The ideas that I thought were the neatest were advanced performance tracking, nanotechnology and cybernetics.
I understand that there is no crystal ball which will help us see what form emerging technologies will take. That being said, in the realm of education and training, advanced performance tracking combined with nanotechnology and artificial intelligence holds enormous promise. I can imagine this technology going far beyond the tennis example the author gives. In the medical field, physicians in training wearing special gloves could perhaps be taught advanced surgical techniques with greater efficiency. Chiropractors in training could be evaluated for their technique. The techniques of savant practitioners could be fed into computers and these techniques could be disseminated with much greater speed. Physical therapy could be enhanced with the use of clothing that could train injury patients how to walk again.
I can only imagine the implications for regular education as artificial intelligence technology matures. Truly individualized instruction could be created in ways not even conceived of yet. I was amazed at the authors’ speculation about automatically matching learning styles and preferences to learners.
Who doesn’t think the idea of cybernetics is cool? The authors talk about “carrying our knowledge with us” and “control computers directly from our nervous system.” Combining these two concepts leads me to wonder how long it will be before we can create and interface into our brain where we can simply plug information in. Perhaps we can all be doctors, or lawyers, or multilingual dependant upon what knowledge bank we have installed. Admittedly, this would be several steps beyond simply controlling computers with our minds but it is what the logical next step would be. I wouldn’t be surprised if these ideas have been around for years but now we find ourselves in an age where it can be realistically imagined, even planned for. Wow.
My favorite activity in this course was the group collaboration PBWiki project. I must say I’m surprised to be saying this because my previous experiences with collaborative projects have not been great. The thing I liked about the activity was that it was an authentic activity and it brought home the functionality of WIKIs . I had learned academically of WIKIs and even created one but I had never actually used one to collaborate. I found it more enjoyable than I anticipated and I felt the three of us, who will probably never meet face-to-face, produced a good product.
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6 comments:
Obviously as a programmer artificial intelligence interests me because it goes hand in hand with robotics.
I agree with you about the possibilities for cybernetics in education. Wouldn't it be convenient to just plug yourself in Matrix style and boom you have all the information you could want. I remember reading a neat article in Wired magazine a while back about cybernetics called Cyborg 1.0. http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/8.02/warwick.html
I just like wikis. I am not sure why but I do.
“control computers directly from our nervous system.”
Haha.. I don't know if this would be a great idea for me my mind wonders so much I would probably crash the computer. :)
Katherine
I thought cybernetics was cool. If it ever got to that point I being a special educator I wonder how this could help students with disabilities. Its neat to speculate on what might be someday especially considering how far technology has already come and how its always changing. I also enjoyed Wiki assingment. It was a neat and easy way to work in a group.
Tony Vitto
Joe,
Your comment on thr group participation of the WIKI project made me think. I find it very hard to work in groups because I feel someone is always left doing more but the Wiki project went against this normal feeling. I think all the groups worked well together and produced very good content. I was concerned that we were thrown into the project and then having a group partner drop the class made it a little bit more nerving but in the end it worked out very well and I would like to use it in the future.
Jennifer
I like what you had to say about the APT, and the practicality of it in the work force. I think it is something that is used in our advanced programs (sport, space, medicine), but we will see it much more as more gets developed.
I too enjoyed the PB Wiki project, and as a group, it worked out well.
Joe,
I was glad to be turned on to the Wiki's too. I have never used it before now. But I found it to be most helpful.
In the past, I have always hated to do group work. I hated it because it is always so hard to try to get everyone's schedule together and then if you can accomplish that, it usually ends up being a waste of time. It ends up being a waste of time mostly because, there isn't that much time to meet. So inevitably someone ends up taking most of the stuff home and doing it while everyone gets to put their name on it.
I think that Wiki's solve this problem and allow everyone equal time to do their part and because they don't have to be in the same place to add to and edit the wiki, it can be done anywhere.
People can take 5-minutes here and there to work on things throughout the day as opposed to having to go home and sit for hours etc. They can also share information to put presentations etc. together more efficiently and things of that nature.
I agree with the idea of being amazed at where technology is and where it may take us; but I often worry that we are so used to it that we know nothing about doing things manually anymore. With the recent storms and blackouts, I couldn't image what one would do if everything in the class relied on technology.
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