and texting. And their future employers cannot either. We cannot ignore this phenomenon, we cannot merely tolerate it or move it to the side, we must embrace it and teach to it.

Blog Archive

Contributors