Dear LPG,

I am writing because I have just heard the news that we are to be locked down for yet another month, but I have questions and I am wondering if anyone else is thinking the same way that I am.

I don’t know if I am a typical old aged user, and I have to admit that I already knew how to send an email before all this started, but it will be interesting to see how next year’s statistics will reflect on the pandemic’s effect on our relationship with technology.

Self-isolation forced so many of us to interact with the three T’s so much more than we ever needed to before.  I knew what I was doing with the television and while we are used to seeing reruns of programs on the many channels we now have I found that even the big five (the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5) had problems keeping us really entertained, so I turned to my telephone and bored all my friends with long calls where we talked about very little just so that we could hear another voice.  Just like so many others, I then turned to my mobile phone and video calling once I got the hang of it because it was a case of learn to do the basics or make do with the television.

It has to be taken into consideration that if you started learning something new during lockdown, many had to go through the process of learning on their own with what little instruction you could get from the odd more knowledgeable person you could talk to over the phone, which probably made it all even harder. 

I think that there are now three types of technical oldies.  There are those who knew a thing or two before all this happened and who have used their time to get more comfortable with what they know, there are the ones who have managed to perfect the art of a video call to their friends without cutting them off at least three times during each attempt at a conversation, and the ones who have just given up at the first hurdle or taken a look at it and decided that the telephone and the television will have to do.  Perhaps many of us oldies who have now managed to get past the stage where we are frustrated because we have had so much time to practice this most recently learned skill through their mistakes

I am sure that in the light of the news that we are going to have another month to practice there will be some who really just want to tear their hair out but, did you know that scientists have worked it all out according to the internet, there are four stages that we have to travel through if we want to learn anything at all.  It must be true because I read it on the internet (?) but there is no actual indication about how long it takes to get through each stage, then again, the one thing that most of us oldies have is time.  So, in theory and while learning so many things over the years, we more senior citizens have been doing it all our lives.  Don’t let a bit of technology, or anything else beat you.

When we were at school we experience varying degrees of struggling with the three R’s and now, so many of us are struggling as we grapple with the three T’s, but perseverance is the way forward and we have another month to do just that. 

OS, Croydon

OS offers her research on the learning stages as incentive to get reluctant learners to keep going…

(►►►)   (►►►)     (►►►)