After the last video, Lexie left a great comment:

“Okay you showed us how you were learning and tools that helped you. Now show us what you learned and how those tools made the material more valuable than using other more traditional tools. Show us how you are learning now at age 55 compared to 15 or even 30 years ago.”

Here’s part of an answer:

But I think part of the problem is that these questions are based on a flawed proposition.

First, it would take too long to catalog everything I’ve learned. We’ll have to make do with some of the distillations. The point is that because I’ve learned a lot in 55 years, I have a very rich structure into which I can integrate new knowledge.

Second, the tools don’t make the material more valuable. The tools make the material available. Without them, I wouldn’t be able to learn as much or as fast.

Third, I’m not learning any differently now that I did as a boy. What’s different is the structure – the network – the connections – that I can use. Growing up in rural Maine, my resources were limited to whomever I could find in the neighborhood, or convince my parents to take me to see. The school libraries were pretty good, but the town library was a couple of rooms of moldy fiction. So the process is largely unchanged, but the resources I can bring to bear have vastly increased. The structures I have in place — mental, physical, and virtual — have expanded geometrically.

One point additional point came up in another discussion and that’s the question of “easy” versus “likely.” Many people believe that the use of this expanded tool set makes learning easier and they get frustrated when the tools themselves add a layer of difficulty. The real value is that the probability that any given learner will find a connection with existing knowledge increases by exposing them to a wider range – and a richer pool – of resources.

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 9th, 2008 at 12:31 PM and is filed under Education, Technology. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.