Subject: Creativity

Posted by Sharon Villines on 10/12/2010
In Reply To:Creativity Posted by Alex Leus on 10/12/2010

Message:

Another point that I touched on but wanted to say more about. In addition to the report cards that have become such miracles of technological precision that they are both inhuman and incomprehensible, our dependence on technology has also become out of proportion to the ability of technology to have any educational value. It is a given that students need access to information appropriate to their level of understanding and technology itself is a field of learning that is essential, but like the bloated textbook that Phil mentioned, it also obscures the subject under study.

We have come to believe that somehow the technology provides understanding and is essential to it. In the arts it is especially pronounced. As a Dean, I had a conversation I still am dumbfounded by — that a professor could not teach theater without a fully equipped stage.All the trappings of a professional stage. Not acting, not writing, nothing. Given that students ultimately need to be experienced in those trappings _if_ they are going to be professional actors and playwrights, but were they necessary to Shakespeare or the Greeks? And how many of out students have have surpassed those standards and are ready for more?

We use technology, like those report cards that look so "scientific," to substitute for learning. To gloss over lack of understanding of what the technology is supposed to accomplish. What are the human values and aims?

Creativity can be hampered by technology that takes the control and imagination out of a student's hands.

Sharon