Blog Post 5

Don't Teach Your Kids This Stuff, Please?

In this article by Scott McLeod, he wrote a satirical poem about the supposed "dangers" of teaching children about the internet and how to use it, making his point in the end that he was doing all of this with his own kids, who would have the advantage when they grew up.

First, I've never really thought about the internet as something to teach kids. It's something I learned to navigate on my own, because it's not like I had tech-savvy parents or friends when I was growing up. I learned the ins and outs of posting stuff on the internet a long time ago. Of course I don't know everything, but I know enough to do what I like to do, and if something pops up that I need to know, I just figure it out on my own. So, actually, the idea that we could teach children all of this is appealing! Because while I did figure out all of this on my own, it took me a very long time.

If I'd had someone who could have shown me all this stuff, it would have been so much easier. For instance, I still don't know what an RSS Feed is. I could look it up, but so far my life has been just fine without it. If I'd learned about it when I was just starting out, though, maybe I'd consider it more important. And I've always wanted to learn to make Flash videos, but that requires software I don't have and is sometimes expensive. If I had someone to teach me, or if I could have learned this in school, I wouldn't sit here and sigh in envy whenever I watch a really good Flash video.

In case you haven't gotten the idea: I totally agree with Scott McLeod. Kids should definitely be taught about the internet and how to navigate it and utilize everything on it. Reading some of the comments, I noticed a lot of people think kids should have someone watching them every time they get near the computer. I don't think kids have to be constantly monitored at the computer, they just need to be told certain things more than once (don't give out personal information, for example). A little monitoring isn't out of the question, but I think it depends on how old the child is. The younger they are, the more they may require. But it would also largely depend on the individual kid. But give the kids some freedom to explore! Hanging over them constantly isn't going to make them safer--they'll just learn that you don't trust them with a computer, and try to hide everything they're doing, suspect or not.

I had no idea who Scott McLeod was before this class. When I first saw his name, I thought he was the cartoonist Scott McCloud, whose book, Understanding Comics: The Invisible Art, I had read. But, I quickly found McLeod's bio page. He is considered "one of the nation's leading academic experts on K-12 school technology leadership issues." So, he sounds pretty cool to me.




The iSchool Initiative

Travis Allen makes some strong arguments in favor of using the iTouch as a base for education in his video. It would reduce the amount spent on each student by about $600 dollars; it would simplify how students and teachers communicate, turn in assignments, and keep up with dates; it would be a greener way to learn, using the iSchool rather than wasting tons of paper and pencils; textbooks could be read on it; and it would have many apps that would be useful in the classroom, such as "Chemical Touch" (a periodic table that displays information on every element), "WorldWiki" (a map app that could replace globes and maps in the class), and a graphing calculator app.

I think this is amazing, and it would be great if schools used this. The only problem with this is actually getting schools to use this. It's awesome that Travis Allen has received such recognition for his project, but it needs more than that. School boards would have to be convinced that this new method would be better than our current one, and while Travis Allen's video should be more than enough, it doesn't guarantee anything. Some people believe that what we have going for us now is just fine, why should we upgrade when what we have works? Those would be the people needing convincing. I'd really like to see this happen one day, because I think it would be amazing. Until then, I'll try not to hold my breath.


Eric Whitacre's Virtual Choir

This is actually not new to me. I've never seen this video before, but I've seen the Doctor Who Fan Orchestra do this with instruments as they perform music from the British Sci-Fi show Doctor Who in celebration of Murray Gold's fantastic compositions (My personal favorite, and their largest to date, is "Rose's Theme/Doomsday"). Though they do not use as many people as in the Virtual Choir, I think it's amazing nonetheless, getting people together from all over the world for one collaborative effort about something they enjoy immensely.

It makes you wonder about how else this use of the internet could be applied. Students could collaborate with other students around the world on projects like this or anything else.


Teaching in the 21st Century

Kevin Roberts' view on teaching in the 21st century seems to be, from what I understand of the video, being able to teach students how to use the internet to problem solve, communicate, collaborate; using it to create; and teaching responsibility, reliability, and integrity. Students should definitely learn how to do these things using the internet and technology. It's not something we're taught by our parents or friends normally, and it takes longer to learn all of this on your own. If we were to straight up teach students this, we'd probably use computers to communicate with students more than anything else.

Reading Rockets

The Reading Rockets website is an amazing compilation of resources for not just teachers, but librarians, parents, and even school counselors, among other professions. Some of the resources I found would be very useful for when I become a teacher. There are resources for first year teachers, which includes advice, what to expect, and a self-study course. There are resources for finding free or cheap books for the classroom, which features foundations and programs that provides books for students. Since I'm going to be an English teacher, this could be a valuable resource to use in getting books for my own students.

There are articles on developing a literacy-rich environment, plenty on helping students with learning disabilities, and posts on how stories relate to readers. This is an excellent website, and there are tons of resources for helping students with reading and literacy. It's perfect for me, since I'll be an English teacher, though the main focus of the website seems to be teaching younger students. That's no problem, since there's still plenty to learn, even from articles aimed at teachers with young students.