Social Networking isnt just for kids

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Social Networking isnt just for kids!

• Tim Hawes
• Vice Principal/Assistant IT Manager
• Ottawa-Carleton

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• Three reasons why this topic is important to me
• Philosophical
• Personal
• Practical

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What makes me loose sleep at night (Philosophic
al)

• Im nervous about web 2.0 and what is means for
  education but not for the reasons you might
  think
• Media coverage of social networking is almost
  exclusively fear-mongering
• Despite efforts to educate teens about how to
  safely exist online, most districts (including my
  own) block all access to social networking/media
  sites
• Warning Blatant generalization ?Teachers (and
  adults in general) are completely disconnected
  from the emerging online participatory culture
• While our students are increasingly engaging more
  and more in this new culture, they are doing it
  in the absence of any mature influences

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Web 2.0 Technology is different today

• The Internet today is very different from the
  place we first began to explore together with our
  students in the late-90s
• See
• http//youtube.com/watch?v6gmP4nk0EOE
• Play

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Beyond the Technology - Web 2.0 different from
Web 1.0?
Then
Now

• mid/late 90s most teachers and students first
  accessed the web
• Most experienced it first at school
• High startup costs limited teen access to
  emerging technologies
• Adults and teens learned their way together

• Access nearly ubiquitous
• Most new online tools tried first at home
• Virtually free no barrier to adoption
• Teens operating in isolation

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If MySpace were a country
If MySpace were a country, it would be the 11th
largest in the world (between Japan and Mexico)
8th largest, between Russia and Nigeria
Are you comfortable with your kids growing up
in a country without any teachers?
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If MySpace were a country

MySpace gt70 3.2051-70 0.4841-50
0.48 31-40 1.3422-30 8.4918-21
22.80 14-17 60.01
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Web 2.0 Participatory Culture

• "While to adults the Internet primarily means the
  world wide web, for children it means email,
  chat, games-- and here they are already content
  producers. Too often neglected, except as a
  source of risk, these communication and
  entertainment focused activities, by contrast
  with the information-focused uses at the centre
  of public and policy agendas, are driving
  emerging media literacy. Through such uses,
  children are most engaged-- multi-tasking,
  becoming proficient at navigation and maneuver so
  as to win, judging their participation and that
  of others, etc.... In terms of personal
  development, identity, expression and their
  social consequences-- participation, social
  capital, civic culture- these are the activities
  that serve to network today's younger
  generation." -- Sonia Livingstone.

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Participatory Culture

• Lets define participatory culture as one
• With relatively low barriers to artistic
  expression and civic engagement
• With strong support for creating and sharing
  one's creations with other.
• With some type of informal mentorship whereby
  what is known by the most experienced is passed
  along to novices
• Where members believe that their contributions
  matter
• Where members feel some degree of social
  connection with one another (at the least they
  care what other people think about what they have
  created).
• Not every member must contribute, but all must
  believe they are free to contribute when ready
  and that what they contribute will be
  appropriately valued.

http//henryjenkins.org/2006/10/confronting_the_ch
allenges_of.html
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Participatory Culture

• Doesnt that sound like it describes an ideal
  classroom?
• Doesnt it also sound a lot like YouTube and
  Flickr and MySpace?

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(No Transcript)
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Teaching Social Network skills

• If there is a grain of truth in this, then what
  are we to do?
• How should we respond as educators?
• Do we need to teach social networking?
• Everything I need to know if life I learned from
  watching Sesame Street
• (see http//youtube.com/watch?vZ4VNMERVsC4)
• PLAY

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Teaching Social Network skills

• Can we ever really teach something we havent
  experienced ourselves?

http//farm1.static.flickr.com/213/471164290_18be6
b3bbf.jpg?v0
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What to do

• TIME Magazine this year named You the person of
  the Year.

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What to do

• I dont always recommend running out and becoming
  an active MySpacer

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Getting Your Hands Dirty

• Commun-IT.org

• A social network just for us
• A chance to experience social learning and build
  an online professional learning community
• Start to develop an independent community voice
  for those of us who are involved in ICT and
  eLearning
• 2 birds, one stone engage in participatory
  culture and meaningful PD at the same time

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Practical Reasons

• Like a lot of educators, Im sometimes frustrated
  by the slow pace of real educational reform
• In the Tipping Point (2000), Gladwell pointed to
  networks as being one of the pivot factors in
  facilitating change
• Connectors key players who link others
• Mavens gurus with vital information
• Salesmen persuaders
• Educational theorists (George Siemens, Steven
  Downes, others) have expressed the same vision of
  connected or Connectivist learning

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Practical Reasons

• Each of us (in our own districts) is working in
  isolation
• Even if we are fortunate to be among the select
  few who travel frequently, attend conferences
  we still work far too often on our own
• Is it an coincidence that schools and prisons
  look alike?

http//farm1.static.flickr.com/2/1907910_fb8151177
1.jpg?v0
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Personal Reasons

• Our recent experiences (OCDSB) have forced us to
  come to terms with the fact that we cant and
  shouldnt try to do it on our own
• Wealth of resources for ICT integration, but
  impossible to maintain and keep fresh on our own
• We needed to take a more open approach and
  collaborate with others

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Recommended Readings

• PEW Internet Social Networking and
  Teenshttp//www.pewinternet.org/PPF/r/198/report_
  display.asp
• George Siemens, Learning In Sync With
  Lifehttp//www.elearnspace.org/Articles/google_wh
  itepaper.pdf
• Australian Flexible Learning FrameworkNetworks,
  Connections and Community Learning with Social
  Softwarehttp//www.flexiblelearning.net.au/flx/go
  /pid/377