Issue 13. 6 September 2010.pdf [PDF File, 1.7 MB] - UWA Staff - The ...

the last word …
Computers are
about people
“You’re young – you can run the computer labs.”
And so began my career in e-learning when, as a postgrad
student, I was asked by the French Department at UWA to
design language lessons for the newly-built Arts Multimedia
Laboratory.
Since that day in 1995 when I struggled to find the ‘on’ switch
on the newest computers, I’ve been on a long journey through
successive generations of digital technology, and I’ve been
privileged to both teach and learn from successive generations
of students as they’ve interacted with the technology. Along
the way I’ve learned a lot about computers – but much more
about people.
As the informational web has morphed into the social web, it’s
become clear that computers, and the internet they give us
access to, are all about people: people communicating with
people, in multiple languages, registers and media. It’s as if
books, magazines, radio and TV have been rolled into one and
the reins handed over to anyone who wants to take them.
We’re no longer limited to reading the words, listening to the
voices, or looking at the videos of the tiny elite who were
traditionally published, recorded and filmed.
But not everyone is happy. We’re told the internet leads to
empty chatter (as we were told, some 150 years ago, about
the telegraph). We’re told it destroys face-to-face relationships
(as we were told, 100 years ago, about the telephone). We’re
told it stultifies thought (as we were told, 50 years ago, about
television).
Everywhere there are politicians, parents and self-appointed
public guardians who want to clamp down on this new medium
in which they themselves are effectively illiterate: to sideline it,
block it, filter it. And everywhere there are young people who
insist on using it anyway: to engage, share and, most of all, to
say what they want to say how they want to say it. Not
everything expressed online is worth hearing. Far from it.
Like pens or cameras, computers can be used to express the
best and the worst of ourselves. But the key word here is
‘express’: each new generation of communications
technologies has given more people more opportunities to
make their voices heard.
Effective self-expression isn’t easy: not in print, not in art, and
certainly not in multiple media spread across networked
environments.
As technologically adept as they sometimes are, today’s youth
still have much to learn, not just about the technology itself, but
about how to interact with, learn from and even teach other
people online – and how to do all of these things safely. The net
does have its risks, even if most are digital inflections of
analogue risks that have been around for decades, if not
centuries. That means young people need guidance on many
levels. As a teacher trainer in new technologies, I believe the
greatest gift I can impart to my students is the digital literacy to
support their own present and future students in making the
Mark Pegrum
Assistant Professor Graduate School of Education
best of, and avoiding the worst of, the communicating and
amplifying machine that is the internet.
Not long ago I spoke to one of my former Dip. Ed. students
who’s now teaching English to recent migrants to Australia.
At the same time she’s teaching them language, she’s teaching
them about and through the latest technologies like blogs and
Twitter.
For some of these students, the journey to her classroom
began in the killing fields and refugee camps of their former
homelands. Supported by a dedicated teacher, they’re now
getting the chance to learn, to talk, to write, to express
themselves. One of these days, they’ll have both the language
and the technology to get their messages out to whoever wants
to listen. I wonder what they’ll have to say?
UWA NEWS
EDITOR/WRITER: Lindy Brophy, Public Affairs
Tel: 6488 2436 Fax: 6488 1020
Email: lindy.brophy@uwa.edu.au
Hackett Foundation Building, M360
Director of Public Affairs: Doug Durack
Tel: 6488 2806 Fax: 6488 1020
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UWA NEWS 6 September 2010
The University of Western Australia