Once in a while, we read an article about how a particular technology is acquired, deployed or applied in a particular school, school district, or another organization or region.  Most of these articles are written with pride, leaving the impression that some great work is accomplished.   Undoubtedly the advancement of technology is changing lives like never before.  But are we supposed to be happy about that?  The honest answer is that it all depends.    Few would argue that technology can be used to accomplish great virtues as well as grave vices, but people still load the word technology with values.  To paraphrase what Richard Clark had said about various medium in teaching, technology is probably a mere vehicle which does not influence people’s performance “any more than the truck that delivers our groceries causes changes in nutrition.”  For one thing, kids may not like the cauliflower that this truck brings.  And we’ve got to work on that.  Getting a whiz-bang truck may not do the trick.  Not all human problems can be addressed with technological solutions.   A Syracuse University professor Dr. Don Ely once famously asked: if technology is the answer, what is the question?

A recent issue of the Atlantic Monthly (November 2007) provides some interesting insight about the age when people dig out their cell phones to check emails at the traffic light.  In the article entitled “the autumn of the multitaskers”, Walter Kirn says that the ubiquitous digitization is now taking a toll.  I would probably call infinite connectivity an occasional nuisance, but Kirn simply calls it a “nightmare”.   Today’s students all multitask, or multislack, if you will. They are often found to be simultaneously talking on the phone, updating their Facebook profile, sending instant messages to friends, and trying to do some assignment.  This kind of multitasking, Kirn says, is “dumbing us down and driving us crazy.”  Most teachers have probably seen indications of this in the assignments they turn in, assignments that may reek of choppy instant messages.   And don’t get me started on what PowerPoint does to the rigor of thinking if inappropriately used.   

As the younger generation stays on the very cutting edge of emerging technologies, some educators and administrators are nervous about the digital divide between them and their students.  Rightly so in most cases, because you do not want to be clueless while talking to them.  However, as they try to catch up or keep up, it is equally important to be cautious about the shortened attention span students are now developing.   It is essential to get them immersed in some “alternative” activities that used to be all they do many social networks ago.  Reading a book, for instance.   Do not always do facebook.   You may lose some face among peers, but the book you read may help you go a long way.

In the workplace, similar things are happening.  There is a great irony in technology-enabled multitasking in the office space:  though people want to achieve more by doing several things at the same time, often using some digital tools afforded to them by their computers or smart phones, they actually accomplish less, which probably does not surprise you.    Research analyst Jonathan Spira conducted a survey of office workers across the country, and found that people report that an average 28% of their time is wasted to multitasking-related transitions and interruptions.  That translates to six hundred and fifty billion dollars in “National Attention Deficit”. 

It is a curse and a blessing that much work today can be done using personal computers.  And lot of our life is now digitally converged on the screen we are looking at.  The sad thing is: in spite of our good will to achieve more by doing many, we actually end up in what I would call a “digital fatigue”.  Juggling numerous things at the same time may lead to a “brainslide” (Walter Kirn) that buries half our day.  Certain technologies just make it so much easier to cross boundaries, from one task to another, from work sphere into our personal sphere, and vice versa, that we sometimes are going nowhere while moving everywhere.   Why don’t we just focus on doing one thing at a time for a change?  In the a recent novel “who moved my Blackberry” by Financial Times columnist Lucy Kellaway, a man called Martin Lukes, who probably would drop dead without a Blackberry,  constantly hits the wrong button which caused his love letter to go to his boss,  or worse, the entire company.   

Would the magic person who has not had a similar (maybe less disastrous) experience please stand up?

The man was beside himself with joy.   He started a business to teach people English in this method.

The rest is history.

Will Rogers says that the best doctor in the world is the veterinarian, because he can't ask his patients what is the matter.  

So often I see people jump to prescriptions to instructional or performance problems just like a vet except that they can ask but just don’t ask.   They just think they have the answers, often constantly the only answers they are capable of.   They are good at producing DVDs for instruction, so they think that’s all that their learners need.

“Let’s go ahead producing some DVDs.  If they don’t have DVD players, somebody got to buy it for them.” 

Have you done any research beforehand what learners prefer?  Have you done any research on the budgetary limits?  Have you done any research on what kind of message is going to be presented?  Well.  Nobody has the crystal ball.  Just ask.

The Chinese phrase for learning is “xue wen”, with “xue” mean “stuyding” and “wen” means “asking”.