Our Online Footprint

                The article “Footprints in the Digital Age” by Will Richardson clearly describes how our impressions are given off on the Google, not necessarily good or bad. In the first paragraph, he describes about his worry of his daughter not being recognized positively when searched on the internet. He says, “That quick surf through the top five hits will fail to astound with examples of her creativity, collaboration skills, and change-the-world work.” This was interesting me, because it seems that people should also be recognized for doing something incredible, and not just for a negative post about something that they might truly regret.

                For the most part, I agree with Richardson when he talks about students learning the internet without the help of teachers. He said that we are creating, publishing, and learning on our own. It’s weird to think about, but the internet is such an important tool for people, that kids these days are teaching themselves how to use Web 2.0. Another point that Richardson makes is that we are not being taught by educators how to use the web correctly for creation, navigation, and networks of learning. I do agree that the web can be used for much more than just Facebook and Youtube, because it is also an incredible learning tool, like Richardson said.

                The next major point Richardson makes is how the internet connects people. He refers to a guy that met another person who shared their common interest of mountain- unicycling. It’s strange to think that the internet can connect people in this way, but it can also do more than connect people. As Richardson said, “Twenty- Five Days to Make A Difference” made people share Laura’s experience by creating organizations.

                This article made some more important points about the way the internet is viewed from a kid’s point of view, and an educator’s point of view. The learning tools the internet can provide should really be taught in schools, because web 2.0 is capable of sharing, connecting, and learning, so we should embrace that fully.

The Internet Is Taking Over

                The article “The Web Takes Over”, By David H. Freedman from the October 2010 Discover Magazine makes a few points about how the web has transformed hundreds of millions of people. This may seem like old news; the internet being “big” and all, but the truth is that the internet is huge, and this article actually makes points about why it’s taking over, and how it’s improved our lives. I thought these points were interesting.

In the first few sentences, it talks about how the internet is making us healthier with the quick health information at our fingertips. It facilitates new gathering, people are able to know what’s going on in the world. It is an economic turbocharger, it enables anyone to start a business while just sitting in your living room. it is revitalizing politics, and it’s connecting us. I think that this is mostly true. Without the help of the web, our lives would be completely different. We wouldn’t be able to find information as fast as we can on any given day.

However, not all of this article was positive. It talked about how the web “poisons politics” and “alienates us”, meaning that lots of people get addicted to the web, causing obesity. It is important not to let the internet poison us, but help us, and do nothing more than that. It is a helpful tool for millions of people, but it is also a problem for millions of people.

Is the Internet Ruining our Brains?

          The article “Is Google Making Us Stupid?” by Nicholas Carr described about Carr’s experience of the internet making him less patient with obtaining knowledge. I found myself relating to this article quite a bit. Even reading the article I skimmed through it just to find the important things in it, as Carr described in this article.  He talked about how we rely on Google to find things that could take hours to find just searching through books in the library.

Another point he made was how the internet (Google) gradually made it harder to immerse himself in a book or article, because of how quickly you can find information or media. After reading through this, I realized that I can partially relate to what Carr was saying. I often find myself drifting off during a slower paced part of a book, and I cannot focus as well. I think that only trying to find main points in articles is okay, but a lot of information from the article might not have been read.

Carr also said that we do read a lot- with our text messages, emails, Facebook profiles, etc.., but it doesn’t help us in any way. Why aren’t we just able to read 10 pages of a book and not get distracted for at least a few seconds?  Why does it seem so impossible to find information in a book compared to the internet? What would the millions of people that rely on Google every day do if it was just taken away?

Finding information on Google however, does help with our learning quite a bit, but when we are required to read a few pages in our history textbook, or a novel, what do we do? We find it to be overwhelming so we won’t read as well as we would if Google didn’t exist. It tends to be much harder to find all the information in a book.

We all use it, we all make Google searches. I don’t think that Google is making us dumb at all. Google is just making us learn differently by obtaining information quickly instead of handling the duration of a whole 20 pages, but disabling us in a way that makes reading longer articles harder. I agree with Carr’s analogy, “Once I was a scuba diver in the sea of words. Now I zip along the surface like a guy on a Jet- Ski”, but I do not think it’s making us stupid. We’re not dumb, just handicapped.

New Schools in South Africa Serve the "Underserved"

The New York Times article, " New Schools in South Africa serve the Underserved" tells about how in South Africa, education for richer mostly white schools was sponsored for years, but fees became a problem for people with less money. South Africa is just now starting to serve blacks with quality private schools. This could be a  very important step for schooling in South Africa. Just imagine if the whole entire world was able to take a small step like this, it could greatly educate and inform people about our worlds problems. This might sound like an overstatement, but if other poor impoverished countries just took steps to have a decent education, it could greatly effect the future. Right now, there are only 500 students in these schools, but I hope to see this idea spark into a whole reform of schooling in South Africa for black or poorer families. 

A Vision of Students Today

The video, "A Vision of Students Today" was really shocking to me. It makes a few important points,but mainly it shows you that technology isn't always good in a learning environment, and a students won't always get the individual attention he or she needs to learn. I was surprised when one of the sign- holders sign said "my average class size is 115". What I don't get is if you pay for education, why shouldn't you be able to get more individual attention? Also, it talked about how most of what you learn won't even benefit you. What is the point of paying for required courses that don't even give you the tools that you need for what you want to achieve? Another striking thing in this video is how the students rely so much on technology. If you could be studying in the time that you were looking at 2300 web pages, you could do exceptionally well in your college classes. This video really made me think that education these days need to be somehow reformed, and It concerns me for when I will be in college.