1. Why aren’t academic qualifications a guarantee of success?

2. What’s the fast-paced transient society?

3. Do you agree with the following statement: “Good luck is when opportunity meets preparation?”

4. “To do smth in a religious fashion” (line 20) in this paragraph stands for: a. being obsessive about education b. being unreasonable refusing to change his ideas of education c. being very careful to do smth

5. “Pulp fiction bestseller” (line 27) stands for: a. being of poor quality and often about sex and violence b. being popular c. being very thick

6. “To short-change” (line 38) stands for: a. to deceive b. to treat someone unfairly by not giving him what he deserves c. to make someone different

7. Comment on the following sentence: “It is the very people who need to commit to self-education who are the last people to do it.”

8. To what is the following sentence alluded? “You might as well raise your arms in commanding fashion…” (line 35)

9.  “Financially successful people have the least use for on-going education because they are already successful!” Do you agree with this line of argument?

10. What do you call a classic chicken-and-egg situation?

11. What does “a freebie-seeker’s paradise” stand for? a. you can download things free b. you can download cheap stuff c. you don’t value cheap knowledge

12. If you continually just seek free stuff, what sort of message are you sending your subconscious mind?

13. Characterize people who are in an expanding spiral of life and those who are in a contracting spiral of life.

Comment on the title.

Clashing cultures: why some teachers have difficulty using new technologies.

By Edna Aphek

What is it that causes some people to vehemently avoid using computers and the Internet whereas others readily, rapidly and eagerly adopt the new technologies? Is it technophobia? Or are there deeper reasons for this aversion to the use of computers and the Internet in particular?

For the last six years I have been involved in integrating technology in education. Though much of my effort has been quite successful, I often met and still do, a number of teachers who have been most reluctant to adopt the new technologies as a useful, valid means in their work. Yet most of these people who are "computer-phobic" are not technology-averse, they watch television and might even have that TV set hooked to a VCR or DVD, they talk on their cell phones, and they happily microwave their meals. I had been very curious as to what their reasons may be but was not fully satisfied with the obvious explanations such as: (1) teachers, especially the older ones, are afraid of technology and aren't comfortable with me new technologies; (2) on the other hand they can manage, and even be very successful in their work, without using the new technologies: (3) teachers tend to be conservative and often are resistant to change.

It's not that the aforementioned arguments aren't true, but they are only pan of a bigger picture.

It would be advisable to note here, that in his Diffusion Theory, Everette Rogers claims that an innovation becomes wide-spread once it has crossed the threshold of about 13% in a given population. To be more exact, some say it could even take up to 20%.

Rogers also postulates that an innovation usually undergoes a period of incubation during which it would be adopted slowly and gradually and only later on it will gain momentum and become wide spread.

Rogers tells us that the diffusion of a given innovation is contingent upon several factors; Its complexity, its efficacy in comparison to other means, the timing, the diffusion of information about it, and the social setting in which it's implemented.

I believe that we are past the 20 percent of teachers who are computer savvy. There's much information in the media about how the use of computers and the Internet is actually trendy and prestigious, yet teachers are still left behind with respect to using the new technologies. Though much of what Everette Rogers is saying sounds reasonable and makes sense, I still feel there is more to it.

Trying to fathom the reasons that might lie behind this phenomenon, I would like to suggest that we are facing here a clash between two cultures: the new culture winch can be referred to as the technological-digital or "TD," and the older one, which relies on books, pen and paper and can be referred to as "BP."

These two cultures aren't, as of yet, reconciled.

There is much prejudice associated with the new technologies, and there is much disdain associated with the lack of its use. The "fanatics" in each culture think theirs is the only truth and the only right way.

Let's take a look now at some of the characteristics of each of the two cultures: The BP culture is focused, centered, and well-organized. In the BP culture information is organized and well arranged, usually sequentially. The teacher is the main source of information and authority and the classroom is the location where learning takes place.             

Learning is graded; achievements, learning products and time are uniform. There are solid, proven ways for measuring knowledge and for its grading.

The TD culture is more open, less centered or focused. It believes that there are very many and varied sources of information and many of them are scattered out there in Cyberspace. The teacher in this TD culture isn't the main source or the authority for knowledge, but rather a mentor and a guide to learning; to information finding, evaluating and arranging it. Ways for evaluation and grading are still not fully developed, and there isn't as vet a solid body of research as to the efficacy of this way of learning.

The BP culture has a proven past, it looks back to its well-paved ways, to its "maps": written textbooks and well designed curricula. The TD culture is looking at" the now and the future. It's more adventurous, and uncertainty an asset rather than disadvantage,

The meeting between the two very different cultures is a meeting between a linear-sequential culture, and an associative, multi-directional, zapping, often-undirected surfing culture.

It's also the difference between a "real-here "Tangible culture and a virtual one. The believers of the "concrete-here" culture are confronted by the culture of "somewhere out there," in Cyberspace. In this non- tangible culture one sits in a limited physical environment while the spirit roams in the unlimited space of the Cyber, visiting museums, meeting people, going on expeditions and much more.

The two cultures also treat time differently: The BP culture is slow and halting. It is synchronic, and it maintains that things should be done one at a time. The DT one is quick and racing. The information age is an age of asynchronous as well as synchronous learning, immediacy, constant updating and simultaneity, doing a few things at the same time.

Children of the Information Age often watch television, talk on the phone, surf the Internet and even do their homework, at me same time.

One culture, that of the book- and the teacher and the classroom-as-main-source-of-knowledge is a serious, grave culture believing that learning is mainly in black and white and requires much effort and investment. The other culture is more lenient: it's lighter, colorful, and integrates different media. It could be described as something between learning and fun, as it combines education and entertainment.

The one culture proposes that learning is the acquisition of many items of knowledge, memorizing is very important, and that the order of acquisition of these items should be decided by the grown ups who know better. In this more traditional culture there is "easy" and "difficult" and "first" and "second", and they must come in this order.

The other culture, the DT, die more innovative one, views learning as a dynamic, ever developing airy tissue. There is no such thing as an adult deciding what is easy or difficult for the younger learner. The learner is the one to decide.

It's not that one culture is right and the other is wrong. Both are right and wrong at the same time.

Those who maintain a priori that the old culture is better than the new one might not even try to experience the latter. At a stage when and where attempts to implement change are made, an "either- or" approach and value judgment are most detrimental. In such a situation words such as "good" and "bad" should be substituted by "different", "interesting", "worth checking."

The "either- or" approach is also problematic from another aspect as many adherents of the new technologies totally reject the "old" book culture and falsely believe that one could find everything and anything, in the Internet.

In a recent issue of From Now On Ken Vesey asks the following question: "The Internet-only Research Approach: Does the Web Really Have All There Is to Say?" Vesey analyzed many Internet learning resources and in light of his research he advocates "an approach to research э[which] will lead students to the best information wherever it is and whatever format it is in."

His model is a "comprehensive research process for the students and often lead them to analog resources, as well as encourage them to use relevant online tools to tease out the best information on their subject."

Some scholars, like Julie Landry in her article "Is Our Children Learning?" raise the question whether the use of computers in general will bring about the educational impact we have been praying for. Landry points out the enormous amounts of money invested in instructional technology and in teacher training. She is worried about the cost effectiveness of this investment and whether the harvest we are reaping is worth the investment. Landry even fears that in certain cases the use of technology in the classroom might have a "detrimental effect" on the learners.                                                

As long as one culture maintains that it's better man the other, or tries to dominate and annihilate the other, mere is no chance of reconciliation.

In the face of the above I am not recommending sitting back and waiting until more teachers will join the "computer savvy force" or until some of the reluctant teachers will retire. I believe that an on-going open public dialogue, in which parents, educators, philosophers, high tech people, and public figures will participate, might serve as a bridge between the two clashing cultures. The blind followers of the new culture do it much harm. Their messianic prophecies that the new technologies will totally revolutionize the schools, make them obsolete and meaningless, might be a major cause of panic among several good conscientious teachers of the more traditional culture.

Technology is not only a blessing and a boon. According to Postman, adopting a new technology is always a "Faustian Deal," as technology always gives and takes, simultaneously. For example, the automobile, while being a great means of transportation, has given rise to suburban sprawl, air pollution, noise and even unnecessary deaths in accidents.

Postman is calling on us to discuss the ways in which the new technologies are using us, and not only the how we should use them. Postman claims that we have turned technology in general and the new ones in particular, into our new gods. By doing so we are destroying the main reason for the existence of schools i.e., socialization: caring for each other, learning to share, learning the rules of fair play - in short the components of civic education which help create a democratic public.

Postman, among others, is worried about the digital divide and the enormous gap the new technologies are creating between the "haves" and the "have nots" and tile growing inequality they are generating.

Others express concerns [not entirely unfounded] which actually exaggerates and intensifies the dangers the new technology might bring about, such as: Internet addiction, exhaustion from information overload, the IFS (Information Fatigue Syndrome), the uncensored land of pedophilia, the land of hate sites, the endless dangers and pitfalls awaiting the young and the innocent. Yes, the Internet contains much of the above. But so does life itself. We don't send our children out without guidance, without equipping them with the right tools, and even escorting them, at least in the beginning. This is one of the many functions that school and parents take upon themselves. Life is dangerous and die new technologies are part of life and often its reflection.

What I am talking about is no way a public trial or a confrontation between the two cultures, but rather a dialogue between people who hold different legitimate views of what learning and education and information are all about and what might be the best means to implement their views.

To paraphrase Postman's words, let's not be "exclamation marks" but rather "on-going question marks." What I have in mind is a meeting of minds rather than attacking views and ideas. Starting a real, unbiased, candid dialogue about the use and misuse of the new technologies might show that the new technologies are neither demons nor panaceas, and therefore will neither solve all our learning and social problems nor destroy everything we have already accomplished, if used mindfully.

If such an on-going dialog is openly and courageously held between proponents of both cultures it will help us air and reassess our views of what education and information are all about and thus I believe it might pave the way for more teachers (who until now have been reluctant to do so) to at least try the new technologies.

I. Answer the following questions.

1.What’s the author’s major concern in the first paragraph?

2. Why can teachers be reluctant to use new technologies?

3. Why can teachers be reluctant to use new technologies?

4.Under what circumstances can any innovation gain momentum and become wide spread?

5.What phenomenon perplexed the author most?

6.What’s BP culture?

7.What’s TD culture?

8.Why can the blind followers of the new culture do it much harm?

9.What’s Postman’s major concern?

10.What does the author of the article call for?

11.What can an on-going dialog held between proponents of both cultures help us to do?

II. Make up a list of arguments for both cultures.

III. Formulate the main idea of the article.

IV. What’s your approach to new technological development?

Training

by Tom Walsh

Who and how have you been trained to be? I ask myself that question fairly regularly these days, along with several others: how have I responded to that training? Has that training made me a better person, or has it made me simply a blind follower who's so intent upon behaving and acting based on the training that I'm hiding my true self from myself and from others who are with me? We usually don't think of our past experiences as "training", do we? We tend to see them as "learning", but I think we have to distinguish between those two terms. To me, training involves getting other people to act in certain ways in certain situations, while learning is a much more personal experience that doesn't depend on other people's reactions to determine its success or failure.

Most of what we're trained to do is positive in nature for society as a whole. For example, we're trained to be courteous and polite, to be punctual and reliable, and/or to be kind to others. In school we're trained to sit quietly at our desk, not to speak until called upon, and how to respond to prompts from others who are in authority (our teachers), among many other things.

But when we're very young, as we are when we start school, how are we able to discern between what's being taught (information and processes) and what we're being trained to do (behaviors, actions and reactions)? Are we at all able to pick and choose which things we want to be trained at, and which things we'd prefer not to learn? As adults, we can be trained to kill people if we want to join certain branches of the military, we can be trained to save lives as doctors or surgeons, or we can be trained how to teach others- we have many choices, all the time. But when we're kids, we get whatever's given to us, and we have no say in what we're trained to be and do.

This isn't necessarily a terrible thing, unless we're trained to do terrible things or think horrible thoughts. And we must ask ourselves just what we were trained to do and to be if we're ever to get to the bottom of some of our major issues in life. Could it be that some of our problems in relationships are the result of the ways that other people trained us to see others or react to them? Could it be that some of the thought patterns that we have that can lead to depression are the result of training that we never realized we were getting? We must remember that many of the people who were doing the training were not authorities in the fields in which they were training. Very few parents are experts in relationships, yet most of them form the basis of their children's ideas of relationships. Who trained us how to manage our money? Who were our role models and examples? Who trained us to take the first job that comes along that's halfway bearable and stick with it through thick or thin for the rest of our lives just so that we can make money? Who trained us to avoid risks and conflict in order to keep life "stable" and "safe"?

This isn't an article about answers – it's an article about questions. These are questions that we all can ask ourselves if we want to learn more about just how we came to be the way we are, and just what we can change if we're somehow dissatisfied with the way things are. We've all been taught, but we've also all been trained to act in certain ways and do things just so; there's a good chance that the training has done more to limit us in our lives than to help to free us to become the people we were meant to be. Training doesn't focus on letting people be themselves – it necessarily focuses on getting people to do things in predictable ways in order to maintain the status quo and to keep things safe.

What parts of you are the result of training? Has that training been of value to you, and helped you to grow? If not, what can you do about it?