Eighth International School On Mind, Brain And Education
2013 July 30 - August 04
Science Education
in the Digital Era
Directors: Antonio M. Battro, Kurt W. Fischer and Diego Golombek
Program officer: María Lourdes Majdalani
Academia Nacional de Educación, ARGENTINA
One Laptop Per Child Association. Chief Education Officer.
The click option and the digital intelligence: the Tablet revolution
“The Laptop is the brain, the Tablet is the skin”. This metaphor reminds us about the common origin of both the nervous system (brain, spine and nerves) and the skin (epidermis) in the developing ectoderm of embryos. In this sense the co-evolution of laptops, netbooks, tablets and other mobile computer devices is the effect of the expanding digital environment that is covering our globe. Some hybridization occurs too, as in the recent XO laptop with a “touch screen” developed by OLPC, the One Laptop Per Child Foundation. The term “touch” reveals the immediacy of the “click option”, the core neurocognitive action of the digital intelligence. The tablet can be used very early, even before language is acquired, and may induce new neurocognitive skills in young children that should be explored in neuroeducation and in the teaching of science.
