Technopoly and the education of children: Media ecology as a form of reflection, praxis and resistance

The central theme in the work of Neil Postman focuses repeatedly on the dangers posed by the presence of electronic technology in every facet of our communication environment. Postman termed this relentless intrusion of technology in society ‘technopoly’ and warned of dire consequences if left unchecked, unnoticed and unopposed. Postman frequently advocated educational reform to meet this challenge and sketched some general ideas but was never systematically involved with such an attempt. In this article, the authors outline a 40-year educational experiment designed to resist the harmful effects of electronic technology by developing an ‘oral curriculum’ that engages children through a wide range of interpersonal and creative arts strategies. By deliberately adapting a ‘lo-tech’ workshop model that relies heavily on oral communication, the asking of questions and the development of literacy through engagement with the creative uses of drama, the Educational Arts Team has fostered a pedagogy that seeks to counter the ascendancy of electronic technology in the lives of children.