Chapter 10 - What It All Means

So here we are, at the end of the book, saturated with lots of new, important information about the Read/Write Web and it's implications for student learning...

Chapter 10 was written in a way that nicely revisits each of the premises examined throughout the book while coming back to the big picture.  And here is the big picture in my mind: the access that students have to information has become almost limitless.  If we choose to use only the traditional instructional resources and tools, we are gatekeepers to their potential moving forward.  I really see it as a moral imperative.  We need to develop a knowledge of and comfort with employing appropriate technology tools to assist  in their life-long success.  Students have that right.

I found myself nodding in affirmation at each of the "Big Shifts" but the one that resounds most with me is "Big Shift 4:  Teaching is Conversation, Not Lecture.  Throughout this text I found that to be the thread that pulled each of the components together.  Learning is a social practice.  We learn more when we take existing ideas, assimilate new information, evaluate, reconsider and formulate new understandings.  Siemen's quote:
"Ideas are presented as the starting point for dialogue, not the ending point" perhaps should be a banner in classrooms everywhere.  I know for sure that we all want our students to think!