Blog Post 5

In Don't teach your kids this stuff. Please? Scott Mcleod uses a satirical rant detailing the reasons why parents and teachers should "avoid" teaching young people how to use various technologies. He uses this rant as a way of illuminating the fact that learning these useful tools early on will give kids an advantage in the future. Scott Mcleod is a renowned professor on technology education at the University of Kentucky, and he is also the co-creator of the Did You Know? video series.

Dr. Mcleod makes some very good points in this blog post, specifically that learning how to use different technologies at a young age could become an advantage in the near future. It is important for kids to be exposed to a variety of technologies throughout their school years, but the fact is, most of the learning in this area will most likely take place away from school. As a future English teacher, I believe my responsibility is to prepare kids for college and future career work. If possible I would like to incorporate a few of Dr. Mcleod's ideas into my curriculum, but I still believe that these ideas come second to teaching the fundamentals of the English language.

The iSchool Initiative is a video created by Travis Allen, a high school senior at the time, and describes a way in which he believes the educational system can be completely revolutionized. He says that schools should completely abandon the use of all paper and textbooks and rely solely on the use of iTouches. He details the reduced cost that would occur if this were to happen by saying that the school system could save six-hundred dollars per student.

I have no clue if these figures are close to correct, but it does seem like a school system strapped for money may eventually resort to something similar to this. While I do believe it could possibly be an effective cost saving option, I do not think it should be considered as anything but a last resort. I applaud Travis Allen's creativity in creating this movement, but it just seems that students would miss out on many important aspects of learning. I do not believe that books are going to go out of fashion any time in the near future, and paper is still going to be used for many things in the near and distant future.

The performance of Lux Aurumque by a virtual choir of 185 people and conducted by Eric Whitacre was an extremely impressive video. The amount of time and effort put into an undertaking like this had to have been incredible. This is a case of the internet and technology being used for something that almost everyone can appreciate.

I've seen a couple of videos similar to this before, where someone compiles a video from many different sources and people who have never met. Lux Aurumque is not the type of music I would normally listen to, but in this setting it's far more enjoyable than any orchestra or choir performing it could be. It is a situation where you can not only appreciate the talent of the individuals but also of the person who compiled and pieced together all the videos. There is another video I found on YouTube where someone put together a compilation of thirty-six different YouTube artists and made a cover of Radiohead's Paranoid Android. That is one of my favorite videos on YouTube, and it is a unique use of technology.

Teaching In The 21st Century is a slideshow presentation created by Kevin Roberts that presents a great deal of information and ideas about teaching in the modern age. He shows numerous ways in which teachers can include technology in the classroom such as blogs, presentations, and research projects. He also makes a good point about how computers in the classroom are a temptation but don't cause problems themselves.

I liked several of the ideas presented here especially some of the homework research type projects. These could lead to some really interesting discussions in the classroom. Another point that I thought was a good idea, was to start by adding one technology based item to the curriculum. I think it is important to not inundate high school students with too much, especially in classes that require a great deal of writing and reading.