I remember sitting in a lecture when I was completing my teaching degree back in 2000. The lecturer said something that struck a chord. He said “education is a conversation” and asked us to let that idea sink in. I wish that I could remember more but I’m ashamed to admit that I don’t even recall the lecturer’s name. Nonetheless, his message continues to deeply resonate with me, impacting my work nearly 20 years later.
His point was that education is not a one way street. It’s not a monologue but a dialogue; a back-and-forth between the generations that has been playing out across the ages. Our place, he said, was to join that conversation at the most formal level for our time; as teachers. The irony that the medium for this message was a one-way lecture was not lost on me. Yet that medium did nothing to diminish the potency of his message.
Over the years, I’ve wondered about the extent to which the medium can influence the message and thus impact education. Through the lens of viewing education as a conversation, I watched as the pace of technological advancements and disruptions continued to gain speed. Today, we bear witness to Moore’s Law and Kurzweil’s prediction of the singularity as tradition pushes back against evolution.
Some inventions came and went almost unnoticed, like the fax, whilst others, such as the humble book or pencil, have had such an influence on us that calling them ‘technology’ feels almost bizarre. Yet that’s exactly what they are and, more importantly, they changed education. If education is a conversation, then print technology changed the way we communicate long ago.
For instructional designers, our playground is the cusp of the next technological revolution that is changing education. We are helping usher in the next dominant medium: digital technology. We get to take the traditional and build on it, climbing up to stand on the shoulders of the giants that came before us. We’re constantly pushing the limits of existing media; experimenting with emerging technology such as virtual reality; defining what online and blended learning can be; evolving the static word into interactive digital experiences, and; all the while we place the student at the centre whilst we choose the best medium for the message.
Education is a conversation, and technology is continuing to change the ways in which we can communicate. Therefore, technology is changing education. To help me explore that idea and communicate it to whomever is out there, I created this animated video:
