Technology is not Neutral

I want to learn how to use technology in my classroom in ways that are meaningful, in ways that encourage creativity and problem-solving and critical thinking. I'm not entirely sure what that will look like all the time, which is part of why I'm taking this class, but I do know that I don't want it to look like this:

Scott McLeod at the edublog Dangerously Irrelevant often posts insightful questions about what it means to truly integrate technology and learning, sometimes citing columns or comments/questions written by others that spark a discussion. Recently on his blog, he shared a link to another educator's thoughts about Three Competing Visions of Educational Technology. 

The author of that post, Gary Stager, emphasizes the importance of using technology for student-centered learning rather than simply using shiny, new gadgets to add some glitter to otherwise outdated and uninspiring approaches to teaching and learning. The line that really caught my attention was, "Technology is not neutral." Technology--and how we use it in the classroom--is always going to reflect how we think about learning in general. We can use to technology to stifle creativity and reduce "learning" to regurgitating knowledge, albeit through a more modern interface--as in the cartoon above, or we can give our students the opportunity to use technology to explore and create and construct knowledge that is meaningful to them and useful for participating in a world that is constantly re-creating itself.