Well, I agree with several of Alan November's points. I wish he were a bit of a more dynamic speaker. *yawn*
Anywho, if I could teach a class that had a research station, a reading station, and a writing station, I would be all over this stuff. I truly believe students need to know how to research, create, and own their learning. My only issue--again--is our lack of resources in order to allow it. I am pretty sure that if a streaming video uses too much bandwidth that Skype is out of the question. Also, in my experience, my middle school students who are higher-performing are very tech savvy and the lower performing ones can barely type or operate a computer at all. Oftentimes this goes back, too, to what is available in the home. Quite a few of my students do not have computers at home, even though it is assumed these days that everyone has one.
I suppose I am a bit torn on this issue, because theoretically I agree completely; logistically I agree mostly; and realistically I tend to raise red flags. Yes, this is what we need, yes I think this is where we are S-L-O-W-L-Y heading... Will we implement these needed changes before I retire in 20 years? We'll see...
The good news is that our district's bandwidth, in its connection to the Internet, is being upgraded by the state from 100 mbps to 250 mbps. Hopefully, that will make streaming audio/video applications more feasible for classroom use.
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