CHAPTER NINE

Technology

echnology is the application of science, or so the dictionary instructs us. The uses of technology are varied at work, at home, and in schools. Speech can be part of technology, as in a recording where we or others hear our voices on tape. In this form of communication, vocal cords are the critical tools, more important even than the taping equipment. Lose those cords (say, to cancer), and one loses ones ability to speak directly, but modern technology can help. Engineers have designed sophisticated devices to help victims by producing sounds that resemble speech, allowing that person a modicum of oral communication; however, hearing such people talk is upsetting because the sounds, though intelligible, are different than they were earlier. It is difficult not to show our agitationwhich then has the result of increasing the self-consciousness of the person with the impairment.

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What we have long termed a book is also a form of discriminating art, gathered and sorted by technology. What this implies for planners of the New American High School is that the sources of knowledge available to serve our students are to be found in many places, not just in our classrooms, where we use our voices and describe chalk squiggles on a blackboard but also use audios, videos, and computers. Further, those sources are in constant flux, we hope in accurate and useful forms. Not only do we expect to help our students receive these new sources of information; we enable them to express themselves, their information, ideas, and stories in a variety of new forms. Books are technologies in that they facilitate that communication and send it to a wider world. They provide us messages, whether they are fiction or nonfiction. They are the creations of one or more authors that arise from those writers sense of what is true and, with fiction, creative. One puts on different spectacles when examining and using each mode. Is the nonfiction true? Is the fiction persuasive? Is a story plausible, or is it beyond the reach of most peoples imaginations? Savvy schools today use all sorts of technologies in their classrooms, from the daily newspaper, delivered to each student at school, to highly sophisticated interactive computer-based problems and lessons. The dictionary is now frequently accessed in digital formats, like an application, and can be instantly revised as new words and ideas enter the language. High schoolsand colleges and graduate schoolslead us through these useful, worthy doors and then abandon us,

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believing that each of us is ready to go on our own, is able to express what we think or feel in a manner that connects us accurately with what we mean. Because we have learned several new technologies already, with their guidance or on our own, our teachers trust us to handle the challenges to come. We know these challenges will come, because the world, especially its technology, is in flux. Classical, so-called dead languages, such as Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, are fixed, providing continuity to those who want to find out about the past. Modern languages do not provide as much insight into earlier times, but they keep up with the culture, itself roiling and reflecting a variety of situations and sites. Whats more, modern languages can be practiced with realand interestingpeople. What mastery over technology means in one place will signify something quite different in another. I may use email but will not attempt to send text messages. My elderly thumbs could never manage it! Thus is my communication with my grandchildren enlarged but also at times constrained. Technology has changed the role of the flesh-and-bloodin-a-classroom teacher. Once the sole authority, he or she has become the director to other sources of knowledge. Libraries are to be consulted, online or in the familiar paper form. A document can be called up on a screen where the whole class can see it. Both students and teachers necessarily become the analysts of ideas, processes, charts, and statistics. Together they can search for the facts and arguments that appear to be cogent and applicable to a particular situation. Students and teachers can also become searchers, independently or within teams, for new and powerful uses of

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technology. In these kinds of searches, students often feel a compelling sense of connection with the world outside the schools walls. They also feel as if the product of their own hard mental work may be useful to others. They are beginning to take on a sense of responsibility for the world, more than if they were merely working on a paper to be read by one teacher. Some examples: the military depends heavily on a variety of technologies. There are devices that can, in a way, see around corners, advising forces of what may be lurking in wait for them. The armies that have such equipment have a great advantage over those that do not. The latter might find themselves suddenly the recipients of shell fire that seemingly comes from nowhere. Diplomacy depends almost entirely on technology. Much of modern international communication is by means of cable or international telephone communications. Televised or video conversations via Skype are possible over great distances, and the communicators can get some sense of what mood or emphasis each presents. There is dramatic acting in all this; anger or fear can show through. Blogs such as the ones from Israel and South Africa that our granddaughter studies can express bigotry but also a desire to understand one another. Technology plays a large role in air-traffic control. Flights are given air space and a place in a dependable sequence of take-offs or landings. The success of this routine is measured by its mishapswhich have been virtually nil. One rides his or her flight with few worries, looking out of the small windows and dreaming (once more) of the lay of the land.

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On railroads, especially commuter trains, we read our morning papers (or, if younger, do our homework) in the sure belief in the effectiveness of the system. It works, and it has worked now for decades. Technology has a major role in modern medicine. CT scanners can reveal a full range of pictures of the insides of a persons body quickly and without risk or pain to the patient. The technical description of a CT scanner is a device that produces cross-sectional views of internal body structure using computerized axial tomography. Few patients (myself included) have any idea of what that definition practically means; suffice it to say, we accept its findings gratefully, even as we must drink a thick white liquid that highlights our innards for the CT scans production. We can walk away from such a procedure, grateful for its limited, predictable aftereffects. We may not like what we learn, but at least we can be sure of its accuracy. New books for younger readers are being produced with an accompanying video and video game. The assumption is that the modern reader expects not just to absorb new material but to interact with it. More and more scholarly books in education are also produced with CDs that illustrate the authors ways of reaching her or his conclusions. What the future will bring is uncertain. At some point hence, we automobile drivers may be able to tune in to an invisible roadside signal that guides us safely at the speed limit, not hitting any other cars or even skidding on unexpected iceassuming that the roadside signal is programmed to identify slick roads when and where they may appear.

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The far future may see further uses of sophisticated technologies. Perhaps each of us drivers will have a sort of PIN that allows us to connect to roadways over which we pass, this allowing us freedom to relax and enjoy the trip. However, I doubt that any technology of whatever merit will give us full confidence in the system; there will always be the chance, however small, of driving errors. A safe driver will be a skeptical driver. As far as I know, a skeptical computer has not yet been invented. There are other dangers in technology as well. All users of computers must ponder who can invade them (for example, through the spam that appears almost magically). The reader who rushes from a book to a video game may lose the valuable period of thought that a slower process would allow. Another danger for us is to depend too much on technological tools. Just because Google or Wikipedia says something is so, we must never assume that what it tells us is the answer or answers. No matter how we receive information, a human being has still provided it. Humans are not always neutral or careful or smart. We must remain cautious, as must our students. Critics will not like this attitude: Some things are truethe moon comes up at night, even if we cannot see it through the clouds. To deny that is to confound common sense. Yet we must be wary about most of what is around us, and we must preach the virtues of discrimination and skepticism to all but the youngest of our students. We want them to trust us, but not to believe that everything they are taught and everything they see and hear is automatically true. Our job must be to find the richest possible assembling of resources to provoke learning in each of our students. This

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requires, of course, that we know what useful resources are and how they may be harnessed for each student. This will take time and will require collaboration with other teachers and librarians. All of us must also be aware of what technologies are available at home for each of our students and clever in creating assignments requiring the use of these, student by student. All this is as complicated as it is promising. Behind it allonce againis the necessity of knowing each student well, how she learns and how she might be changing. The oldest stricture applies to the newest mechanism. How encouraging, especially to an historian!