The idea presented in "Digital Nation" that interested me is the proposition that human beings are actually altering how our brains function through our immersion in the digital world form a young age. Looking back at my psychology classes, I distinctly remember discussing neural culling, which is the tendency of the brain to expand frequently used neural connections and discard less used connections. As a person interested in English, and language in general, the way technology has impacted the way students today write is an issue that I will eventually confront as an educator; honestly, I'm not sure if writing in paragraphs, versus a longer more integrated work, is necessarily worse writing, maybe simply different. In Eats, Shoots and Leaves, Lynne Truss offers the idea that in an age of Facebook, blogging and instant messaging, young people are actually writing a great deal more frequently than the students from the paper-and-pencil generations.
The epidemic of Internet addiction in South Korea, however, was quite sad, but unsurprising. I remember when the first large online multi-player games arrived; I played Ultima Online for about a year, and I found it to be an addictive experience. Many times I played through the night until early into the morning, and I frequently thought about the game when I was supposed to be occupied with other tasks. I really pity what those children and their families must go through; where can you escape technology and the Internet in today's world?
The success of the school which featured the integrated use of technology, reading scores up 30% and math up 40%, is a testament to the necessity of making learning techniques relevant to digital native students. For better or worse, our students are now in a world which is shaped, guided and defined in terms of technology, and it is futile to think that we can ever take the classroom back to a pre-digital world and successfully instruct digital students.
The most disturbing topic was probably the military recruitment centers in the mall. The modern disconnect between accepting risk by participating in warfare and dealing risk fundamentally alters the nature of warfare. When I hear about drone strikes in Pakistan or Yemen, it really makes me wonder if we will someday live in a world where drone strikes will be conducted on us from far away places, and the kind of terrifying lifestyle that must engender for the populations affected.
Nice post, Bill.
ReplyDeleteThroughout class, I have wondered why people say tht there isn't any data about how technology has affected the brain...isn't a country like Japan known for it's technology use for decades now? Why isn't that looked at, if there are indeed studies done on it?