The problem of alternative media is a false promise that dense subjects and information about our world can be swiftly downloaded into our brains. Travel and life-long reading provide antidotes.
It's good in theory to say people should read hefty books instead of listen to podcasts but having enough interest to listen to a 60 minute podcast on a topic doesn't mean you want to devote 50 hours to studying that topic.
And I am dubious that a lot of people want to use the two weeks of vacation they get a year to travel to a foreign land so they can vet their opinions. A lot of people just want to relax on a beach.
Realistically, we all only have so much free time and a lot of stuff is competing for that time.
If people enjoy traveling in order to learn and reading hefty books, they're probably already doing this ... or at least doing it as much as their time and finances allow. If they don't enjoy these things there probably isn't much society can do to interest them into doing these things.
Fair points Joe. As much as I hope more of us will become more curious and able to explore the world through travel and books, I think there's a lot of factors that prevent many from doing so. The onus isn't entirely on the individual.
This gets into the weeds a bit, but what in your view initiates the "spark" in someone to become interested in things like travel, being outdoors, and reading books? Does this mostly occur in early child development perhaps, through peers, the larger culture and society? Are some of us perhaps "born more adventurous" than some?
As an anthropologist, I see the long history of how humans evolved and feel strongly we are all primed to explore our environments, so I can't help but think we all have some innate interest in doing these kinds of things and what prevents many of us from participating are structural things in the kind of society we've created for ourselves. You said "people don't want to use the two weeks of vacation..." true, but in a different society and culture, maybe one in the future, working 9-5 for 40+ years won't be such a dominant feature of life that inhibits a person' autonomy. I think we've got a long way to go to tweak things so I'm under no illusion that we just need to tell people to do these things. We have to find better ways to instill the value for these things. It's the long-game I'm interested in.
This is a huge topic and an excellent post, with many points to potentially comment on. So I'll add another one -- language learning! We have of course the apps like DuoLingo that promise "learners" that they are getting "one step closer to fluency" when the step may be just mastering 10 words. But there are even more insidious tools that I observed students using in my last few years teaching, and this was in higher education! For example, apps where you can just take a photo of a text and it comes back automatically "translated." Then, they would write about it using, of course, Google translate. I could go on and on...
I would tend to disagree about the necessity of travel for learning. I think it is a means of learning, but many a learned person has become so without it.
Thank you Betty! A huge topic for sure. This was challenging to keep it errr short lol. Hadn’t even considered language learning but that’s another great example. And fair point about travel. People can certainly become learned without it but I think for some minds, it acts like a switch turning something valuable on for them that might not otherwise have happened but that’s challenging to unpack or know how often that occurs or doesn’t occur in someone.
I think travel is a mixed bag and depends on what people take into it or get out of it. Americans who take Europe for some sort of Disneyland would be better off staying home reading about it in books, in my opinion. For others, of course, it is a life-changing experience.
As for language learning, I was a 37-year language teacher and changed careers partly because of my inability to connect with my students anymore, all of which took place over a stunningly quick period of just a year or two. I had specialized in speaking skills and a communicative approach, although not ignoring grammar and vocabulary, and suddenly found myself in front of 18-year-olds who no longer had the attention span to participate in the conversation activities that had been the cornerstone of my teaching.
What does one do? Either “adapt” by gamifying everything, teaching via Quizlet, and chopping a 2-hour class into 24 5-minute activities, or quit. I quit.
Agreed. There are some prerequisites that certainly go into get the most out of our travels.
That is unfortunate and disconcerting to hear but I don’t blame you. That tracks with what I’ve heard over the last few years and observed from a distance. My mother was a teacher’s aide for a local middle school and was very involved with the local school system so I’ve heard about some of this from her perspective.
What do you attribute such sweeping changes in student learning to? The common culprit I hear a lot is cell phones and social media but is this something that’s been occurring for a while or happened much more rapidly in your opinion? What about changes at the state or federal level on the education system or perhaps lack of parental or community support for teachers?
Also, thank you for all your years of being a teacher! I was fortunate to have quality teachers growing up and didn’t appreciate it then but am eternally grateful for them now in hindsight.
Oh very heavy topics indeed. I'll just tackle one: I think it is important that there is one world view on how events transpired and their outcomes, ie- the Holocaust, and a political election outcome.
It's good in theory to say people should read hefty books instead of listen to podcasts but having enough interest to listen to a 60 minute podcast on a topic doesn't mean you want to devote 50 hours to studying that topic.
And I am dubious that a lot of people want to use the two weeks of vacation they get a year to travel to a foreign land so they can vet their opinions. A lot of people just want to relax on a beach.
Realistically, we all only have so much free time and a lot of stuff is competing for that time.
If people enjoy traveling in order to learn and reading hefty books, they're probably already doing this ... or at least doing it as much as their time and finances allow. If they don't enjoy these things there probably isn't much society can do to interest them into doing these things.
Fair points Joe. As much as I hope more of us will become more curious and able to explore the world through travel and books, I think there's a lot of factors that prevent many from doing so. The onus isn't entirely on the individual.
This gets into the weeds a bit, but what in your view initiates the "spark" in someone to become interested in things like travel, being outdoors, and reading books? Does this mostly occur in early child development perhaps, through peers, the larger culture and society? Are some of us perhaps "born more adventurous" than some?
As an anthropologist, I see the long history of how humans evolved and feel strongly we are all primed to explore our environments, so I can't help but think we all have some innate interest in doing these kinds of things and what prevents many of us from participating are structural things in the kind of society we've created for ourselves. You said "people don't want to use the two weeks of vacation..." true, but in a different society and culture, maybe one in the future, working 9-5 for 40+ years won't be such a dominant feature of life that inhibits a person' autonomy. I think we've got a long way to go to tweak things so I'm under no illusion that we just need to tell people to do these things. We have to find better ways to instill the value for these things. It's the long-game I'm interested in.
This is a huge topic and an excellent post, with many points to potentially comment on. So I'll add another one -- language learning! We have of course the apps like DuoLingo that promise "learners" that they are getting "one step closer to fluency" when the step may be just mastering 10 words. But there are even more insidious tools that I observed students using in my last few years teaching, and this was in higher education! For example, apps where you can just take a photo of a text and it comes back automatically "translated." Then, they would write about it using, of course, Google translate. I could go on and on...
I would tend to disagree about the necessity of travel for learning. I think it is a means of learning, but many a learned person has become so without it.
Thank you Betty! A huge topic for sure. This was challenging to keep it errr short lol. Hadn’t even considered language learning but that’s another great example. And fair point about travel. People can certainly become learned without it but I think for some minds, it acts like a switch turning something valuable on for them that might not otherwise have happened but that’s challenging to unpack or know how often that occurs or doesn’t occur in someone.
I think travel is a mixed bag and depends on what people take into it or get out of it. Americans who take Europe for some sort of Disneyland would be better off staying home reading about it in books, in my opinion. For others, of course, it is a life-changing experience.
As for language learning, I was a 37-year language teacher and changed careers partly because of my inability to connect with my students anymore, all of which took place over a stunningly quick period of just a year or two. I had specialized in speaking skills and a communicative approach, although not ignoring grammar and vocabulary, and suddenly found myself in front of 18-year-olds who no longer had the attention span to participate in the conversation activities that had been the cornerstone of my teaching.
What does one do? Either “adapt” by gamifying everything, teaching via Quizlet, and chopping a 2-hour class into 24 5-minute activities, or quit. I quit.
Agreed. There are some prerequisites that certainly go into get the most out of our travels.
That is unfortunate and disconcerting to hear but I don’t blame you. That tracks with what I’ve heard over the last few years and observed from a distance. My mother was a teacher’s aide for a local middle school and was very involved with the local school system so I’ve heard about some of this from her perspective.
What do you attribute such sweeping changes in student learning to? The common culprit I hear a lot is cell phones and social media but is this something that’s been occurring for a while or happened much more rapidly in your opinion? What about changes at the state or federal level on the education system or perhaps lack of parental or community support for teachers?
Also, thank you for all your years of being a teacher! I was fortunate to have quality teachers growing up and didn’t appreciate it then but am eternally grateful for them now in hindsight.
Oh very heavy topics indeed. I'll just tackle one: I think it is important that there is one world view on how events transpired and their outcomes, ie- the Holocaust, and a political election outcome.