When I was a child, no one challenged the three-stage model of the development of learning … The VCR, the CD-ROM and now the Internet each represent a step in development that will eventually short-circuit the middle stage and its frustrating and psychologically dangerous dependence on adults and schooling.
Predictor: Papert, Seymour
Prediction, in context:In a 1995 article he wrote for Time magazine, Seymour Papert says: ”When I was a child, no one challenged the three-stage model of the development of learning: in an initial period a small child learns by direct exploration of everything and everybody within reach; in a middle period learning by self-directed exploration is subordinated to being taught; and in the adult period books, newspapers, libraries and laboratories support self-directed learning for work or play, using skills acquired in the middle period. The love affair that kids have with the computer is fueled by sensing the possibility of exploring the whole big world with the freedom and self-sufficiency they learned to love in their earlier explorations of their own small worlds. The VCR, the CD-ROM and now the Internet each represent a step in development that will eventually short-circuit the middle stage and its frustrating and psychologically dangerous dependence on adults and schooling … Acquiring the knowledge and the social structures to handle far greater independence in the middle stage is an awesome prospect. It is certainly one of the many social factors making for ever greater independence at ever younger ages. But it can also be a powerful instrument to help forge a new kind of relationship between parent and child.”
Biography:Seymour Papert, a mathematician, was one of the early pioneers of Artificial Intelligence. He is internationally recognized as the seminal thinker about ways in which computers can change learning. He wrote “The Children’s Machine: Rethinking School in the Age of the Computer” (1992) and “The Connected Family: Bridging the Digital Generation Gap” (1996). (Pioneer/Originator.)
Date of prediction: January 1, 1995
Topic of prediction: Community/Culture
Subtopic: General
Name of publication: Time
Title, headline, chapter name: The Parent Trap
Quote Type: Direct quote
Page number or URL of document at time of study:
http://www.papert.org/articles/parent_trap.html
This data was logged into the Elon/Pew Predictions Database by: Anderson, Janna Quitney