Looking Ahead

I have an game application on my phone called Four Free.  It's a simple game where you try to line up four balls in a row - horizontally, vertically, diagonally - before your opponent does.  The first one with four in a row wins.  I play against the computer in my phone.

The phone usually wins.

I am terrible at this game. Well, that's not completely true.  On "easy mode" I am quite successful.  When I try to play on the "medium mode" I am terrible.

I was trying to analyze why I always lose.  It is such a simple game, yet I usually fail to see that the computer has lined up three balls in a row and needs only one more to win.  I get so focused on looking at my game pieces that I don't look at how the board has changed.

As I thought about this it struck me that we sometimes do the same thing in education.  We get so focused on looking at our "world,"  that we fail to see that the world around us is changing.  As a result, we may not see how new technologies or new ways of doing things offer the potential to transform how we offer education to our students.

Take online learning, for example.  Much of the learning that adults do is done online.  Many colleges and universities are now incorporating an online component into college courses.  My son has taken several classes entirely online.

Yet in the K-12 environment we are slow to recognize the potential impact that online learning will have on how we do business.  Is that because we are so focused on looking at our world - our own pieces on the game board - that we fail to see how the rest of the world is changing and adopting and moving in a different direction?

While I may never be very good at the game Four Free, I hope that I continue to get better at looking ahead to see where we need to take education so that we can continue to prepare our students to be successful.