A few caveats…
I’m not doing this as a grad student anymore. I don’t want to be a full-time researcher or an academic. Instructional design is my game and I just have to get better at that. Well, that and managing a bunch of other designers and developers.
Two, I’m not really taking on Clay Shirky. The dude is smart, way smarter than I am. That and he says a lot of things with which I agree. So, this is not an attack on Shirky. Rather, it’s an attack on one thing he wrote that will be taken out of context and used for evil, sorta like the Bible. My beef isn’t with a guy who could burry me in a rhetorical bloodbath. It’s a beef with an idea, which I’ll get to soon enough, but there’s yet another caveat.
C) This probably won’t take me 25 minutes. I’m guessing longer, but it will probably be shorter. Also, I’m not doing this every day. Of course, I wasn’t doing this every day before this post either.
Now, back to Shirky…
Shirky wrote this piece which showed up in the Washington Post before making an appearance on my Facebook wall. Read it. It’s super-thought-provoking as is with most anything this guy writes tends to be, but I have a beef with the central idea: restricting laptops and other devices from the classroom.
Here’s the basic argument: technology is distracting for students when Clay Shirky is talking.
Well, that was a bit harsh. Basically, Shirky, an expert in new media, has opted to restrict technology that actually interacts with said “new media” from his classroom because they are too distracting for students. He goes on to cite research about how multitasking is a really inefficient way to learn; software is designed to demand our attention; and devices are distracting even to those who aren’t using them if they can see them. All this adds up to none of Clay Shirky’s students are listening to them.
Now, I find this all hard to believe. First of all, how does Clay Freaking Shirky not engage his audience when he speaks? I mean, he’s a TED talker. Of course, this is one of the biggest problems with his argument, but I’ll come back to that…
Okay, so social media and their ilk are too distracting. These technologies engage our emotions/elephants and provide us emotional gratification. Little ol’ Clay (or any teacher for that matter) just can’t appeal to students who are drawn to this sort of distraction. Well, why not appeal to these emotions? Shirky snarks briefly about Maria Montessori’s naiveté, but he misses the point that constructivist learning pedagogies work. Instead of the content originating from where the academy or its representatives stand, start from the student’s place. Engage that emotion in leading them to the knowledge.
Now, how is there time to spend on all of these distractions while sitting in class? Multitasking, y’all. Well, yes, he’s right. Multitasking is possibly the single worst thing to ever happen to learning and productivity. I won’t even steal any of his citations to prove this, because we all secretly know the truth. Multitasking might save time, but it ruins our cognitive abilities.
So, why not teach students how to “multitask”? I don’t mean ignore all the research that says multitasking sucks. I mean teach students how to use back channels. Busy students with applications of what is being discussed in class. Hold them accountable to one another through cooperative learning. Teachers know how to combat distractions. Just teach, Mr. Shirky.
Now, back to Clay Shirky’s gift for public speaking. If anyone can deliver a lecture that is engaging, informative, and meaningful, it’s the guy I’m bashing. To his credit, Shirky admits that he and his colleagues tend to overestimate how interesting they are as lecturers. I could’t agree more. However, what some academics will take away from his essay is that they don’t need to engage technology or their students through technology. Just ban the devices and tell them what they need to know and how to think about it. And the biggest problem with this thinking is that none of them are Clay Shirky. Students aren’t ignoring them because they’re on Twitter. It’s because they suck at speaking.
For me, the most disappointing part of the piece is that the guy who’s supposed to know how all this technology will work to advance our society can’t use the same technology to advance his own students and their learning.
(It should be noted that I have no idea what Shirky does in his classroom with his students. For all I know, they’re putting down the computers and moving around in cooperative groups. Also, he’s restricting technology, not banning it. I realize this is very different.)
25 Minutes a Day 