The Value of Making Mistakes in Tech Education

While looking for something else, I found this book, In Search of Stupidity. I'm putting it on my summer reading list. You can find a description and purchase info at Amazon.com.

It got me thinking about the Literacy and Technology class. We've developed a sense of community that enables us to take risks in trying out new technologies in class together and in our own classrooms with kids. There are many reasons this worked (including small class size, a Mac-using professor in a PC lab, every student being a veteran teacher with lots of successes in his/her past), and one of the things we've wondered aloud together about is how we can translate and transfer what we've learned and experienced to colleagues in other settings. It seems to me that the stories in this book, and our own attitudes and modeling (i.e., willingness to try new things we may not fully understand, willingness to learn from and with our students) are important components of whatever we do.

The book, by the way, chronicles 20 years of tech marketing disasters. At the book's website, is a quote, " Remember: The race goes not to the strong, nor the swift, nor more intelligent, but to the less stupid." The lesson, I think, is that if multi-billion-dollar companies can make humongous mistakes, then individual teachers have full permission to make individual missteps.