Erik’s Random Babble

I found both Alan November’s and Larry Lessig’s podcasts very interesting and thought-provoking. Each of them mentioned things that connected to my own personal experience, as well as left me with a number of ideas which I hope to put into practice within my own role as a technology leader in my school.

November’s “Preparing Students to Succeed in a Global Economy” definitely presents a major wake-up call to US educators, though the message shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise to anyone who’s paid attention to the news or had the opportunity to travel overseas. He pushes for a “global work ethic” for students, which, in an ever-more-interconnected and interdependent world, really is essential. And to hear his suggestions for how teachers can take their first steps in this direction really comes across as quite straightforward — turn classrooms into “global communication centers” through the use of Skype, podcasts and blogs.

Several points throughout November’s talk reminded me of what was basically the mantra of my Master’s program in teaching ESL/EFL at the School for International Training in Brattleboro, Vermont — that you are your own best resource. He speaks of making students self-directed, shifting control of learning to the students so they’re empowered to be more responsible for their own learning. As educators, this requires us to give students enough guidance so that they aren’t just floundering about unsure of what exactly they should be doing, but also to give them enough freedom to find their own individual meaning in what they are studying. This goes right along with the concept of differentiated learning, which is a constant topic of discussion among the faculty at my school.

Where do I see myself going with this? Of course, I would love to push forward with what November suggests, and work with both my teachers and students in morphing our classrooms into these global communication centers. The challenge, as always, will be finding the time to show teachers how to take the first steps — though I do think November’s idea of having students attend trainings along with or even instead of teachers is a way to do an end-run around this. The students, on the whole, are far more aware of the potential of what’s out there than many of the teachers, and by involving them, it’s not only empowering them but also helping to prod the teachers along. Is it going to happen tomorrow or next month or next year? Probably not. But at least I can get the ball rolling, and hopefully once the momentum starts to build, things will snowball and everyone will get hooked.

Now, whereas the Alan November podcast had fairly clear and concrete suggestions for what could be done within my own work environment, Larry Lessig’s TED presentation about “How Creativity is Being Strangled by the Law” was rather more nebulous, at least in the realm of the elementary school. However, his points about user-generated content and a “read-write culture” were very familiar to me, as the same concepts has been the focus of the July 2005 issue of Wired magazine, the cover of which proclaimed “Remix Now! — The Rise of Cut & Paste Culture.”

One article in particular in that issue was a piece titled “God’s Little Toys: Confessions of a Cut & Paste Artist” by cyberpunk author William Gibson. In it, Gibson describes author William S. Burroughs’ “cut up method” whereby he had “incorporated snippets of other writers’ texts into his [own] work.” He also mentions the “versions” of existing songs that Jamaican musicians King Tubby and Lee “Scratch” Perry created in the early 70s, linking those early experiments with what modern DJs have been doing more recently in clubs around the world, remixing and recombining songs in new and creative ways. He touches on other modern examples of the same type of remixes and mash-ups that Larry Lessig speaks of, and also looks at the legal implications of this new norm in the culture. Gibson concludes that “we seldom legislate new technologies into being. They emerge, and we plunge with them into whatever vortices of change they generate. We legislate after the fact, in a perpetual game of catch-up, as best we can, while our new technologies redefine us.”

Again, where do I see this in the context of my own school? While I’m not sure how or when I might encourage students and teachers to start creating their own mash-ups and remixes, I do think the whole issue of copyright infringement is important to discuss. I imagine that using the same types of examples of remixes that Lessig shows in his presentation with teachers and students would be an interesting way to make them question what copyright really means. It’s a good way to at least start the discussion, and I think it can frame a broader, on-going look at what is and isn’t acceptable use of someone else’s content. We shall see where that discussion takes us.