Rørfoss- a look into the Information society, cultural dimensions.

This picture I took using an infrared filter, and I'm satisfied with the result. Actually, this is maybe the one picture I like the most. I haven't been out taking pictures lately, but maybe I'll try to take more pics when I get some spare time. (Which is not likely to happen very soon....) 

The culture of the information society today is kind of overwhelming I think. When I think back to the mid 90's, I remember my first computer. Inside it there were a whole new world, and this world just expanded as I started to explore it. The first time I connected my computer to the Internet, I remember the screen started to change, from the top, slowly to the bottom, as the site was loaded. The colours were great! Today, the Hotbot-site is rather boring, but back then it was the gateway to the world.

Now we live our lives on the computers, well, maybe not all our lives, but a bigger part of it at least. We communicate by using e-mail, messenger (Yahoo or MSN), ICQ, chat-sites, and so on. We share our lives on Facebook, blogs, Myspace or Youtube. We read our papers, watch TV and movies, go banking, and much more, online. We share our pictures on Pbase or similar sites, we promote our music like this on Facebook, or like this on Youtube.

In my work as a teacher, I use my computer in the classroom almost all the time. Earlier, when a student asked me a question I needed some time to figure out a good answer to, I had to write down the question, or remember it until I could find time to look it up. Now I use Google, Caplex, Wikipedia and more to find the answer right away. I'm able to take (almost) every question straight on, and make a rewarding discussion in the classroom. The answers are not always conclusive, and this gives me a good oportunity to train both my own, as well as my students, critical sense.

But, I need to ask this question: I all this a good thing, or is it bad? Some of you will maybe say it's good, and some of you will say it's bad. Maybe I'll just say it's ok? At the end of the day I think it can be a little of each. First of all, I need to have given my students some guidance lines in order to know how to find information, and how to develop a critical sense. We have talked about ethics and law, and how this may tell us what we can use or do on the Internet. You can read more of this here. It may be easy to be "thrown off course" if I allow us to discuss all kinds of questions that may arise in the classrom. Good or bad? This depends, I think, on the content of the matter, and on how the students involve themselves in the discussion. It also depends on my ability to draw lines from the actual topic in the classroom to the matter discussed at the moment. If I'm not able to do this, and the students get the experience that we're just having fun, then I clearly need to get us back on track asap!

I think, just to try to sum all this up in a brief conclusion, that we need to realize that for many young people today, books are not an option in order to learn or relax. I try to take pictures, like the one on the top of this page, to promote the place where I live. Or I use some of my pictures in my classroom, trying to make an entrance to a certain subject. To create and obtain a good learning environment today, I think it's vital for us teachers to develop good skills on how to meet the students at their own arena. The digital arena.