Web 2.0 Text Chapter 9

As I review my notes from this chapter on New Schools I see many things that I've already touched on in previous chapters. Among them:

- The idea of Education web based programs like Ebay or Amazon. Excellent idea. Again, they had better be as neat and user friendly for both the educator and the student or they won't fly. Might I suggest reviewing Google and FaceBook? We should learn from our competitors.

- Teachers picking their own materials custom fit for each student instead of textbooks as mentioned on page 181 is a wonderful idea. However without some help this is a lofty goal. The information overload is wild. I can tell by reading some of the comments on this blog that we can feel it even trying to pull information out on this class for ourselves alone. Educators are so busy with things that have nothing to do with actual academics, our educational system will really need to figure out how to facilitate this for it to happen.

- Hear, Hear! on the software sitting in cabinets and used only on school computers. Let's make learning available everywhere.

I really liked both the boxes on pages 184-186:
- Creators in the Classroom by Jeff Utecht. I've mentioned in numerous ways how we're afraid of the social web, but that our students already live in it. I really don't think being the Ostrich and putting our heads in the sand is going to make it go away!
- Learning from Games by David Warlick. First, let me state that I am not either a parent or an educator who thinks that everything a kid should do has to be fun and entertaining. I actually think that's a really dangerous viewpoint and was afraid that was where this article was going, but it wasn't. One thing I liked is the time invested to increase levels. The rewards and personal investment - how can we use that in education? Also I was really struck with the part on Dependability. How many times have you seen kids work and work to find the "secret" in the game because they know that a "secret" does exist for that level? But the same kid gives up easily on the math problem or figuring out the theme in a work of literature? They don't have the "...sense that the answer is always close by; that it merely means turning over the right stone..." (page 186.) Really well stated and thought provoking.