Qualifying Essay: Digital Wisdom and Education

Qualifying Essay: Digital Wisdom and Education

(George Dong)

2710 words excluding Abstract and Bibliography

Abstract

In this report, the terms “digital native” and “digital wisdom” are reviewed and the relevant role of education is discussed in search for enhanced wisdom. Digital extension to human wisdom has been around for decades. Its growth has seen nothing but acceleration. Whether the children are digital natives or not, digital fluency is required to enable digital wisdom development and, in this, education plays a key role. Technology should be made a pillar of education and computing at school is the key solution in linking all three: technology, education and digital wisdom.

Introduction

In 2009 Marc Prensky put forward a couple of less divisive terms: “digital extension”, “digital enhancement” and “digital wisdom”[1]. Digital extension and digital enhancement refers to the digital tools that help humans in carrying out tasks and making decisions. Digital wisdom is the digital extension to human brain power and this concept will develop in future. Though we might debate on where to draw the boundaries between digital extension and true digital wisdom, the current urgency is how to achieve digital extension/wisdom.

Digital extension is just another tool. Digital extensions to human abilities have been around for decades. This has happened in many fields of the world. Digital technology is used to autopilot planes, to remotely control drones, to predict weather, to select materials, to diagnose patients, to research for new drugs, to mine the data from search engines, to target web users with relevant products, and so on. People have even tried to use a drone to invigilate school exams [23].

Digital Wisdom

What is wisdom? Wisdom is “the ability to discern or judge what is true, right, or lasting; insight.” [25] Wisdom is “the quality of having experience, knowledge, and good judgment; the quality of being wise” [26]. When viewed from the philosophical perspective, “A basic definition of wisdom is the judicious application ofknowledge. The opposite of wisdom isfolly.”[27] While from an educational perspective, “traditionally, schools share the responsibility to build character and wisdom along with parents and the community”[27]. This definition clearly has a moral and ethical element in wisdom.

Apart from those above extensions, Marc Prensky’s “digital wisdom” includes digitally manipulating brain wave signals to carry out tasks, such as hand-off flying via neural-technology[1]. Similar devices have been demonstrated in BrainGate[21]. This is significantly different from previous extensions where expert systems or some artificial intelligence helps the human controller to make better decisions. While with brain wave signals detected and deciphered, the implication is huge. Because this has opened the door to directly interact with human brain, by-passing all the senses. And this turns homo sapiens into homo sapiens digital. Human being would become another race as the processing and decision making is done in a blended mode with human brain and machine brain working together, not solely the human brain anymore.

First thing people might worry about is “Will this digital wisdom be able to make ethical decisions?” More literatures will be reviewed in this aspect. In the meantime, this report focuses on how education can help achieve digital wisdom.

It would be too harsh to require machines to make moral decisions at this moment, though it might be possible in future if we dare to speculate. However, focusing on technical qualities, artificial intelligence (AI) could be a candidate for some of human wisdom. For example, which plastic material or metallic material should be used at temperatures of 500 Celsius degrees? Expert system could easily make that choice for us.

The current model of interaction between digital device and human being is this:

Human Brain – instructs – Digital device - Things Get Done.

Digitally enhanced wisdom is the future

In BrainGate project, a person who has paralysed for 15 years could have a cup of coke using a robot that was controlled by her mind [21].

The interaction model for BrainGate is:

Brain – Brain Wave – Computer - Robot – Things get done

Each section of a wave pattern means thought in the person’s head. Once all potential wave patterns are deciphered it is then possible to build devices to interact with the brain digitally and directly. That is when true enhancement could happen. So the next model could be:

Computer – Electronic Wave – Brain - Arms/Legs/Mouth/etc – Things get done

A microchip in the brain? It sounds scary but it is not too far away from the horizon. This technology can be used to help people with certain health issues such as: eyesight problem, speech problem, learning difficulties. If that part of brain is not functioning anymore, so get a replacement, just like a hip replacement.

So, what now?

Can you feel the power of digital technology? What do we do? From education’s perspective, how do we make today’s students into tomorrow’s digital wisdom creators, not consumers?

The answer is education, technology in education, computing at school.

Marc Prensky believes technology should be made a pillar of education [5]. It will prepare the young to be more creative! Resnick believes digital fluency should be about using them to create and to remix, not just browsing and chatting [19].

Prensky has divided education content into “legacy” and “future”. “Legacy” content should be replaced with “future” ones [1].

There is also a need for pedagogical change. Prensky and Wim advocates for this so that we can meet the needs of the digital natives / homo zappiens who are different from previous learners [1] [12].

It is wise to analyse the current situation, reflect on the current practices and constantly search for more effective ways of education, in terms content, pedagogy, and supporting facilities. Let’s start by examining “digital natives”.

Digital literacy and digital natives

“Digital natives” refer to people who were born after the 80s [2, 3] and their lives are immersed in digital technology and digital devices and are also called “homo zappiens” [12].

There are different descriptions of digital literacy. At the lower end of the expectation,

“Digital Literacy is understood as basic functional skills, such as the ability to use a keyboard, mouse, email, and web browser.” [8 At the higher end of expectation spectrum, “digital literacy” includes “... Classify, store, manipulate any information gathered or generated; Restructure and generate information [6].

Digital natives are perceived as “natural with technology” and digitally savvy. I believe they can be group into three levels: Those who can use the digital tools (hardware and software) at Level 1. This is obviously important. At Level 2 they know how the tools work. This will help them to become a critical user and can identify erroneous information. For example, knowing how search engines work they would be able to differentiate between findings of a search. At the highest level, Level 3, they can create things from simple tools to complex systems. Within each level, there may be sub-levels. For example, at Level 3 one could create a simple web site with static pages as a novice creator, or one could create a fully operational e-commerce website as an expert.

Digital natives learn differently in the following ways: [12]

Homo Zappiens / Homo Sapiens
high speed < / > conventional speed
multi tasking < / > mono tasking
non linear approaches < / > linear approaches
iconic skills first < / > reading skills first
connected < / > stand alone
collaborative < / > competitive
learning by searching < / > learning by absorbing
learning by playing < / > separating learning and playing
learning by externalizing < / > learning by internalizing
fantasy < / > reality

Because digital natives play games for long hours over years, their brain might have changed as a result. London taxi drivers have different brain structure according to Professor Eleanor Maguire. “Acquiring ‘the Knowledge’ - the complex layout of central London’s 25000 streets and thousands of places of interest - causes structural changes in the brain and changes to memory in the capital’s taxi drivers”, her Wellcome Trust funded research has shown [22].

Nadal’s left arm is visibly larger than his right arm due to the fact that he is left handed. We can draw some similarity between this and the change of brain structure.

(Taxi drivers’ brain) (Nadal)

However, most students sill fall into Level 1 group. Their skills are usually within this set: browsing the internet, facebook, twitter, email, texting, video or computer games, using cloud drives for storage and mobile phone. The tools, such as web 2.0 and various application software packages, have made it so easy to do things online that many seemingly complex tasks are just a few button clicks. The real challenge is in making those buttons and designing those tools. Direct observations have also shown that when it comes to programming games, they are not showing any signs of nativeness, with rare exceptions.

Therefore they need further education to become a fluent native, to be able to create, to become a wisdom creator, not a wisdom consumer. First the content may need change to challenge them and to engage them. Some of the basic skills can be learned from peers as proved by Hole in the Wall project in India. In villages and cities on India, computers with necessary software are installed and left with young users who may be homeless or students. After a couple of months the children have learned from each other and from exploring the computer themselves. [28]

Pedagogy might need adjustment as well to suit the students. However, not all the features demonstrated by the homo zappiens [12] are plausible and should be discouraged. For example, the lack of patience and immediate answer attitude is not good for long term development. When it is difficult, teacher breaks it down into easier to manage chunks. Students have lost patience and would not think about a task before asking for help or answer. This should be corrected, not appeased with. The lack of perseverance and lack of research will damage their future digital wisdom.

Multitasking is another issue. Many say it is natural for digital natives to multitask. This need further research to back it up. From my observation it works on simple tasks. With a task such as coding a game, the learner needs to be focused. Otherwise they will not be able to tackle it.

A balanced approach with digital natives might be plausible [18].

Digital fluency and digital natives

“Digital fluency” should mean designing, creating, and remixing, not just browsing, chatting, and interacting.” [19] “Digital fluency” is an ability to reliably achieve desired outcomes through use of digital technology.

Digital fluency is the basis of creativity.

The majority of digital natives have not reached this level. They need to learn more skills for creation, such as using digital technology to remix, to design and to create music, images, animations, games etc. Simple chatting, uploading and downloading skills would not help. Those tasks have been made easy by the ones with the creative skills so that a beginner could do them.

The current curriculum change to computing is a step in the right direction, towards the achievement of digital fluency.

Computing at school is the way

What has failed the previous computing at school movement? In the 80s when microcomputers first became popular, many schools started programming and, however, it soon developed into the digital-literacy focused ICT course. That was due to several reasons. To prove this, further research needs to be done. But by pure speculation, one reason is the use ICT was new to most, natives were not formed yet. ICT literacy was the right thing to do. Secondly, the programming platforms are far from “being friendly”, things like Scratch was not available. Hence even the most able ones were facing a steep learning curve and an impossible hurdle. Thirdly, the lack of teachers who are experienced in programming and finally the leadership role of the exam boards. All of those have led to the decrease of computing uptake and the dominance of ICT GCSE and ICT A levels.

The current curricula of computing and computer science in schools will have significant implication in future. One university dean commented to a group of secondary school computing teachers: “our computer science graduates start from scratch now. They learn the very basic stuff in the first year and they don’t have time to develop skills enough before leaving their course. With computing at schools implemented, our students will start, right from the beginning, to learn advanced skills and techniques to create meaningful projects and products. In 10 years, Britain will be a different place!”

To ensure success, these are a few factors:

A suitable platform is most important. Scratch is the ideal choice, or similar ones, to start with. For beginners Scratch is easy and rewarding. It is particularly good for KS3 and below. Any text based programming environment will put most beginners off.

Adequate teaching resources (including teachers) should be provided. The web offers tons of free resources already, such as CAS at computingatschool.org, raspberryfool.net, and of course GOOGLE, just naming a few!

A determining force is the exams and assessments from the exam boards. Schools follow exam guidance after all. OCR is doing a lot of high profiled promotions of computing at school. [31]