Technology, the Tool: Humanity, the Heart.

"My students are self-regulated, empathetic critical thinkers and life-long learners who know and choose to follow Jesus," I journaled.

My cursor flashed blankly as my mind continued whirling.

I had just completed my first year of teaching - well, sort of. I had been working as a teaching assistant for two years until a professor had finally coaxed me into working toward getting a teaching certificate. I had gotten a last minute position in a multi-grade school classroom helping a very busy teaching principal find some respite for his other responsibilities. I had been a whirlwind of growth and adventure being thrust into a classroom, full-time, by myself for the first time; but now with a little "summer reprieve" of my own, and upcoming school year to prepare for, and no traditional education to fall back on, I sat watching my cursor blink.

What was I doing here?

What was my purpose as a teacher?

Who did I want to help my students become?

Many have noted that with the increase of technology to revolutionize the workforce and forever change the landscape of society, the need for an intentional shift in education as we move more solidly into the 21st century is imperative. This video, for example, contrasts the model of education where teachers lecture and students listen, memorize, and regurgitate information with another model where students take an active role in their education by asking questions, engaging in research, and solving real-world problems collaboratively with their peers. This video goes further by stating four specific qualities of an ideal 21st century education: critical thinking, communication, collaboration, and creativity. And This video describes 21st century learners as being social, mobile, global, digital, and visual.

While these descriptors certainly sound good, nearly a decade after these videos were created and nearly a quarter of the way into this shining 21st century, teachers are seeing some unexpected and real challenges with the increasing pervasiveness of technology. While technology should have increased community and access to others, students are facing depressing, anxiety, isolation, and loneliness like never before. While technology should have provided focused and individualized learning plans, attention span and self-regulation have almost disappeared. Online bullying, anonymity, misinformation, and unrealistic beauty standards have warped our students' minds and shattered their self-confidence and self-worth. Literacy rates remain troubling despite almost unlimited access to every form of literature.

Technology can be a marvelous tool, but, like all tools, should be used age-appropriately.

Perhaps I did not grow up in the age where teachers merely lectured and students merely regurgitated, but the ideal teaching outcomes of student learning listed above don't sound like new skills students need to learn in order to function in an evolving world. Instead, they are basic skills of humanity that are no longer naturally learned. Of course humans should collaborate, communicate, and live in connection with one another. They should work together to solve real-world problems. This is how society has always functioned ideally. The core of being human does not change with advancing technology - unless we let technology make us forget how to be human.

So how must we prepare children to live in an increasingly technological world? By inundating them with innovative technology at younger ages and standing back while they collaborate and figure out life?

Or by intentionally teaching them what it means to be human?

As a teacher, it is important to me that my students first know that they are loved and valuable. Social media and technology will never show a student that they are valuable. It may show them that they are currently popular. It may show them that they have a special skill. But it will also show them 100 more people who are more loved, more talented, and more popular than they are. Technology may replace human jobs, but technology cannot replace human people. Students must understand this first and deeply. People need to be reminded that they are made irreplaceably in the image of God.

Moreover, I want my students to learn good-ol'-fashioned empathy. I want them to love those around them with the same care and value they learn to see in themselves. This is hard in our current world of social media where decorum has been lost, harsh words are spoken in anonymity, and people can bully each other without social repercussions. Already, young students can follow those they agree with, block those they don't, and even unintentionally box themselves into an algorithm that isolates them from the world instead of connecting them to it.

Is it any wonder that depression and anxiety are on the rise? Not to mention ADHD and a general inability to focus. It's becoming difficult to tell which is a genuine diagnosis and which is caused by the fast-paced scroll, scroll, scroll culture we allow children to experience too early in their lives. Humans were not meant to sit in front of screens and stay inside of buildings all day. So thirdly, I want my students to learn good mental health strategies and coping skills to help them regulate their emotions, set good boundaries, and function healthfully in our unnatural world.

Fourthly, I want my students to become critical thinkers. So much of what we see online is fed to us through algorithms. Videos are becoming harder and harder to identify as true or false. Filters, AI, deep fakes, and misinformation can look so real and so appealing but can lead to devastating consequences. Even "funny trends" on the internet can go viral before consequences are thought through.

Lastly, I want my students to become life-long learners. I want my students to understand that there is a world of information available at their fingertips that has never been available to other generations. I want them to understand that in our learning, we are merely scratching the surface of every topic we cover. I want them to experience the joy of learning and growing and changing so that school isn't a chore to begrudgingly finish, but a basis for all their future endeavours. With this solid base: valuing themselves, valuing others, creating positive mental health and self-regulation, thinking deeply about the information they consume, and finding joy in continuous growth, I want my students to come away choosing to love and serve Jesus. Jesus created them and places upon them the highest value.

Jesus calls them to love others as themselves.

Jesus gives them the power of self-control, peace, and a balanced mind.

Jesus freely bestows choice and calls for us to "reason together."

Jesus assures us of life-long learning and growth as He sanctifies us day by day.

Technology will come and go. Technology will hinder and help. But our relationship with Jesus as we become the person He desires for us to become is eternal. We should therefore strive to be what He created us to be: Human. Made in His image.