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Massachusetts Computer Using Educators
COPYRIGHT: ©2008 by the Massachusetts Computer Using Educators, Inc. All rights reserved. Permission tocopy most or part of this material is granted provided thecopies are not made or distributed for direct commercialadvantage. Title of publication and its date, author, andnotice that copying is by permission of MassCUE mustbe given. Several articles contained in this issue arecopyrighted by the author or another publication. Please
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We are currently soliciting submissions for our Spring2008 issue of on Cue. We welcome submissions on alltopics related to instructional technology. Submissionsmay include action research, interviews, opinion pieces,and articles that contribute to a greater understanding of the integration of technology into all levels of education.Deadline for submissions:
March 15, 2008.
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onCue
, s/he should make the managing editor aware of this.The article will not be reviewed by the editorial committeeuntil the author has gained copyright permission from theoriginal journal for it to be republished.Opinions expressed by the authors are not necessarilythose of the journal or publisher. Mention of products bytrade name in editorial matter or advertisements in noway constitutes endorsements by MassCUE.Editorial Policy: The editor reserves the right to rewriteor paraphrase any submitted article. Email articles to<masscue@masscue.org>.
on Cue
is published 3 times a year.
collaborating with peers. Their Inter-
net searches are not ltered. In fact, as
I write this, my high school age son,Dan, is in the basement with six of hisfriends playing video games with otherpeople from around the world. Danhas the latest Internet video game tech-
nology, and his friends have ocked to
our house to connect with the world.They are operating in multiple win-dows, making mapping strategies,making collaborative and individualdecisions, and communicating face-to-face and across the Web. The capacityof the game is 32 simultaneous users.It is approaching 11 P.M. and I willhave to ask them to return to their ownhomes soon.If it were only about games, wecould probably ignore much of whatthe Internet has to offer. However,as Thomas Friedman so articulatelydescribed in his book,
The World IsFlat,
connections around the world aretransforming developing countries intohotbeds of engineering and innovation.Those who have the ability to managemassive amounts of information andassemble teams of high-performingworkers, regardless of time zones, willhave capacity to contribute more tosociety.Our students deserve our thought-ful and balanced approach to tappingthe Web for their learning. They needus to be role models. We must learnmore about why they are so motivatedto connect with people around theworld. As many schools are choosingto “protect” students from the outsideworld, students are in turn pushingthe limits. They are creating three-dimensional virtual models, usingtools like MySpace to collaborativelyraise money for worthy charities, andteaching each other using podcastsand screencasts. But as we all know,for as many inspiring stories as thereare, there are just as many stories, and
Fear and Control
Continued from page 1.
more, of students actively plagiarizingthe work of others, losing ownershipof content they place on MySpace, andunknowingly putting themselves atrisk. The decision not to educate ourstudents in this new media is a danger-ous one.After more than 40 years of dominance, the Internet has replacedtelevision as the primary media forpresidential candidates to raise moneyand broadcast their messages. The useof blogs, YouTube videos, podcasts,and RSS feeds have become the foun-dation strategy of how we elect people
to the highest ofce in the land. Yet,
if we do not teach our students how tothink critically about this media, theywill not have the ability to separatethe message from the medium. In thisregard it is a very dangerous time.It is also a very exciting time.Like the presidential candidates, edu-cators can harness the power of theInternet to get their message out andto empower students to become moreactively involved in managing theirown learning. We can teach studentscritical thinking and how to be so-cially responsible when they use theInternet to have a globally connectedvoice. For example, if my son weregiven the chance to debate studentsin England about the origins of theAmerican Revolution and his teacherwere to record and podcast the de-bate across iTunes, he would likelybe very motivated to prepare for thisauthentic audience—perhaps muchmore motivated than preparing for atest on the same subject next Friday.As soon as that podcast is posted iniTunes, he would download it to hisiPod for his personal review. Today inmany schools, iTunes and global com-munication tools are blocked, makingthis kind of rigorous and motivatingassignment impossible.While some third world countriesare tapping into every tool they canget their hands on, the strategy in theUnited States remains mired in a pol-icy of control. The gap between whatsome of our students do at home andschool is widening. We should be feel-ing a sense of urgency to tap the toolsour students love to use.
st
This is an excerpt from Alan Novem-ber’s upcoming book
Webliteracy forEducators
being published by CorwinPress in 2008. We encourage you to join us at the Building Learning Com-munities conference where you’ll meet leading-edge thinkers, international leaders in education, and colleagues from around the world. This year’sconference will be held from July14th-18th at the Boston Newton Mar-riott and features hands-on pre-con- ference workshops, keynotes, and over90 main session workshops.,For more information, visit
http:// www.novemberlearning.com/blc
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