At a commencement speech at Hampton University, I was a bit surprised by an unexpected dig at technology by Obama when he stated:

 

It seems to me that he is arguing against a view of the present, and the future, that is reminiscent of  Huxley's Brave New World , only in our world, information is the Soma and technology is the delivery vehicle.  This is an increasingly common view of technology, and one that is based more in fear and misunderstanding than in truth.  I find it interesting that this note of anti-technology, and especially the digg "none of which I know how to work" came from a president that is arguably one of the most tech savvy we've ever had.  The focus on technology, however, is the wrong target and the misstep here is a failure to address the real issues and instead to take the easy road of identifying a common fear and playing to it.  

 

True, information and entertainment are closer now than ever before, and the quantity of information available and being produced is on a scale that is not humanly manageable.  And yes, technology can provide us with unprecedented ways of being distracted.  There has never been a time when the average person was exposed to more influences than they are now, and it is only going to increase.  Yes, there is a lot of mis-information out there, but there are an awful lot of people out there, as well, ready to call BS when they see it.  Technology has allowed the people a voice that has never been heard before.  

 

In the past, most people might have had a subscription to one newspaper and a few magazines. These were the points of view that they were exposed to.  Even now, when you read an article or blog, it can be just as informative to read the comments as the article itself.  Never before have professional writers been taken to task in such an immediate way, and I think our experience has improved because of this.  To be sure, there have always been letters to the editor, and people have vented about bias articles around the water cooler prior to the internet, but when you can read a New York Times or Newsweek article and then read through the 132 comments below, it broadens your understanding of the topic, illustrates the bias of the writer (and the commenters) and provides a far more sophisticated backdrop with which to engage the material.  To be sure, there is a lot of noise to the signal, but this just illustrates the direction that we need to focus on in education: Critical thinking, judgement, and assessment; the skills of the future.

Jeff Jarvis, Professor of Journalism at CUNY, states that "Content is dead."  We are awash in content.  Perhaps that was what the president was speaking to in his speech.  But he blamed technology for this when technology is not what is at fault.  What is at fault is that we need to teach our students how to build better filters.  When I went to school, it was a struggle to find information.  Any research project started with a huge initial investment of time an resources.  Books were expensive to buy (and any useful book needed for serious -or even not-so-serious research were rarely found in the local pre-Barns & Noble/Borders bookstore) and libraries presented considerable time investments-if you could find transportation and  get there during operating hours.  Now, we are awash in information, it is true, but in schools, the focus has yet to shift from the old model of how to find information, to how to filter information and analyze it.  There are teachers who do this, of course, but from an institutional, state, and federal level, our standards, policies, and laws do not yet account for this shift in reality. What we are missing here is that the very concept of critical thinking has shifted from "Something that an educated person should have" to "Something that everyone must have."  

I will argue for a way of looking at information that breaks it up into two types (this is a working model, and I welcome any input): Authentic and inauthentic.  Authentic content is content that, either bias or not, factual or false, allows for comments, revisions, or any other type of feedback.  Inauthentic, then, is content that does not.  In this model, what we need to do is teach students to seek out an analyze authentic content because this is the material that invites criticism, allows for alternating viewpoints, and opens debate.  Inauthentic content, on the other hand, has the taint of marketing materials that project a canonical position that is above such debate.  In the new would, such positions should be treated as suspect.  I am aware of the fact that this model has limitations.  For instance, books could be considered inauthentic, and indeed many are-for they do not necessarily invite debate.  Television and other broadcast media are similarly inauthentic.  Though in both of these cases, there are ways, generally on the web, that will allow discussion and debate in a way that was the exclusive domain of academics in generations past.  Only now, we are part of the content creators.

What the president's statements do not illustrate is that people are more engaged with each other through the internet than at any time in the past.  More people are creating content and engaging friends and communities in interesting and unique ways that would be impossible without those very same technologies that he derides.  Many of the most popular video games are not passive entertainment like television (or dare I say, reading) but are popular because they provide editors that allow gamers to make their own content, levels, and sometimes, as with LittleBigPlanet, their own games.  Yes, there is a lot of drivel on YouTube, but there is, for those that look, incredible educational opportunities.

 

Cory Doctorow, author of Makers , stated once that the difference between thinking something and knowing how to do it is all but disappearing. Want to know what teachers think of their jobs and students? What to know how to build a go-cart? What to see a lecture on 18th century history?  It is all there.  Want to see cute pictures of cats with snazzy sayings?  Yes that is there too.  And the bad stuff, however you define it.  And, no, that wont go away.  But it will also not help matters to make people afraid of it.  What education needs to do is give their students the tools that will allow them to function and thrive in our brave new world.

To do this, the essential skills that we need to impart is not a doctrine of technological abstinence, but a system that will help us all function in a world of information abundance.

 

Game engines, word processors, mash-up sites, video, music, in addition to all of the resources that show you how-to do things in real life as well. What is truly amazing, however, that many creative avenues that are essentially free today would have been impossible in the past or been prohibitively expensive. We should be celebrating that fact.