I’m sure glad we’re focused as a country on having “no child left behind” (though results are questionable), but what about parents? The other night at dinner, Joe sadly reflected, “When it comes to technology, I fear I have just slid from the number three position in the family to number four.” (This after something Alex, our four-year-old, said about computers.) It’s a strange and eerie feeling when your kids have an understanding about the world–even a small slice of it–that you don’t. After all, it’s our job to teach them the ins and outs of the world, and it’s hard to imagine being done with some of that so soon.

I’m hoping that this turning of the educational tables may be an opening for another level of the parent/child relationship. After all, if kids can mentor other kids, why not mentor parents (in somethings). This morning, when I was having trouble loading a plugin to this blog, I seriously considered asking Andy to see if he could figure it out. Even though it was something he had no experience with, he has amazing intuition about how software works, and I knew he could crack the code quicker than I could. Happily, I ended up figuring it out on my own. But I can imagine this scene will replay with increasing frequency in the next months and years.

I came across a great comment in an article in Diablo magazine (August, 2007) , which put a context around this for me. James Daly, editor in chief of Edutopia, a publication of the George Lucas Educational Foundation, reflected on why schools must change:

Today’s high schoolers are hardwired in a fundamentally different way than most of the adults who instruct them. Many [kids] never knew a day in which broadband Internet access wasn’t delivered directly to one of the two or three PCs in their home.

As kids pass their parents by, we can’t lose sight of the fact that there’s more to technology than knowing how to use the hardware and software. Judgment comes into play, as does life knowledge. While Andy may be able to figure out how to install a plugin faster than I can, he lacks the background I have to know that a particular plugin would be a cool marketing tool. Or the classic example is a teenager who can navigate through MySpace with gusto, but may not have the background to make clear judgments about safety.

I see another benefit as parents race to keep up with kids in technology. Neuroscientists tell us our brains stay healthier when they adapt and learn new strategies. Who needs crossword puzzles and Soduku, when learning to download a ringtone can be as challenging and, then, satisfying? I hope I will be playing on the mental playground of technology–waving to my kids in the distance–for many, many years.