PLN #6

          Mr. Fisch's video titled "What if" technically had no plot. It was merely a 6 minute, 18 second video showing what people have said about technology incorporation into education for the past three hundred years. That is what the video seems like without any thought. The video shows what different educators have said since 1703 about different technology being installed into the education system. At that time, it was the transition from bark to slate. Succeeding that was the transition from slate to paper, then pencil to pen, then the transition from self-made to store-bought ink. Technology was harassed next by the PTA saying students depend on fountain pens. The next few include ballpoint pens, using calculators on tests, again calculators are harassed, another shoot-down of calculators, etc. At last, the internet comes into existence, it is unwelcome by people saying it is just a fad, that schools don't need websites, teacher will never use email, rejection of network ports in all classrooms and computers in every classroom, rejection of LCD projectors, (take a breath now, there's more) rejection of high school students having laptops, grades on the web, wireless networks in schools, and electronics in class. Now, we are at the 6 minute, 10 mark of the video, saying, "What if...we'd listened?" This video demonstrates how people constantly doubt technology in a very interesting way.

          I totally agree with what this video was saying. People always say that technology is distracting to the learning enviorment and things like that and they are proven wrong time and time again. It is not bad that they say such things as skepticism alone isn't bad, it is the fact that they say things and never learn from them. Critics fail to recognize that every time they say something negative, they have to later eat their words; this video proves that. I find it amazing how it doesn't matter what the technology is, people still accuse it of basically pampering students. For three hundred nine, almost three hundred ten years, people have resisted change in education. I think the bottom lin of what this video is saying is that if doesn't matter the circumstances, people don't like change...and that is what I entirely agree with.