Week 7
I have chosen to focus on the Jenkins piece for my final blog. When thinking about teaching the responsible use of technology, three things need to be examined. Access, transparency, and ethics are of major concern to teachers who wish to introduce the use of technology into their classrooms. By access, Jenkins means who can get a hold of the technology and how easily? The technology referred to here is in its most basic sense, a computer and internet access. Transparency refers to a student’s ability to transfer what they find in the technology to reality – differentiating between truth and fiction. Finally, the ethics come into play when outsiders have access to the same technology and can interact with a student. Who chaperones this interaction?
I believe that all three are good points and need to be thoughtfully addressed before a teacher introduces this technology into her classroom. Perhaps most salient is the ethics point. I believe that in school settings, types of technology such as blogs or wikis should be closed to the public and only permit members of the school community to enter.
In my experience IMing with a 6th grade class, the program used required membership. Therefore, outsiders could not join a conversation with a student. This is, I believe, an appropriate use of technology.
Here is a link to a page that talks about different ways to integrate Wiki into instruction in the classroom: http://www.wikiineducation.com/display/ikiw/The+LTC+Wiki+-+Experiences+with+Integrating+a+Wiki+in+Instruction