Kids and the future…can we even imagine?
Sitting with my mother this past weekend on the real front porch of my childhood home, built by my great grandfather, I was once again mesmerized by the stories of her 99 years. Though I have heard so many over and over again I am like a young child as I listen, rarely tiring of hearing the adventures and often catching a new detail. One story recounted when as a young child she and her siblings would either traverse the miles to school with the horse and buggy or by foot…no snowpants in those cold Minnesota winters and frozen bag lunches by the time they arrived. When she was a bit older, her family’s Model T was so light that if it happened to tip over into a ditch several people could simply set it upright again. She drove it over the Rocky Mountains, to California, New Mexico, Texas and other places with no air conditioning, no GPS, no 70 MPH freeways. During those years could she even imagine the huge fire engine red ’54 Packard I learned to drive on, with all of its 1950′s amenities, spaciousness, and increased capacity for speed? Or dreamed of the original VW Beetle she acquired in the 60′s with the trunk in the front? With each couple of decades and each new car came the “wow!” factor. How could she possibly have imagined the improved engineering, style, computerization, and all the developments that have brought us to the world of cars in 2007? I think of cars as an example…it could be Victrolas (mine is in my office) to record players to tape players to CD players to IPods to ????? What will it be? Times hundreds of categories. In the next 40 years what will I be reminiscing about that will seem so “old?”
For children growing up with IPods, IPhones, SUV’s, Tablet PC’s, witnessing regular excursions into space, access to countries and people one could only dream about when my mother was young, what will the world be like 10, 15, 20, 50, 100 years from now? What will our children have seen and experienced when they turn 99? How do we wrap our imagination around that, for much of what has occurred is the use of amazing imaginations to move to the next level and the next and the next, to see new possibilities that are not yet known. Where will the imaginations and conceptual skills of our children take us and them? What will they add to what is already known that will create the latest cutting edge product or contribute to the strenthening of global relationships?
In education we try to think about these questions so as to prepare our students well for their world ahead. It feels like a daunting task, but it is also one that invites us to access and use our sense of wonder and dreaming and to explore our own untapped thinking capacities.
And…how will imaginations be harnessed to preserve our world for 10, 15, 20, 50 and 100 years from now? What will be the future views from front porches?
October 14th, 2007 at 6:36 pm
Very interesting questions to ponder, DP. Nice post as well.
Although I know that you tend to think about education in terms of your audience (3s-1st), I wonder what you think about the following question: What implications are there for teachers’ understanding/knowledge/use of technology given the fact that new tech tools (like blogs, wikis, and podcasts) are creeping into education? I think that there are lots of learning opportunities for students who use these tools for educational purposes, but so much is dependent on the teacher familiarity and comfort level.
October 14th, 2007 at 7:53 pm
Thanks for our comments and question. Clearly, part of what I am thinking about is that all that is available to students today is quite different than what could have been imagined when I was a child, much less those who grew up in the early 1900′s. How could I have even dreamed as a 6th grader of the creation of something called a tablet PC? But here we are. I absolutely agree that teachers, in particular, will have to become more familiar and comfortable with much of the technology that will be part of children’s educational experience in our schools. Some may choose to leave the field of education if the technology piece is too daunting or if there is not the desire to immerse themselves in the learning and use of it. That is ok. However, education will not go back from these new tech tools and I hope that there will be many creative ways to introduce them to teachers and to walk through how to acquire the skills to use them. Life is like that in many dimensions…some seem more intimidating than others…some match modalities of learning and others are much more challenging, even feel impossible. Some teachers will take to the new tech tools like a fish to water and wonder why this didn’t happen 50 years ago; others will need more time and guidance. How will we build in the time to do this well and during a prime time of day? Of course, once learned and familiar, some who thought they couldn’t do it, including this writer, may wonder what took so long!