During the recent 'non-term time' (I prefer this to 'holidays' because during the year, most teachers work during their breaks) - I read the first 80 pages of John Brockham's How is the Internet Changing the Way You Think? The book contains 150 responses to this question, from a range of viewpoints - artists, writers, neurologists, technologists - bright people with a range of views. The first two chapters get the ball rolling nicely in terms of the debates about literacy and digital literacies. In 'The Bookless Library', Nicholas Carr, author of The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains, laments the decision by Cushing Academy (an elite Massachusetts prep school) to empty its library of books. The headmaster of the college is of the opinion that reading Chaucer on a kindle is the same as reading it in a paperback - the medium doesn't matter. Carr disagrees: 'as a technology, a book focuses our attention, isolates us from the myriad distractions that fill our lives. A networked computer does precisely the opposite. It is designed to scatter our attention.' Carr isn't against reading online as such, but he feels that there is something to be lost as well as gained in 'going digital': 'it's hard not to conclude that as we adapt to the intellectual environment of the net our thinking becomes shallower' (pp.1-3).
As a book designed to provoke our thinking should, the second chapter takes the opposite view. Clay Shirky, author of Cognitive Surplus, argues positively for the changes in reading habits that have come about as a result of the Net. The central comparison Shirky sets up in 'The Invisible College' is the historical one of a group of sixteen century natural philosophers who - unlike the secretive alchemists - had a culture of sharing, and hence made rapid progress in putting chemistry on sound scientific footing. Beyond the 'narcisism and social obsessions' that characterise much internet usage, Shirky argues for a similar revolution in thinking that comes from new forms of reading, writing, publishing and collaboration: 'We could, however ... use it as an Invisible College, the communicative backbone of real intellectual and civic change' (pp.5-7).
So, how do schools respond to this challenge, and what is my view, as English teacher, writer, and educational leader in a school?
The Sydney Morning Herald today had an article subtitled 'the digital age is transforming the way students learn' ('Humble book loses its shelf life' - James Robertson). The article describes two schools who are going ahead with forms of digital literacies and new pedagogies - but concludes with the 'problem' of high school assessment, which remains largely based on traditional examinations as the 'end product' of the school system. Hence, 'for now, teachers will have to walk the line between the traditional and the digital themselves'. This is the reality schools face - and as a believer in the power of books to transform our thinking, I tend to think we need to advocate for both 'long form reading' (novels, creative non-fiction) whilst opening our minds to the incredible potential of the Net to inform us as creative citizens of the present and future. I am learning to read certain things on my Kindle or Ipad (educational leadership articles, for example, don't lose much shine). However, I like the touch and feel of a novel in my hands, and the memories it provides for me on my bookshelf. Perhaps one day we will have 'digital wine' but I will be one who still enjoys the dust of a wine cellar (or, at least, a wine rack under the house) and I will lament the death of the publishing industry if it comes to that. What's your view? After several weeks back 'online', I can say that a blog can be as lonely as a diary - and possibly even less permanent. After all, my first blog came and went and I managed to remove the digital trace. But I am not sure I would have burned a diary with my thoughts on publishing my first novel.
I hope that the humble book maintains a shelf life. I also hope that teachers engage with digital forms with their students now, before the digital divide means we lose their attention altogether and opportunities for assisting students to see the tremendous positive power of the Net is lost.
