Andrew Sullivan points me to an interesting article in the New Atlantis about the book divide.
in 2008 reported that the Web is now the primary source of reading
material for low-income high school students in Detroit. And yet, the
study notes, “only reading novels on a regular basis outside of school
is shown to have a positive relationship to academic achievement.”
Despite
the attention once paid to the so-called digital divide, the real gap
isn’t between households with computers and households without them; it
is the one developing between, on the one hand, households where
parents teach their children the old-fashioned skill of reading and
instill in them a love of books, and, on the other hand, households
where parents don’t. As Griswold and her colleagues suggested, it
remains an open question whether the new “reading class” will “have
both power and prestige associated with an increasingly rare form of
cultural capital,” or whether the pursuit of reading will become merely
“an increasingly arcane hobby.”
Yes, the digital divide is nearly over. And that's a good thing. Everyone should have access to technology. But the issue is not longer who has access and who doesn't. The sticking point is what people are using technology for. If you come to the Internet with certain skills, skills that are no doubt built up by years of novels and good non-fiction, you are able to access different things on the Internet Instead of using Facebook to post videos of you getting loaded at parties and sucking face with your boyfriend, you'll use it to post your resume on Monster, engage in deep debates about politics, and watch political debates on YouTube.
The Internet is a huge amusement park. Those that have the skills get the E tickets for the best rides; those who don't have the skills are stuck on the "It's a Small World" ride over and over again.
Apt. 11d 
We’ve been posting some Craigslist free and $1 and $2 stuff, and some really poor people have been turning up, alongside the middle class. It’s been helpful as a source of local intelligence. A guy was telling me his family gets their diapers from Caritas and local churches, so Caritas immediately went high on our list of local charities.
LikeLike
yup, even if it was the twilight books my son read over break, better that than Yu-ge-oh 24/7 online.
LikeLike
Damn, I considered writing something about ten years ago about the digital divide, and about how within 10-15 years it would be like the TV divide; that is, that those without internet access are that way by choice, and no worse off for it. Should have written it.
An aside. My middle kid is nearly 8, and is the nicest, most socially adept, kid I’ve met (we claim no credit for this, it must be some random gene). BUT, after just 10 minutes playing a computer game she transforms into a bundle of anxiety and unpleasantness. Basically, we forbid it, but I know she plays at other kids’ houses. Is this normal?
LikeLike
For me, anxiety and unpleasantness is normal, regardless of whether or not I’m near a computer. I blame stopping smoking.
LikeLike
Yes, yes yes^infinity.
I’m toying with the idea of developing an Info Literacy course using our new course management system. No one is paying me to do it, so I have to do it in my spare time, but it will have 3 sections: research, online privacy/ethics, and social networking.
My current lit class has a Ning, and I’ve been using it to point them to cool links and such. Last week I asked them to analyze Death of a Salesman in terms of 1940s ideals of manhood and heroism. They blinked at me. I pointed them to the computer at the front of the room and said “Google. Use it.” Then I found out most of them had No Idea who John Wayne was. NO IDEA!
I model intellectual curiosity for them all the time (or try to), and I keep the computer on so I can look things up for them.
Also, check this out. Our students aren’t going to figure out how to use the web effectively until we throw out the old lecture model of teaching. I have to confess I also thought of you, Laura, when I read the first paragraph of this yesterday.
OK, off to my class where my students had to do research before coming to class today to finish discussing DoaS.
LikeLike
That ‘coverage’ link is great Wendy, thanks. I’d never have seen it.
LikeLike
My middle kid is nearly 8, and is the nicest, most socially adept, kid I’ve met (we claim no credit for this, it must be some random gene). BUT, after just 10 minutes playing a computer game she transforms into a bundle of anxiety and unpleasantness. Basically, we forbid it, but I know she plays at other kids’ houses. Is this normal?
In my observation, yes, it is; I believe manufacturers of many, if not most, computer games on some level actually want to produce a sensation of anxious nervousness in their users. Some, I suppose, could argue that in a wired, hyperactive world, this is part of why computer games are potentially good resources for learning and growth: it trains the users to deal with multiple, high-pressure options in a circumscribed in environment. I, Luddite that I am, think it’s part our ever-continuing dumbing down, pushing us towards a world where an artificially induced ADHD is considered a normal part of the next generation.
LikeLike
Wow. We really need Tim Burke to champion the use of video games here. Quickly, from my perspective… There are different kinds of video games. Some are more discovery and not timed and don’t involve beating the crap out of each other. They honestly don’t make anybody nervous. I’ll play dumb video games on the computer to calm down before I start writing.
I quickly skimmed that coverage link, Wendy. Mixed feelings. I teach political theory every semester. I use very little to zero powerpoint and technology in the classroom. I hate group work and “think time.” I have students read hobbes, locke, marx in the original with no modern commentary. An extremely traditional class.
And that class is the first to book up every semester and I’m get tons of students begging to over draft the class. In one of my student evals from last semester, a student said she wished that she could take the class again. Another said it was the best class at the school.
What am I doing? I go back and forth between lecture and discussion. I help them decipher the text. We critique the work. I have them guess how one philosopher would respond to another. We guess how they would respond to current events. We talk about which one makes most sense today. They participate a lot and I have them play off of each other. I teach them how to debate each other. I have to say that all my years of blogging really comes in handy here.
Technology or group work or any other teaching method doesn’t make a subject more interesting. If a professor really loves what he/she is talking about, if the professor likes the students, if the professor is open about hearing any old crazy idea, that’s what gets the students turned on. Not the uncoverage method.
LikeLike
Wow. We really need Tim Burke to champion the use of video games here.
You’re right, Laura; I knew I was being unfair as I was writing the comment. It’s what I genuinely believe, on the basis of what I’ve really seen, but I also know that to a degree I see what I want to see, and that I’m basically ignorant of what the huge range of computer gaming technology involves.
Thanks for your defense of lecture and discussion. I clicked through the “coverage” link, and couldn’t find much that matched my experience. Again, obviously to a degree I see what I want to see, but nonetheless in my experience, students want (to say nothing of what they need) someone to stand in front of them, walk them through the hard material, explain it to them, and ask them pointed questions about what they just read and what they think it means, and then ask them further questions about their answers. I work hard to do this well, and to get the students involved in doing it to each other. And overall goal of the class is, of course, to do that through all the assigned material. That’s real “coverage,” and I think it works.
LikeLike
Laura, I hear you, really. But I have to ask: where are students going to learn the digital skills you want them to learn if you don’t require interaction with technology?
I guess what I’m saying is that I agree with you about the need for digital skills but I’m not sure that traditional methods of teaching content can teach those skills. I think the people who have learned them are a small subset of people who simply love learning and technology and have other factors encouraging them to learn. People constantly tell me how I know more about Web 2.0 stuff than anyone else they know, and I feel like a major ignoramus when I’m online.
Also, my field is English, with an emphasis at my university on professional communication. So communication skills via the web and info literacy (read: research papers) are kind of under my purview in a way they might not be under yours. Though they should be, but that’s an “Info Literacy Across the Curriculum” sermon I will refrain from giving right now. 😉
LikeLike
My students have to learn the basics of political debate and theory. If they get that in my class (sans technology), then they can easily jump into any political debate on 11D or elsewhere in the blogosphere. The Internet is easy. Nobody has to learn how to surf. Students need to know what Locke said about property and how they would respond to him. That has to be taught and struggled with and mastered. If you have a good foundation, then you’ll gravitate to better conversations on the Internet and be more likely to explore and find new stuff.
LikeLike
Learning to debate on the internet is a bit different than learning to debate in other formats. If you only debate in real life, you’ll be much too slow to compare somebody to Hilter when on the net.
LikeLike
“My students have to learn the basics of political debate and theory. If they get that in my class (sans technology), then they can easily jump into any political debate on 11D or elsewhere in the blogosphere. ”
Hm, I didn’t think of that as one of the digital skill set.
LikeLike
“then they can easily jump into any political debate on 11D ”
Do any of them, I mean, find their way here? (I know, you might not be able to answer, because of privacy and all that). But, I’m interesting in seeing how “children” grow up to be participants in adult conversation. When my daughter was a baby, I remember saying, casually, that she wouldn’t have anything to contribute until she was 30. I now realize that’s really not true. But, when to college students have something really interesting to say, in a discussion like the one we have here?
LikeLike
I’ve had a very hard time guessing people’s ages and genders successfully on the internet–I’m often surprised by who turns out to be female (like some sort of reverse Crying Game). And when we did weekly movies (mainly foreign language) on a college campus in DC, the kids were often very insightful in their understanding of films. I’ve heard people say (here or elsewhere) that the up and coming generation is very good at analyzing media (films, magazines, etc.) Plus, even a college freshman might have spent a high school year living with host families abroad, and will have hours of stories to tell.
Politics, I’m less sure about, since nearly all of us get our politics more or less from a can. (No, whoever is planning to object first, you’re not different. If you look around, your politics are probably very similar to your cultural peer group.)
LikeLike
Ok, I’ll take Amy P up on that. Not me: Russell Arben Fox.
LikeLike
Though I’d add that, while my politics are probably very much what my cultural peer group would have if I had one, they are not quite so close to the politics of the people whom others would put in my cultural peer group. But, I’d still like to see the can that Russell got his from.
LikeLike
But, when do college students have something really interesting to say, in a discussion like the one we have here?
I think you’d be surprised. In high school I started to break away (in opinion) from both my parents and my school cohort. It wasn’t until college that I was ever brave enough to speak up about it. I’m not big on blog discussions, but I’m more than happy to hash out issues, like this one, in person. To an extent I still shy away from adult conversation, in part because I’ve found (in my limited experience) that my parents and their peers are much less likely to change their minds or give much weight to what I’ve got to say than my peers are. Not true for all (or perhaps many) adults, but when it happens enough, you tend to stick to your peer group.
LikeLike
I’m not sure if I’m objecting to Amy or not. I’ve spend my adult life in very different cultural surroundings than those in which I was raised without changing much of what I picked-up from my ‘birth-early adulthood’ peer group. When I was younger, I thought I was very different from my peers because I was bookish. Now that I’m older, I realize that the fact that I got the dirty jokes in Hamlet didn’t make me that different from the rest of the class. On the other hand, I’m fairly certain the fact that I was raised in an environment where I knew 95% of the people I saw, as well as their parents, siblings, etc., makes me very different from those around me now.
I was already thinking of this topic because of the Crooked Timber post on how living in a city affects you.
LikeLike
Not me: Russell Arben Fox.
And yet, I want to be Harry Brighouse. Except for the atheism, that is.
While my politics are probably very much what my cultural peer group would have if I had one, they are not quite so close to the politics of the people whom others would put in my cultural peer group.
Like me, Harry, and presumably like nearly all people, you likely have multiple “cultural peer groups.” Do we focus on your married-with-children status? Your residency in Wisconsin? Your professional associations as an academic philosopher? Your birthplace and birthdate cohort from England? Your expat status? All of them could presumbly make up elements of the “can” from which you’ve drawn your political beliefs, or at least the perspectives/assumptions upon which you’ve developed/thought through/argued out your beliefs. The error, as you note, is that other people assume one or another peer group is the controlling one, and attribute the beliefs they think are defining of said group to all the members in it, ignoring the way social memberships are multiple. (Not that the science of polling hasn’t gotten good enough to account for this when dealing with the fairly limited choices any given election may bring.)
As to my own odd can, I’ll have to get back to you on that.
LikeLike
I think that a handful of students have found this blog, but I don’t talk about in class, so it’s only the super curious who google me. They don’t participate, because like lindsey, they aren’t quite comfortable arguing with adults. Even though some of us have questionable maturity levels (see the organ donation thread). heh.
I think our students are different, Wendy. Mine spend hours goofing around online and don’t need any help with the technology. They need to understand politics and increase their over all knowledge levels, so that they can go to the right places on the Internet and get smarter. They know how to find the NYT on line, but they need to gain a love of politics before they willingly check it out themselves.
We are all products of our can.
LikeLike
Speaking of cans, I wanted to mention the subtitle of the book version of “Stuff White People Like.” The subtitle is: “The Definitive Guide to the Unique Taste of Millions.” I really like that formulation, because it captures how the Bobo/”White Person” lifestyle flatters the practitioner into thinking that they are being creative and different by following the herd (albeit a smaller, more select herd).
LikeLike
“Mine spend hours goofing around online and don’t need any help with the technology.”
See, I think you’re wrong about that. They do need help. However, I do also think you’re right about their needing to gain a love of politics.
However, I do know plenty of people who love politics IRL who don’t have a freakin’ clue how to use the net.
I just had to teach Bartleby lecture-style to 12 tired college students at 7 am. I am GRUMPY. Or, as I said after class, “I would prefer not to” go to my next class. 😉
LikeLike
Getting back on topic, kitchentablemath.blogspot.com recently quoted a paragraph from a book called “Perfect 1600: The 7 Secrets to Acing the SAT.” Fischgrund is interested in what makes 1600 scorers different. Here’s the quote:
“[S]tudents who ace the SAT read an average of fourteen hours a week. Average score students, on the other hand, read only eight hours a week—an immense drop-off. The biggest difference, however, was found in the amount of time students spent reading for school. Average score students spent four hours a week reading literature, textbooks, and other assigned reading for school. Perfect score students put in nine hours a week for school-assigned reading, more than double the amount of time.”
LikeLike
I’m not sure I get this. So it’s not just a matter of reading anything (i.e., novels, comic books, blogs); it’s a matter of reading what’s assigned? So, textbooks actually help?
Hm.
LikeLike
“I’m not sure I get this. So it’s not just a matter of reading anything (i.e., novels, comic books, blogs); it’s a matter of reading what’s assigned? So, textbooks actually help?”
My guess would be that like all correlational factoids, this one doesn’t tells us little about what “actually helps.” I’d presume that perfect scorers are better students, taking more substantive classes, more driven students, who also read more.
They probably are far more likely than average to play the violin, and though I wouldn’t rule out the connection between musical education and SAT scores, the mere fact that perfect scorers play the violin doesn’t mean that stroking a bow on a fiddle would increase your SAT scores.
They are probably also richer, but I doubt if giving a high school student money would raise their SAT scores, either.
LikeLike
Speaking of cans, I wanted to mention the subtitle of the book version of “Stuff White People Like.” The subtitle is: “The Definitive Guide to the Unique Taste of Millions.” I really like that formulation, because it captures how the Bobo/”White Person” lifestyle flatters the practitioner into thinking that they are being creative and different by following the herd (albeit a smaller, more select herd).
The phenomenon is analogous to the way that an ideology of personal responsibility flatters those who succeed by our society’s lights that they can claim credit for their success rather than owing it to the luck they’ve enjoyed and the fortunate environmental circumstances they enjoy, a phenomenon which underlies some of the crueller aspects of right wing politics.
There’s a difference, though, between taste and political opinions, which is that whereas there is (as far as I can tell) a very large number of possible combinations of tastes, there’s a rather more limited set of combinations of political views. What’s odd is that even among that much smaller set of combinations, many are relatively uninhabited. Those of us who have combinations that are (we think) coherent but, apparently, not widely shared are sometimes a bit bemused that our bit of conceptual space is so lonely (right, Russell?). And, in my case, a bit irritated that other people assume that my bit of space isn’t there. But, as Russell says, we just get them from lots of cans (and he’s named some of mine).
LikeLike
Likewise, I think discovery learning enjoys much of the popularity it does thanks to the fact that it’s gratifying to think that we “discovered” a lot more knowledge for ourselves than we actually did. Discovery learning is the educational equivalent of pulling yourself up by your bootstraps.
LikeLike
I like the E-ticket vs. small world analogy here. I’m teaching a very traditional writing class this semester (read, write, workshop, repeat) and have added a digital storytelling component so that students can get a sense of how the materials they consume are created. They are smart, well-educated, privileged kids, but they still don’t seem to want to think much about how the sausage is made (to mix the metaphor wildly).
(BTW I tagged you with a kind of annoying award today.)
LikeLike
Yay. That’s so nice, Libby. Thanks for telling me. My usual ways for finding out what people are saying about me (technorati, google blog) haven’t been working that well lately.
LikeLike
Another article on getting rid of the lecture here.
LikeLike