Comments on: Social networking sites pose “dangers” for educators?

By: Interesting articles on blogging « Polkagrisar09’s Blog

Interesting articles on blogging « Polkagrisar09’s Blog — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 08:26:44 +0000

[...] relevant article discusses the dangers of social networks like facebook or twitter for teachers: http://sustainablydigital.edublogs.org/2008/01/18/social-networking-sites-pose-dangers-for-educator... Although I don’t think that teachers should not have a blog or something similar of their [...]

By: Ben Wildeboer

Ben Wildeboer — Tue, 22 Jan 2008 00:04:56 +0000

@mrsolsen You bring up a very intriguing point. MySpace has a lower age-limit of 14, and I believe Facebook's is 13. Clearly many children under this age misreport their ages to gain access to the sites. Do we just ignore this fact because technicall it's illegal? Or do we educate them how to properly utilize and protect themselves while online? That's a tricky question with lots of gray areas. Ideally, the parents would prevent underage children from signing up for these sites, but in all reality that's not going to work in all situations (either from indifference or ignorance). This sounds like a whole new tricky line to walk. It makes me somewhat glad the kids I teach are at least "of age" for the sites.

By: Columbus Education Association » Blog Archive » Ohio Teachers And Online Social Networking: Part 3

Mon, 21 Jan 2008 01:40:18 +0000

[...] Wildeboer at Sustainably Digital writes in part: It’s time for school officials to realize that social networking sites and other [...]

By: mrsolson

mrsolson — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 16:37:28 +0000

Great in-depth post on this topic. I indirectly linked to you through Wesley Fryer’s post linking to you – my post is at http://googtweetblog.edublogs.org/2008/01/20/hiding-under-my-blog/. I discuss myspace/facebook with my students, but am not really able to use it in my classroom because although many of the students I teach have accounts, they’re not supposed to because they aren’t old enough. Many of my 6th graders are on myspace with ages listed as 18, 25, etc. We had a short discussion about it, but I don’t think it’s appropriate for me to teach how to use the tool if they’re not supposed to even legally be ON the sites. I have really begun digging into the social networking area and plan to come back here for more resources in the future.

Kate
http://googtweetblogs.edublogs.org

By: Ben Wildeboer

Ben Wildeboer — Sun, 20 Jan 2008 16:12:53 +0000

Thanks for the comments & notices. As a new educational blogger, it’s pretty heartening to have my 3rd post get the response that it has.

@Wes: I (obviously) agree with your position. It makes me wonder what type of research the OEA based their decision upon. The NSBA report is dated earlier than the OEA memo, and I know if they had performed even a half-hearted search for potential uses of the technologies in school they would’ve found many examples. I get the feeling they went out looking for reasons to ban the sites- and found what they were looking for (& nothing else).

@Rick: That’s a great example of ignorance guiding actions. It seems the educators really need to be educated on the realities of the new online tools- both the potential misuses and potential great uses. Thanks for doing a post on your blog on it as well. I received a tweet from a professor I’m taking a class with this fall that he read your posting on leadertalk.org. Who says there isn’t online community?

@Rodd: I agree that it’s definitely a challenge to support the use of these tools. I certainly don’t push hard enough in my situation. Perhaps that’s another “resolution” I can make for the coming year…

By: » Education Association warns against social networking RickScheibner.net: Education — Music — Family — Life

Sat, 19 Jan 2008 21:18:39 +0000

[...] Here is the full article from Ben: » Social networking sites pose “dangers” for educators? Sustainably Digital [...]

By: Rodd Lucier

Rodd Lucier — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 18:12:29 +0000

This block it, ban it, avoid it mentality is not new. As communications technologies continue to evolve with teens and tweens taking the lead on finding appropriate uses, we’ll continue to find ourselves seeing only the negative aspects of a given tool.

Taking the lead on leveraging these new tools for education is a challenge… especially if you don’t know much about ‘yesterday’s tools’ (text messaging, blogging, MSN…). I’m still trying to get my head around my school board’s attempts to regulate ‘personal digital devices’ (including iPods and cell phones) and to block access to networking websites (for educators and students alike!).
http://thecleversheep.blogspot.com/2008/01/ban-cell-phones-until-we-can-figure-out.html

By: Rick

Rick — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 16:43:26 +0000

Amen to that. What I run into is the attitude of “We don’t understand it, and we don’t want to, so let’s pretend it doesn’t exist.” Earlier this year–and I’m not kidding–we had a teacher send a student to the office for wearing a MySpace t-shirt. He’d heard “all kinds of bad things about that MySpace thing” and wondered if her shirt my be inappropriate.

By: Ohio Education Association gives bad advice on social networking » Moving at the Speed of Creativity

Sat, 19 Jan 2008 05:26:33 +0000

[...] Wildeboer has written a thorough post (“Social networking sites pose “dangers” for educators”) about The Ohio Education Association (OEA) sending out: a memo this fall strongly advising [...]

By: Wesley Fryer

Wesley Fryer — Sat, 19 Jan 2008 05:09:51 +0000

Ben: Thanks very much for bringing this to my attention via your link which trackbacked to my blog… The main thing I would add is that in addition to getting familiar with social networks by joining them and using them, educators and our schools have an obligation to provide opportunities for students to engage in appropriate, courteous, and safe social networking AT SCHOOL. We need systems of accountability much more than we need to ban or block people from using an entire class of tools. This is something Karen Montgomery and I talked about with the founders of VoiceThread today, and the accountability which is being built in to their new ed.voicethread.com environment.

I’d also point everyone again to the NSBA’s summer 2007 report on social networking which concludes just the REVERSE of this OEA group: Schools need to leverage the opportunities available with social networking technologies, rather than just ban or block them.

This response is a typical, fear-driven response. Sad but not really surprising.