Technology+Leadership+Book+Summary



The technology leadership book I picked was "The Tipping Point: How Little Things Can Make a Big Difference(Unabridged)" by Malcolm Gladwell. The main focus of it was to give some explanation to why epidemics or infectious behavior arises. At first glance I really thought it was just going to give insight into how medical infections spread but it did more than just explain that. Malcolm Gladwell pointed out many historical and sociological examples of how anything can theoretically spread. Essentially he tells about a "Tipping Point" being a point when trends makes a sharp increase or decline, "the moment of critical mass, the threshold, the boiling point"[Chapter 1:Audio book]. Tipping points can be set of by the smallest of entities. Some of the causes of tipping point he says are from people called connectors, mavons, and salesman.

Connectors are people who keep a close circle of friends but have many acquaintances and have great influence among them. People that pass on something to many in diverse groups and it will spread. Acquaintances tend to be "weak ties" but can be effective transmitters having been in contact with the connectors. One common example he states is the well known is Six degrees of Kevin Bacon and how people are link to one central person or how many steps from that person are they linked. Surprising to me was that in a computer model he talks about, Kevin Bacon would actually be ranked near 600th in this type of linking and Rod Steiger would actually be the best ranked at almost 3 links to all actors. So basically the connector has a very good reach to many people. Lois Weisberg, the Cultural Commissioner of Chicago, is another connector. She is a person that has been in many different fields and made a name for herself and is a position now where she can reach out not just to the groups she knows but to many she doesn't. Mavens are connectors as well and have much information to purvey and willingness to share and also are willing to share and also collect more knowledge altruistically. These people do not have a motive to pass on something to others and do it for the others benefit. They share information by word of mouth. Salesman on the other hand are just like it sounds. People that reach out to people for a purpose and are persuasive.

These three types of people belong to a group called the "Law of the Few." Where I see the technology education implications are that as educators we belong to the "Law of the Few." I think we are all three, the connector, maven, and salesmen. The fact that we see hundreds of kids everyday who are "Digital Natives"(Presnky) we are connectors. Educators have the knowledge to use the latest technology at their disposal and the job to impart it on the "Digital Native" makes us mavens and salespersons.

Our job now is to find out the "Stickiness Factor" or what it will take to get the "Digital Native" interested in learning further applications to what tools are around them. This factor, he says, is the criteria used to make individuals interested. We start first with us the "Digital Immigrant" and train us in a way and find a stickiness or strategize a stickiness factor that can be propagated to the "Digital Native". I suggest as we get professional development on new tools that we not only send our most technology capable teachers to learn but also send what my wife has said to me as a mixed ability grouping. This would include some teachers that are on the fence of using technology in their curriculum and those who score low in this domain as well. So this way we get a wider variety of educators become knowledgeable. I would hope that maybe those that are proficient will also lead those who are less proficient in the training and possibly bring them up to speed and have their interest peaked and bring them a step forward. So that when they return to the campus, all levels of teachers can be reached to pass on what they have learned and develop together way to integrate technology into their planning and teaching. So we spread the knowledge wider with these groups we have reached out too.

Oddly enough technology is a virus that we have to spread to our students. From a technicians standpoint, that was odd to write, but we are a few people who can revolutionize how the next generation will be prepared to handle technology out in the world. So epidemics can be good. That still doesn't sound right to say from my field, but it make sense. Although Gladwell goes on to talk about a few other concepts such as the "Power of Context" and "Rule of 150" I am limited, but from what I have listened to can be applied just like the above mentioned concepts have. The power of context would be more about changing small things in the environment to get the students more interested in these technology tools where it becomes acceptable for them to learn. And the rule of 150, we can take the knowledge of working in small groups to help coordinate learning in groups using technology and the ability to pass on what has been learned to other groups.