Visitors and Residents

     Last year Dr. Doug Fisher presented to the two classes of Secondary Literacy that I was teaching.  During his presentation he showed a video clip of one of his colleagues teaching to help demonstrate a particular concept.  In the video (this was not the main point of the clip), the teacher texts one of his contacts to get clarification on a piece of information, and within a couple of minutes the teacher had a response.  In the room in which we sat there was an audible gasp that a teacher was actually texting in class, in front of the class, and on video.  After the video clip was over and Dr. Fisher was about to continue his talk, hands went up and the next few minutes were devoted to talking about the texting teacher.  Dr. Fisher’s reaction was somewhat surprised that people wanted to talk about that teacher and then quickly acknowledged that some schools still live in an “era of prohibition.”  I remember thinking at the time, “neat, the teacher has a very current technological tool and he is using it.”  I did not see anything wrong with it.  Dr. Fisher concluded that portion of the talk (because I would imagine that he wanted to move on) by saying, “21^st century learning is 10% over already, and some schools are still not letting our students use 21^st century tools.”  It was at this point that my views about using cell phones and smart phones in the classroom changed.

      I thought about Dr. Fisher’s presentation as I was watching the video Visitors and Residents featuring Dr. White.  According to Dr. White, I would be a visitor- I use the internet as a tool, but I am a very frequent visitor, to the point that I pretty much have internet capability with me at all times, whether it be by using my iphone, my ipad or being on a computer.  I am such a frequent visitor that there are certain tasks that I do not even think about which type of tool I am going to use, it is automatically an online tool.  Banking-check.  Paying bills- check, buying airline tickets- check, want to go to a movie?- check, the family calendar- all online,  a store that offers to send me my receipt via email- absolutely.  Maybe I am like a snowbird resident. 

I particularly liked Dr. White’s example of a visitor being characterized as one that can be very competent in using technology, but not having a large web presence.  I think this is more of who I am online.  I use Facebook to keep up with friends, but I do not post very often, and I do not have many online friends.  My Facebook page reflects who I am in real life- a very private person with a close group of friends.  In fact, I view Facebook as a tool- I go “there” with a purpose and often feel guilty if I spend too much time just “wandering around.” 

     As for the 21^st tools that some of our students are not permitted to use in the educational setting, I would really like our learning to be reciprocal.  I would very much like to learn about how they live on the internet and how they use it.  And as I create more of a web presence through the different social media tools that are being shown to us, I would like to teach students to be more targeted and competent with their use.