Distributed+intelligence

Distributed Intelligence - distribution of resources that shape and enable activity across people, environments, and situations. Examples: technology such as word processors, calculators, rulers. Not all intelligence is distributed. (Pea 1992)

Distributed intelligence may have implications for how we teach and what is important for students to know, for example, do students need to know how to convert measurements, when smart phone apps can do this?

According to Pea (1992), "There are both social and material dimensions of this distribution. The social distribution of intelligence comes from its construction in activities such as the guided participation in joint action common in parent-child interaction or apprenticeship, or through people's collaborative efforts to achieve shared aims. The material distribution of intelligence originates in the situated invention of uses for aspects of the environment or the exploitation of the affordances of designed artifacts, either of which may contribute to supporting the achievement of an activity's purpose" (p. 50).

Pea, R. D. (1993). Practices of distributed intelligences and design for education. In G. Solomon (Ed.), Distributed cognitions: Psychological and educational considerations (pp. 47-87). Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.