this year.

George Lucas wants us to turns computers into pencils in a talk he gave at Dreamforce. He suggests that the education process should be very project based and that technology should be used to facilitate learning. Kids shouldn’t be learning WordPerfect (yes, George said WordPerfect) two days a week as an elective, they should be using that tool to accomplish other work. I find my ideology of teaching lines up well with one thing George said in the talk:

You teach kids how to find information, you teach them how to assess that information and see how true it is, and then you use it in a creative endeavor, to build something, to do something. [George Lucas at Dreamforce (video)]

The fact is children these days have access to information like no previous generation ever has. They can learn more from a 45 minute program on the Discovery Channel than they typically do in a 1 hour classroom period, and they can search the Internet to fill in the gaps. I strongly feel that the role of the teacher in the 21st century is to help students find information, help them to decide what is good information (or a good source of information) and why that is a good source, then work to help them find meaning in that information and organize it into logical ideas. Being able to filter information and assess its validity is already an essential skill, and the need for it will only grow stronger.

George Lucas funds Edutopia (through The George Lucas Educational Foundation) a website and publication that works to help educators use technology to facilitate learning, and not just for technologies sake.