Rant of an older millennial - Technology as an asset

"What if the world was your curriculum?" I think this is a great way to frame what we should be thinking when we are planning each and every lesson. Our future students need skills that will help them succeed in a smaller, more global world. They need to learn how to be critical thinkers, understand different perspectives and points of view, and to understand how to best use their resources. We have information at our fingertips just sitting in our pockets. They should be view as an asset and not a liability. But it takes trust. And we can build that with our students. What kids need to learn is how to search, analyze information, be able disseminate it to others, and form their own thoughts and opinions. I love, love, love the idea of teaching WWII through the lens of music, military, those on the home front, etc and putting the pieces together so students get a more intimate look at a specific aspect and then be able to come together to share what they learned with the rest of the class. This model also incorporates working together as a team and the inherent social interaction that comes as a result. Also, to have kids e-mail an author, talk to astronauts, and have our students chat with and collaborate with kids from another part of the world is still the same type of activity that we would do when I was in school but it wasn't in real time. We would just write letters and then the lesson might lose momentum until we received a response weeks later. Many of the big ideas are the same, but the way we implement the learning might (and should be) different. 

As an older millennial (right on the cusp of being gen x) with children of my own, I completely understand and see the fears of older generations that think younger people have forgotten how to interact with one another. There is definitely something to be said for the feeling of getting a letter in the mail or getting a phone call from someone you love but I think what people who didn't grow up with so much tech forget to think about is that the culture of younger people is simply different. It doesn't make it better or worse, just different. Just as much as older generations have learned to use smart phones, I do think younger people have a lot to learn about social graces, human interaction, privacy and the value of disconnecting. As future teachers, we do have a lot of influence and will work with both students and parents and can look at helping to bridge the gap.