Web 2.0: Connecting People
From Shifted Learning
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Contents |
[edit] Us
Me. Teacher -> Technology Guy -> Blogger - > Instructional Technology Guy -> Parent -> Writer
You.
[edit] What is It?
Web 1.0: Connecting things.
Web 2.0: Connecting people.
[edit] Different Path
Everybody else is covering the tools. See them.
I'm going to hit you at...
- 50,000 ft with globalization
- 30,000 ft with creativity in education
- 10,000 ft with some things you can do to connect to other educators around these ideas
[edit] Expressive Capital
Image:Kids Connected.jpg Hugh MacLeod is a marketer, a writer, and a cartoonist. He specializes in marketing hand-made suits, South African wine, and Microsoft. Hugh is a model of what it will take for our students to succeed.
Among Hugh's gems is a piece called "Expressive Capital"
- First we had human capital. You! There! Go to the next village and kill everybody because I’m the chief of this village and I say so etc.
- Then came physical capital. Land, property, factories etc.
- Then came financial capital. Money, credit, dollars etc.
- Then came intellectual capital. Our products are better than yours because our we are smarter than you etc.
- Then came emotional capital. People love our product more than they love our competitor’s product etc.
- Expressive capital. Our products find and/or express meaning, narrative, metaphor, purpose, explanation and relevance in their own lives better than yours.
Take what we are learning about globalization in the 21st century. Others have quickly surpassed our ability to compete in the domains of human, physical, and financial capital. Leaders continue to focus on metrics comparing where US students match "intellectually" compared to international students. "How are our widgets compared to theirs?" "21st century leaders" know this is the wrong battle. They realize that successful "21st century business" stopped focusing on "my widgets vs. their widgets" and refocused on being emotionally and expressively rich. They stopped trying to improve Foldgers and got on with building Starbucks.
Marketers know that establishing a successful "21st century brand" involves tapping people's emotional and expressive sides. Foldgers vs. Starbucks. How are schools meeting student's emotional and expressive needs? No doubt we are still chasing a benchmark of "intellectual capital" as our "financial, physical, and human capital" continue to dwindle. How are we working to make learning more relevant to students? Is learning today like Foldgers or more like Starbucks
Tough Choices or Tough Times The New Commission on Skills and the American Workforce
[edit] Creativity & Expression
Do Schools Kill Creativity? Sir Ken Robinson TED Talks
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iG9CE55wbtY
[edit] Message
Communication. It's happening in very different ways. Blogs, wikis, text messaging, etc. How are these impacting you personally? Professionally?
Connection. The World is Flat, etc.
Creativity. Others countries will capitalize on the physical, human, financial, and intellectual capital. Differentiate by focusing on the emotional and expressive capital.
[edit] Action Items
Image:Boy Book.jpg 1. Question.
Is it Okay to Be a Technologically Illiterate Teacher?
"If a teacher today is not technologically literate - and is unwilling to make the effort to learn more - it's equivalent to a teacher 30 years ago who didn't know how to read and write."
2. Learn.
Listen. Download a copy of iTunes and begin exploring the content available in the podcast section of iTunes. I highly suggest feeding yourself yourself with a few of the following...
Read. Support Blogging is a great resources for educators to dip their toes into the edublogosphere and see how people are connecting.
Write. Grab a blog. Learn it for yourself.
Connect. Twitter is where things are getting creatively interesting in the educational world these days. Twitter for Newbies is my little tutorial for getting started.
Conference.
- WEMTA 2008 Milwaukee, WI, April 6th - April 8th
- NECC 2008 San Antonio, TX, June 29th - July 2nd
Participate. OpenPD Free professional development community for teachers around Web 2.0 tools and ideas.
3. Be relevant.
Educating the Net Generation - Educause
"The Net Generation has grown up with information technology. The aptitudes, attitudes, expectations, and learning styles of Net Gen students reflect the environment in which they were raised—one that is decidedly different from that which existed when faculty and administrators were growing up. This collection explores the Net Gen and the implications for institutions in areas such as teaching, service, learning space design, faculty development, and curriculum."
