Singularity University was started by some of Silicon Valley’s top companies – Google, Cisco and others – to teach individuals, businesses, institutions, investors, NGOs and governments how to leverage the newest technologies to benefit mankind. Singularity published this article, written by Nathaniel Calhoun and based on an interview with Adam Aberman (both Members of The Learning Collective), on the failure of technology in public schools to build students’ critical thinking skills.
Here’s a quote from the article: “Elementary and middle schools I’ve been in that leverage a lot of technology tend to do an even worse job at promoting students’ higher order thinking abilities. At 100% of the approximately twenty blended schools I have evaluated, there is an acknowledged lack of students’ higher-order and critical thinking skills.”
Some questions raised in the article include:
- Is there an unscientific bravado behind the assumption that uni-variable learning tools will work well across many classrooms without creating atrophy in other skill areas?
- Are our educational technologists overlooking social innovations and perhaps weakening our culture of learning?
- If incorporating tech into our charter schools is further depressing our learning outcomes for older students, how can we change course?
- By designing tech for core standards that overemphasize narrow learning goals, are we missing an opportunity to design more transformative technologies?