What Is This Blog -- And Why?

Just in case anyone has stumbled upon this blog unaware, I thought that I'd explain the spark that led to this flame.

Along with several other people, I am in the final days of a summer school graduate class at Rutgers University. The class, taught by Steve Garwood, is designed to introduce and provide a practice ground for using several of the newer Social Information tools, that are largely free (Open Source) over the Internet.

The platform for this blog is free. The class has also created podcasts, worked with Flickr, created wikis, and played some online games.

The experience has been great -- as far as I am concerned. My only regret about my experience is that I took the class during the summer. A summer session does not allow enough time to adequately learn how to use these resources. That was not a shortcoming of Garwood's. It is merely the summer school system.

As it turns out, we have only had time to scratch the surface of what is available in Social Information. I especially want to learn how to create audio-visual blogs or vodcasts.

I do expect to delve into that area further.

This class was taught via screen captures, Camtasia software, and vodcasts.

I intend to continue this blog and the numerous other blogs that I began during this session.
ReadyReadz Wiki
KidReadz Teachers Blog
Dr. Seuss Wiki
My Rainbow World - A Wiki Curriculum
Brer Rabbit Wiki
Brer Rabbit Blog
TeenReadz Wiki
TeenReadz Blog
KidReadz Blog
Caldecott Medals Wiki

Does Pop Culture Deliver Stupidity? No! The Current Is Too Fast For That!

The pendulum is in motion! With every swing, new technology adds more bells and whistles to the Pop Culture Toy Chest.

Information eddies and rushes, from a stream that is ever-widening. No need for today's kid researchers to go to the library--to pull out the card catalogs and periodicals. Research is at home--at the tip of one's fingers.

Life is simple. Kids today have it made--right?

NO!

I have been in the teaching and parenting business for many years; and I have watched a few trends come and go. It might seem that kids today are on Easy Street. It might seem that because of all of the research time that they are saving, that they should be able to prop up their feet, eat, drink, make merry, surf around, video game themselves down the drain, and still manage to do their homework.

It might seem that Pop Culture has delivered to kids a recipe for Slovenly Stupidity; but that is not what I have observed.

True--kids today have more gadgets that would ostensibly make research and schooling simpler; but they are expected to do twice as much work, too.

More ground is covered faster in classes; and more and more classes are added to the curricula.

Getting into a good college becomes more difficult each year.

College-bound kids are tutored for the SAT, because SAT scores can make them or break them.

For a group who are often characterized as lazy and spoiled, kids today function under a great amount of pressure. They are walking on a very thin tightrope. Just getting from Point A to Point B requires a certain amount of savvy.

I don't know how anyone could believe that Pop Culture is making kids today stupid. Kids today are functioning at a higher level than at any other time in history. Even today's games are tough!

In his book Everything Bad Is Good For You, Steven Johnson, discusses how very un-fun today's games can often be:

"The dirty little secret of gaming is how much time you spend not having fun. You may be frustrated; you may be confused or disoriented; you may be stuck." (p. 25).

Even at play, today's kids function at intense levels. To resolve game issues, they are required to undertake engineering and strategic missions that many would not tackle for money.

Is Pop Culture Stimulating? Yes!

Does Pop Culture Deliver Stupidity? Hardly!

Today's Pop Culture might offer a bit of comic relief and an occasional breath of fresh air to today's kids; but kids today have little time to wallow in stupidity. The current is too fast. Kids today can barely stay afloat.

If we really want to discuss the problems with today's culture -- that is it.

Kids today can barely stay afloat. The current is too fast.

Johnson, Steven. (2005). Everything ad Is Good for You: How Today's Popular Culture Is Actually Making Us Smarter. New York: Penguin Group.

Image from www.booksamillion.com

Rock Band Rocks!

My son and I just finished playing a game of Rock Band on his Xbox 360 entertainment system. For months I have been hearing the constant rhythmic thumping of the electronic drumset (included with the game) without realizing exactly what was going on, but I finally got a chance to try it first-hand tonight. When I went downstairs to ask him to play one of his games with me, he was already playing the guitar (also included with the game), clicking the color-coded buttons in rhythm as they made their way down the screen at a seemingly impossible pace. I decided I would give the drums a try. Within minutes (after choosing a much easier difficulty level), we were playing songs as unique parts of the fictional band that we created in the game. We played songs by all kinds of artists, ranging from the grungy sound of Nirvana to the more vintage sound of bands from my era, like Mountain. It was interesting to play the game, because not only was it incredibly addicting and fun, we both had the opportunity to enjoy each other’s company and also enjoy music from each other’s unique generations as we virtually performed them in the game together. It was very refreshing to play a game like this. The object of the game is not violent or antagonistic; rather, it is entirely cooperative. I hope games like this continue to be popular with today’s youth as they promote much better values while still managing to be incredibly fun.