Personal Reflection #2 for Social Networking

Assignment 4 – Personal Reflection #2

Page 68 – “We argue that as young people are accessing these sites anyway, we need to give them the critical skills to negotiate the spaces carefully. They will come across texts that are racist, sexist, or otherwise socially unacceptable, and they need to be helped to recognize these as such.”

What are your thoughts about this? Do you agree or disagree? Why or why not? How can we help students develop critical skills to determine the validity of information?

This quote comes from the book Web 2.0 for Schools: Learning and Social Participation. Julia Allison Davies and Guy Merchant state this quote while discussing YouTube. The statement, when read with the entire paragraph, lends itself to debate.

On the one hand, teachers would like to have tools they can control. To paraphrase the old television show, "Students say the darnedest things." Even in a classroom discussion, a student may say something Ms. Davies or Mr. Merchant might describe as "socially unacceptable." The question the teacher is faced with is whether to censor the comment (and ignore it), or use it as a teaching moment. If the choice is the latter, the teacher then becomes the moderator of a spirited point-counterpoint session.

Isaac Asimov created science fiction's "Three Laws of Robotics." In the book, Robot Visions, he uses tools as an analogy for these three laws. First, a tool must be safe to use. Second, a tool must perform its function, as long as it does so safely. Last, a tool must remain intact during its use (unless its destruction is part of its function (Asimov, P 424-425). While that final law may not apply here, the first two point to the concept of digital citizenship or "Netiquette."

When I look at the two sentences given, I would certainly agree that students need to be able to discern the message a particular web site is giving. Technology Teachers are becoming Technology Coaches, giving students the opportunity to work on assignments, commenting only when answering questions. Dr. Ardito employed this technique during our last face-to-face. There have been many instances when half-truths or false messages have been shared online. Who hasn’t received a forwarded e-mail or a Facebook post touting the latest urban legend? Later in the paragraph, Davies and Merchant go on to say, “teachers can provide pupils with the tools to read such texts in discriminating ways.”

The greatest critical skill one could impart to students is to use multiple sources when searching the Internet. Students may use only the first hit on Google, and believe that one hit to be the truth. With multiple sources, we would remove inaccuracy, half-truths, and bias. Typically, the first hit on Google is for a Wikipedia page. Here, Wikipedia has become sensitive to the bias some of its contributor convey. Wikipedia notes where citations are needed, and gives a detailed bibliography a student can use.

The only part of the quote I would be concerned with is the last sentence. It is almost as if Davies and Merchant have established some “moral code” when it comes to certain sources found on the Internet. While I agree there’s a difference between “the authentic and the inauthentic,” what constitutes “the racist from the non-racist?” This week, Volkswagen caused controversy with an ad slated for the Super Bowl. In it, a Caucasian is speaking as a Jamaican. Some find it funny because of the absurdity that the voice and face don’t match. Others compare it to an audio version of an old minstrel show. I would hate to think that in a paper on racism, a student couldn’t use a primary source because of something acceptable in 1920 but not today. Here, classroom discussion would serve as a vital tool.