A reoccurring theme that I have heard many times before TEDxNYED, and it was echoed here as well, is the question of the educator’s role in the era of Google, etc., and now the rise of mobile Google, etc. as well. Lehman answered this beautifully. We might not be the conduits of information as teachers had been in the past. We are not the monopolies of knowledge. In the era of on demand learning and fact gathering, we can still impart one thing. Wisdom. The question I have is: how much wisdom can we truly impart if we continue to, as Marshall McLuhan said, view the present in a rearview mirror, marching backwards into the future?

Fellow 8th grade teacher Daniel Agins has a great post reflecting on his exerpiences at TEDxNYED here that is worth a read.

However, throughout his reflective post little threads bubbled up that resonated with my own experience as an 8th grade teacher trying to be a good role model for my students… topics like social acceptance and questions about my own role as a teacher in the “After Google” age.

It seems that Daniel and I (and thousands of other 8th grade teachers out there) are continually poking holes in the fog that surrounds the educational enterprise in this first decade A.G. (After Google). I often ponder how much my own borderline-chaotic/blissful style of teaching would be different had I started my teaching career B.G. (Before Google).

Probably not very different, after all.

Nevertheless, good things to ponder on a gray Sunday morning coming down.

Thanks, Daniel.