Using technology in a constructive and productive manner.

I heard a very interesting radio program several weeks ago. It is thought that over 75 percent of all high school students in this country reads and writes a weekly blog. I thought that percentage was far too high. When I returned to school the next morning, I polled our high school students. The results of my poll shocked me. All but one student said they write a blog and read them daily. I went to our staff meeting the next morning. I told the staff that over 99 percent of our high school students are blogging. How many teachers are writing a blog? Not one teacher! So we have a serious problem today. Students are blogging, reading and writing every night at home. They are not reading the newspaper or watching television, they are blogging. When our students come to school each day we tell them they are “blocked” from using all blogs on our computer network. We tell them, “You can’t read or write the way YOU want to in this school. You must do it our way.” So think about this…who is going to teach our students to use blogs in a constructive and productive manner? Where is the collective intelligence in education today? We must reshape education so it is more relevant for our students. Will Richardson wrote in his book Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, other Powerful Web Tools for the Classroom, "Teachers will have to start to see themselves as connectors, not only of content, but of people. We can invite people from around the world to engage in discussions and even content creation with our students, and our teachers must be willing to find and use these sources effectively." Can teachers comprehend the way our culture is changing?