Alx Bal

Thank you Jason for this video.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MuaKMm28c5Q

It is so clear to me that children will become verse in a language we do not understand. I think youth already is operating in a completely different digital sensory world and can not operate in our current social reality in the same way. One moment that really struck me listening to Howard Rheingold talk about hi classroom was his showing footage of a student using facebook while the class goes on and Howard explaining that he is the A+ student….. I see this in my own classrooms, students interact and engage via the network much more freely then in the classroom. When I ask them to participate, they quiet down, if I ask via facebook, they come to life. If I ask them to comment on something orally, hey again quiet down, when we talk via second life they have lots to say…..  I heard a very interesting documentary on how thoughts are extension of our parents” voices acquired in early chiuldhood. Silence is a form of docility imposed by parents and the classroom. Youth is already verse in another form of communication, I just hope universities wake up soon and realize that high school has taken out a lot of the participatory aspect of class discussion out. So, students do not know how to participate in a classroom but as soon as we are  exploring a new space (virtual in our cases) the old rules are no longer holding them back…. They come alive……