When the powerful, glittering, and flashy neon lights first came into the signage industry, about a century back, none could escape their impact. They blinded those who looked at them and did not allow those who closed their eyes to rest in peace. They began to affect the brain deeper than one possibly could conceive. Perhaps, this triggered further the insatiable thirst in future generations for increasing levels of stimulation.

Within a couple of decades, designers and manufacturers of neon lamps exhausted their innovation and creativity, to beat each other in the war to grip the attention of the buyers. The onlookers got exhausted too, and due to the decreasing “return on investment,” use of neon began to die a natural death. Presently, only the collectors preserve them for their antique value.

Did this experience teach us to assess, evaluate and scrutinize the many other outputs of technology, which spring up so rapidly? Is it not high time that we examine the place of computer-based approach in schools critically so that we reap the advantages and avoid the adverse consequences? Please let us be sure that it is not as easy to do so as it seems… it surely requires a deeply reflective and dispassionate mind to do this. If not, we shall continue to pay heavy prices before we learn to discern the merit of any new development. Often, it may be an irretrievable loss.

Right from birth, little children experience the world around them by looking, hearing, touching, smelling and tasting in progressively intensive and more curious steps. This, psychologists say, leads naturally to thinking and cognitive abilities. Educators have emphasized that the natural progress of a child’s cognitive development, by continuous and deeper engagement with the natural world, is the base for sound growth. Contact with a virtual world at an early age, of up to say twelve or thirteen years, in which contact with the natural world, and its awesome phenomena is not direct, not through our sensory mechanisms, is very detrimental to the “healthy” growth of a child.

The world is reeling under the impact of these consequences but unable to counter it due to the high-pressure communication and promotion by the sales and service companies. Have we seen and experienced the natural and physical processes deeply to be able to appreciate and respect them? To what extent do we, as educators, understand the hinterland of education? To what extent does this understanding influence our educational approach and our choice of teaching aids, including computers?

If we do not enable little children to relate to the natural world deeply, in their early years, the long-term consequences can be quite serious and inconceivable for both the child and parents. Whether we realize it or not we are already facing the adverse impact of the computers and internet, including easy thefts in banking, perversion etc. Are we aware of these consequences while we allow computers and Information Technology to sweep schools and our society without adequate scrutiny and caution? Are we as stimulated by computers as we were by the neon lamps? The neon was “put in place” within a couple of decades but to what extent the self-correcting loop will come into play in the cyber age is unclear.

In a school, what is the order of priorities, out of our ingredients like love and affection for the child, knowledge and expertise of the teachers, simple and likeable relationship with students, deployment of computer-based teaching and assessment aids, repertoire of pedagogy etc.? In the absence of teachers and school leadership having this higher-order knowledge and perspective, we may accord misplaced importance to the different components.

Strangely and paradoxically, it seems to me, presently, that the best “chalk and talk” teacher will also be the best teacher at the Smart Board because he has, what is to be taught, on his finger tips… at the tip of the fingers… with which he writes on the board. Therefore, perhaps, he is best equipped to decipher and decide the applicability and efficacy of the computer-aided teaching and assessment processes. Is the corollary true? Can the best technology based teacher, who did not graduate through the “mill,” excel as a teacher in the absence of technology? One has to answer this for oneself.

At this critical juncture of technological leaps, let us ponder over these questions so that we, collectively, discern, understand, and aspire to provide intelligent and better learning environments to our students.