First things first.
I'm not trying to cast doubts about the educational concerns of the Web 2.0
in education evangelists. I'm sure that they really do want real learning (whatever
that is) to take place. We're in (have I written this already?) the same camp
(if not, to choose a perhaps rather threatening metaphor, the same boat - and
we won't link to a question of whether or not it's sinking). But it's precisely
for this reason that I'm convinced that we need to clearly state that our first
priority is to learning - to developing the skills that can allow our pupils to
function intelligently in an information-saturated society. Pupils who write blogs
may become engaged in investigating their environments, they may
ask more and better questions, they may discover that contributing and
sharing information to a like-minded group can be worthwhile and productive. But
it's certainly not a given, it's not something that happens automatically just
because we put some software, or a particular writing tool, in front of them.
Though we often read in these tomes to the wonders of the blog that the role of
the teacher has to change, very little about what those changes should be, or
what this new sort of teacher should be doing, seems to get written. More often
than not, it seems as though what the teachers are really being asked to do is
to simply keep out of the way - and experience has taught me that that's really
not the answer.
Go to: Perhaps nobody wants to admit it, or
Go to: A magic strand?