Is Educational Technology Shortening Student Attention Spans? This question addresses the use of technology in education and for that use the answer is emphatically No! The article taking the affirmative decries the multi-tasking and twitch factor of popular technology but does not make the case that use of technology in education diminishes the result. The 150 years since the Lincoln-Douglas debates have changed our culture substantially. We move at a faster pace that is made possible by technology. If we can't turn back the hands of time to horse & buggy days with regard to our society we should not attempt to do so in our educational forum. Use of technology in education is not a "Faustian Bargain" but a rational use of the tools available to us. I am not advocating a multi-tasking nightmare of "iPod, chat, research on the Internet while typing a paper and playing an online game." It is foolish to suggest so. Good results on a paper take dedicated time, no matter what the medium. Our students are different types of learners so we should use a multi-disciplined approach in our teaching. When I read the "Yes" argument I envisioned living in Amish country. Is that the intent of the author?
Is Chatspeak Destroying English? I do not believe Chatspeak is destroying English. It is simply another dialect of English. It's important to remember that Chatspeak is about Chatting. It's informal and doesn't express deep thought. It is not formal English nor intended to be, and I agree, its use "has no appreciable effect on the command of written English." It is clear that "good writing skills are essential." Whether a student is bound to college or the workplace, written communication is an essential skill. "The short cuts and acronyms that make instant messaging, text messaging, and online chatting so popular have no place in academic, business, and other formal writing settings." We can address these skills in the same manner we have in the past, through writing standards. As business exchanges have moved from formal memos to email exchanges, I have seen some elements of Chatspeak used. BTW is often used for a side comment. Is this bad?
Should Cellphones be Banned from Classrooms? Banned, No; turned off, Yes! It is true that the "basic cell phone has the ability to be the students' "Swiss Army knife" of technology" but in practice cellphone features vary wildly and are poor substitutes for purpose built technologies. "Laptops are much more versatile yet uniform than cell phones." There are instances where cell phones can be used effectively. On a field trip, for example, cell phones are useful for keeping the group together and keeping to a schedule. Cameras which are now ubiquitous on cameras can be used to capture a photo journal of a field trip, experiment or observation. I question using Jott for speech to text conversion for hearing impaired. In my experience speech recognition on cell phones has a long way to go before it can address such complex needs.