One Web Day

Via Andy Carvin comes a reminder that is never too late to start planning for OneWebDay. With the avowed aim

“…… to create, maintain, advance, and promote a global day to celebrate online life.”

the whole notion makes for an interesting adjunct to another recent thought provoking from Jeff Utecht on refocusing on what really matters. In a very important post in the wake of the recent NECC conference in the US Jeff was left wondering whether the vast majority of humanity really knew of most of what is happening in Web 2.0 and indeed if that really matters. Jeff then goes on to consider that if this is indeed the case whether all his, (and other’s) groundbreaking work is really ‘the right thing’ to be working with in his school setting.

As one who is trying in my own small way to get some things happening at our school, it was interesting to read these thoughts as if I am honest similar self doubts creep in quite often. Typical of these are considering;

• the time and effort needed to set up tools designed with more general purposes in mind so that they can be used by the students I am teaching
• the tension between giving time to this and still meeting other tasks associated with teaching the class including marking and homework management
• deciding what can be left out of/or modified within the timetable to accommodate Web 2.0 related tasks
• the need to closely monitor what is happening on the blogs in order to ensure that nothing untoward occurs
• once students have been given a measure of control over their webspaces how to respond to their innovative ideas and challenges
• the time needed to bring other staff members on board so that the use of these tools will spread across the school
• the need to meet my own desire to “keep up” with the latest, (is this a further confession of blog addiction?)
• the knowledge that developments in the Web 2.0 arena are happening so rapidly that the instruction we give related to blogging today is being made redundant almost as we teach and will certainly change within the schooling lifetime of our students
• quite apart from the overarching question of Jeff’s as to whether this is the direction my teaching should be heading in or whether I am just satisfying my own ego.

Then just as often as this thinking occurs comes an email from a student requesting assistance or you see a comment from a parent on their child’s blog or you find, (as I posted in a comment to Jeff’s post), the following comment

“I am doing this (blog) for school but it is so fun I just want to keep going on it and never stop. ”

it’s then you know that, if nothing else, you are providing an opportunity for the students to be a more active participant in their present if not their future. So if you have a desire to make the Web “a little bit better than it was before” check out sites like OneWebDay and the list of project ideas.