Information Overload

Looking back at John Seely Brown's PowerPoint slides for the OLN conference, I'm reminded of his advanced thoughts - of how we need to focus not just on learning, but on the differences between "learning about" and "learning to be," and many other important concepts. I'm going to review his website in detail to check out his latest thinking.

I was searching for John's thoughts - that I recall from his earlier SHEEO talk - on the problem of information overload, given the masses of new, unfiltered stuff we now get. It's a growing problem because even the media don't do the job they once did in critically evaluating the substance and value of information and opinion.

For most of my life, there have been professionals who have evaluated and assessed the value of much of the information that has gotten to me. Educators decided what was important for me to learn. Librarians decided which books to put on the shelves. The New York Times decided what news was fit to print. Times have changed.

Although so much of education is still based on the rote transfer of knowledge ("learning about"), the Internet has opened access to an inconceivable amount of unfiltered information. And it appears to be a basic journalistic tenet today that to be "balanced," a reporter must offer a contradictory viewpoint for every issue. 

The problem then is that educators haven't focused on how learners can - and must - determine for themselves the value or validity of information and points-of-view. Are we preparing our kids or ourselves to weigh the arguments of those who want us to believe that the holocaust never occurred or that the theory of evolution must be abandoned because of ones faith in divine creation?

Yet the founding principles of the United States recognize that widespread education is required to preserve our free and democratic society. Given the huge volume of unassessed information now available to all, we need to educate people on different things than we've done for the past 100 years. Yes, I know the cries from educators: "How can you ask us to do even more than we're already doing?" I don't advocate doing more, but doing different.

I recall that John said that kids today do judge the validity of information they receive. But are they developing the needed "critical thinking" abilities and dispositions to apply judgment throughout their lives, or are they doing so only in particular compartments of issues and information? I fear it's the latter.

But enough for now; more on this critical question in upcoming pieces.

Blogging

Thanks to K.S. for starting my Mom on blogging. Her blogs finally got me into doing mine.

Years ago, I bought futurist John Seely Brown's 2000 book The Social Life of Information. He's the former head of Xerox PARC. I really couldn't get into the book (it's a difficult read). But I had the pleasure of hearing John present at a national SHEEO conference. He made the story live! And he made so much sense. He basically presaged the Web 2.0 phenomenon, noting how much more directly people would interact with each other through the Internet.

In 2006, I suggested we invite John to speak at an Ohio Learning Network conference of education technologists. I had the pleasure of introducing him. (It's interesting to look back at the video of my introduction on the OLN website. My 6 1/2 minute introduction includes some of my fundamental conclusions of what we must do to improve elementary, secondary, and higher education education in America.) 

In introducing John, I boasted how I had really learned something from hearing his address at SHEEO and, as a result, had moved to get with the new technologies: I had taken an online course using the multi-participant conferencing facilities of Elluminate, bought an iPod, signed up for instant messaging, and had a webcam. In response, at the start of his talk John quickly burst my bubble and challenged me further: "Do you have a blog? Ah, we have to work on this guy!" (John Seely Brown's thought-provoking talk and slides are, sadly, no longer available on OLN's website.)

Having lived such a public life for the past 25 years, I've been especially focused on maintaining what personal privacy I could. The notion of making my thoughts available to people I don't know has been completely abhorrent to me. However, as I've been thinking about writing a book with such thoughts, the notion has become more reasonable. Tackling a big project such as writing a book is somewhat more conceivable if I address it a little piece at a time.

So here I am, almost 3 years later, finally blogging. Thanks to K.S., Mom, and John Seely Brown for getting me going! This blog has already gone in directions far removed from my book thoughts. But it's nice to get down in writing some of the thoughts I've had for a long time, even as they randomly pop to mind.