One of my idols from my photography days, saw him speak once at Pitt. Still uses film. These two paragraphs were interesting: The only color picture in the New York exhibit was taken more recently, on Jan. 20, 2009, at one of the inaugural balls. Newly sworn-in President Obama and the first lady wave to the crowd from a brightly lit stage. All across the bottom half of the photo, the crowd waves back, with a sea of upraised illuminated smartphones. "It's an illustration about the use of cameras these days," Erwitt says. Inaugurals, graduations, birthday parties, backyard barbecues - everybody's taking pictures. Too many? "All you need is a pencil and a piece of paper to write a novel, don't you?" the Magnum photographer answers with a wry smile. But he points out that "not even with a very good pencil" will those novels necessarily become the next War and Peace. The same for photographs.

There are many parallels to how learning is changing and how gardening is changing. The concept of a gardener some may have as a fogey in a big floppy hat is as quaint as the concept of a knitter being an elderly lady with a cat or a professor being John Houseman in the Paper Chase.  Note how younger gardeners are learning - not from books. I see this constantly. They reject the idea of manicured lawns as not only old but of questionable morals given effects on environment. They believe in eating META local. They believe in collaboration and community. This is continuing adult learning, and it's blended learning.  Note where Emily Goodman got her idea for her garden design - not from a book. And guess what - it's not limited to age. Just interesting to me how stuff like this is happening in so many aspects of the world outside higher ed. I think this offers more evidence we need to keep up. 

Lays out some compelling reasons to include tablets. I like the last line, btw.

"Rows of desks, teacher lectures, and passive learning won't lift us into the future. We need a serious, national discussion on what the 21st century classroom can and should look like, acknowledging the variety of ways that students learn, the multitude of tools they use to interact with the world, and the growing use of online learning."