Our Times: 21st Century Technologies Plus Harry Potter
President George Bush with fourth graders in St. Louis. Photo courtesy of Bettmann/Corbis.
2001
The first of 100 million iPods is sold, opening the door to the new medium of podcasting, which brings university lectures to people's earphones. The same year, Wikipedia, an encyclopedia collaboratively written by many of its readers, launches and soon becomes the go-to place for researchers around the world.
2002
No Child Left Behind, an elementary and secondary school act proposed by President George W. Bush, goes into effect, focusing on standards-based education reform.
With 78 million baby boomers approaching retirement, the Bernard Osher Foundation gives seed grants to establish a network of 115 Osher Lifelong Learning Institutes in 48 states plus the District of Columbia.
2006
Sesame Workshop creates Sesame Beginnings, a series of research-based DVDs for the millions of children under age two who watch TV. There are 74 million "graduates" of Sesame Street in the U.S. alone.
2007
Earth Day, now the world's largest secular holiday, is celebrated by 500 million people; the Earth Day Network includes more than 100,000 teachers in its Educators' Network.
The July 21 release date of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows creates international suspense for the last installment from J. K. Rowling's astonishingly successful series: 8.3 million copies sell in the first 24 hours, bringing the total for all seven books to more than 325 million.
More than 25% of students are spending 3 hours a day or more on computers. Web 2.0, as user generated content is nicknamed, enlivens classwork and curricula, wikis foster collaboration, and personal blogs (coined from web-log) have been legitimized as journalism by such respected publications as the New York Times and the Washington Post.
About the Authors
Mark Ciabattari is a novelist and cultural historian, and author of the forthcoming book Social History of the United States: The 1940s. Jane Ciabattari is a widely-published journalist and frequent contributor to NRTA Live & Learn.
This article originally appeared in NRTA Live & Learn, Summer 2007, as a 60th Anniversary Extra.
