Keeping Up With the New World of Tech
Season 1- Episode #4
Welcome to Tick Tock Tech! In this episode, we are focusing on the rapidly changing landscape of technology and its effects on education and learning.
In each episode, we will focus on a “fire” or a problem that educators and professionals may be struggling with. We will then focus on three options or tools for helping “put out the fire”.
The typewriter helped revolutionize the world of work and change the lives of working women in particular. It helped them launch their own businesses at a time when female employers were rare and became a vital weapon in the fight for women’s suffrage. Typewriters inspired novelists and artists, with American writer Mark Twain among the first to use what he called a “new-fangled writing machine”.
Inventors across Europe and America experimented with writing machines throughout the 19th century. Many of these devices were made for people with visual and hearing impairments. Instead of a keyboard, the operator turned a dial to choose a letter and then pressed a lever or key to print it on paper. They may not look like our idea of a typewriter, but they show there was a growing interest in devices that could print individual documents.
Keyboard typewriters in a form we would recognize today were first sold by American firm E. Remington & Sons in the 1870s. The first shipments arrived in Scotland in 1876. They were luxury devices which would have been out of reach for many people at the time, costing the equivalent of half the average annual salary.-nms.ac.uk
In this episode of Tick Tock Tech, Anna and Cassie discuss (insert fire statement here). Listen to learn about three solutions or tips regarding (insert topic here), including:
1. Network and find learning opportunities
2. Don't be afraid to try and get hands-on with new tech and tools
3. Model new tools and learn from your students
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, or hit Play Below.
Transcript
The typewriter helped revolutionize the world of work and change the lives of working women in particular, it helped them launch their own businesses at a time when female employers were rare and became a vital weapon in the fight for women's suffrage. Typewriters inspired novelists and artists, with American writer Mark Twain among the first to use what he called a new fangled writing machine.
Welcome to The Tick Tock tech podcast where we'll talk about all things education, tech and teacher happiness join hosts and a cliff and Cassie frost as they share simple ideas to guide you and bring meaning to your day to day experiences.
So talk about how big of an advertisement the typewriter was, and kids don't even know what that is nowadays. So how do we focus on how technology is advancing? And how do we work through this dilemma of it's advancing faster than we can keep up with? Perhaps we need to move forward and keep up with the change in technology. But how do we keep up with the world that our kids are living in right now? How do we learn this stuff?
I mean, right now, I just feel like it's changing in such a fast pace. It doesn't even what we're teaching and training kids for right now. may not exist, and 10 years from now, right? And so how do we how do we come up with and keep up with that? It just to me, it's mind blowing, right? Technology is just how do we train each other and ourselves to keep up with all this?
I think that is such an interesting quote, especially when you hear like this author, you know, describe a you know typewriters and newfangled writing machine. And now we don't even have typewriters, right. We use computers, or Chromebooks, or laptops, and your kids don't probably really even know what a typewriter is, like, I feel like that could be like a challenge that we have to do in the future at some point, like, show your kids cuz you've got little ones like, show your kids or stuff like Do they even know is? Um, that makes me laugh, Kathy, because we went to a museum in Michigan, and it was in Grand Haven. And I remember they had this. I took my daughter up, and they had a typewriter that kids could type on. And she was so amazed at like what it was. And she was like, What is this mom and I was like, Oh my gosh, you don't have any idea of how I had to wait out letters, because I typed the wrong one and had to go, it would take forever together assignments done back when I first started using a typewriter.
Right. So I think that's a really good point. Because like you and I guess in our generations, like we did use a typewriter. And now we definitely don't. So we've been really part of this huge change. So I think about like, as I became a teacher, like what I learned in school, and how I learned is so different than how my students and my own daughter are learning now, because they're not anywhere near the same. I'm also going to link into the show notes just because when you brought this up, I immediately thought of it. If you haven't, have you ever watched the video, the evolution of the desk? Maybe, okay, so I'm going to leave the show notes. Otherwise, okay. Oh to YouTube.
Um, it's just it's a picture of a desk in like 1980 1990. And then it actually shows how the desk has changed. And it actually shows like calendars on the wall and like, you know, scissors and tape and how that's actually become on our computer now. So cool. Wow, that is really cool. I'm gonna have to look it up now. Yeah. So okay, so this week, kind of getting back to it our fire the problem we have, if I understand it, right, is how do we deal with this? Change? That right, that's our fire?
Yeah. Yeah. How do we keep up with us?
I got a couple solutions for that one.
All right, give it to us. Cassie, let's go through some of those.
Okay, so, solution number one. You know what connect with other people. Um, I learned most of the stuff that I learned by talking to others. You know, if you do what you've always done and you know, work with what you're comfortable with, you're probably not going to learn much. So solution number one, network, connect with others, ask questions, go to conferences, like expose yourself to the world, like, figure out what new is out there. And Cassie, when you said that one to me, reminded me of the like hashtags that we talked about in a previous episode where you just following hashtags. You learn a lot about new tech that's out there.
So and then you we talked about like clickable links in the past to right and so once you get a clickable link, sometimes you learn new technology just from that, some of that right so there's these pros and cons, a lot of things we do in this last episode, we just talk about ways to avoid links. And now you're telling people to click on them to learn things.
I know at times, you have to find the balance right? Somehow, yes, some Yeah, it's actually a great place to for a plug. If you haven't listened to our previous episodes, you really should go back and do that, because we talk about some of these things there.
Yeah. Okay, so solution number two, don't be afraid of new things. So try things don't be scared to get hands on. Most tech won't break. Or it's easily flex fixable. So this is something I run into people with, like, they'll have a new tool, a new device, and they don't want to try it because they're afraid that it is going to, you know, break, you know, I'm not gonna be able to undo this. I don't know how to do it. And most things are pretty easily fixable.
So gets Yeah, gets me into that to another solution. So we can we can model new ideas, we can show new strategies to kids. But a lot of times we can ask kids and people who are younger than us what some of these new tools are. So sometimes kids are faster with technology than we ourselves. So asking what's kind of the new and the current trends? So we can stay abreast of what's going on?
Because that's sometimes that's the only way I can't keep up i i? We, yes, yes. There's so many ways we can keep up with it. But I definitely think using the people that are younger than us, it's a great tool. You know, there's another thing we need to do in the future is like, ask your kids about technology, and then ask some of our kids and teenagers about the technology we don't know anything about.
Yes. So when we teach them about the typewriter, they've got to teach us about the next the next world of, of Instagram, right? There we go. Definitely. Okay, so three solutions we have, in order to deal with like the changing technology, we have the option of connecting and networking with others. Solution two, don't be afraid of new throwing things, try them out. Don't be scared.
And solution number three, model new tools, but also ask your kids to teach you things. Love it.
Alright, we're gonna go to that brighten my day challenge. I'm excited. You you kind of set the bar really high. And so I mean, mine is kind of my it's kind of simple. And it. It all started with getting my winter gear out. So I pulled out my winter ski here kind of gearing up for the snow to be coming. And I pulled out my winter coats. I was unzipping pockets, and I found a $20 bill. And I know that is like the best thing about getting out winter stuff here in Wisconsin. Yeah, it was like I had gone skiing, I'd put cash in my ski coat ready to you know, go and get a hot chocolate or maybe a beer. Whatever I decided to do after skiing after a long day of skiing, and I forgot to put money in there. So it's kind of a bonus. That's nice. I like that. So it's like it's one of those things and I was it like I've been working so hard on the holidays. It's just do I keep that for myself? Do I donate it? Do I give it to my kids? You know, what would you do? Kathy? Like? I don't know, I don't even know what I would do with that newfound money.
Oh, I think usually if I find like cash that I didn't know, I had, like, I usually have money kind of like your mark or things like, you know, this is what this going for this. I think when I usually like find like a $5 bill or I mean 20 is great. And usually I kind of say okay, this is this is found this is something fun. It's not earmarked for something else. This is fun. So this is usually like we're going to go get a cup of coffee, we're going to go you know, just do some goofy fun thing. And if it's $5 you really it's like a half a cup of coffee. But, you know, regardless, depending on this plate the location, right, correct. Yeah, I think definitely I'm going to be used it for something a bit more fun, but I'm going to try and keep it local. Just support local. I like that great little local shops in our small town. So I like that. Finding money. I love it. Finding money in Islam in a bonus right giving back to like that. I like that. Now I want to go try on all my winter jackets. But let me go here. That's what I'm going to go do is try every single one of my jacket. Ready. There we go. Okay. So thank you for joining us for another episode of tick tock tech. You can find links to information discussed in today's episode along with references on our website. Don't forget to like, subscribe and share this podcast so you don't miss any tips and tricks and so your fellow educators can join in the fun