Oh the Possibilities..are a Bit Overwhelming but Exciting!!

The tools are here to help our classrooms be more "disrupted" with technology!! Many of them are free and available to everyone (if they have an email address =-) )!! There is even a great book (Web 2.0)that lists many Web 2.0 tools and gives great examples of how teachers have been using these tools to help students be ready for the 21st Century skills. So what does it take to become one of these cutting edge teachers? How can I help "the students apply these tools toward more serious endeavors instead of for enjoyment" (as Web 2.0 states on pg. 50)?

One thought that probably crosses many of our minds as we think about doing something new is "When will I have the time to play with/incorporate/learn about the new technology?". This is when the Web 2.0 tools that we have been reading about may help the teacher as much as the student. I like the remark Marty made in her blog Marty Remarks under the heading "The Pace of Change: Are we institutionally prepared?" that "it is exciting to be a part of an industry that is continually looking for ways to improve." So lets keep helping each other improve by posting good ideas that may be helpful to someone else and maybe save them some time as they are trying to improve their classroom. As Bill brings up in his blog BlamSpot under the heading "Make It, Ma-Top of the World", teachers have always had time as our enemy but the more experience we have with something, the easier it is to make sense of what we are doing. So share your expertise with not only the teaching world but the world. That is what we want our students to be doing as well, right?

So now the question is once I have learned a new technology, how can I get it to be "disruptive" in my classroom and not "crammed"? (Can you tell I love that analogy?") Being a business teacher, I liked the examples given in the book Disrupting Class where they discuss businesses that have come in and taken over an industry with a "disrupting product". How do they do this? As it states in the book on pg. 85:

Success with disruptive innovations always originates at the simplest end of the market, typically competing against nonconsumption.

So what is something that has not been consumed yet in education? How can we turn our Web 2.0 tools into something the students have not used/seen before? Here is an example of a new way to go over rules in the classroom creating a video and TeacherTube.



I hope what I put together here makes sense. Just a few thoughts that have crossed my mind several times as I get more into reading our textbooks, blogs, and wikis.

By the way, can anyone recommend a good way to search for blogs? I am trying to find one that might be for business teachers. I tried searching blogs in Google but did not get much luck. I wondered if there was another way.

Good Night Blogosphere!!!

Photo Found:http://www.teachertube.com/members/viewPhoto.php?photo_id=2837&title=Web_2_0
Video Found: http://www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=247