Teacher as Algorithm
Someday, the world may be made up of individuals only having to be with themselves. Perhaps with chips inside their brain, in their bodies, programmed to be what’s required of them. No one knows. But we are social beings. We relish face-to-face encounters, words, taste, smell, sight, hearing of it. When at peace, we pass one another, heads up often greeting one another. We gather in stadiums, at concerts, at plays, the cinema. Being together.
We are people, who live together, work together, play together, cheer together, protest together. We tell stories, first it was around campfires, later around the kitchen table, today in cafés. We confide in one another, we commiserate, we celebrate, we mourn together.
Why take away the energy of the classroom, the energy of hallways, cafeteria, the gym, the athletic fields? Why keep our children apart? Why ask them to learn alone? Without a teacher to confide in? To ask questions? To express feelings? To learn the unexpected?
Do you know schools where cellphones have been packed away where students find joy? At lunch they engage in conversation, no phones present. Children hungering for connection, for eye-to-eye contact conversations where they speak up and listen to each other.
Isn’t that what we want for our children?
