Week 1 Personal Reflection
Beyond technology integration: The Case for technology transformation & Of Luddites, Learning and Life. by Neil Postman
Postman, N. (1993). Of Luddites, learning, and life. Technos Quarterly, 2(4)
As Dr. Horvitz eluded to, this is definitely a more optimistic view of technology in education. I tend to air on the side of optimism as well, this is most likely because of my current job as a virtual teacher. My job has opened up my eyes to the technology that is out there and available to learners. Which I did not originally see, or use, as a brick and mortar teacher. This article also refreshes the reality of our dependence of technology. No longer do we have to go to the library and look in an encyclopedia. Most student's wouldn't even know what that is or how to use it. I pick up my iPhone and hit my Google app and a few seconds later I have the answer I am looking for. We are living in the "information age" as the authors pointed out.
The one thing that kept going through my mind while reading this, especially in the beginning of this article, was the authors dated view of what is going on in classrooms. I am not sure if it because this seems to be a older article, 2002 if I am not mistaken, but the author does not seem to have an accurate grasp of what is going on in classrooms everyday. He calls for a "transformation", and more individualized learning. I taught 1st grade for 3 years, and yes, we do have the GCLEs (grade content level expectations) and Common Core to abide by, but my students were not always learning the same thing at the exact same time. They had individual goals in Math, Reading, Writing, and Spelling. They had personal goal sheets that were individualized to meet their needs as a learner. I don't think technology is the sole answer to this call for "transformation" I see it as a tool. There needs to be a balance. I love the opportunities and learning that technology can bring to education, but it is not the only answer.
The second article left more of a bad taste in my mouth. I felt like I wanted to say "lighten up!" to the author. The more I read the more I wanted to argue with him. I did not care for his example of buying the car. I get what he was trying to illustrate, but I was interested to see if he was going to address, specifically what technology was hindering student's learning. I also, do not agree that "One of the principal functions of school is to teach children how to behave in groups." Is that what is in our job description as educators? I felt angry by the time I got to the end of this article. I think because I don't particularly like this article I have less to say. But, just to reiterate what I said above it's about balance. I don't think technology is the enemy nor do I believe it to be the answer.
No comments:
Post a Comment