Empathy
Empathy is one of the words and human quality I always keep myself aware of, in all circumstances. How does that connect and work in terms of technology? In my humble opinion empathy has a strong connection with technology. All we need is to ‘notice’ and ‘appreciate’ that connection. As I said before, technology is nothing but a modern way we, humans, have devised to assist in acquiring, processing, storing and sharing the information we collect about the universe around us. 21st century learning is not limited to ‘technology’ and at least I have stopped to think of this term in sense of it’s ‘technological’ connection. Humans can still learn, equally good, without the aid of 21st century technology. I have seen and continue to see examples of this and I am sure this will not stop even when we step into 22nd and subsequent centuries. However, we developed technology for a reason and it indeed has it’s prime place in our learning process today. We need to teach ourselves and our young ones the meaning of knowledge, have them appreciate the human qualities of inquiry, creativity and most of all empathy. Basics and fundamentals of technology need to be understood before indulging ourselves in the wild cyber west of information overload. Combine that with empathy and technology will do wonders not only in our endeavour of gaining knowledge but also in all aspects of human lives.
I hope to find a teacher in my school who will allow me to work with them in future courses of my COETAIL journey to share, discuss and have an action research project while incorporating my thoughts expressed in this course about technology and it’s role in education and future of humanity.
2 COMMENTS
If you can work with another teacher at WAB, I do think that will really help you apply the thinking you are sharing here within the context of the classroom. However, if that doesn’t work (for any reason), you are more than welcome to think of ideas that will work in your current role – we often customize projects for participants that are not “in the classroom” and we can do that for you too 🙂
Thank you Kim,
I will certainly want to work with another teacher at WAB. Once goal for myself I have set by joining COETAIL is to get more engagement in the classroom and this will indeed help me to achieve that goal. I will get in touch with a teacher who is willing to support me in this journey.