On Tuesday Scott McLeod tweeted this link to a post on his blog, Dangerously Irrelevant. The post, "If We Were Really Serious About Educational Technology", provides a starter list of things educators can to truly integrate technology and reach our 21st Century students. Then yesterday, one of my Google+ followers, Stephanie Sweeney, wrote this blog post about professional vs. personal social media.
For background, Scott McLeod's post was from 2010. Stephanie's was written yesterday. What I find intriguing about the 2 articles, written nearly 3 years apart, is that we're still dealing with the same issues of teachers not being able to meet the needs of 21st Century students. Even more disturbing are teachers' continual resistance to using the tools students are using everyday.
If we're going to seriously meet the needs of our students, and truly engage them, teachers need to change their mindsets and enter their students' technological world. The true power of these 21st Century tools is that they're just not for students. Tools like Edmodo, Twitter, and Instagram are just as powerful for a teacher's Professional Learning Network as they are for a student's learning. I was one of those people 3 years ago who resisted Twitter. My supervisor convinced me to try it, and I haven't looked back. Twitter has become my most powerful ally, alerting me to other new tools, providing me new professional connections, and an outlet to get my own message own out.
It's time we get serious about about educational technology. Our students deserve it.
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