Seymour Papert
Does change in education really need digital technology? Well, I think there are two sides to that. One is why do you want to go back to pre-digital technology? Okay. So it’s natural for them to be using the appropriate technology in the world they live in, that they’re going to live in, they’re going to work in.
So that I would say we don’t want to do it even if we could. However, I think there’s another argument that’s just as powerful and that is that even if you knew that these children were never gonna touch any digital technology in their lives. Yeah. Even then working with the digital technology enables them to learn concepts.
Much more effectively at earlier ages and in a way that’s much more realistic ’cause it’s related to using it. So for example, if they use digital technology, like say they’re using a computer and they’re using Micro World’s logo to program, say a multimedia show. The point is not that child is learning to.
Be a producer of multimedia shows or even a user of computers. But in making this multimedia show that child will be using all sorts of knowledge, including how to plan a complex activity, how to use geometry to move things around on the screen and so on, let alone what the multimedia show is about. So even if they learning ideas and skills that.
They will use without any digital technology. The digital technology gives them a better way to to learn. Yeah. I’d just add one third argument and that’s making small changes in a complex system is never works because if you make a small change, they can just jump back to where they were before.
As soon as you stop pushing on it in order to make something really. Different. You have to make a big difference. You can’t do it by small steps. You’ve gotta make a big jump at some point. And I think that in education, the obvious big jump is by introducing not just digital technology, but the use of digital technology as a basis for constructionist learning.