Have you had this conversation with another teacher yet?
Me: Hey, have you ever thought about starting a class blog? You can use it publish what happens in your classroom, put up all the cool things your class does, and share it all with the world. What do you think?
Them: Are you crazy? Why would anyone be even remotely interested in reading about what we do? And anyway, no one will ever see it… they probably wouldn’t even be able to find it!
And then, eventually, they do start a class blog. And pretty soon the conversation changes to this…
Me: Hey, you should post up those photos of what your class did last week on your class blog. And what about that video you made with the kids? How about we post that on YouTube?
Them: Are you crazy? You want me to put that stuff with the kids online where everyone can get to it? It’s way too dangerous! I don’t want the whole world seeing it!
So which is it? When we post stuff online are we putting it somewhere where no one will ever find it, or are we putting it somewhere that the whole world can see it?
And which is worse?
Make up your Mind by Chris Betcher is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
I would say if they started a class blog, then you’ve made some progress!
Undoubtedly! And we have made good progress in that area.
I was merely pointing out the paradox that hear so often… That we worry about putting kids online because all the alleged predators will get them, versus the original fear that it’s all a waste of time because no one will ever see it.
Chris. I live in this conflicting world! We recently worked for weeks doing 4th grade visual podcasts about famous persons. Now, I’m not sure about publishing these as the “guidelines” and “communications” have not yet been established, especially with parents–so getting some push back. When the desire to share what we’ve created outweighs the fear of the unknown, I hope that we’ll see less of this type of pushback. Often I feel that people worry, but are not really sure what exactly they’re worried about. If children can get to YouTube by clicking a link on a teacher’s page, they can get to YouTube anytime they open a browser, go on their phone, look something up online, etc. Do we want kids sharing their work? And if so, why not potentially with the world?
I agree that often people (parents, teachers, principals, journalists…) worry about the wrong things, but I also think there are plenty of reasons why you might not want to encourage kids to share their work with “the world”. For example, stuff on the internet can stick around for a long time, maybe in a few years time some of the students involved might not be so proud of it or keen to have it around.