Notes

• Tim Berners-Lee, developed Internet in 1989 with vision to ..."make it a collaborative medium, a place where we all meet and read and write."
• Not just consuming content but creating and collaborating - learn about ourselves and the world in the process
• Pew Internet & American Life Project 2003- "more than 53 million American adults or 44% of adult Internet users have used the Internet to publish their thoughts, respond to others, post pictures, share files and otherwise contribute to the explosion of content available online."
• Technorati.com is currently tracking 30.6 million blogs.
• Remaking web into a community space - happening in politics (blog example), journalism (wiki example) and business
• Participatory journalism - Northwest Voice and Greensboro (NC) 101
• Douglas Rushkoff - "Society of Authorship" - see interview
• standardized tests and goverment accountability vs constructivist, collaborative pedagogy of Weblogs

Read/Write Web in Education

The ability to publish content online will force us to rethink:

• the way we communicate with our constituents
• the way we deliver our curriculum
• the expectatioins we have of our students

Important Questions to Consider:

• What needs to change about our curriculum when our students have the ability to reach audiences far beyond our classroom walls?
• What changes must we make in our teaching as it becomes easier to bring primary sources to our students?
• How do we need to rethink our ideas of literacy when we must prepare our students to become not only readers and writers, but editors and collaborators as well?
• How do we best put to usse the reams and reams of "digital paper" that Weblogs provide?

Digital Natives

• National Education Technology Plan (2005) - students far ahead of teachers in computer literacy
• Marc Prensky - to students it is a way of life- Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, The Games Generation: How Learners Have Changed
• Examples - Esc from the World! (blog of a 13 year old from his bedroom), The Dylan Show (video blog of a 14 year old), Tess's Weather Book (Weather Book project for second grade)
• Netday survey released March 2005
• Neurological effects of technology immersion - Do They Really Think Differently?  Neuroscience Says Yes

The Toolbox

1. Weblogs

2. Wikis

3. Rich Site Summary (RSS)

4. Aggregators

5. Social Bookmarking

6. Online Photo Galleries

7. Audio/Video-casting

-Pedagogies and literacies which surround successful implementation of these tools (in subsequent chapters)

Keeping Students Safe

• More than not publishing children's names and pictures or viewing obscene content
• About responsibility, appropriateness, and common sense
• Laws - Children's Internet Protection Act requires: filters, monitor online activities of minors, policy in place that addresses safety and security
• Teach students skills to navigate Web safely and effectively - not just refraining from seeking inappropriate sites but what to do if accidently do
• Discuss with students what should and should not be published online - They need to ask themselves, "What if someone finds this piece five or ten years from now?"

Parent Approval

Send letter that tells:

• Description of technology
• How it will be used
• What security measures have been put in place
• What the teacher's expectations are of students

Blogging Letter to Parent Example

Planning for Blogs

• Who is the audience? - small peer group, whole class, entire Internet
• How to identify student? - first name, pseudonym, number
• What outside people should be allowed in the process?

Reflections

*

*

*