iBrain Chapter 5 : High Tech Culture

From what I pulled out, this chapter is Dr. Small and Gigi Vorgan describing in detail how technology is either destroying families and the next generation or setting the world for a global economic meltdown. That was, at least to me, the meat of this chapter. Dr. Small does list some interesting tables on the most popular websites and search queries from 2007. I really had a chuckle seeing Facebook FAR behind MySpace, however given the year this is totally correct. Facebook wasn't allowing users without a college email address to create profiles. I did a little bit of research, and I stress little (like 2 minutes) finding the list for 2010 and another minute or so to find a side-by-side for 2009 and 2010. So behold....the top ten websites of 2009 versus 2010!

What I first take away from this list and the list given by Dr. Small is the rise and fall of a social media site. Forward this list three to four years in the future and there may be another social media site (think Google+ ?) rising from the ashes of Facebook...hmm.

I do like how Dr. Small has set up the foundations of the electronic marketplace and how it is changing the way we do business. More often than not, I buy things online simply for the ease of not having to  be faced with the "oh we're sold out" when I get to the store. One example that really hit home is the roll of film versus digital prints. Erin just went through almost a year of photos on our computer to create a folder to send to Wal-Mart to print for an album. We do this from time to time so we can still have them when the inevitable hard drive failure occurs and we potentially lose the files. If we had had Maddy even 10 years ago we would have spent much more time and money developing an entire roll of film that may have been blurry, or had a finger over the lens. Now we can simply delete the bad ones or leave them in the digital realm.

I don't really agree with the fractured family story on pages 93 and 94. It sounds to me that the family never had a set dinner routine, but now we can blame technology for it. Throughout this book so far Dr. Small has given us examples of things that weren't working to begin with, and now we can throw technology to the wolves because that has to be what's making this not work! The family on pages 93 and 94 needed to have dinner time and routine set long before this story happened. Time limits for technology and/or a set time when the technology can be accessed. I've seen many, well not many because I'm only at the beginning of year five of teaching, but enough students who have parents that have a handle on technology and have rules in place for family time. On the other hand I've seen some kids that rule the roost and have nothing to do with family time because to be very frank, family time doesn't exist for them.

Luddites on Parade

I'm not sure how we are supposed to do this, but I just finished iBrain Chapter 1 and want to get it out there. Sorry if I'm stepping on anyone's toes. Frankly, as a concerned "Digital Immigrant and " I found the chapter to be very interesting and confirmed some of the observations that I have had in class regarding the "digital natives". Its good to know that there is researched positive affects of the digital era. When people debate evolution vs creationism, what gets lost in the conversation is the idea that evolution continues...there is no stopping point. So naturally the idea that our environmental inputs - digital age - would have an impact on our neural wiring. I am very concerned about our social skills. My wife signed me up a few months ago for Facebook. Its great and nice, but I still miss in person contact. My parents moved here in 1986 and I remember people always stopping by or vice versa. That doesn't happen anymore. Even though I live in the town I grew up in, I rarely have people stop by for a beer and conversation and my wife and I don't reciprocate. My students don't wait. They barge into conversations with other people to inject their own unrelated requests or statements. These are interpersonal skills that are being lost. I believe that some of this behavior comes from the "chatting" with multiple people, each in their own window....you don't have to be polite in that environment. I also see the continuous partial attention. It becomes additive for the kids. They have to know whats going on and have 30 things going on. Parents then ask about ADHD......Over the holiday, I'm planning on going camping, somewhere with my family. I appreciate this time with, almost, mandatory disconnection from the digital world.
~Jesse