Give a small boy a hammer, and he will find that everything he encounters needs pounding.It seems to be popular lately in education circles and I don't much like it. It's cute and perhaps useful in certain limited cases where someone (presumably not just a small boy) is over-relying on some procedure or solution that has worked in the past. But I take issue with the more common use of this phrase that seems to point a wagging finger at technology's role in education. I also take issue with the idea that technology has some kind of role to play in education, as if it is an actor on the stage. I'd rather re-frame technology as the stage, or maybe even the entire theater and education as the actor or maybe some kind of plot device.
Often technology doesn't even receive the actor status. Too often, technology is relegated to the props table. Certainly some gadgets belong there, but what those gadgets do and represent and enable creates the context of our lives. We live within technology. At least most of us do. I'm sure there are some remote cultures still relatively unexposed to modern technologies and their transformative results. At least I hope there are. But our students aren't likely from these cultures, and neither are we.
I hear teachers and administrators often say in some kind of proud, affirmation of truth that technology is just a tool that can enable or disrupt learning. And I cringe a little every time I hear it. In part I cringe because this is often said with much bravado and as if the speaker has just communicated some kind of revelation or incredible philosophy. But more importantly I cringe because of the ignorance this supposed revelation communicates. And I am no less guilty of using this phrase myself. I am no less ignorant. I own a hammer.
Truth be told I own many hammers. And I am often surprised by their usefulness and variety. Hammers are not merely for pounding, but also for leveraging. They not only hit nails but also t-posts, concrete, bricks, wood, chisels. Actually, the combination of hammer and rock was integral in the construction of further solutions to life's problems as well as some pretty sculptures.
Give a small boy a hammer and he pounds things perhaps because he is a small boy and small boys like to pound things. It might also be that because small boys often learn by observing and mimicing adult behavior that he is merely using the implement in a culturally appropriate manner. And my bet is that the small boy will do all sorts of crazy culturally inappropriate things with that hammer - but we won't much notice them because they are wrong and corrected.
All of this is to say I see technology as more than just a tool. It's a context. It's our culture.
