The Symposium
delegates are a varied, prominent group experienced in myriad ways to bring digital technology into the world of learning.
In advance of the event we asked delegates to
send brief biographies and statements of position on the driving question
of the Symposium. Considering the
implications of digital technology for learning, some people imagine education
undergoing changes as far-reaching as those that have turned medicine
or communications into forms that would be unrecognizable to anyone from
earlier centuries, while others contend that education may change its superficial form
but will always be recognizably what it always was.
Of course we did not presume that the Symposium could decide between these alternatives. But we do believe
that we are groping towards an important - indeed urgent - question that
needs to be formulated more precisely than we know how and given more
serious attention than it has yet received. Our goal is to catalyze discussion
in this direction.
A representative from each discussion group summarised the perspectives:
Learning - Brendan Tangney
Change (and cheese) - Paul Conway
Technology - Mark Jacobs
Society - Barbara Barry
Epistemology - Idit Harel Caperton and Sarah Fitzpatrick
School - Jim Moulton
Wrap-up - Seymour Papert
Brendan Tangney offered graphical summaries of the discussions about Learning
and Change
