Week Eight Reflections

LM_NET

            There has been a big discussion on LM_NET this past week (10-02 to 10-05) about whether or not to teach students about Wikipedia during the research process.  On the one hand, traditional researchers don’t think teaching students about Wikipedia is worth anything.  They claim it is an unreliable source and if we teach students about it then that will only encourage them to use it.  On the other hand, some teachers believe in teaching it since they know students will use it no matter what so they might as well be informed on how to use it.  If a student knows how to get what they need from Wikipedia then they can move on to a reliable resource. I for one believe in this approach.  Students need to be informed on all methods of research.

            Jaclyn Adler, a 7-12 Teacher Librarian from Salem CSD, writes to the netters about kids wanting books from displays that she has created.  She is frustrated by taking the books down, since then there wouldn’t be a display left. Many encouraged her to go ahead and let students check out the books since that is what the display is for.  Some came up with some excellent solutions like creating dummy display books by scanning the covers and setting those up in the display.  I really enjoyed this idea and I think I will use it to advertise books in my own classroom.

 

Blogs

            In his blog, “Two Cents Worth”, David Warlick writes on August 30^th, 2009 about how little students now value history or geography.  He makes some very valid points about how students now don’t learn because “we tell them” or even if we threaten that it “will be on the test”.  He instead claims that they learn out of necessity and they view learning as a tool.  Just like in their video games, they obtain information to use it for something they need.  By presenting education this way, students will be more receptive to the learning process.  I completely agree.  Students need learning to be authentic and they need to understand the purpose behind it.  It has to be valuable to them or it won’t stick with them. Further proof that teaching solely from a textbook is useless to students.

            Doug Johnson wrote on September 16^th in his “Blue Skunk” blog about the different options for sharing and collaborative editing.  He points out that sometime too many options can be overwhelming and it’s important to know your options and chose the best one to fit your needs.  He covers some of the pros and cons of different applications including: email, Lodestar, rSchools today, Google Apps, and even wikis.  The list gives different ideas for how to use these applications.  Some of them I haven’t even heard of before!