Flickr-ing -- OUT
Flickr, BubbleShare, and other Web 2.0 services are the rage in schools today. But, should school administrators allow teachers to chase off after these "here today, gone tomorrow" technology fads? Anne over at edublog insights shares this first draft letter requesting use of Flickr, presumably in K-12 school district for a new blogging project they are starting.
I can easily imagine the response of a school district administrator....
TO: Ms. Davis:
CC: Ms. Davis' Supervisor
Re: Your Students' Access to Inappropriate Web Sites
Thank you for your inquiry regarding unblocking of social networking sites. As you know, it is District policy to block access to inappropriate web sites. Due to the relaxed, social settings in virtual environments like Flickr, MySpace.com, Bebo, Facebook, and many others, these sites are blocked as a matter of course.
Parents are given the opportunity to learn about how to model appropriate use of these tools at home--where they are often mis-used according to the media--through our Digital Citizen courses, but their use in schools is off-task. Although the District cannot take disciplinary action based on inappropriate photos shared or edited outside of school, it is our responsibility to block acess to such materials at school.
Yet, as you share in your letter, there are important skills that students need to learn to live in the 21st Century. You cite as relevant the following skills:
1) Tagging;
2) Copyright guidelines learned in the context of relevant learning experiences;
3) Development of appropriate writing, technology and collaborative learning skills; and
4) Use of Photos with RSS feeds to facilitate viewing of student work that may be present in those photos.
There are different approaches to take than using adult sites that host inappropriate content. While it is certainly convenient to take advantage of existing web servers, since you have access to District Technology Services, the following actions could be taken and still achieve your instructional objectives.
Some suggestions are shared below and organized according to the main activities you outlined as important.
Those actions include the following:
1) Tagging: This is a skill that can be learned using web sites that are not blocked and minimize exposure to inappropriate images or content. For example, students could focus on developing their blog entries, then using Free Tag Generators to tag their blog entries. This enables students to save each entry with a keyword, facilitating development of organizing and categorizing skills that ensure each access to information--mainly, their own creations.
Students could also share their favorite literature using LibraryThing.com ( View this "tag cloud"). This would help students share what books they are reading and help foster literacy appreciation among our students.
2) Copyright guidelines: Copyright awareness is an important set of strategies, and students could learn to release their work under Creative Commons Licenses. Awareness and use of the Creative Commons licensing on their blog entries, as well as any art or audio they produce (perhaps, as a podcast?) through sites like The Internet Archive might also be beneficial. Students could learn to incorporate CC friendly images from sites like OpenPhoto.net .
There are many other CC friendly services that do not require the use of predator-friendly web sites like Flickr. And, parents could supervise use of Flickr Creative Commons at home.
3) RSS Feeds: Web sites like SuprGlu allows content to be "aggregated" via RSS feeds. Teachers could use Bloglines.com to aggregate student feeds, and the link to Bloglines.com shared with parents or others. If students publish photos in their blogs, then those will be pulled up via the RSS feeds.
If you would like an external photo archive, then consider using a Web Gallery software, such as that offered by Gallery 2 , an open source web based photo album organizer. Gallery gives you, Ms. Davis, a way to blend photo management seamlessly into your own class or individual student blogs with logins and passwords. This means that students will not be exposed to the inappropriate images found on commercial, adult sites that have been misappropriated for student use.
One benefit of using these solutions is that they can exist behind the firewall then shared on an as needed basis with parents. Another benefit is that students will have the opportunity to see their teachers model the use of these sites within school settings.
BLOG USE
I am concerned about the use of blogs in the District and ask the following questions:
1) What release form will you use for publishing student work online?
2) Has this form been approved by the District Administrative Procedures committee?
3) Are you using a District-supported web site for hosting student and teacher content, or is a commercial site being used for this purpose? With the Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) gaining much support at the federal level, and the importance of protecting students from unauthorized access ("Virtual Stranger Danger") by online predators, it is important that the venues which students frequent be kept within District control.
4) Has the campus administrator approved teachers participating in potentially putting students at risk?
5) What steps have been taken to ensure all stakeholders are aware of what is going on?
6) Have parents been notified so that they understand this is an instructional activity and what the duration of such types of activities might be?
7) How does use of blogs, image galleries with RSS feeds prepare students to achieve at an "exemplary" level on our state-mandated tests?
8) Will there be sufficient access for students, or will instructional time be used for these activities? If after-hours, how will this impact existing instructional programs like Terrific Tutoring that help students achieve state mandated instructional objectives?
Again, Ms. Davis, I want to thank you for your visionary and inspirational teaching. Planning activities that lie outside the realm of instructional objectives is challenging yet can make certain, instructional activities appear more relevant. I want to encourage you to participate in the Administrative Procedures Committee that is meeting this Friday morning to discuss how to best discipline employees who use social networking tools inappropriately--that is, use them at all--during the work day.
Your participation will help sensitize you to the consequences of inappropriate use of these popular social tools. I am sure you agree that socializing during instructional time should be prohibited since our school was listed in the newspaper as needing improvement. If we all focus on the job at hand, student achievement will SOAR.
Thank you,
Your District Administrator
Go Eagles!
...well, thanks for joining me on that "trip." What are your thoughts?
Comments
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