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Our children do not read; they only surf. They do not write; they only text. They do not plan and strategize in games; they react to visual and aural stimuli while inflicting simulated mayhem. They do not follow a plot: they cut among disjoined images in the style of rap videos.

Learning how to learn is the point of education

It is mouth-foaming, howling-at-the-moon madness, and it is our mainstream culture

The obsession with digital classrooms goes back to president Bill Clinton, who called for more computers in the schools in 1997. After 15 years of failure, the Barack Obama administration's National Education Technology Plan ''calls for applying the advanced technologies used in our daily personal and professional lives to our entire education system to improve student learning.''

The obsession with digital classrooms goes back to president Bill Clinton, who called for more computers in the schools in 1997. After 15 years of failure, the Barack Obama administration's National Education Technology Plan ''calls for applying the advanced technologies used in our daily personal and professional lives to our entire education system to improve student learning.'' [4]

Learning how to learn is the point of education. We will forget the great majority of specific things we were taught: Euclidean proofs, the polynomial theorem, Roman emperors, French grammar, atomic weights, the poems of Browning, and whatever else was stuffed in our heads as schoolchildren.

The Waldorf movement diverges radically from the mainstream. It tends to recruit crunchy-granola rebels against urban civilization who love acoustical instruments and handicrafts, as well as philosophy graduates of major universities with a deep interest in metaphysics. Some of the classical curriculum of the German Gymnasium of a century ago is preserved as if in amber. And the fact that so many of the Masters of the Universe of the digital age send their children to this countercultural throwback is a fair gauge of the degradation of mainstream learning.

Somehow, I don't think that's what Shakespeare meant by "as you like it." Web access in this case is simply a pretext to help seventh-graders to reduce Shakespeare to their own level, rather than allow Shakespeare to lift children up to his.

Once children had limitless opportunities for gratification, abetted by ever-more-realistic (and ever-more violent and perverse) computer simulations, the psychology profession observed that attention spans shortened drastically, and presumed that a genetic deficiency was to blame.

A seventh-grade English teacher roams among 31 students sitting at their desks or in clumps on the floor. They're studying Shakespeare's As You Like It - but not in any traditional way. In this technology-centric classroom, students are bent over laptops, some blogging or building Facebook pages from the perspective of Shakespeare's characters. One student compiles a song list from the Internet, picking a tune by the rapper Kanye West to express the emotions of Shakespeare's lovelorn Silvius. [6]

Personalized

crumbling

bottom-up revolution

Students are taking responsibility for their own learning, and the lines between student and teacher are blurring. Learners can determine their strengths and weaknesses and connect with one another to help and teach each other based on their areas of expertise--all they need is Facebook and Twitter.

This kind of social and collaborative behavior results in teachers and students working together as peers (gasp!)

Education is changing, and it’s changing fast.

Learners, not institutions, are leading innovation. This is an era of plenty. I like to call it the Education Harvest.

The education paradigm of the future is all about the doers, not the academics or theorists. A paper degree won’t stand a chance against action. Start your own company, build a website, organize an event, get a side project, and you’ll make it.

Advancements do not mean we change our internal values, but it does mean that technology allows us to make choices we may or may not have previously made if the option was available.

The problem with scientific progress is we are suddenly faced with a myriad of options that previously seemed unattainable and this is overwhelming because there is no clear or definitive framework to

As technology evolves we hold the same traditional kinds of moral beliefs we've always held, but scientific advancements add a twist because different factors now apply to the equation in the choices we are needing to make.

Visualize our world where we can now take cells and grow multi-celled beings, we can artificially create things which were previously impossible and only resided in between the words of science fiction novels. For most of history, these capabilities were a sheer impossibility and now suddenly a very real probability if not an actuality! As a result, the widely increased number of choices becomes a clash of ethical beliefs and moral foundations amongst individuals.

Unfortunately morals and progressive ideas don't always coexist peacefully. It's not uncommon we have to make trade-offs in order to meet solutions.

is perceived by as heightening security, but for others it is infringing on privacy.

Scientific advancements do not inherently change moral values, but they do impact and complicate the decision making process. Scientific advancements are fast, but taking the time to evaluate progress and the consequences from using it is slower paced.

“You must have worked really hard.”

As noted earlier, ACTA is an international agreement that aims to create international standards on intellectual property rights enforcement.

It has been negotiated,

Many states have already signed up for Acta, well before the widespread web furore over Sopa.

mostly in secret, between various countries and the EU over the last four years.

European Union, Mexico and Switzerland have supported the treaty and shown a commitment to signing it in the future.

trade agreement, which has allowed it certain freedoms from democratic scrutiny.

However, the European Commission was not allowed to negotiate over Article 23 -- the controversial part of the treaty which not only insists on criminal penalties for piracy but also for those accused of "aiding and abetting" copyright infringement -- the member states had to be represented at the table. They negotiated these new criminal sanctions behind closed doors

prison and large fines for companies that that are accused of copyright piracy on a "commercial scale"

Critics argue that this is copyright legislation being pushed through under the guise of a trade agreement so that it doesn't get debated as much. Unusually for a trade agreement, there are criminal sanctions.

supported by major copyright holders including pharmaceutical companies, movies studios and record labels.

GlaxoSmithKline, Pfizer, Sanofi-Aventis, Monsanto Company, Time Warner, Sony, Verizon, The Walt Disney Company, the Motion Picture Association of America, News Corporation, and Viacom.

Acta is opposed by internet companies, digital rights groups such as La Quadrature du Net, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Anonymous, The Pirate Party, Reporters without Borders, Oxfam, and 13 Sakharov Laureates. It is also opposed by the Members of the European Parliament.

The European Parliament voted almost unanimously against Acta on this basis by adopting Written Resolution 12. This included the statement that "economic and innovation risks must be evaluated prior to introducing criminal sanctions where civil measures are already in place" and that all documents related to the negotiations be made publicly available. That doesn't really matter because Members of the European Parliament haven't been consulted. It is even being negotiated outside of existing trade bodies such as the World Trade Organisation and the World Intellectual Property Organisation.

Acta has been largely negotiated behind closed doors, with many participating parties being forced to sign NDAs before being allowed to see Acta documents.

It is undemocratic

It blurs the lines between piracy and counterfeiting

Piracy and counterfeiting are not the same thing.

Counterfeiting generally requires the person receiving the copied goods to be deceived into thinking it is real.

If you treat Chinese manufacturers who create counterfeit DVDs or medicines in the same way you treat individuals sharing not-for-profit in their homes you know that you will have problems."

They are trying to sneak through a lot of the copyright stuff by pretending it's about counterfeiting

It criminalises copyright infringement when there are civil sanctions already

According to the controversial Article 23, criminal penalties should be applied "in cases of wilful trademark counterfeiting or copyright or related rights piracy on a commercial scale", although the phrase "commercial scale" is not clearly defined and specifically removes the intentionality, i.e. it doesn't matter whether a company intends to make a profit from the pirated content, it only matters whether it has the scale of a commercial operation. Criminal sanctions should also be made available for those "aiding and abetting" infringement on a commercial scale. Critics argue that this means that ISPs and data centres would potentially be liable for aiding and abetting any commercial website that features a copyright infringing piece of content. "This is the nuclear weapon against any actor on the internet," says Jérémie Zimmermann. He believes that the criminal section of Acta will be used as a weapon to ensure that ISPs cooperate with rights holders. As the Sakharov laureates warn: "In the name of copyright enforcement, the European Union and other signatories would be bound to put pressure on internet actors, compelling them to monitor and police the network."

Acta takes away from democratic governments the right to set their own copyright policy or patent policy.

How does it compare with Sopa and Pipa?

However, while Sopa and Pipa were designed to extend US law to foreign infringing sites, Acta writes the law internationally, and takes away power from democratic governments to tweak their own copyright law.

Acta bypasses the sovereign laws of participating nations, forcing ISP's across the globe to adopt these measures.

cs argue that Acta could hinder developing countries' ability to choose policy options that best suit their domestic priorities.

India has argued that Acta's levels of enforcement far exceed anything agreed under the WTO and says it could "short-change legal process, impede legitimate competition and shift the escalated costs of enforcing private commercial rights to governments, consumers and tax payers.

Acta hangs on a vote from the European Parliament, which awaits the outcome of a report by the International Trade Association (INTA). The treaty will be discussed over the next few months before voted on in June. Meanwhile, Poland plans to ratify Acta on 26 January. The treaty will still need to be ratified by the European Parliament and member states individually. If Acta is not ratified there it will get rejected in its entirety.

You can write to your MP or your MEP.

"blow your mind."

It could be because of the addictive effects of video game

. While there is no formal diagnosis of video game addiction in the medical literature at present, the similarities it shares with other compulsive psychological addictions, like gambling, may make it a legitimate disorder.

might even help children better develop their brain

visual acuity, attention, and certain cognitive functions

skills that translate well into real-world applications.

l. Underuse of this area of the brain was, in one study, shown to cause difficulty concentrating and socializing, as well as mood alterations and changes in behavior

ideo games can keep users on the edge of their seats, but that might not always be a good thing

Kids who played non-violent, collaborative games were much more likely to be helpful and cooperative with their peers than those who played neutral or violent games, proving that games can have a positive impact on behavior.

In one study, teen males who play violent games were compared to those who played few or no games

Regular video gameplay can improve hand-eye coordination.

Playing video games may be therapeutic for those struggling with trauma.

Video games are becoming part of treatment programs for a number of conditions, most prominently PTSD

Where special effects were clearly unavoidable – such as the scene where the horse gets trapped in the barbed wire – then I was determined to make it so life-like that nobody would know it was done with CGI. That was the big challenge, and I hope we got there with it.