Welcome to the Redback Project….
A self paced journey of discovery of 21st Century tools specifically designed specifically for Victorian Educators, but potentially relevant to any teacher.
Originally developed by Helene Bowers for the staff at the Public Library of Charlotte and Mecklenburg County in August 2006 the Learning 2.0 project participants created blogs and explored a wide range of Web 2.0 learning tools, based on completing 23 things . The aim was to provide their staff with a better knowledge of web 2.0 tools which would be useful for working in libraries. I have recreated the project to fit better into the Victorian education sector, focussing on tools that are useful and relevant, available, as well as a bit of fun.
Many of you may be thinking, “What is Web 2.0″ and “Why change how we have taught for the past 5, 10, 20 or more years?”. Well, we are living in the 21st Century, and it is a very different world our children are growing up in, than what we grew up in. In Victorian government schools we need to prepare for the eventual deployment of the Ultranet (looking at term 3 2010 at this point in time), a government provided Learning Management System designed to encompass all areas of teaching, learning, assessment and reporting. This will require a huge shift in the way many teachers work, so by developing 21stC skills with Web 2.0 I am hoping we will have more teachers better prepared for its implementation.
The Potential
Technology today has the potential to make the world a much smaller place. We can talk in real time with people on the other side of the world in video conferences through instant messenger programs, sharing ideas with the world.
The nature of the web 2.0 beast is about a sharing community – share and share alike, Creative Commons licensing, Open source software, sharing images, ideas, concepts thoughts on blogs, videos, podcasts and wikis. This project was developed in the US, but through creative commons licensing, we are all able to develop and share in the project, giving credit to those who created it.
The times are a changing, one of the quotes I stumbled upon during my research was from Dale Spender
“In the past, schools have been places of quiet and orderly process; (the most common statement that teachers have made is ‘Be quiet and get on with your work’.) But today’s digital generation has developed the necessary noisy, interactive, and collaborative skills — they have acquired sophisticated scanning and evaluating processes, along with great reflexes and fast response times – which are the basics of the digital literacies.
The print generation can learn from the digital.”
We need to support and develop these skills in our classrooms to ensure our students have the required digital literacies to be successful in the digital age.
The Reasons
Our students are heading into a world like no other… in The video “Shift Happens” there were comments that our kids have been exposed to more information in the past 5 years than their grandparents were in their whole lives… amazing potential, and we have to ask ourselves are we doing justice to the kids by keeping the same way of teaching them? Are they going to be able to process that information effectively? What do we have to learn to be able to enrich the future lives of our students and give them the skills to meet the challenges they will face? We have to be able to empower them to use the tools, beyond MS Office and the internet search engines, techology today is so much more.
The video by Karl Fisch and Scott McLeod, below, has a lot of relevant points, even though its focus is on US students, it is still very relevant to us. Watch the video “Shift Happens“. How are we going to support our students in embracing this shift?
To be able to best prepare our students, we need to develop an understanding of the tools available, and begin to embed them in everyday life to help US to cope with the amount of information out there.
Back to the original question What is Web 2.0? Check out this video on Teachertube for an overview Web 2.0
Michael Wesch’s The Machine is us/ing us gives us more food for thought about the world our children are going to be a part of, here is the link.
Why take on this challenge? We encourage developing Lifelong learning in our students, so this is a course we should also be travelling.
Take a look at this NZ educator who has recorded some views about how we can and should be using new and emerging technologies, web 2.0 tools in the classrooms. Educators as Professional Learners – from Teachertube
The PLCMC project developed a very insightful tutorial which explores what is needed to become and effective lifelong learner HERE.
And if developing your knowledge of 21Century skills wasn’t enough of a hook for you to become involved in this project it also covers the standards required by VIT for Professional Learning.
It may at times feel like a huge learning curve, but it will give you the skills and knowledge to handle the information available, embedding best practice into your everyday teaching.
Good luck on your journey
I would love to hear your feedback