Failing to learn by experience

During our conversation she said, “Whatever the benefits of technology, it’s an undeniable fact that an hour spent in front of a machine means an hour not doing something else – like walking on a beach, giving someone a hug or having the sun on your face.”

Sometimes I try to explain to my children the visceral surge of anticipation I felt lining up in the late seventies to buy the latest album by the Pretenders or Elvis Costello.

Even better, was slipping the record reverently out its cover and then its inner sleeve with a silky swish, before placing it delicately, between fingertips, on to the turntable. We went to people’s rooms for the sole purpose of hearing a new album.

My 15-year-old daughter spends much of her life attached to her iPod and claims she can’t do homework without music.

Call me fuddy-duddy (and she does) but having the constant background buzz of thousands of downloaded tracks is not remotely comparable to the joy of huddling round a record player to listen to a precious new album – actively.

The paradox is that we’re spending so much time chasing information that we’re failing to learn anything the best possible way – through experience.

It’s as if we’re exchanging a delicious, slow-cooked feast for hundreds of microwaved ready meals devoid of nutrition or flavor.

Knowledge that is valuable and not throwaway takes time to absorb and currently we’re in danger of becoming a society of jacks-of-all-facts and masters of none.

<== попередня сторінка	\|	наступна сторінка ==>
Need-to-(appear to)-know	\|	Bidisha, writer and critic

Не знайшли потрібну інформацію? Скористайтесь пошуком google:

Генерація сторінки за: 0.005 сек.