There is a great discussion going on at Underachievers about education, and how technology affects us. Loren has been attending a few classes at the city college, and had a few interesting thoughts to share on the experience of re-entering the college environment. 247-drugstore.com
I can, of course, relate to his story, since I am giving college a third try. ;)
The comments left led to a discussion about the role that technology plays in education today. Are kids these days smarter because they have immediate access to more information than we did?
I say, not necessarily. The technology and accesibility of the information on the internet is merely a tool. The tool is always only as good as its user. If you don't have the passion, the drive, and the motivation to succeed, the technology is useless.
This is why I am a big fan of education in the arts and mechanics. These subjects require you to be hands-on to learn anything useful. It takes a special kind of person to excel in these fields.
Technology may, in fact, be making kids dumber. The wealth of information has also made kids lazy, and take knowledge for granted. They rely on technology way too much. Scott puts it best... "why come up with a new way to do something, when i just need google to find the answer?".
Of course, I am making generalizations here. Of course, there are smart, resourceful and knowledgeable kids out there. It's just that a majority of them have found great new ways to be lazy, and not LOOK like it.
Do I sound old or what?
i agree. i had to read the gawddamn encyclopedia when i was a kid to get info ( 28 now ). we didn't get our first mac til i was in 8th grade. that was a good 13 years of Other Learning. real shit takes work, and the sooner you learn that, the better off you are.
transmitted by b on February 11, 2003 10:35 PMI agree nowadays nobody wants to work for money far easier to rob someone else,lol!
http://www.1heluva.com/cgi-bin/join.cgi?refer=19778
i think it's too soon to see
the new gen of kids grown up with tech is like an experiment
we'll see what happens
transmitted by Jack on February 12, 2003 07:07 AMwhenever my brother (9th grade) needs to do something outside of the textbook the first thing he does is hit the net. where broadband really comes in handy, but that's another topic. if he's got any questions there's a network available to him made up of schoolmates, classmates, sometimes even teachers online through instant messaging and teacher/homework help sites. if that doesn't clear anything up then he hits the stack of encyclopedias or asks me.
I don't know about lazy, but if there are tools available that allows you to work quickly, more effectively, and accurately then I'm all for it.
work smarter not harder.
transmitted by james on February 12, 2003 09:21 AMHey, Socrates thought books were a bad idea because they meant people learned plain facts, and didn't learn to think for themselves by being challenged and forced to debate continuously (he only thought books were good for collecting obvious facts, and his one known volume was... a cookbook). But if his own young whippersnapper student Plato hadn't disagreed, we wouldn't have The Republic or Aristotle or even know about Socrates. Simple fact is, Socrates only knew about being Socrates. "Book lernin'" wasn't a part of that. Who can say what people will be like after a lifetime of dense searchable data on demand 24/7? They may have realizations and knowledge we only vaguely guess at today. And they will still be homey sapiens, wired with the same Socratic hardware that we all have. *B*
transmitted by 2465 on February 12, 2003 11:54 AMI agree, people are people... we all work off of similar brains, but it is how we absorb the information and knowledge that is different.
I do think that technology is helping make things easier, for sure, not necessarily making anyone stupid (although it can make people more stupid a lot faster, heh). No one is becoming smarter or dumber because of the technology and the accessibility of the info, it's just increased the speed by many many times.
I guess this is what I was meaning to get at.
transmitted by courtney on February 12, 2003 12:17 PMIf we're making things even easier for kids, doesn't that imply that they're going to be lazier than their previous generation? I mean, I was a pretty lazy kid, but even I had to work to get stuff done. If I can just pull down any answer or piece of information at any given time, why should I spend any effort in retaining it in my brain? Do we even need to teach some of the more outdated subjects any more, for example: Why force someone to memorize the multiplication tables, as long as they understand the logic behind arriving at the answer? Teaching someone how to arrive at the answer should be more important than the answer they arrive at, right? So why not build on that, and introduce classes on how to maximize information use, classification and research? To see the furthest, you should stand on the shoulders of giants. Dang, I'm good at following the penguin eh?
transmitted by kylar on February 12, 2003 01:58 PMI hope that saying the internet is going to dumb people down or make them lazy is like saying that libraries are going to make people stop asking questions of other people. If you can find it in a book, why communicate?
transmitted by norton on February 12, 2003 10:53 PMNot a prediction, Norton, just merely food for thought. I don't think this would apply to every kid out there, but certainly to some.
I agree with everyone's thoughts in this here comment section. Good discussion, folks.
transmitted by courtney on February 12, 2003 11:23 PM