Recently, I attended a very interesting talk by Sherry Turkle, who wrote the book, “Alone Together; Why we expect more technology, and less from each other“. It was interesting to hear the thoughts of a doctor in the area of technology in one of the most famous universities in the world (MIT) talk about the
Dr. Turkle discussed how parents and kids were so distracted and engaged with “Facebook” that they often ignored the people around them. Now I do agree that does happen but saying it is “Facebook” that many people are addicted to is not really the truth. What many are addicted to is the people on the other side of Facebook and the constant interactions that happen. I am also not the expert to say if connecting through social media is detrimental to society or just different than what we are used to. I have had many powerful interactions and made some great friendships with people because of social media. Without it, those friendships would not have existed. In fact, I have probably had more face-to-face interactions with people in the last two year (including my own brother) because of social media.
One of the things that Dr. Turkle asked in her lecture that really stuck out to me was the following question (that I believe we need to all ask ourselves): Does the technology serve our human purpose?
So the first thing that came to my own mind was, “What is our human purpose?”, and with a greater focus, what does that mean in the context of schools as learning organizations. As I thought about this question, my first and strongest thought that our main human purpose is to connect with one another. The second one that came to my mind is the need as humans to continuously grow (learn).
Dr. Turkle made the comment that if the technology does not serve this purpose, then we definitely need to rethink our use of it, which I wholeheartedly agree. What I believe is that face-t0-face interactions are so vitally important to our own development, and the more we can connect in that manner, the better. The reality though is that technology gives me the opportunity to connect and grow with many people all around the world. My learning has not been limited to the social circles that I have grown up with or known in my personal life; they are now only limited to whom I am able (and choose) to connect with around the world.
Seems pretty purposeful to me.
