Blogs will change your classroom

The May 2nd cover story of BusinessWeek magazine was titled, “Blogs Will Change Your Business.” The end of the tagline is particularly eye catching: “Catch up…or catch you later.”

This article could easily be retitled, “Blogs will change your classroom.” And subtitled, “Podcasts will change your classroom.”

Think I’m exaggerating? Check out the New York Times article today, “New Tools: Blogs, Podcasts and Virtual Classrooms.” (Use bugmenot if you’re asked to register and don’t want to or link to a PDF version.) In addition to discussing podcasting with Bob Sprankle’s Elementary Students (Room 208 podcast) the article discusses the ways in which innovative, creative educational uses of technology (like blogging and podcasting) are really at cross purposes with the test-centric mentality of NCLB and our current educational policies at the national and many state levels.

This fits right in with what I blogged about earlier this week, concerning podcasting and “sustaining” versus “disruptive technologies.”

Bob Sprankle (the main teacher featured in the NYT article) has the following post on his blog for today, “Hello Students! You are in today’s New York Times!” How cool is that?!

The NYT article also mentions Skype, and the educational possibilities it offers. Sad thing is, many school district IT departments have already or likely will soon be blocking firewall ports to shut down / prevent Skype use by students and teachers. If so, that is sad but expected. More evidence we are living in an era marked by lines described well in Virginia Postrel’s book, “The Future and Its Enemies.”

Which side of this fight are you on?

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On this day..