Is the new thing a possibility - or simply a problem
Wednesday, March 26, 2014 at 05:40AM Warning: rant in progress
Have you seen one of these yet? Or something similar, in your library? If you haven’t, you probably will soon. Many phone companies are producing this latest craze….the watch phone! It has shown up in my middle school and the kids love them! I highlight these devices in our Tuesday Tech Tip because they create a dilemma for school librarians and school administrators. Trying to secure a safe, fair, and no device testing environment means watches have to be confiscated just like all cell phones. BYOD policies need to address watch phones.
Technology is advancing very quickly and we need to keep up with it!
Really, a post like this from a librarian on a national library association blog site who should be celebrating the opportunities such devices present learners rather than stewing they may be used to cheat on some meaningless test. (Why not focus on Google-proofing testing?)
And think of the possibilities for libraries for these cool tools: a book or video on your wrist, a reference collection on your wrist, contacts with real-time experts on your wrist, a means to collaborate with your classmates on your wrist, and a way to take notes, write in a journal, or record your ideas on your wrist. I came up with these and I have a rather limited imagination! Clever people with amaze us all with what educational value these watches will afford - I'm sure of it.
Librarians, we of all educators should be about opportunities, about access, about empowerment. Let the anal-retentive tech directors worry about the misuse. Let's get on the kids' side of technology use.
Seriously, I expect better from my professional association.
Reader Comments (2)
I could not agree more. I am in the throes of standardized test preparation. It is the start of my final three days in education, and do I get to work with my kids on a project? Have a great book discussion? Teach them something they'll actually use? Nope. Because of the overemphasis on testing by my lovely state (Texas), I get to spend my last month in education doing the thing I hate most - test prep.
How is this related to wearable tech? Instead of focusing on the opportunities that abound for our kids, we focus instead on what could go wrong when they take that all-important test next week. We try to slap band-aids on the gaps in kids' skill sets that exist because we no longer have the time, resources, or administrative backing to teach our students how to be critical thinkers. Instead, we live in a "gotcha" climate where kids and teachers function in an environment analogous to rats in a lab - it's all punishment/reward.
Sorry, I realize I'm ranting too. Librarians should be the starting point for a solution, not part of the problem. Unfortunately, we are as caught up in the culture of testing as everyone else. Until that tide shifts, we are swimming upstream.
Len,
A rant is good for the soul now and then.
Doug