You probably realise that when you search for something on your computer that your browser keeps a history of those searches (and page visits). You can of course clear that browser history at any time. (For those of you with paranoid tendencies, perhaps you should be using Incognito Mode?)
You might also realise that a full history of your search and web browsing activity is kept by your search provider. In my case, that's Google. This search history is not kept on your own computer, but rather on the search engine's servers. You can also visit your web history page online to review (and delete if you wish) your search history or the pages you've visited.
But what I think is not very well known is that you can also see the full history of all the voice searches you've ever made using your phone. Yes, every time you pick up your phone and say "Ok Google", then ask a question, that search is recorded. And by recorded, I mean the actual recording of your voice asking the question. Naturally you can have full access to these recordings and listen to, or delete them if you wish. Personally, I find them fascinating to go back and listen to.
I recently visited my voice search history and then used Audio Hijack to record them to a file, and Audacity to tidy them up a bit. I removed the gaps, tightened them up and placed them all back to back. I was struck by not only the number of searches but the variety of what I was asking for. I remember asking most of them, and funnily enough I remember getting reasonably useful answers to most of them too. I often get told I'm a fairly curious person, and when these voice searches are all compiled in one stream like this, it becomes fairly obvious.
If it's possible to ask - and I mean literally ask - your "curiosity questions" about basic facts and get quick answers, then we really do have to rethink the nature of what we ask our students to do in schools. When "fact recall" is simply the low hanging fruit of knowledge, we can (and must) change the way we think about information and knowledge building. I'm not saying that "knowing stuff" doesn't matter. Of course it does. And a well rounded, knowledgable person should "know stuff". But when our ability to find a basic fact quickly becomes so simple, surely we need to think about asking better, more interesting questions.
And it makes you wonder, to whom did we direct our many daily "curiosity questions" before Google came along?
Header image: Curiosity by Mohammad Abdullah CC BY-NC
