Tag: midterm

The technology of the internet has transformed our brains into depending on it for the answer. It became the downfall of the society because we all depend on it to do our jobs for us, when it is our duty to do it on our own. For example, getting paper work on time to our boss. The technology is not going to get up and bring it there for you. We are non-stop, on the phone and using computers and tablets. Whatever happened to people reading a book on paper, or writing in a notebook and figuring out problems the old way? The technology we have today gives us the answer in the palm of our hands in the matter of five minutes. It is good but, in some cases, it is not always the right answer and can get you in trouble. The world relies on computers and technology, when they could do it by themselves. Schools rely on computers because that’s how the world is evolving. What are students going to do when the real world comes to them, and they cannot use these devices? For example, if you get a job in construction working and have to measure how far the medal has to go to fit in the spot? It takes math and writing out the problems to figure it out, the device is not going to do it for you. What will their jobs be in the future? They cannot rely on technology forever and are going to need to be independent. The world is changing fast, but what could the society do to retaliate and fix the minds of the children?

Students come to class every day and teachers tell them to go online and read this chapter or read this article. Are they actually reading it? It gives them the chance to skim through because they are a computer and have the ability to scroll. With paper and no online sources to distract the students, it makes them realize there needs to be focus and time taken out to read it thoroughly. Nicholas Carr shows the way of “Is Google Making Us Stupid”. When reading a book, thoroughly reading the pages, has the way of letting the brain know this is what happening, and the point that is trying to be made. On the internet, Nicholas Carr states, “Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet Ski” (“Is Google Making Us Stupid”). Stating that he zips along the surface, meaning that he barely reads, he skims through and does not pay attention to the words in front of him. Being a student and wanting to get work done quickly, it happens all the time. It is a  process in which students go through of getting the assignment, read the directions, skimming through the reading fast, and saying they are done. At the end, when the teacher asks questions, there is a handful of students going back because they did not read and did not expect to be asked questions. Class and work should not just be forced to be online but split it up. It depends on the assignment in way. For example, having the kids read on paper, and then write a response is a great way to make them understand the work being read and then putting it into their own words. Having the internet do the work for them does not have it stick into their brains because they will rely on the online process. Due to the reading on paper, it will make them work and work for what is really trying to be accomplished. For example, say your boss gives you papers to read through, and you skim through and do not read a single thing. Next day, he comes in and asked you what you thought and how can we elaborate and make it better, and there is nothing running through your brain because you did not read it. Your fired. Reading takes time, effort, and thought process.

Reading on a screen can be the best for some people but it is common that most people like reading on paper. Ferris Jabr gives us the message that it could be good both ways. For students or teachers, it could go both ways because they use both in their everyday life. For example, “teachers and students routinely switch between working long hours in front a computer at the office or school and reading magazines and paper” (Jabr “Science of Paper versus Screens”). It is relatable because the world of technology gives us the advantage of having it all and making life easier. Sadly, we cannot rely on it because not everything is used with technology and for a job that does not use it, what is going to happen? Some students prefer to read on paper and that is okay. It is better to read on paper because it makes the mind understand better what is being talked about. Before 1992, “studies concluded that people read slower, less accurately and less comprehensively on screens than on paper” (Jabr “Science of Paper versus Screens”). Exactly the point. When reading online, it is hard to follow along, and it is very easy to lose track to where you left off and what you are reading in general. On paper, there are no distractions to take you away from the book and stop you from reading. No other than the words on the paper going all the way down left to right.

Besides having students and teachers use technology, it becomes a problem when they decide to do different things at once. It is called multitasking. Everyone multitasks, and some people see it as a good thing, but others say it is bad. Olivia Goldhill comes to explain that multitasking is bad for the brain. In quote she writes, “it uses up oxygenated glucose in the brain, running down the same fuel that’s needed to focus on a task” (Multitasking, Goldhill). Students, especially at the age of a young child, cannot be able to do this. It loses their focus on their work at hand. Their brains are full functional to be on two things at the same time and be able to put the same time into what they are supposed to do. It is the same for teachers. They cannot teach a class, and try to figure something on their laptops, they start to lose focus on what the task is at hand. Technology of course is designed to help us make life easier in a sense, but people take advantage of what it is giving us. It is used for everything around the world, and it could be used just to search the web, which every kid does instead of doing their work. Daniel Levitin found a study on which, “switching comes with a biological cost that ends up making us feel tired much more quickly than if we sustain attention on one thing” (qtd in Goldhill). Precisely, saying that the kids do not have the attention span to do multiple things at once without getting distracted. Students need one thing to focus on to make sure they understand what the task is. Making the child do separate things will cause them to fail on the task at hand and also fail in the classroom.

Life has come to the point where we all think about is what is on the internet. Everyone is always asking what is on this site, and what is going on in the world. Nobody ever focuses on what is actually needs to be done, the actual work. We rely on the internet like it’s our parents in a way. Always asking them what to do, and what decision to make, and whether this answer is right or wrong. One day, there is going to be no one to tell us if the choice we make is the right choice, it is going to be put on us. It is just part of life, and the school systems to make that a point because the students have no idea what is right and wrong. The internet will be there forever, but when you get a job, it cannot help you with every single thing. It is going to take some of the mind to figure it out, and that is what school is here for. To show the students and also teachers’ life is important and what you learn here is going to be used in the future life. Would you rather be the solution of a student’s successful life, or the problem why they do not? The teachers and system are here to educate the students and that is what they need to. No internet or tablets, but the teacher that is in the class. For example, instead of just using online sources, have students read the paper copy and annotate on paper, and then write a discussion online about what they read and how they felt. Students come to school for one reason, to get a degree and become successful. Without success, you are nobody and everyone wants to be someone. It takes hard work, and determination, and everyone has that. It only takes one person to retrieve it and that person is yourself.

Many people have their own take on how technology can, or in some cases does not, help us learn. Some may say that technology helps us and that “The Web has been a godsend” (Carr, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”) to the many who uses it for work and learning purposes. Then there are people who argues that technology is a bad way of learning and you should not use it because it causes us to lose focus when it comes to handling multiple jobs at once, for example typing an essay and drawing points and references from within an article. Both points are valid, but we can all see that technology is becoming more prominent in our daily way of life and in the way, we learn. Schools should adapt to the way technology has come in the lime light of learning by having the students take classes regarding how to manage using the internet for learning and not as a distraction.
Carr is someone who makes several points about how technology positively impacts learning. Carr eventually recalls how “A few Google searches, some quick clicks on hyperlinks, and I’ve got the telltale fact or pithy quote I was after” (Carr, “Is Google Making Us Stupid?”) in turn meaning that the internet has shortcut tools in order to find information faster and much easier than you would if you were searching through a physical copy of an article. I personally feel that technology helps me when I’m doing school work, such as different research assignments since I can go search up something and go deeper into the topic at hand. Technology helps us because it allows us to make phone calls to people who are not with you in the same area physically, it allows us to quick search different researches, it allows us to make papers look professional, it also allows us to our jobs if we work corporate jobs at a desk. There is nothing bad with allowing a little technology in the way you learn; many people are doing it and it is becoming the new way to learn.
Davidson is another person who you can refer to who argues the view point that technology gives some benefits towards many peoples learning. Davidson mentions an experiment called the “gorilla experiment” which was based on the phenomenon of “attention blindness” and how the technology we use can help us overcome attention blindness (Davidson, 2). Attention blindness is when you focus on one event so much that you don’t pay attention to another stimulus or object that is thrown into the fray. She proposes the argument that “Fortunately, given in the interactive nature of most of our lives in the digital age, we have the tools to harness our different forms of attention and take advantage of them” (Davidson, 2). Davidson was saying that we can collaborate with each other in the modern world we live in, so we can have the ability to overcome attention blindness. Agreeing with Davidson’s point when she said “But once we acknowledge the limitations we’ve been living with, we can come up with a workaround” (Davidson, 8) I can say that I myself have been able to get around being blinded by my own mind and many obstacles thanks to technology giving me insight on a subject from many sources that has different viewpoints on it.
Goldhill disagrees that technology is helping us within our learning. She believes that “… despite the downsides of multitasking, we’re juggling an increasingly frenetic list of activities, as online notifications deliver ever more distractions” (Goldhill, “Neuroscientists say multitasking literally drains the energy reserves of your brain”). She’s basically saying because of technology we will be more inclined to struggle when it comes to juggling obstacles or in other words multitasking. Collaborating helps us because it allows us to see different viewpoints of a situation or topic such as the gorilla experiment when the objective was to count how many times the team in white passes the basketball, a gorilla was then thrown in the fray and depending on some people you either saw it or you didn’t. If you collaborate with one another then one person can count how many times the team in white passes the basketball and another person can catch the gorilla walking through the group of people, giving you the whole picture of what is given to you. Goldhill is blaming technology for the distractions it brings when it comes to handling multiple forms of works or topics when it comes to learning, such as pop up ads, emails popping up on the screen, or colorful pictures that may be within a website. I can see where that could be a problem, but you must know how to prioritize your work for you to not allow technology to take you away from what you are meaning to accomplish.
I say we can change schools for them to adapt to the way we are learning with technology by allowing the students to take classes that trains them to moderate the use of the technology in learning for only the purpose of learning. If schools acquire new methods of teaching with the technology such as classes online, uploading assignments online, having students use the internet to research everything they need, or even reading articles online. If schools take the initiative to enforce technology in their teachings then it will be easier on the students and the teachers to adjust and be more comfortable with the climate the learning world has come to, using the internet to learn.

Reading on different types of quality media can improve reading comprehension. However, it can also diminish and reduce the amounts of information that is learned and retained. All students learn at different velocity and have their own learning styles. With education adapting to the digital age it brings together some strengths and weaknesses along with it.  Schools should find the perfect balance of applying technology to courses to maximize overall efficiency.

Prior to 1992, most studies concluded that people read slower, less accurately and less comprehensively on screens than on paper. Studies published since the 1990s, however, have produced more inconsistent results (Jabr 4). This by itself is more confusing of a statement as the complexity of these results seem to have gotten further and further away from us as time went on. Other things have come into the world, like LCD screens that are ‘supposed’ to make it easier to see your computer screen or television. In my daily life reading a short story or article on the computer can be easily disrupted by other things I’m doing on the computer as opposed to a physical paperback in my hands holding my attention.

Reading and writing has evolved since 384 A.D. (Farge 1) when novelist and essayist Alberto Manguel saw his teacher, Ambrose, reading silently. Apparently, reading silently was something that seemed abnormal to Manguel. He described a shift in ‘human consciousness,’ when he realized that one could silently read, instead of aloud and still comprehend texts (Farge 1,2). Fast forward to today, where we are attempting to simplify our lives even if it may be with an AI like ‘Alexa’ to reorder my laundry detergent. We have been programmed to multi-task and skim over information as quickly as possible, to try to fit into our busy lives.  With this lifestyle in mind, technology has allowed us to retrieve important alerts, specific information, order food ahead of time, and it has also given us the opportunity to connect with other people in less than twelve seconds! Since we are in a fast-paced world, it is hard to gather and disseminate any important information quickly, which makes us multitask, or try to multitask. When we multitask, we attempt to do six things at once as expeditiously as possible. “When we attempt to multitask, we don’t actually do more than one activity at once, but quickly switch between them. And this switching is exhausting. It uses up oxygenated glucose in the brain, running down the same fuel that is needed to focus on a task “(Goldhill 1,2). Once a day is filled with multitasking and the physiological impacts come to a head, it turns you into one tired person! It is much easier to focus on one task a time with frequent breaks, says Levitin in the same article, it also allows one to be more productive. (Goldhill 3)

Additionally, when one is constantly multitasking, it interrupts their work. Gloria Mark, stated, “that when people get interrupted, it typically takes 23 minutes to return back to their work, and most people will do two intervening tasks before going to back to their original project”. “This switching leads up to a buildup of stress, so little wonder people who have high rates of neuroticism, impulsivity, and are more susceptible to stress tend to switch tasks more than others.”  (Goldhill 3).  With all of this in mind, technology can lead to multitasking, which then makes one more susceptible to higher rates of the above-mentioned diseases and make the day less productive for that person (Goldhill 3). When we are in grade school, we are taught to read out loud and to sound out syllables. Not only does this help every type of student learn from listening, but other students who read out loud, have an opportunity to use their auditory and visual skills as well. This helps to shape an excellent thriving student to a successful future.

In the same article from Goldhill, “Hal Pashler, psychology professor at UCSD, points out that not all attempts at multitasking are equally as draining. If one is completing a task on autopilot, like laundry, it makes perfect sense to read a book at the same time. But attempting to do two challenging tasks at once will lead to a drain in productivity. You can’t do two demanding, even simple tasks, in parallel,” he adds. (Goldhill 3). For young people in the adolescent stages, it is an important time to master the basics of what you learn. Things like washing your hands after bathroom use, respecting elders, and learning to not take things that are not yours, are all important life lessons that should not be bargained with. The less distraction, the better. Also, it would be costly for a school district to have a more digital aged solution to teach students important life lessons, including the curriculum.

To that end, after my recent assignment, I have concluded that adapting education to the digital age would be a brutal detriment, as the studies that were within the articles showed critical contradiction of each other and the findings. From the studies that were discussed in the articles by: Carr, La Farge, Jabr, Davidson, and Goldhill it can be concluded that there is a lot that happens to a person physiologically when they read, on any media, as well as mentally. “There is physicality in reading” (Jabr 5). It can also be concluded that a positive attitude can increase the odds of retaining what one may be reading.