I recently attended a talk given by Curtis Johnson, one of the authors of the book Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns. As I heard him speak about how technology would profoundly change teaching and learning, I grew so frustrated that I began to develop an outline for this essay – ironically, by surreptitiously tapping out notes on my iPhone.
Part of my frustration with his talk is with the promised technology itself. There is a powerful allure to acquiring the latest and greatest, but in doing so, we sit on the bleeding edge of innovation, with all its inherent challenges and uncertainties. If there is one thing that teachers need in a classroom, it’s reliability. The more time spent worrying about whether the LCD projector is going to work, the less time there is to attend to the students’ many and varying needs. Students bring enough variability on their own without us adding more to the equation.
In the September 19th issue of the New York Times Magazine, there is a glossy double page spread of classroom technologies over the centuries, beginning with wooden horn-books from colonial times and ending with the iPad. To look back at some of the technologies of the past is to see the contents of the local landfill. Does anyone remember Skinner teaching machines? Scantron graders? Language lab headsets? Interestingly, it is the oldest teaching technologies, the chalkboard and the mass-produced pencil, that have had the longest run in classrooms. While I would be hard pressed to find a working mimeograph, I know exactly where I can find (and use) a piece of chalk.
Please be assured that I am no Luddite. This essay was composed on my new netbook / tablet which I’ve been proudly showing off to everyone I meet. I look forward to a day when all textbooks can be downloaded onto cheap tablet computers, when buildings share their energy information for students to see, when virtually every product of school can be safely composted after its use. But as author Kevin Kelly wrote in an essay in the same magazine, the oldest technologies are more likely to continue to be useful, and students should find the minimum amount of technology that maximizes their options.
The other part of my frustration with Johnson’s talk is that for all of technology’s promise, there are two central elements of education that can’t be supplanted with technology. First, schools need to teach students to work with each other face to face; to experience frustration, challenge, and inspiration through direct social interaction. Instead of attending Johnson’s talk, I suppose I could have downloaded a YouTube video of his presentation and saved the gas money and the commute. Yet had I done that, I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to spend time talking to fellow heads and trustees about the future of education. Technology can be wonderful for answering specific questions, but learning isn’t all about getting answers to specific questions.
Technology’s other gap is that it doesn’t allow students to experience the wonder of nature, to show them problems without immediate solutions. By way of illustration, I share the following story: Recently I was outside on recess duty with some of our lower school students. One of the boys came running up to me with a piece of quartz in is hand. He wanted to know more about the rock – what it was called, why it broke so easily, where he could find more. He then found a bigger piece of quartz next to the soccer field and set about trying to dig it out with some classmates. I overheard their questions as they poked at it – how big would it be? How do we fill the hole when we’re done? Can you use a piece of quartz to dig out quartz?
This is what sets schools apart from a simple collection of online videos. Children, working together, wondering at the world, becoming curious scholars. So long as our newest technologies work to support this, then we are on the right track, and there is a place for schools in the decades to come.
John Huber
John Huber was appointed as Barnesville’s fourth head of school in 2006. He began his career in education as a Latin teacher in 1992, and he has been an independent school teacher and administrator for over fifteen years. He received his M.A. in Educational Leadership from Villanova University and his B.A. in Classics from Cornell University. He is the parent of two middle schoolers and one three-year old son who attend Barnesville.
