Education is a large category which includes a good deal of topics. That's why today I picked only the school. In a environment where time is money and those who don't keep up are left behind, technology is up to date. But is this happening at school?
There is a different story. There is a real dichotomy, writes Suzanne Korf of The Gazette from Montreal, Canada:
- Take your average teenager and picture his home environment. He most likely has a computer with high-speed Internet and loads of gigabytes, and probably does his homework while downloading movies and answering text messages on his cellphone, with his favorite tunes blaring away on his iPod.
Now picture his school environment.
It hasn't changed all that much since we were in school. Aside from the same old buildings now even more in need of a makeover, in the average classroom, teachers still lecture in the front of the class, writing notes on a blackboard and using static textbooks as materials. Sure, there may be a computer and perhaps even a SMART Board in the classroom, but kids must feel like they are in a time warp. Some of the rules are archaic, too.
For example, cellphones are banned on school property, even during lunch and recess. hey are taken away if hey accidentally fall out of a pocket if a child so much as looks at it to check the time.
Perhaps these detested phones could be embraced as a resource. With most teenagers having phones with Internet access, in a classroom of 30 kids I would bet that this would make the equivalent of 15 personal computers in the class. Kids could pair up to look up information, share and discuss it.
At work, we often refer to our BlackBerry during a meeting to see if an update is available or to share information. Why shouldn't our schools reflect that?
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