What the kids say

For a conference on handheld technologies, there are a lot of laptops about. But people are also recording the action using handhled devices, audio, video, you name it. There is a lot of creativity here at Handheld Learning 2008, and the lighting, music and most importantly, the people, are creating a real buzz of expectation. We are in the plenary session for the conference, and listening to some of the keynotes.

I enjoyed some long discussions before this plenary session with danah boyd, Marc Prensky (who is sat right behind me), Mark Kramer and Steven Berlin Johnson so it pays to get to the conference venue early. danah was talking about the constraints of the technology being probably more important than the affordances, and cited microblogging tools such as Twitter as being particularly creative because they make people think more deeply about their message and also the audience they are writing for. Marc Prensky was talking about the fact that everyone is different and that people have misunderstood some of his ideas about natives and immigrants.

But it's what the kids say that matters the most, because they are the future, and we are watching a video of vox pop on how kids use the internet and technology to learn. A lot of work is being done in inner city schools to engage young minds in collaboration and inhibition in their learning (a quote from Stephen Heppell). There should not be a lot of difference between entertainment and learning and 'brain games' and 'adventure games' are favourites to hook young people. We are also watching a video of a young girl playing with Pictochat on her Nintendo DS Lite. She is scribbling and getting used to the graphics pad - not writing yet, but sitting next tyo her elder sister and learning from her. Lord Puttnam says that the power of the links between the entertainment and education sectors is vital to nurture and propogate. Games, collaboration, entertaining software, adventure and enjoyment. This is the future of education.