The blocking wars
admin, learning, web 2.0 November 4th, 2007
Many of us would have heard students complain that the sites they want access to are blocked by ‘big brother’. Content filtering is managed by systems, and, to date, most emergent stage of connectove technologies, teachers themselves are the source of the risk, due to their lack of development in this area. How can we unblock content and tools if the teachers responsible for the care of kids don’t understand their duty in this environment. Many teachers would have a greater sense of the risks from the shock jocks than from informed and participative investigation. If you were to ask a garden-variety teacher what strategies she would use in a classroom to manage the risks of online social networking what would her response be?
Teachers of this ilk will give tacit support to sytemic blocking if they remain disengaged fromt the tools that are making kids and systems vulnerable. Hysteria is no excuse for remaining ignorant. If there is no challenge, or alternative view, beaurocrats will make decisions to protect themselves, without regard for the effect on learning. We need to develop a professional, evidence based-response to these technologies (and the risks) so that we will not join the chorus of “the sky is falling!”.
Hands up if you have a Facebook account…
January 30th, 2008 at 7:58 am
You have made some very valuable points. Parents as well as teachers can be very hesitant to allow students to access certain resources because they have seen news stories about terrible things that have happened to children as a result of their online activity. As is the case with most things in life, being uniformed about something and basing ideals on what you see on television is ignorant. Hopefully as people become more informed, they will open their minds to the potential that certain internet resources contain. Teachers having an open mind to new technologies are essential to ensure that students receive educational experiences which will prepare them for the advanced world they will be living in.
January 31st, 2008 at 4:15 am
I agree with what Steph is saying. I think that teachers need to become more aware of sites that students are involved in so that they can educate them on how to properly participate in these new technologies. If teachers are more informed, they can ensure that students are more informed and we will not need to worry so much about blocking certain internet content.
January 31st, 2008 at 11:45 am
Interesting blog…
I can understand having ‘big brother’ watching over us and I totally agree with Steph that we as educators should be hesistant about allowing students to access certain resources but what about teachers in school? Maybe I’m getting off-topic here but my network doesn’t allow me to access certain sites in school where I find it to very relevant to education. But back to the point, students not only need to be more informed about technology but they also need to learn the rules of the internet, first and foremost. Such as never revealing your identity to anyone online
February 5th, 2008 at 4:38 am
Prior to becoming a teacher/librarian, I too though that filtering was all about “big brother” and did not agree at all with filtering. After teaching for 5 years and seeing how children can easily get into inappropriate sites, I feel that there is a need for filtering, but there is also should be more internet education for students. I saw an excellent presentation that schools could use. If you go to http://www.nyfinestspeakers.com/ you can find out more information.