Chapter 1 response blog

In chapter one of our book we read about the power of PLN’s or personal networks. The chapter discussed how technology is changing the way we learn things outside of a standard classroom and how students or educators can learn from other educators across the globe on the internet or other offline resources. It also discussed how teaching styles need to be changed in order to meet the children’s needs of learning about the positive outcomes of PLN’S. Doing this will expose students to the dangers of the World Wide Web or other offline resources, but us educators need to guide them into the right direction to be able use these PLN’s as useful, knowledgeable, tools. I looked at this text and found many things to be interesting, but I want to focus on the negative outcomes that all of this could bring about. That brings me to my first problem with this. I believe that giving the students freedom in the classroom to use the internet can create more problems than it being beneficial for students. If the students have laptops or tablets and the class is supposed to do an assignment or research a topic, I wonder how many people would actually do that thoroughly rather than being on Twitter or Facebook or etc. They discussed this problem in a section in the chapter how the memory is affected by having multiple tabs open and switching back and forth while trying to complete and assignment. I understand the benefits though, and they this could be a big step for schools around the U.S. or even the world but it will take a lot of time and effort for it to be successful.

            The second issue I have with this chapter is how they failed to bring up the negative health results that we have seen due to advances in technology. If we teach the students about all of these cool things about the internet and how to research this and that it seems to me as if they will spend even more time in front of the computer rather than exercising. I don’t think many of the things that will be done in most of the classrooms will be active exercises, but in most schools today they aren't active either. What I am saying is that when the students go home from school where they have spent all day learning about the powers of the internet, I believe they will want to spend more time of the internet to learn more about it. I’m not saying every student will do this, but I believe many will.

            Lastly, if educators can be accessible online then what is the point of me going to school to spend all this money and competing online with other educators all around the world? Teaching is already a competitive field and then a class from Erie, Pennsylvania is able to connect with a teacher somewhere in South Africa teaching biology, it seems it will get even more competitive than what it is now and that scares me. I know they said that there will still be schools because teachers need to teach the students about the positive and negative things from the internet but I am going to school to teach first graders about math, handwriting, and more, not about the benefits of the internet so they can connect with a teacher a couple states over or half way across the globe to learn about something I’m qualified to teach. It seems unfair to me and makes me really question if being a teacher is worth all the time and money. I know that there are a lot of steps that need to be taken before things will start to change, but we have seen how fast technology has jumped in the past half century, so it will be sooner than later I believe.