Regardless...about technology...specifically in the classroom.
There's a tendency for us to all rush towards that "new thing". Teachers feel compelled to "stay ahead of the curve" with new and exciting devices and apps. We have to understand the cutting edge and what's en vogue. To connect with students, do we really have to know the difference between pinterest and twitter? Are these things kids even use?
Considering the wealth of apps and devices available, I have been quite reticent to join the bandwagon. I recognize that the future is coming, bringing with it all sorts of new advances. I recognize that for students to excel in society, they will increasingly need to know how to incorporate technology into their lives. I recognize this all...
A curious thought routinely finds its way into my head. We are the last generation that can remember life without a cell phone or a computer. We didn't have a computer in the household until the middle of high school. I didn't even get a cell phone until I moved out of the dorms junior year. Yet now, I'm sitting here at home writing a message that will be available to whoever wants it and can get private messages on a small box in my pocket..
My question: what happens when we forget? What happens when we become so enthralled with our "technology" that we fail to look out the window and appreciate the rain? What happens when we no longer stop to investigate how swarms of ants will fight over a particular territory of sidewalk? What happens when we no longer remember what it feels like to be barefoot in a field of grass?
With each new "device" and "advancement", we run the risk of alienating something sacred. As I move into a classroom, I will reluctantly adopt the technology, but more importantly, I want to instill the belief that the natural world, sans computer, sans cell phone...is worth slowing down and simply marveling at. Take a moment. Turn off your phone, ignore your e-mail and feel the wet sand between your toes.
Well, all I can think of now is that t-shirt that says, "SCIENCE IS A VERB NOW."
ReplyDeleteI understand where you are coming from on this. I shiver when I think about the preschools I've heard of that now have iPads for two-year-old kids to play with.
But I think that we have an opportunity to teach them better than that. I also think about the citizen scientist movement and imagine taking kids out into nature to identify frog songs and measure river flows and using technology to report it to real life SCIENTISTS.
It's so easy for technology to distract us from the world, we have to learn to use it to experience it instead.
Is there such a t-shirt? I like it. Yes...we can encourage the "citizen scientist movement"...get kids out into the muck and get that t-shirt filthy.
Delete