Just when I thought I could take a hiatus from McLuhan, here he is again creeping up in the writings of Neil Postman in his book, "Technopoly: The Surrender of Culture to Technology."
IS TECHNOLOGY FAILING OUR CHILDREN?
Postman writes that, "children come to school having been deeply conditioned by the biases of television. There, they encounter the world of the printed word. A sort of psychic battle takes place, and there are many casualities- children who can't learn to read or won't, children who cannot organize their thought into logical structure even in a simple paragraph, children who cannot attend to lectures or oral explanations for more than a few minutes at a time. They are failures, but not because they are stupid. They are failures because there is a media war going on, and they are on the wrong side- at least for the moment" (PG 17).
As a mother and educator, I really want to understand what technological advances, the many that exists and those to come, will mean for our children. It concerns me that as parents and young teachers, that adults will not be able to 'keep up' or to really understand this new world in which our kids live in. We are caught in one of those 'it's too soon to tell' instances, which doesn't help anyone!
Quotes from the text:
"...the uses made of any technology are largely determined by teh structure of the technology itself- that is, the functions follow from its form." PG 7
"...technology imperiously commadeers our most important terminology. It redefines "freedom," "truth," "intelligence," "fact," "wisdom," "memory," "history"- all the words we live by. And it does not pause to tell us. And we do not pause to ask." PG 8
"...to whom will teh technology give greater power and freedom? And whose power and freedom will be reduced by it?" PG 11
"...whose unseen mind guides the unseen hand..." PG 41
Related Web Sources:
Thoughts on Postman's book
http://www.ibiblio.org/cmc/mag/1995/mar/hyper/npcontexts_119.html
http://www.hartmen.us/todd/BookReviews/0679745408-Technopoly.html
Technopoly in Education
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dGCJ46vyR9o
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_RAi3XAPhA
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I don' think it is too soon to tell what effects technology can have on our children. Believe in yourself! I think part of taking control back from technology is rebuilding our trust in our own abilities and power. I think we are starting to have a pretty good shot at understanding the good and ill effects of the tech in our lives. Now we just need to develop the strategies we'll need to help children manage their digital lives.
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