http://www.pewinternet.org/Reports/2002/The-Digital-Disconnect-The-widening-gap-between-Internetsavvy-students-and-their-schools.aspx
Many schools and teachers have not yet recognized—much less responded to—the new ways students communicate and access information over the Internet. Students report that there is a substantial disconnect between how they use the Internet for school and how they use the Internet during the school day and under teacher direction. For the most part, students’ educational use of the Internet occurs outside of the school day, outside of the school building, outside the direction of their teachers. While there are a variety of pressures, concerns, and outright challenges in providing Internet access to teachers and students at school, students perceive this disconnect to be the result of school administrators setting the tone for use at school, the wide variation in teacher policies regarding Internet use in and for class and poor and uninspiring quality of Internet-based assignments. Students say they face several roadblocks when it comes to using the Internet at schools.
Do you feel that the internet is used effectivly at schools? What are some ways to make using the internet acceptable in schools at the same time keeping the students attentive to learning?
I know that in my school district a lot of sites are blocked as well as personal email. Teachers and students cannot check their gmail, aol, yahoo or any other account. As a teacher it is so frustrating when I try to see a site and I am unable to. I do understand why this is done. I could see that its a way to ensure that we do our doing what we are supposed instead of on our favorite social network. I do know that teachers do use the internet affectively when using educational sites. I think at some point though, its not such a bad thing to be unpluged. The students are usually so distracted by these things that its not such a bad thing to not let them use them in school all the time.
ReplyDeleteActually, I totally agree with how the students perceive internet usage in school. Schools block so many things that really can be useful for students. One thing many administrators don't see clearly, is the more you let the students use a particular site in class for example FACEBOOK,it will fall into extinction. When they are told to go on FACEBOOK rather than doing so on their own, it will become a faded distraction/stimuli. Just think about a toy, If your mom gave you the same toy every time you asked for a toy you would become sick of that toy and want something else to play with. It's the same idea.
ReplyDeleteAt AHA, the students have been required to buy a laptop and bring it to all classes for several years. Under our previous Director of Technology, the students were able to work around the blocked sites. This was very apparent to the staff when a student accidentally included the dean of students in an emial asking "Yo, who has a proxy?" while she was supposed to be taking notes in a class. As teachers, we would have to circulate around the room to make sure the girls weren't shopping or on ITunes. Our new Director of Tech has purchased a much more sophisticated filtering system which seems to work well so far. I think websites are getting on the bandwagon too: My students were blocked from Glogster, but when I asked it to be unblocked, I was told they could access an ed version of Glogster.
ReplyDeleteI feel that currently the internet is not being used effectively in schools. Most instructors know that the students use the internet on a daily basis so they must know how to navigate it. This is the problem. We are not teaching the students about the internet. It is their first source whenever they need to write a paper, however once they type a key word into Google they are lost. Students should learn how to embrace and control the amount of information at their fingertips. We have so much technology however we are still using the simple principle of survival of the fittest when it comes to the "wild wild west" style of the internet.
ReplyDeletei agree that the internet is not being used in the most effective ways in school. As mentioned above, blocking of many sites presents significant obstacles to teachers and how they can use the internet in the classroom. Students need a little freedom to operate, as do the teachers. For example, Youtube is an excellent Web 2.0 technology but is blocked in many schools. As Pam mentioned, they had to circulate the room to keep the students on task or monitor them. There is absolutely no problem with that. I think the common misconception of technology/internet use in the classroom is that it is hands-off for teachers. Student behavior will always have to be monitored and disciplined accordingly. Therefore, given the right opportunities to use the internet, students can succeed, but teachers must be willing to monitor correctly by circulating or even standing in the back of the room so they can see everyone's monitors.
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