Leah Dewhurst’s Weblog

Due to PTC’s I was unable to attend Tuesday’s session with Darcy Norman and Brian Lamb.   As I was listening to the recording the saying ”you learn something new each day” held true once again.  I have heard the word folksonomy many times in this course and it has finally made some sense now.  The simple definition: how people sort things out makes a whole lot of sense now.  I found this great picture that sums up folksonomy, courtesy of Flikr.

Another topic that interested me was about choice fatigue ( I think that’s the perfect word for it)  I always find myself with that problem.  It is hard to leave a tool for something else.  However I think this course has open me up  to the many different tools available through the web.  The blog “50 Ways to Tell A Story” showing the different tools that could be used, is a great example of what can be done.  Not necessarily so we need to do all 50 ways, but it gives us choices. All the new tools are not for everyone. What is good and what works for me, doesn’t necessarily work for the next person.  There are an abundance of tools , and again we as educators need to “play” around with them to suit our needs and the needs of our class. 

Today in the news a 41 year old man was charged with abduction, when police found him with a 14 year old girl. They had met on a chat site on the internet. The girl was voluntarily running away with this man.

The key to this situation: parental education and involvement. The RCMP had noted that parents need to be educated about the internet and need to be aware of what their children are doing. If you need to know whats available or what kids are into these days,  ask teenagers whats on the internet, they will gladly tell. Every generation seems to know more and more about the different tools on the web. Cindy has created a great parental wiki for our final project with information for parents. Even though, we have seen less or have heard less of these certain types of cases, the need is still there to educate the children about internet safety.

This situation reminded me of the parental concerns that I had when I set up my classroom blog. One of the comments was, “I teach my children not to talk to strangers and now you (the teacher)  says it’s ok.”  This conversation was in regards to blogging with U of R students.  I responded by saying this type of blogging is very controlled.  I have personally gone to meet with the students and they all have had criminal record checks.  The purpose of the U of R students blogging with my students was to help with their writing and to give them an audience.  I have also educated my students about talking to others, that we don’t give out any personal information, etc.  I can definitely see where parents are coming from and the key to address some of these issues is through education.