My Own Filter

July 3, 2017

This past week has been pretty eye opening, to say the least. Traveling to a new country, taking graduate classes, and being away from home can be pretty overwhelming. What makes this journey so bearable is that I am surrounded by so many amazing, intelligent, and compassionate educators who all have the same goal: to further their learning to be the best teacher they can be.

One of the coolest things about this fabulous group of people is that everyone has come to this same place, but with a completely different journey behind them.

I have my own ideas about certain issues based off of all of my previous life experiences. Someone else could have the exact opposite opinion on that same issue, only because their life experiences were completely different than mine. My point? We all have different brains and we all have different lives.

Who is to say that someone’s opinion is “right”, and one is “wrong”?

Exactly.

Nobody has that power, because that’s what opinions are for.

We are allowed to disagree. We are allowed to think differently than the person sitting across the table from us. If we are able to disagree and positively communicate, then that will only bring us to a more open mind and heart.

In our class this week, we talked about the “Information Diet”, which, shockingly enough, I was quite oblivious to. I have only been reading things that I am interested in. Why? Because that’s what I want to do.

Our technology is so advanced, that it already knows what we want to hear. After listening to Eli Pariser speak about the “filter bubbles”, I was shocked at how closed minded so many individuals are based off of technology’s advances.

Basically, a “filter bubble” is what our own technology devices have advanced to as we search for different things. For example, since I really enjoy looking at baby animal pictures, I am more likely to see more baby animal articles, pictures, stories, etc. on the internet when I search for things. Someone who really enjoys traveling and purchases many plane tickets to different countries will probably see more deals and offers to travel more. This is a pretty neat feature that technology has come to, however, when does it become negative?

When we look up certain things on the internet, our mind/technology literally starts to shift towards a specific direction. Instead of being open to all articles/ideas, we are geared towards our own interests because of how advanced technology is becoming.

In order to be more mindful of these shifts, it is our duty to start actively looking and listening to the “other side”. Why should we be so closed minded?

I then took the time to start following some individuals on twitter, like Betsy DeVos and Donald Trump, who seem to have different education goals/visions than I do. These are just examples, and I will leave it at that.

If everyone were to start listening to the “other side” and other opinions of others, then maybe we could start to understand, instead of disagree.

Life would be pretty boring if we all had the same ideas and opinions. Also, life can get pretty frustrating when everyone disagrees, which is why we need to be aware of our “filter bubbles” and start being more open minded to all ideas and opinions.