Comments from Chapter 1 of Richardson
What made you say "hummmmm"? What thoughts popped into your head as you read? This response is mostly up to you (sometimes i'll ask more specific things).
posted by Terry @ 12:14 PM
2 comments
2 Comments:
Chapter One Thoughts
Some people would say that I have a pessimistic side to my personality. I would disagree and call myself a realist. After reading chapter one I’m still not convinced that all students are Digital Natives with hypertext minds. And I’m not convinced that being a Digital Immigrant is such a bad thing. Sure we may use a phonebook, but the point is that we find what we’re looking for. What matters is that a need for information is acknowledged and an answer is discovered….no matter how it was discovered. What concerns me is the fact that not all students have access to computers and aren’t as savvy as they think they are when it comes to them. I see it every day and am not sure drastically changing our curriculum will help students become better readers, writers, editors and collaborators. They can’t even read and write using traditional media, how is letting them use a computer going to help? (Okay, maybe I am a pessimist). I do think teachers should learn about all these changes and attempt to become Digital Immigrants who at least speak the same language as the Natives. I just want to make sure my school’s Natives truly deserve the title before I become the Read/Write Web’s number one cheerleader!
I love history and I love technology. The introduction to this chapter put the two topics together... WWW started in 1989...web browsers in 1993...word of year for 2004 was Weblog...wikis in 2004...
The blog/wiki or read/write web has so many possiblities for our students. Many times what's laking in our writing instruction is PURPOSE and AUDIENCE. Our students are taught the writing and research process "because it makes them good writers" or "teaches them to be life-long learners"... but "why?" many students ask. Wikis and Blogs give students a real voice, a voice that will be heard by parents, peers, teachers and the world. It allows them to be heard, to share their thoughts and opinions, to publish their work to prove they are smart and to feel the importance of being published. It also gives them a reason to edit their grammar, puctuation and to think before they "speak".
I love the terms "digital native" vs. "digital immigrant" and can pretty much speak my students' language as I grew up along with the Apple company. My students are 11 years old and younger and I can still teach most of them about computers, etc. I find it exciting just how fast they learn and are ready to move on to the next level. Some of my fifth graders recently posted their reports on a wiki site. I was more excited than they were. They just took it for granted and thought the whole process quite natural. They felt good about seeing their stuff on the web, but not necessarily as excited as I was.
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