[Live blogged, so please excuse the wording awkwardness and spelling mistakes.]
I’m sitting up on the panel now for the SIGTC breakfast. To my left are Will Richards, writing on his tablet pc, and Tony Vincent typing into his new black MacBook. Too cool. We’re going to be answering questions about Web 2.0, and the kind folk with ISTE sent us some possible questions. So here they are with a note or two from the back of my brain.
Where is Web 2.0 going? Is it a fad, or is it here to stay?
It’s not a fad, but it hasn’t finished evolving yet. The who small pieces loosely joined makes it a platform where innovation and invention continue. I suspect that the it will become more streamlined, easier to understand and use.
What do the next three years hold in store?
I think that the aggregator is going to have to evolve. It needs to be as easy to use and intuitive as an internet browser. Someone in your classrooms today will do this.
Where is the boundary for students’ private postings and school concerns?
Well there isn’t a hard boundary, because this new information environment flows without containers. Attempting to put walls up between our classrooms and information makes no sense to our students. We need to invite the new information landscape (Web 2.0) into our classrooms and use these compelling nuances to power learning engines.
Information is property. When our students are passive learners, we deliver the information. they’re only responsibility is to consume the content. Now that they can and do engage in content conversations, their responsibility multiplies. This is why we need to define and describe the ethical use of information and make it an explicit part of our definition of literacy, and it needs to be integrated into teaching and learning the the same way that we integrate reading.
What are the challenges of sites like myspace.com? What are the positives of such sites?
As I’ve stated before there is much that is positive about MySpace in terms of generating learning through conversation. We need to learn how to integrate these qualities into the classroom.
How should districts balance security, community/moral/standards, social networking, and emerging, disruptive technologies?
We educate ourselves and engage in ongoing and casual conversations about the changing landscape. These issues are constantly melding. The only way that we will balance and harness these developments and challenges.
How can we stay on the cutting edge without too much bleeding?
Get lots of band-aids. We need to get use to it. We need to relax experiment, share, and continue to learn and grow. Kids who learn how to learn, and learn how to teach themselves, will be able to take care of themselves.
How can boards deal with the policy issues of new technologies?
Effect on future employment with “negative” social postings?
What about caching websites?
Do posts ever really go away?
Open questions from the audience.
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How can we stay on the cutting edge without too much bleeding?
I particularly like that question because so it explains much of the adverse reaction to blogs and wikis. Because of the turmoil surrounding education in this country, we’ve created a “no blood allowed” environment where filters are expected to work 100% of the time and breaches are shown on the evening news.
We’ve got to shift the actual environment and expectations of the classroom environment in order to make it conducive to integrating the new Internet. I’m glad you’re on the panel. Thank you for hitchikr!