Week 11: Making Connections

This week I found myself recognizing and weaving new insights into Web 2.0 technologies, and technology assisted education into other facets of life and education. The day before the presidential elections, an article in Monday's New York Times (11/3/2008) examined Campaigns in a Web 2.0 World. The following night we saw a new president elected, probably in no small part, because of the organizing, communication, and collaboration skills he flexed through this technology. Three days later (11/7/2008) the Times reported on a "Web 2.o Summit" with the headline, "Al Gore and the Purpose-Driven Web". Is it just coincidence that these articles came out around the same time we've been reading about "Democratization of the Web" with Web 2.0? Or am I just taking notice? Either way, the transformative nature is coming to my attention.

Not to be outdone, the latest edition of Education Week's Magazine, Digital Directions, carried an article entitled, "Disruptive Innovation" repoprting on author Clayton Christensen's prediction that the rate of online high school courses will grow exponentially over the next 11 years, from low single digits now, to over 50% by 2019, transforming, who, where, and how teaching and learning takes place over the next decade.

Beginning this week, a small non-profit organization I work with is trying out these technologies as well, with a collaborative message board.

So clearly Web 2.0 is getting hyped-up these days. How real and deep the penetration will be in transforming social structures has yet to be answered, but the potential seems to evident.

Teaching with technology is weaving itself in an interesting way in my course requirements this week as well. I had proposed an interactive computer based simulation as a component of a student's behavioral intervention plan for a course in Applied Research in Behavior Management. The teacher requested that instead, I involve the whole class in the simulation based lesson, familiarizing him with the tools as well. Well, my Teaching Science to Adolescents course requires that I teach a lesson anyway, so I agreed. The lesson I plan to give next week integrates an interactive computer simulation lesson into a non-Regents high school science course. The school still relegates instruction like this to "the computer lab", whereas I would prefer to integrate the technology directly into the classroom. Nevertheless, I am looking forward to the challenge.

Separately, while preparing to deliver a brief on-line lesson for this course, I sensed that I've got the gist of using constructivist principles in the lesson. That lesson is scheduled for later this month. We'll see how it goes.

Finally, one of the videos scheduled for this week touched briefly on the dark side of the proliferation Web 2.o, including the implications for privacy. This issue was echoed in two personal conversations I had as well. One was with an instructor. The other was with a friend. Tonight marks the 70th anniversary of Kristallnacht. Personal experiences of this period of history reach deep into a family's and a people's history. Some believe such stories need to be shared with many. Others have reservations. Clearly the power to easily publish oneself and others calls for an extraordinary level of sensitivity and judgement. I'm not convinced our society is there.