This is in response to being tagged by Alice Mercer. Alice Mercer has done some interesting work integrating technology into the Open Court program, putting class discussions and unit openers online in the form of podcasts…

For the uninitiated, Web 2.0 is a concept floating around the ed tech world. Web 2.0 refers to the web as an interactive, global community versus a static place where students go to research information posted by others.

My take on this is that the web has always been a place for interaction and being a part of a global community. My first experiences on the net were in discussion boards where I networked with fans of similar TV shows, movies, and plays as a kid. I don’t want to give away my age in this post but I turned 30 in March. By junior high I was a frequent online discussion board contributor and had my first web site right after high school. It is educators who have just realized the potential of the web to provide global audiences for student work. When I first learned what web 2.0 was I was disappointed because I was expecting it to be something new and really it was just a reference to tools I have been using for years though not necessarily in the classroom.

The creation of blogging platforms allows people who might not have had the technical knowledge to create a web site to create their own soapbox in a matter of minutes. (I use wordpress but there are many others). More importantly, there is much potential for students to reach larger audiences via posting their work on blogs. I don’t think this has even been fully realized yet. In many classrooms, writing is often done for an artificial audience i.e. the teacher and so students never really understand the reason for writing. I think there are many ways to overcome this by engaging with audiences outside of your classroom (pen pals, political figures, members of the community etc) but a blog allows you to do this perhaps more easily than before.

However you slice it, frequent discussions about the web 2.0 and now school 2.0 bring attention to these “new” technologies and underscore the fact that our schools are woefully inadequate for addressing the skills needed in the twenty-first century which I do agree with.

Here are the questions.

Is School 2.0 about technology or pedagogy (teaching methods)?
Undoubtedly it’s about pedagogy. The real art is in integrating technology into your curriculum whatever curriculum that happens to be. A lot of really technical people have no clue on how to use it in the classroom or hand that technology over to the students. On the other hand, I talk to a lot of teachers who do not consider themselves technically savvy who are able to wonderful work with technology because they’re just good teachers and know how to manage a classroom. They see the technology as a tool to support student learning and aren’t using it just for the sake of technology.

What were 1-3 things you had to”unlearn” to become an effective teacher?
“Silence is golden”
Students do learn best when they’re allowed to talk. I don’t even insist that they talk about what they’re working on anymore after observing that if you ask a group of teachers to work on a project, they never talk only about the project at hand and still they’re able to complete the project at hand. Why do we expect students to be able to work in total silence when most teachers are unable?

Did you learn these poor practices in your teacher preparation program, or somewhere else? If so, where?
Any poor practices were modeled by a few teachers who taught me through the years. I had, however, many excellent teachers who I credit with making me the teacher I am today.

Describe the philosophy of your teacher preparation program in 25 words or less.
All students can learn. If they’re not learning you haven’t figured out how to teach them yet.

What age/grade level do you teach? When did you attend school at that level?
I teach 2nd grade though I have a new job (more on that later). Since you already know how old I am I can tell you I was in 2nd grade in about 1984.

When were you in your teacher preparation program?
2001-2002