making the time count.

It drives me crazy, but kids these days (yep, that just happened, I said "kids these days") are losing some of the fundamentals. Like telling time from looking at a clock face or counting change. It's cliché to blame it on technology, but that is of course, the truth. I read an opinion piece awhile back claiming that some of these things are like the chalkboard, at one time arguably a piece of technology (by definition), and "so what" if we evolve past that? Why do kids need to be able to tell time on a clock face when the future is digital, period? We are not still trying to start fires in our kitchens to cook dinner, are we? I have no credibility on this issue, but I believe it fundamentally changes how our brain operates and it worries me.

For me, it's about problem-solving. Understanding the genesis of something. Having more than one way to ask and answer a question. If your iPhone craps out on you (which my Palm Pré did the other night and I about lost my marbles) how will you possibly know what time it is? Of course living in civilization would point you to your friend's iPhone and thus, problem solved. But what if you were, say, in the mountains and you needed to get your bearings on how much time you had to hike out? The clock face was based on the sun dial, the shadows that are created at various times of daylight. I know, I know - basic background. Useless today? I don't think so. I wonder...are we giving our kids the depth of information they need for them to develop strategies to solve problems?

Problem-solving is an intuitive and thoughtful process, isn't it? We either do it at lightening speed for easy issues, or go through a longer process for tougher ones. Intuition is partially based on experience and partially on free- thinking, both help to develop natural triggers. To be thoughtful, you have to have a basis of something to think about, ie: information. Anyway you look at it, the more we know and the more we think about something, the better prepared we are to see all alternatives and create a strategy to work through it.

So believing all of that, how do we reconcile the influence of rapid technology and the loss of some fundamentals? Chuck Klosterman, in his book Eating the Dinosaur, lays out a fascinating look at the Unabomber, Ted Kaczinsky and his manifesto Industrial Society and Its Future. Fundamentally I think Klosterman's big idea in this essay is that we have lost our ability to be free (think "pure" not "political") thinkers because of the physical presence of technology and therefore the constant influx of messaging (from the media, friends, whatever). In other words, I think he's saying that we've lost the ability to think free-form. We no longer have the space, time or, to his point, lack of constant messaging from the technology in our lives in order to think more for and of ourselves. I think this is a sound argument and in my mind adds further fuel to the fire - loss of fundamentals plus influence and general "noise" of technology...where does that leave our kids and their problem-solving skills?

As I am known to do, when I am flummoxed, I think of what my mother is likely to say. I think I will ask her, but I am pretty sure she will say, "keep it simple stupid (k.i.s.s.)" Here I am blogging and filling the space with more noise. Email and the internet are my professional life lines. My cell phone, iTunes, facebook, Outlook calendar - all of it seemingly indispensable. I'm certainly not about to Kaczinsky-it and live out the remainder of my existence in a cabin in the middle of nowhere, so how can I "keep it simple, stupid?" How can I help my dot develop the fundamentals, think free-form, and develop stronger strategic and problem-solving thinking?

This question is being debated by people far smarter than me, in far more depth than I could ever imagine or absorb, but I need to parent now, real-time. So, I am going to employ the k.i.s.s. advice: I am going to start by shutting things off now and then, and asking my dot what time it is.