Can Technology Be Bad?

Being a 1:1 laptop Middle School is a catalyst for many very interesting conversations. A lot of these conversations center around dealing with adolescents and their insatiable appetite for all things technological. Then of course the 'digital native - digital immigrant' divide comes up as well. A recurring theme through a large number of these techno centric conversations is the idea that technology is bad. Every time this occurs I hear Mr Darren Price (our Director of Technology) in my ear saying, "Technology is neutral - it is neither good nor bad." This always reminds me that the technology is only as powerful, positively or negatively, as the person using it. Face book is not bad - people have certainly used it to do some bad things, but the program itself is neutral. Our responsibility as parents and educators of young adolescents is to help them develop good decision making skills, skills that will enable them to become ethical, responsible, and powerful users of the technology available to them. Along the way we should also stop and ask our tech savvy middle schoolers what they are doing - we may be amazed at what they can teach us!