CITE Journal - Editorial
It is almost as if one of the goals of teaching with technology or using the technology that students use is a way of trying to squeeze educational goals into the creative activities of students.
Cognitive surplus is an interesting term--does it mean light or just heat? does it mean cognitive power put to the task of solving problems and creating new things, or is it just employing brain cycles to filter and recycle ideas and objects found on the web?
The Pew Internet and American Life project reports that the majority of all teens are now engaged in active creation of online content. The rise of social media reflects new opportunities and outlets for creativity.
Increased youth engagement through these activities represents a repurposing of what Clay Shirky terms a cognitive surplus. Shirky, a professor in the Interactive Telecommunications Program at New York University, believes that a movement from passive activities such as watching television to more active and creative pursuits is emerging as a use of the cognitive surplus in the Web 2.0 era. Collaborative projects such as Wikipedia demonstrate that a previously unexploited collective intelligence can be tapped when the right conditions are established.
It is almost as if one of the goals of teaching with technology or using the technology that students use is a way of trying to squeeze educational goals into the creative activities of students.
Cognitive surplus is an interesting term--does it mean light or just heat? does it mean cognitive power put to the task of solving problems and creating new things, or is it just employing brain cycles to filter and recycle ideas and objects found on the web?
