by J. A. Ginsburg

In 1999, Sugata Mitra, a chief scientist at NIIT, a large IT training and education company in India, did something remarkable: He punched a hole in wall separating his company’s headquarters from a slum and installed a computer facing out. Within a few hours, curious children, all poor, started to crowd around, playing with the keyboard, teaching themselves and then their friends how it worked. “The Hole in the Wall” experiment was off to an auspicious start:

Mitra was just warming up. Over the next 20+ years, similar computer set ups were installed all over India. Even in rural areas where English wasn’t the primary language, children quickly mastered the basics through peer-learning.

Which, it turns out, is exactly what’s happening in Pre-K classrooms across the U.S.

As part of ongoing research for the new Stuart J. Murphy’s I See I Learn series (launching later this year!), we regularly talk with teachers and administrators about daily classroom life and needs. Computer literacy has become such a vital skill, computers are actually required to secure top ranking in Florida’s UPK program (Universal Pre-K). No matter how strapped a school’s budget, it seems at least of couple of laptops, often “vintage,” are available for the children.

And just like their counterparts halfway around the world, they gather around the screen, trying to make to make sense of the magic box.

Describes one veteran teacher in Texas:

I find these children are unbelievably computer literate. Their biggest struggle at first is manipulating the mouse. The software we use usually attracts a crowd, with several children participating. There may be one child using the mouse, but it’s a collaborative effort. It’s not ever just one child sitting with headsets on doing something quietly by himself. The computer is a social event.

TECH-SAVVY TODDLERS

Of course, in The Age of the Touchscreen, who needs a mouse?

New York Times writer Brad Stone, opens his story on “Children of CyberSpace” with vignette of two-year daughter holding his Kindle, casually identifying it as “Daddy’s book.” It dawns on him that his little cherub doesn’t view tech with the sort miraculous awe of her elders. For her the miracles are simply part of the way things are, from long distance video calls via skype, to phones that are really toys full of amusing “apps.”

…I’ve begun to think that my daughter’s generation will also be utterly unlike those that preceded it.

Researchers are exploring this notion too. They theorize that the ever-accelerating pace of technological change may be minting a series of mini-generation gaps, with each group of children uniquely influenced by the tech tools available in their formative stages of development.

“People two, three or four years apart are having completely different experiences with technology,” said Lee Rainie, director of the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project. “College students scratch their heads at what their high school siblings are doing, and they scratch their heads at their younger siblings. It has sped up generational differences.”

One obvious result is that younger generations are going to have some very peculiar and unique expectations about the world. My friend’s 3-year-old, for example, has become so accustomed to her father’s multitouch iPhone screen that she approaches laptops by swiping her fingers across the screen, expecting a reaction.

As Pickle the dog (you’ll be meeting him soon) would say…

ADDITIONAL LINKS:

• Much to Sugata Mitra’s surprise, “The Hole in the Wall” was the inspiration for Vikas Swarup’s book, “Q & A,” which was adapted to become the film, “Slumdog Millionaire.”

• “Slumdog Inspiration” - CNN video

• “‘Slumdog Milionairre’ inspiration Sugata Mitra talks about the movie” - interview with Dads-space.com

• Sugata Mitra: The child-driven education - TED talk, July 2010