I think Fraser is dead on about the changing role of education, as a result of technology, from learning to remember to learning to understand. What percentage of all the details of your middle and high-school history or science or math classes do you remember? 2-3% maybe? I day dreamed through most of school, and believe I’m not the only person out there to do so, and much of my best learning was achieved via independent studies.
The future of education is experiential learning, and George Lucas is doing some really innovative things in this space. Different people learn differently, but I would wager a hypothesis that teaching is generally more effective via interactivity and engagement vs. passive listening. Teachers who have charisma and truly engage students are so rare.
It has been many years since I’ve played Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego, and maybe I should go find and play it so I’m better informed, but I think there’s a lot of potential for exponential improvement of the Carmen concept.
Imagine a website, in the vein of Second Life or The Sims, where students are avatars and have to travel around the world to discover clews and achieve goals. The game would not only incorporate Google maps and National Geographic videos (as I’ve already mentioned is happening in Google Earth), but also 3D simulated spaces, where students can meet and interact with historically significant characters and students from different places and even time. There could be a time machine, for example, where you scroll along a time line and the civilizations of the earth change, depending on where you locate the cursor on the time line , so you can explore the Mayan cities, or the pyramids in Egypt, or the great civilization of China, and learn about the technological and social advancements of the human race. Time and place can be manipulated, but does exist, so your avatar has to travel to the airport, board and travel on an airplane, and find taxis to move around foreign cities, which heightens the realism of the experience. Thoughts?
