Educsite

I've recently been writing an article looking at the educational differences between Digital Natives and Digital Immigrants. As such I was compelled to read 'Born Digital' by Palfrey and Gasser (2008). Although not rigorously empirical (but clearly founded on lots of information and personal research) in nature the book is thoroughly interesting, partly because of the way it weaves in numerous narratives and anecdotal accounts of events and different people (e.g. Shaun Fanning of Napster fame, Mark Zucckerberg of Facebook fame and many others) who made it big due to simple but timely ideas. The book also discusses a number of current issues with the digital revolution and is organised into chapters as such: Identities, Dossiers, Privacy, Safety, Creators, Pirates, Quality, Overload, Aggressors, Innovators, Learners, Activists. It is well worth a read.

I'm particularly pleased to see the debate that's currently being had about what schools of the future will look like entitled 'Schools 2.0'. The whole debate is now reflected in a website http://school20.ning.com/ which has its own wiki http://school20.wikispaces.com/ stating as it's header:

There is a growing desire to rethink education and learning, and the phrase "School 2.0" is being used to think about what schools will look like in the future. There seem to be three factors driving this discussion:

1. 
   New collaborative computer technologies, in particular the read/write web, distance learning programs, free and open source software, and videoconferencing.
   
2. The move from an industrial to information economy, and a change in skills that are valuable to employers.
   
3. A culture that is rapidly becoming more transparent and collaborative because of the new technologies, allowing a more open discussion about many aspects of our society, including (and especially) education. Please join our discussion.

I'm extremely interested in the idea being propogated that schools should be moving with the times and be brought into the 21st Century but alas they seem to be entrenched in 19th Century practises. There's also and interesting article dating back to 2006 in Time magazine http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1568480-1,00.html