My engagement with technology has always been a reluctant one. I've avoided friends' pleas to create a facebook and only signed up for skype a couple of weeks ago. The idea that as a teacher I would be expected to engage my students' learning through technology is daunting. Not only do i feel ill-equipped to do this, but I'm also a little suspicious of the idea that technology really illuminates and adds dimension to learning for students.
As a student, my high school had pretty limited resources. Near the end of my high school education, the school bought a single projector and teachers vied for use of it among them. I don't necessarily feel that my high school education was the best that it could have been, but I'm not sure I think that the addition of technology would have made it more compelling. I really feel that if I had had better instructors, regardless of their use of technology, my experience would have had more intellectual depth.
One may argue that better teachers would have used more technological resources. Wen I think about past students as products of education, though, and this may be due to my bias toward traditionalism, I think that students before this explosion of technology not only were smarter but may have actually learned better. I'm not sure if this is just a misconception that I have or if it has some real grounding.
The proof for this idea in my mind though, is that the types of written works that were created for public consumption in the 1700s for example, are at a much higher intellectual level than works created for today's public. People in the 1700s engaged significantly more complex language and ideas in the public sphere than non-academics do today. This means that students would have had to learn at more complex levels if they were to be part of public, never mind academic, discourse. And they definitely did this without the aid of technology. I don't think students today could comprehend and critique the same works that students in the 1700s had and would technology help them do it?
I guess what I'm trying to say is, how will technology improve my students' intellect in the long term in ways that traditional teaching would not? How will technology make my students smarter? Technology may engage students' interest more, and it may make them more excited about the tasks at hand, but will it change their intellectual trajectory? I'm hoping that this course will help answer some of these questions for me and clarify ideas about the usefulness of technology in creating intellectual character.
As a student, my high school had pretty limited resources. Near the end of my high school education, the school bought a single projector and teachers vied for use of it among them. I don't necessarily feel that my high school education was the best that it could have been, but I'm not sure I think that the addition of technology would have made it more compelling. I really feel that if I had had better instructors, regardless of their use of technology, my experience would have had more intellectual depth.
One may argue that better teachers would have used more technological resources. Wen I think about past students as products of education, though, and this may be due to my bias toward traditionalism, I think that students before this explosion of technology not only were smarter but may have actually learned better. I'm not sure if this is just a misconception that I have or if it has some real grounding.
The proof for this idea in my mind though, is that the types of written works that were created for public consumption in the 1700s for example, are at a much higher intellectual level than works created for today's public. People in the 1700s engaged significantly more complex language and ideas in the public sphere than non-academics do today. This means that students would have had to learn at more complex levels if they were to be part of public, never mind academic, discourse. And they definitely did this without the aid of technology. I don't think students today could comprehend and critique the same works that students in the 1700s had and would technology help them do it?
I guess what I'm trying to say is, how will technology improve my students' intellect in the long term in ways that traditional teaching would not? How will technology make my students smarter? Technology may engage students' interest more, and it may make them more excited about the tasks at hand, but will it change their intellectual trajectory? I'm hoping that this course will help answer some of these questions for me and clarify ideas about the usefulness of technology in creating intellectual character.
