Page 9 - Priorities 4

■ How will our new communications technology impact the school educationally?
A paradigm shift is taking place in the world from “knowing information” to “using information,” and computers facilitate that. This shift is inevitable because of the volume of information available and the speed with which it changes. You already see the effects in industry.
Not long ago, people could be “experts” in their profession, and they were relatively able to restrict their work to what they knew. That is no longer pos- sible in most fields. People today have to to be willing to be life-long learners, to be prepared to reach into fields of knowledge they never imagined they would beusing. Thinkabouttheinformationweneedtoday to make personal health care and financial planning choices, for instance.
The work students do on computers prepares them for this world. Students learn how to formulate questions, make plans and execute them to find answers, and evaluate the answers. They learn to problem-solve when they encounter barriers. They learn that nothing is final. They learn that they con- tribute to the information base as well as take from it. All this takes persistance, which is important in prob- lem-solving. Peoplewhocan’tmanageaproblem- solving process are going to have a tough time in life.
■ You seem to be describing a sea-change in the use of information.
Yes. A good description of this new view is pro- vided by the National Academy of Sciences. Their web site, Reinventing Schools, is good information and also a superb example of how to design a web page. We will be seeing more like this and fewer of the ones that are hard to read or take too long to download. The site address is http://www.nap.edu/ readingroom/books/techgap/
index.html.
■ Woodside Priory has long had a computer lab and a goal of technological literacy for every student. What does the new technology add?
Thelabisintendedmainlytoteach stu- dents the tools. The new equipment makes it possible for teachers and students to use these tools in their class work. One person on our Technology Committee remarked that his goal is to make the computer as common- place as a pencil, just something the student turns to when it’s the appropriate medium. Access to the Internet, with its potential for information-gathering, is especially expand- ed now.
Every student here learns the basic func-
tionality of the computer. If you look at the
course guide, you will see that they learn keyboarding, word processing and e-mail
right away, in sixth grade. They get some
experience with basic programming, building
and programming robots, using LegoDacta,
and project organization, using MicroWorld
Project Builder. By tenth grade they learn
some outlining, databases, spreadsheets,
draw and paint programs, animation, on-line information services, and how to do on-line
college searches. This year we added HTML language — eighth graders build their own web pages. We have elective courses in advanced graphics and technology. This is what they learn in the lab — the tools. (See the box on page 11 for examples of these tools in use in classrooms.)
What I personally mean by “technological litera- cy”isthat studentsleavehereknowinghowtosetup their own computer system and how to use it to solve problems. Not that they know every application but that they have a working knowledge of the problems computers can solve. I think these are basic skills for going off to college.
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Rebecca Van Dalsem takes the Priory community from “hmmm” to “c’mon, machine!” to “aha!” as we move into the Information Age.