The Thirst for Knowledge
Magazine Assignment
Young
minds have a natural affinity for learning and it is a teacher's job
not only to supply the facts, but to allow them to flow at the rate
which they are needed. For this article in a major western university
magazine, the writer proposes that teaching is a technology, but that
it does not require technology in the modern sense of the word, meaning
computers. Learning happens naturally and the technology of instruction
seeks to harness, enlist, divert and transform this energy stream.
Conveniently
for the illustrator, the writer opens the article with a quote
comparing computers to irrigation. This metaphor vividly manifests in
the mind as it is easy to imagine electrical current as a river of
electrons, being pumped, diverted and stored by the circuit. The writer
argues instructional technology does not require modern software or
hardware, but is an age-old technology of orchestrating the natural
learning process.
For this assignment I initially responded with
two rough drawings based on the irrigation concept. In one, a figure
stands in a field of seedlings. Holding a book in his outstretched arm
causes a resemblance to the wind powered water pump in the background.
The young seedlings are vaguely human with leaf-arms out and reaching
upward.
In the second rough, which was chosen, a small figure
representing the teacher controls a sluice gate. From the student's
mind srrpouts a colorful bouquet of imagination. Next, the revise round
rough was based on author input and adds student control of the sluice
to show the participatory nature of learning. The teacher is shown
digging a new channel to add to the sources that the student controls
and draws from. [dr]
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