Author: James McDonald

One of the most interesting and telling statements in the article, ‘Web 2.0 A New Wave of Innovation for Teaching and Learning?’ comes when author Bryan Alexander is discussing the wiki.  After describing how the wiki works he says, “They originally hit the Web in the late 1990s (another sign that Web 2.0 is emergent and historical)”. (Alexander, 2006)  To refer to something from the late 1990s as ‘historical’ shows how rapidly web 2.0 is developing and changing.  But this rapid development, the thing that makes web 2.0 so interesting and exciting may also be the biggest problem this emergent technology faces.  Anderson’s article is specifically intended to discuss the use of Web 2.0 in education, yet Web 2.0 has developed so fast that it has gone beyond the comfort level of many educators.  Even teachers who are at ease with the technology are leery of much Web 2.0 content, believing that the openness of Web 2.0, one of its key features, makes it rife with faulty information.  Much about Web 2.0 can be discussed and described, with the caveat, ‘on the one hand…but on the other hand…’  Even Anderson, whose intent is to showcase the positive aspects of Web 2.0 appears somewhat cautious of making a categorically positive  statement and has included a question mark in his title, inviting the reader to decide on the verisimilitude of the title statement.  This commentary will look at the Anderson article from the point of view of an educator with limited experience and knowledge of Web 2.0 and point out where some of the problems lie that will prevent this technology from gaining complete acceptance in an education setting.

As any new technology does, Web 2.0 has developed a user language; phrases, terms and even acronyms that are understood by developers and frequent users but can be problematic for the uninitiated.  The article was originally published by Educause, which bills itself as, ‘a non-profit association whose mission is to advance higher education by promoting the intelligent use of Information Technology’.  With this mission statement one can assume that the article was intended for educators, not Information Technology specialists. Yet within the article, Alexander writes in a way that many educators may find confusing. Anderson points out that even the term ‘social bookmarking’ could be confusing to some users yet then goes on in the article to use such phrases as, “Ajax- style pages”, (Alexander, 2006) or, “Web 2.0 can break on silos but thrive in shared services”. (Alexander, 2006)  One of the most effective ways of separating something from acceptance by the general public is to use a specialized language.

Since the article is about the educational use of Web 2.0 Anderson discusses how the open structure of social bookmarking sites can be used with respect to research.  He envisions the collaborative sharing of research between students and instructors and gives examples of how this could be achieved using Web 2.0 based sites where the open structure allows people to not only read but to change and contribute to a site.  As intriguing as this is there are two problems with this notion, both of them related to the open structure of Web 2.0.  The problems are the quality of the information that is being shared and the quantity of information available.  Of the two, quality is by far the most serious for the student.  In the article Alexander talks about one of the best known user controlled sites, Wikipedia, an open structured site which “allows users to edit each encyclopaedia entry”. (Alexander, 2006)  Unfortunately the very openness of a site like Wikipedia and others like it can make the site unreliable.  Wikipedia and other open sites allow anyone to add or say anything they want.  Its hoped that the nature of these sites, which allows readers not only to contribute but to edit material, will naturally weed out information that is suspect or even wrong, but this is not always the case and many teachers now specifically advise  students not to use material that has been found on Wikipedia.

Blogs are another aspect of Web 2.0 that Anderson discusses in terms of their pedagogical possibilities.  He describes how, “Students can search the blogosphere for political commentary, current cultural items, public development s in science, business news, and so on.” (Alexander, 2006)  While this is true and blogs can allow students and researchers to find and share the most current material in their field, the popularity of blogs has made this a challenge.  A recent Google Blog search with the terms, ‘Digital Literacy’ returned over 350,000 hits, and one with the very general term, ‘Web 2.0’ returned over 49 million, which leaves one wondering, is this really useful? How many of these will a researcher actually look at and how much time must be invested to do so.  Realizing this problem Anderson then goes on to discuss services that can be used to filter search results, which rather than simplifying the process only made the process seem, at least for this reader,  even more complicated.

If Web 2.0 is to become ‘a new wave of innovation for teaching and learning’ its first hurdle will be educators.  The problems outlined above will have to be considered and there may have to be a change in direction in how Web 2.0 is presented.  Web 2.0 is relatively new, despite Anderson’s ‘historical’ comment and needs an introduction.  Educators don’t want to be overwhelmed by the possibilities or fantasies about what could be, or have to deal with a steep learning curve, they want to understand the basic concepts and to know how they can start using it now.  The article would have served educators better if Anderson had shown how a Wiki or a blog could be used on a small scale, e.g., show how a Wiki could be used by a group of students to collect material for a project.  Once educators had some experience and improved their comfort level they could move beyond the classroom and use the technology to its fullest potential.

Alexander, B. (2006). Web 2.0 A New Wave of Innovation for Teaching and Learning? Educause , 33-44.

It has become fairly common in education circles to discuss the effect that computers, the internet and a myriad of electronic ‘gadgets’ has had on education and on students.  As a teacher the change that these technologies has brought is evident every day.  No longer do students need to spend the time searching through books or journals, now with a few clicks Google can instantly deliver any information they need.  The speed of delivery of information has proved to be a boon for research but the new technologies may also be contributing to a serious problem. This paper will look at the video and article, ‘A Vision of Students Today’ and examine how the video can be seen as symptomatic of this problem, the effect that instant answers and instant information is having on students’ ability to think and to concentrate.

In the video Wesch tries to show us what his students are thinking and doing both inside and outside the classroom. The video attempts to illustrate that the traditional classroom, whether in university or grade school, is no longer relevant to the ‘wired’ generation. Near the end of the video a student holds up a sign that says, ‘I did not create the problems, but they are my problems’. Watching the video one wonders what problems she is referring to; the ample evidence of a very limited attention span in some of her classmates? Students who play on their computer or listen to an IPod while someone is lecturing? Students who are more interested in Facebook or their cell phones than their classes?  While for many viewers the video causes a reaction of anger directed towards the students, Wesch appears to be trying to relieve these students of any responsibility for their actions.  Despite all the evidence to the contrary he would like us to believe that these are bright, enthusiastic students who are being held back by ‘the system’.  Wesch appears to believe that this is backed up by the students’ claim that they ‘hate school, but love learning’. Just prior to telling us about his students’ love of learning he tells us some of the things his students have learned; that they can get by without studying, taking notes, reading the textbook or going to class.  I agree with the student in the video, there is a problem here and I agree with Wesch that technology may be at the center of it.  But rather than looking deeper at what the problem might be and how technology is affecting students, Wesch chooses to believe that it is the presence,  and his students’ knowledge of technology that is the root of the problem.  He doesn’t look at the bigger problem of how technology may be causing a change in the mental processes of his students.  This is the question that must be asked about the video, has  the new technology changed students so much that they are now being held back by the traditional classroom experience, or has the instant answers and instant gratification they experience through their various electronics made students unable to concentrate or hold their attention for any length of time?  This is a question that is becoming increasingly discussed.

In 2008 BBC published an article titled, “Is computer use changing children?”  The article discusses the work of Baroness Greenfield, a neuroscientist and director of the Royal Institute. In the article she poses the question, “could the sensory-laden environment of computers result in people staying in the world of the small child?” (Settle, 2008)  She further wonders, “could it be if a small child is sitting in front of a screen pressing buttons and getting reactions quickly for many hours, they get used to and their brains get used to rapid responses?” (Settle, 2008)   In another article, also published in 2008 in Atlantic, Nicholas Car asks the question “Is Google making us Stupid?” He talks of his own experience with the wired world and how it is affecting him, “And what the net seems to be doing is chipping away my capacity for concentration and contemplation. My mind now expects to take in information the way the net distributes it: in a swift moving stream of particles”. (Car, 2008)  Further to this are a number of books that have been published recently dealing with the same theme;  iBrain: Surviving the Technological Alteration of the Modern Mind, or,  The Dumbest Generation: How the Digital Age Stupefies Young Americans and Jeopardizes our Future,  or,  Distracted: The Erosion of  Attention and the Coming Dark Age.  Clearly the effect of technology on attention span is being seen as a serious issue.

For teachers, many of whom did not grow up with computers and would not consider themselves ‘wired’ the situation that these writers describe is disturbing. If technology is creating in students a need for rapid responses and is changing their ability to concentrate how will it affect the future of education?  Wesch admits that, “At times I feel desperate for their attention.  I rush to amuse them with jokes and stories as I swing, twist, and swirl that gyro mouse…hoping to dazzle them with a multi-media extravaganza”. (A Vision of Students Today (and What Teachers Must Do), 2008)   It has become common to hear how teachers are moving  from being the ‘sage’ to the ‘guide’, but it appears now that we will need to become entertainers. Some of the problem may be solved as wired students become wired teachers, but of the larger problem, the possibility that technology is effecting attention span and concentration there is no easy solution.  Technology is too much a part of our society and far too useful for peoples’ acceptance of it to change because of a possible side effect.  Teachers will need to change their focus from teaching and passing information to helping students develop skills in critical thinking.  We can assume that information is available and easily retrievable, our job will be to help them learn how to judge and separate the useful and relevant from the useless and irrelevant.

A Vision of Students Today (and What Teachers Must Do). (2008, October). Retrieved October 2009, from Encyclopaedia Britannica Blog: http://www.britannica.com/blogs/2008/10/a-vision-of-students-today-what-teachers-must-do/

Car, N. (2008, July / August). Is Google Making Us Stupid? Retrieved October 2009, from Atlantic: http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200807/google

Settle, M. (2008, August 15). Is Computer Use Changing Children? Retrieved October 2009, from BBC: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/technology/7564152.stm

I have chosen to look at chapter 3 of Orality and Literacy for this commentary.  In this section Ong looks at the psychodynamics of primary oral cultures, the motivating forces that determine the behaviour and attitude of cultures with no knowledge at all of writing.  Through much of his discussion and description of primary oral cultures Ong looks at the subject, and in fact subjects, from a modern perspective.  His intention is to show his reader, by comparison,  how these cultures differed from ours.  Unfortunately his method of doing so creates what can be interpreted as a bias in his writing.  Ong is a 20^th century westerner, writing from a 20^th century point of view, with a 20^th century bias. How these biases are woven into the chapter is the subject I wish to discuss here.

One area where Ong may be seen to show a modern bias is in discussing all primary oral cultures as one single group.  Given Ong’s definition of a primary oral culture, one with no knowledge at all of writing, one must first ask how Ong has acquired his information.  Since, obviously, a culture with no writing has left no written records, Ong must base his ideas on research done among the very small number of people on Earth today who would fit this definition; the very rare groups that have been discovered and have had no previous contact with the modern world, or he must use cultures that are aware of writing but are still primarily oral. He then must use conjecture to project the behaviours and attitudes of those groups onto the variety of cultures that existed before writing.  While there may no other way to do this, this does create a problem.  Ong is discussing as much as 50,000 years of human history and cultures from all over the globe.  It is unreasonable and biased to lump all primary oral cultures together and attach the same generalizations to all of them.  

Ong’s bias is further illustrated in the way he chooses to draw the reader into a comparison of modern to primary oral cultures.  While it is very unlikely that Ong intends to imply in his writing that primary oral cultures are inferior to literate ones, there is a tone to his writing that can, on occasion, be seen to do just that.  The tone suggests amazement that primary oral cultures could function and at one point asks us to, “Try to imagine a culture where no one has ever ‘looked up’ anything” (Ong, 1982, p. 31)  At another point he asks the question, “An oral culture has no texts.  How does it get together organized material for recall?” (Ong, 1982, pp. 33-34) To further draw the reader into the pre-writing world he asks us to imagine ourselves in a primary oral culture and wonders how we would deal with Euclidean geometry or baseball batting averages.  All of his examples are ones that involve asking the reader to imagine going back in time and think about how we would deal with these modern issues.   While this does allow the reader to get some small sense of life without writing, Ong fails, or  avoids pointing out the obvious, these modern examples would have no meaning or concern to the primary oral cultures.  In order to feel the absence of something you have to be aware of it.  To further illustrate the problem I have with Ong’s 20^th century approach let me create an analogy.  I have no doubt that at some point in the future something will have been invented and become common that people today can’t even imagine.  I see Ong as the person living in that future time, looking back on 2009 and wondering how we could have functioned without that item.  He fails to realize that since I don’t know about it, it doesn’t matter.

One of the most obvious examples of Ong’s 20^th century bias is in the example he gives to illustrate the difficulties faced by a person in an oral culture who would, “undertake to think through a particularly complex problem and would finally manage to articulate a solution which itself is relatively complex”. (Ong, 1982, p. 34)  From this he asks, “How, in fact, could a lengthy analytical solution ever be assembled in the first place?” (Ong, 1982, p. 34) One wonders what kind of complex problem Ong is imagining these cultures are dealing with that would require a lengthy, analytical solution.   I have no doubt that these societies did solve complex problems but I would suggest that the problems would be of a practical rather than a philosophical nature, for example, how to get water from the nearby river to the crops.  The problem would be thought through and the solution tried.  There was no need to write anything down, if it worked the people involved would have the knowledge and would pass it on in the same way they passed on their histories and their beliefs, with stories told through generations.

In his introduction Ong states, “Homo Sapiens has been in existence for between 30,000 and 50,000 years.  The earliest script dates from only 6000 years ago.” (Ong, 1982, p. 2) During these tens of thousands of years human population grew and developed into a variety of different cultures.  They developed laws, religions and belief systems as well as techniques for food production.  These were not primitive people grunting in caves, they were intelligent, inventive and creative.  Given this, we must come to the conclusion that writing was missing from these cultures, not out of any failure on their part, but because they didn’t need it.  Ong, writing from his 20^th century bias seems to find this difficult to fathom and has allowed it to colour his approach to primary oral cultures.

Ong, W. J. (1982). Orality and Literacy. New York: Routledge.