OK, the summer break is nearly over. I took my wife and two youngest boys to Borneo, to the Mulu National Park in Sarawak, the place where I’ve been exploring caves for 26 years. Before that, though, we spent a few days in Sabah, at Sukau, watching the fantastic wildlife.
Taking the boys to Mulu was an illustration in how well kids cope with strange environments. My youngest, 6, managed a long walk through the forest in high temperatures and humidity, eased along by frequent stops to look at the insects and plants. On the return journey, a few days later, we did the walk in a tropical storm – he walked more quickly but cried much of the way. However, he wasn’t at all freaked by the leech on his neck and, as soon as the rain stopped and we reached the river, he was back to normal; tears forgotten. That adaptability is a joy.
I would like to see us encourage kids to develop those skills of adaptability in the use of software – adopt what’s easily available and adapt it to suit the purpose. That’s what they already do with social networking applications, once they step out of the safe walled garden that most educational institutions provide. Let’s encourage them to do this with a range of software tools and use them to carry out eduational activities with other kids, whereever they are.
