Analysis of “Build A School In The Cloud” By Sugata Mitra
In the video “Build a School in the Cloud”, by Sugata Mitra, a professor in New Delhi, Mitra explains that due to recent technological advances it is now necessary more than ever to change our education system. In the past, there were many individuals who did not know that something like a computer even existed, but in today’s modern age smart watches as well as smart phones are at the tip of everyone’s fingers.
Today’s children have grown up with technology in their hands. I agree with Mitra’s ideas represented in “Build a School in the Cloud”, because the best way for children to learn is on computers by themselves instead of being forced to do so. In the video, Mitra’s experiment illustrates that computers will help children learn efficiently. He decided to execute the “hole in the wall” experiment, in which he would install a computer in a wall. While conducting this experiment, Mitra placed a computer in a wall that was surrounded by individuals living in poverty. In this particular area, children did not know how to read, write, or use a computer. He left the computer for a few months and came back to a great surprise. Over the duration of Mitra’s absence, children got affiliated with using a computer. The children were teaching others how to function the computer as well. As the children started to know more about computers, Mitra decided to test the kids by putting Biotechnology of DNA replication in a different language to see what the results he would get. At first there were no results, but slowly some results started to appear. Mitra wanted to see more results so he started the grandmother method. The grandmother method was a person asking children questions about the topic. After two months, there was a significant change in the results, almost fifty percent.
Mitra wanted to change the modern schooling way that stared years ago by introducing SOLE. SOLE is a self-organized learning environment in which teacher lets the students learn on their own. By looking at the results of the hole in the wall experiment, “Build a school in the Cloud” was formed. This was a way to help educators run their own SOLE. SOLE gives children freedom of learning on their own and it is a way for students to share and discover new things. The idea of “Build a school in the Cloud” is a great way for children to learn on their own and not be punished for seeking education. When a child is given a phone, an iPad, or even a computer, they are likely to explore the device on their own will. For example, my brother who was three years old had an IPad and started to download apps, search videos on YouTube, and even started to buy apps all by himself and sometimes he would be teaching me. As you can see, when a child is not forced to learn in a typical schooling way they are more likely to educate themselves. I believe it is a way for children to be prepared for the future since the future is changing quickly toward technology.
