Hello fellow educators, welcome to podcast number 42. This podcast is dedicated to those who seek to bring a discipleship based approach to Christian education. We are still sending out free copies of my book “Discipling this Generation for a Digital World” to any one that asks. Details to follow at the end of the podcast.

Today we continue the discussion about Informationalism, my new word to describe the Google phenomenon. I made the comment last week that Informationalism is probably having is most immediate and noticeable transforming effects in our world of education. I would suggest that its effects are beginning to reshape our entire epistemology as a culture. It is challenging and changing our ideas about knowledge and information and ultimately how we know truth.

I received a great email from Pippa Davies last week in response to our podcast on the significant role Google is having in reshaping the digital landscape. Pippia is our teacher librarian in Heritage Christian Online School and has organize our linking library found at the online school website. I found her comments and approach towards internet searching and research very helpful.

Here is her initial comments about Google:

“Thanks for sharing your thoughts on information literacy on the web.  I think many people share your popular vote for Google and it's ability to draw popular hits.  This is what Google does, because it has an advertising base and will not direct library users to pertinent, reliable, valid, authoritative links.  Google should be used in needle in a haystack queries like "when did Elvis die?"or "how do I find an address".  We need to be directing our students to websites that have authentic authors, without bias, that are practical and user friendly. As Sue mentioned students do not have the ability to discern between authoritative sites and those that are popular based.  Critically evaluating a site is therefore an invaluable skill in the digital age.”

She is referring to an interview in podcast #40 with Sue Savard our online school English teacher and Grad program director. I do think Pippa’s concerns about Google’s advertising is a bit over stressed  because Google’s page rank system still keeps to its original criteria. It ranks pages based upon links to and from websites. If a website has many other websites linking to it then it gets a higher ranking and is placed closer to the top choices in the search. This system seems to defy those who would try and manipulate the search to place their website at a more favourable position. What Pippa is correct about, though, Google has opened the door to advertising links. Anyone who wants to get to the top of the linking process can pay for a higher rank in the sponsored link section of the search. These are found on the very top of the search with yellowed background and on the right hand side of the page. We have used this feature extensively in the Online School to advertise our Online courses to Grade 10-12 students around the province. It has been our best advertising option for bringing students to our website. A search for “correspondence courses” will usually bring up our website as the first link. Please don’t click on it because it will cost us well over a dollar if you do. If you really want to test it out may I suggest you click on one of our competitors.  When you look at the bulk of the search on the page you will be seeing the unaltered search that comes from the Google page rank system. This part of the search has not been manipulated by advertising.

I contacted Pippa and we had a great discussion about how several of the principles that she teaches when helping students and teachers with search techniques. I was able to record our discussion and would like to share it with you today. I apologize for the quality of the recording.

Audio only

Pippa did a great job. She has been a great resource to our school and a fantastic teacher as well.

Next week I want to explore the implications of the new Wiki world we live in. If you have yet to visit Wikipedia I encourage you to do so before the podcast. This phenomenon is often referred to the democratization of information. If you go back and listen to my previous podcasts on the communication revolution I tried to make the point that, in the past, major communication technologies eventually reformatted everything about the cultures they were introduced. This was true of both the Codex and the Printing Press. Both technologies took information and brought it to a greater audience. Communication technologies release information from the control of the ruling authorities and academics. In the case of the Codex it gave a new mobility to information and allowed documents to move freely in the new world. In the case of the printing press it allowed broad publication of any document, thus giving the common man access to the written word. In both cases it removed the control of the information from the ruling and academic elite. The internet will do this tenfold. In most parts of the world the ruling authorities have not exercised as much control and censorship as in the past but one could argue that the academic elite have always had a monopoly on what should be considered reliable and authoritative. We see this shifting dramatically in the new internet world. What is unprecedented is that this shift is not only taking place in our ability to access information but also in our ability to publish information. Pippa referred to the problem we have to find a true authority on a given topic. Her guidelines, which were very good, I might add, are still based upon an academic standard that is being altered at its very core. Our cultural epistemology is changing. Our definitions of academic authority are being deconstructed and a new authority is emerging.  We will take this up in next week’s podcast.

We would love to hear from you and I deeply value your comments. If you would like us to mail you a free copy of my book, Discipling This Generation for a Digital World, simply send an email to This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it and let us know what type of an educator you are, home schooler, classroom teacher, school administrator, or interested parent. Please let us know how you heard about the podcast and, of course, please include your mailing address. Thank you for listening and thank you for your commitment to discipleship-based Christian education.