space.template.Leo

It strikes me that there is a convergence between the content of information and how I can access it. In my lifetime I have gone from using a telephone that required me to ring up a local operator to make a connection to using E-mail etc which is practically instantaneous. Mind you the server has replaced the local operator. The problem begins when I am unfamiliar with the "new" processes. I recall not so many year ago when we still had a rotary dial phone. One of my son's friends was visiting and we invited him to stay for supper, provided that he called his mother and told her he was staying. I pointed out the phone, but was puzzled to see him standing there looking at it. It turned out that he had never used anything other than a touch tone phone and couldn't figure out how to use a rotary dial phone. Well I guess I'm like that little boy when it comes to ICT. It's there and I know what it does, but I don't have the knowledge needed to fully utilize it.

This is the question I am pondering: Is the knowledge that I am seeking somehow secondary to the knowledge of how to find it? I find that the volume of "procedural" knowledge that I need to access substantive information is overwhelming. Now that of course points out the need to impart that knowledge to students today. It is almost like knowing the multiplication tables. It is very difficult to do math, leave alone algebra without that basic knowledge