VSTE 2007–Day 1 Reflections
At VSTE 2007’s first day, I participated in three sessions.
- Student Blogging by Kimberly Berry. Kimberly is my colleague in Goochland and shared her experiences blogging with seventh graders at Goochland Middle School. The presentation was among the first of the conference, and audience members revealed some concern for student blogging: security, control, and what I saw–a fear about what kids might write. One guy told me his concern was that students could use the blogging platform to communicate about gang violence. The obvious answer to that is… maybe not to give blogs to these kids. But then again–are we adequately preparing kids for the future if we are afraid of letting them use communications tools to learn? This is a tough issue that will likely take me a longer time to digest and come to grips with. More philosophizing required.
- Whospace? by Cammarano, Horney, and Locher. These three did a good job at showing some Web 2.0 technologies and how they’re exploring them in their school divisions. Their resources are found online at pbwiki. I liked this session as it challenged some assumptions I have. One of the presenters suggested we use MySpace in the classroom. I asked him “Have you done this?” No. They had not. In fact, it was blocked at their schools. It was a touchy subject. Some folks spoke up. “As a parent, I don’t want you introducing this to my kid.” The show ended with a shabby introduction to Second Life. They described it as a game. I don’t treat it as a game, I disagree with this label. It’s an online environment. And I currently question its use in schools… I think this environment has potential, but I am not quite sure it’s there yet. They said as much, but it felt like a tack-on at the end of an otherwise interesting presentation.
- Keynote with Marc Prensky. You can read some of Mr. Prensky’s writings online. I hope to get his book. He was entertaining, a good speaker, and I enjoyed his message. Some of the practical means to which he suggests we change need flushing out, but he admitted as much it’s not easy.
February 27th, 2007 at 9:18 am
John… I am going to buy Prensky’s books for us. As you know Kim Berry already is doing a some “games” with Quia, http://www.quia.com/ and believes having students create games sounds exciting. I do think there is a place for games and play and “second world” model activities and simulations…. all this works to help kids be creative and “higher level” thinkers. Actually, the discussion we can have based on Marc Prensky’s presentation will move us forward with the Web 2.0 world. One thing is for administrators to trust teachers and to allow the freedom to fail. Most often success will come, perhaps not on the first try, but subsequently as teacher and students learn together.