The Future of Thinking: Cathy Davidson and David Theo Goldberg on Learning in a Digital Age

It's been an exciting and interesting morning so far "attending" the HASTAC 2010 Conference... I really appreciate being a part of the conversations, even when I'm hundreds of miles away from the presenters and participants. I love how participatory and open the conference has been (despite some of the Google Wave boo-boo).

Thought I'd post some of my tweets here on Cathy Davidson and David Theo Goldberg's talk on "The Future of Thinking: Learning Institutions in a Digital Age." To start off, here are some of my notes and tweets about their conversation. I reckon another blog post will likely come out of the notes and tweets about the session, perhaps in a post-conference reflection.

I love what Davidson and Goldberg say about digital literacy -- to be digitally literate means being able to be more self-reflexive about the assumptions one makes in the use and capacity of technology, and that self-reflexivity is "what the humanities contributes to any conversation." Davidson argues that, without self-reflexvity, we can't really talk about technology: we need understandings of technology and of our place in the system. 

In thinking about learning and thinking in the digital age, I wonder: in what ways can we foster and encourage self-reflexivity and critique in the university classroom? What digital tools (blogs, wikis, social networks, etc.) can we use -- and how do we use them -- to foster self-reflexivity? In addition, what kinds of activities will foster such critical self-reflexivity within the physical walls of the classroom, and how does collaboration among peers work towards forms of reflexivity and critique? 

Some notes I jotted down from Davidson and Goldberg's session (most of which are paraphrased or verbatim):

Traditional forms of literacy and digital literacy:

• Goldberg: Some of the necessity of traditional forms of literacy (such as reading, writing, arithmetic, content-based knowledge, historical knowledge, and so on) are being eroded by the new technological facility and access that make the reach for content knowledge easy -- one can go online and find something... but assessment is an issue (who and what you can trust) 

• Shifts in literacy:

1. Knowing how to look up content (not simply knowing the content) -- knowing how to be facile with the technology and how to put it into good use
2. Learning with wise judgement -- what sources/authorities to trust, and which are better than others