Sunday, January 17, 2010

Technology, Information, and Education

2. Mark Twain said, "Never let formal education get in the way of your learning." What did he mean by that? Is technology blurring the boundary between formal and informal learning?

People are curious about things that the formal education could not cover. Knowledge from school isn't what the whole world is filled with. There are lot more information that can be earned out of the school, and sometimes it is more beneficial to get outside of the formal education. Formal education is limited, it cannot provide every single aspect that individual seeks to earn, and here is where mark Twain's quote comes in. "Never let formal education get in the way of your learning." It can only mean one thing. Don't stop seeking for an answer when someone is trying to get just because school doesn't give an answer. Keep striving to find an answer even from outside of the school. Use what you can from outside to find and complete your thirst of knowledge.

Technology is getter better over the course of time flows. Our method of learning changed from social talking into getting it from the text, and now we are learning if from communicating with people who we have no idea who they are. We are in the world of online where the whole world is considered as one town. It is a town formed under the development of internet. Also this was the turning point of our method of learning. Instead of getting information from books, people ask questions to other people online. This led students to have their classes online as well. Students find the information online, do homework online, and even communicate people online.

Back to the question of formal education, actually because the technology is developed and our method of learning changed, boundary of formal education is no more clear enough to conflict our thoughts. Formal learning is what we get from school; however, by providing online classes and online blog posting as homework, we now have no clear boundary between formal and informal education. We all use the information off online, and it is all became our base of knowledge. Development in technology changed our way of receiving information, and it blurred the boundary of formal and informal education.



This is one article I found about how information has been presented to people, and how it will be.

3 comments:

  1. The link you found presents a great view of the last 210 years in the evolution of information. Recommended reading for all. I bookmarked it in our Delicious library. Thanx for sharing.

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  2. Hey Hyunhwa

    I really enjoyed reading your post, it reminded me a lot of my own thoughts on the subject. I do have one question for you though, do you think that it is a good thing that technology is blurring the boundaries? Because I understand from what you say that you should never let your formal education hold you back, but what if your informal education holds you back?

    okay, sorry, that was 2 not 1 questions, thanks for the great post though :)

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  3. Hyunhwa,

    In your post, you wrote that "Formal education is limited, it cannot provide every single aspect that individual seeks to earn". I certainly agree that in many American classrooms, this is currently true. Do you think that it is has to be this way? Is it formal education that is the problem or is it how formal education is viewed and implemented in our schools? Have you ever had experiences in formal classrooms that fostered exploratory learning and that capitalized on your interests and curiosity?

    Thanks for your thoughts.

    SKS

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