On the last day of ISTE 2011 I dropped my iPhone 3S on the floor of the convention center. Although it was snugly encased in its plastic protective cover, the phone hit the floor at the improbable angle necessary to break the screen. Although the phone looked pretty bad, it was still completely functional and I spent the last four months working around a growing web of spiderweb cracks taking over my phone’s screen. All this so I could wait to upgrade until the iPhone 4S was released.

I’ve had my new phone for a little over a week now and I think the wait was worth it. It’s faster than my old phone, the picture quality on the camera is amazing, and it syncs seamlessly with iCloud. I’ve also enjoyed getting to know my new personal assistant, Siri.

Probably the most touted new feature of the iPhone 4S, Siri is a speech-recognition software program designed to answer user questions by tapping into databases such as Yelp and Google Maps. It can also be used for web searches, adding appointments to a calendar, text messaging and phone calls. What Siri can’t do right now, is sync with most of the other apps on your phone. However, as Apple Inc. is expected to open Siri for app developers, that may change in the near future.

Although Siri makes for a great procrastination tool (try asking her “What’s the meaning of life?” – my favorite answer so far is “all evidence to date suggests it’s chocolate.”), playing around with the software got me thinking about ways Siri might change education.

Siri will improve. It will become compatible with other apps and the voice recognition quality will get better. At the moment, it’s fairly easy to stump Siri. However, ask the program a factual question such as “Who was the 20th president of the United States” or “How high is Mount Everest?” and Siri turns to the WolframAlpha search engine to provide amazingly fast and accurate answers.

Easy and quick access to data has been heralded as the most pressing change the Web has brought to education. Instead of pulling facts from the depths of memory, information can easily be called up using a device thinner and just a little wider than a pack of playing cards. The voice recognition features of Siri aren’t new; Apple is just making it easier to use and a bit flashier than its competitors.

The voice search function shaves off a few extra seconds during the search process. It also prevents the frustration of typing on the tiny iPhone screen and breaks down a wall between the phone user and the technology. Siri is designed to recognize colloquialisms and typical human speech patterns and users are encouraged to speak to the phone as they would to a person. If we thought students had a difficult time making the conceptual leap between mediated and interpersonal communication before, it’s nothing compared to what will happen with it becomes commonplace to literally talk to our machines.

The interest in and potential of Siri only underscores the importance of embracing new technologies in education. New media has changed much more than how we access facts; it changes how we communicate. As a new tool, Siri will not broadly impact our education system, but as a concept it may have broad reaching changes for teachers and learners.

Katie Stansberry managed the ISTE Connects community for two years.