Thursday 20 June 2013
Information Glut: Can it be Lethal to our Health
Postman summed up my most of my thoughts while reading these two chapters in his final statement of chapter 4: "It is only now beginning to be understood that cultures may also suffer grievously from information glut, information without meaning, information without control mechanisms" (70). I found myself nodding in agreement with his statement "information without regulation can be lethal" (63) and finally that "the genie that came out of the bottle proclaiming that information was the new god of culture was a deceiver. . . . It gave no warning about the dangers of information glut, the disadvantages of which were not seen so clearly" (60).
Once again, although I want to be a somewhat up-to-date user of technology. I also want to use it wisely and with my eyes open. As an educator in the 21st century I think it is my responsibility to teach my students to see technology as a very useful tool and one that will absolutely shape their lives. And yet I don't want them to suffer grievously. How do I help them to find meaning in this technological world? How do I help them access information and find control mechanisms to contain and evaluate that information? Is that even possible? My students (and my family) "are driven to fill our lives with the quest to 'access' information." But I think we have to ask, "For what purpose or with what limitations" (61). And although "we are not accustomed to asking, since the problem is unprecedented. The world has never before been confronted with information glut and has hardly had time to reflect on its consequences" (61), we need to reflect on the consequences and encourage our students to ask the questions: Do they use technology with discernment? Do they believe everything they read? How can they separate truth from fiction? Am I giving them the skills to do that? Can I burst their bubbles that technology is not everything?
And lastly, I had to grin with Postman's description of a "peek-a-boo world, where now this event, now that event, pops into view for a moment, then vanishes again" (70). I see this mostly with my own children who are often calling me to view the latest youtube clip or the latest facebook posting. It is a quick peek-a-boo into a usually irrelevant world, which does not usually enhance or detract from life -- or does it? And do I take the time to even seriously answer that question or discern the believability of the clip? I find myself guilty of finding the time to reflect on the consequences of the information that I am bombarded with. If I don't know how to successfully navigate this information glut, how will I best teach my students who are on this journey with me?
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I often wonder what I would be doing with my time if technology and the "information glut," as Postman puts it, didn't consume so much of it. I find myself looking up so many things just because I can. My 13 year old daughter was watching a show with Carrie Underwood singing the other day. Someone in the room said, "I wonder how tall she is?" Aarika googled it. The answer is 5' 3". I facetiously asked if she could google her weight too? No, but her husband's weight is googleable (is that a word?) because he's a hockey player. Wow!! 20 years ago, would we even have cared to know all this trivia?
ReplyDeleteYour post here really resonated with me, Judy. For example, I really love Twitter, and use it as a source of my own professional development--connecting with other educators, participating in Twitterchats on various education topics, etc. But there is also a phenomenon sometimes called "frittering"--frivolous Twittering, perhaps. What a time-sink technologies can create!
ReplyDeleteI agree that facts are so accessible today that we can find the answer to SO many questions almost as quickly as the question rolls off our tongues. This makes me wonder if we have enhanced the "instant gratification" disease in our culture. In the last few years I've noticed kids being frustrated when it takes them more than (sometimes 30 seconds) to have an answer. In my life, some of the best questions I've had to work through have taken months (if not years) to answer. How patient will our students/children be when it comes to answering those bigger worldview/life questions?
ReplyDeleteYes Julie. I agree with you. I have seen my students completely shut down because the answer was not instantaneous. They brains haven's been "wired" (to borrow Prensky's term) for perseverance. Do we help them with that by using more technology that is instatntly gratifying or do we use other methods to balance things out?
DeleteAlong with that, I wonder if their social skills/relationship are also looking for instantaneous results because they are so used to getting it when they are looking for information! I see that as teachers, in our lessons, we can plan lessons so there is some instant results and some thinking it out times. We need to learn it and plan for it(why do we as teachers need to be reminded of the 3-second wait time?)! How can we teach that to transfer into their relationships? How can we teach them that people are different from Google? (Or are they always different?) And to teach them that there is a season for everything--instant results and waiting? Will are students grow up and still understand verses like, "Be still and know that I am God"? What will being still look like for them if they get so frustrated with wait time now?
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