Digi Teen

By

Kenneth Jones

 

As an 8th grade language arts teacher working to reach and teach modern, global communication skills to today's students, I have run across many volumes from the experts in this field. Mostly, these type of books tell you what ought to be done chocked full of buzz phrases and broad prescriptions for ways to change the way we teach. Julie Lindsay and Vicki Davis go so far beyond this with their long awaited work. They have created a very direct and quite fabulous "How To" manual for the teacher in the trenches. They offer plenty of pedagogical "meat", but add to it a practical slant that makes me really believe that I can do this! The reason for this is simple: They have been actually doing global learning and teaching 21st Century skills and producing 21st Century outcomes for several years. There are no more experienced doers of global learning on the edu-scene today! Their book is extremely well organized and clear. It is evident that these outstanding educators Walk the Walk! I highly recommend this work to any teacher looking for a path toward greater student engagement and authentic global…

While browsing the internet last night I found this article and I said to myself "Oh please, been there...done that!" Well look it's catching on, other schools are doing the same thing we did weeks back!  I want you to read this whole article for HW, yes I know I rarely give you HW.   Please read this article and on Wednesday and Thursday we will have this same type of live discussion regarding this article. So if you don't read the article I will know when you have nothing to add to the convo. You will be given a grade based on participation and cooperation in the Cover it LIve discussion.  If you would like to volunteer to be a class moderator, contact me.  Remember these students will also have the responsibility of posting your comments as they see that it relates to the conversation in class.  

If you have some notes whiles reading the article please take them and bring it to the table for discussion.  

Please go here to read the article! See you in class!  

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/13/education/13social.html

-Ms Mac

I've been asked by some very smart students about the rationale behind how things are divided on Digiteen. Here are the answers.

Why is Digiteen broken down in subtopics and topics like this?

Here is the thinking behind how we broke it down:

• If it is easier to research a topic SEPARATELY it is divided (i.e. copyright and safety don't go together very well.) Keep it simple for students.
  
  
  
  
• If we want to MAKE SURE a topic is covered - it is divided (virtual worlds and social media - because so many things focus on social media -if we didn't split it - virtual worlds would be ignored in their research.) Make sure everything is covered.
  
  
  
  
• We want to make sure that groups are small enough. Students MUST work with people that they do not see in class at the same time. Asychronous communication is the key to their future success so we force it by how we divide the groups. They don't like it but they need one experience of ascyhronous communications or they will not learn. If they can work F2F they WILL NOT work over distance. We have to make sure they understand what we are teaching about a world where f2f is less common.