XplanaZine

Here’s a summary of ideas and conversations from the edublogging community that have captured our attention in the past 48 hours.

The discussion regarding Internet filtering and censorship continues with Doug Johnson posting his ideas about how to address the problem. Yes, he says, a little civil disobedience in the short term might have some effect, but the long-term solution is to attach the process of district policy making. Miguel Guhlin, the original rabble rouser, responds to Doug’s post with a philosophical take on winning through surrender. Bud Hunt also added his take with a nice podcast on filtering conversations, but in the end, I think I like Tom Hoffman’s take the best: “It seems to me that the people with the choke hold on the web filters in our
schools aren’t educators, and often are largely unaccountable. On the whole, ed-tech seems to be subservient to IT. How the hell did that happen?”

D’Arcy Norman has a great description of the Un-Keynote presentation he did in Vancouver with Stephen Downes and Brian Alexander. The three of them roamed the audience, forced collaborative discussion, and instead of a PowerPoint presentation beamed a back channel chat session on the screen. D’Arcy’s description relates the difficulty and anxiety associated with the session, but it also gives nice insight into how this kind of thing can be done and why it can change the way we do presentations in general. Kudos to these pioneers.

Vicki Davis riffs on a Kathy Sierra post and creates her own Typology of Cognitive Pleasures for the classroom. Her list includes Discovery, Challenge, Narrative, Self-expression, Social Framework, Cognitive Arousal, Thrill, Sensation, Triumph, Flow, Accomplishment, Fantasy, and Learning. Worth the read!