I disagree with this statement to some extent.
This is true, as long as everyone has access on the internet. Here in the US and in other developed countries, people can access web2.0 any time they want. They don’t have to sit in class to learn, nor do they have to be stuck in one place while using the internet, since there are a lot of wireless internet devices in place nowadays. So, if everyone has access on the internet, everyone can share his/her knowledge to the whole world. For these reasons, everyone can learn anything, from anyone, anywhere, at anytime.
However, in some parts of the world people don’t have access on the internet, and only wealthy families can afford the cost of the internet. Most of the times those people are preoccupied with some other activities in their daily lives, and they may or may not know that web2.0 provides all the information they need. Some of them do all they can to go on the internet once and then, but this is not on the daily bases. Therefore, web2.0 can’t be considered as the major source of education to “everyone” since we all don’t have access on the internet anytime and anywhere. Thus, schools are needed.
Posts
Marley,
ReplyDeleteYour comment about Internet access is well taken. Access to information through the Internet in today's world is the equivalent to the availability of textbooks and teachers in your parent's world. This inequity is another example of the segregation in education that our visiting scholar, Rob Stein spoke to on Monday night.
Hey Marley, you bring up an important concern, one that is easy to forget, and even harder to really imagine. What would it be like to really not be able to google things, or look up stuff on wikipedia? What are all the ways, besides going online purposefully to learn something, that the internets affect our learning?
ReplyDeleteI want to add to your point as well, having access to the internet is not a cure-all. A lot of people (think about your grandparents, maybe your parents, maybe other teachers you've had) can't really bend the internet to their will. Not everyone with access knows how to effect search for things, for example, or how to watch videos on wikipedia, or how to get plugins for various fancy stuff. Just because its out there doesn't mean just anyone can find it.
This is true that everyone with access can't find everything on the internet, and I would like to add to this in order to answer the questions you asked me earlier.
ReplyDeleteThe other obstacle that we face by studying on web2.0 is that there are a lot of distracting websites non related to school - facebook, myspace, videogames, movies, music, etc. Advertising icons which are in the margins of a website page are very likely to cause distraction. Moreover, even if these icons weren't there on the computer screen, they are somewhere else in people's mind. An example I can give here is me. In my free time, whenever I'm using the internet for school related activities, it is almost impossible not to go on facebook or check for new songs.
Therefore, if the amount of time spent on these different types of websites is unequally distributed, the process of learning using web2.0 is harmed...
Once again, thank you.