"Use technology, block your minds"
...5). Indeed, it would be hard to reject the fact that computers, to an extent, make finding information easier which saves time. Using a computer and the Internet can help a student from a remote region, who has never been across the ocean, learn about other countries. No one would disagree that nothing can substitute a real experience of traveling which brings the true feeling of enjoyment and new knowledge but having a computer and the worldwide web can provide many people with the information which they are not able to receive otherwise. However, by perceiving education only as entertaining and effortless process students will be forced to underestimate a true value of education. Thus, I support Clifford’s conviction, that learning is not a game but a procedure, which requires time, effort, thinking, and commitment. An extensive use of technology or computers by the students may cause the loss of interest in learning, distracting them from work by different graphics and images. As Clifford states, “These teaching machines direct students away from reading, away from writing, away from scholarship” (306). Indeed, how many of us would disagree, that we easily get distracted by Internet, while we are supposed to be doing homework, by downloading e-mail websites, and talking in the chat rooms. Not using but abusing technology in education forces people to get used to the fact that everything is ready and they do not have to put much effort toward working on the homework. Such an approach to education makes students “passive learners”, and as Clifford notices “encourages intellectual passivity, driven mainly by conditioned amusement [...] students develop a distaste for persistence, trial and error, attentiveness, or patience” (306). Nowadays, we see the increase of production of video games whose so-called “main purpose” is to educate a person involving fun. My own little brother who has already graduated from school, used to spend a great amount of time playing a video-game that had a statement on its label which said “Learn to build an Empire.” However, it was obvious that his main goal while playing the game was not to receive a new skill of building, but just spend time entertaining himself. It is not surprising, that such promises did not provide a player with any skills except the waste of time. This example correlates with Clifford’s example of children learning to coordinate colors, through a program for designing Barbie doll’s clothes. As a result, Clifford insists, “a child has no idea of the tactile difference between calico and corduroy, silk and sailcloth. Can’t sew, either” (307). The strongest...