I’m home sick today. I should be sleeping. Instead, I can’t stop reading and learning. So much to know…

I missed this post by Jay Rosen a month ago, luckily linked to by Ken Smith who has been blogging greatly lately and who I’ve been catching up on today. This is the way of connective learning, isn’t it? Based on personal passions, asynchronous, spontaneous, complex…

Jay says

Sure, weblogs are good for making statements, big and small. But they also force re-statement. Yes, they’re opinion forming. But they are equally good at unforming opinion, breaking it down, stretching it out, re-building it around new stuff. Come to some conclusions? Put them in your weblog, man, but just remember: it doesn’t want to conclude.

People trying to explain their attraction to the weblog form say it’s conversational, two way, personal, a medium for the individual voice— plus interactive with our untold wealth in information, and fun. All true. Doc adds something: weblogging is an inconclusive act— and that’s attractive, part of the fun.

I love that. But it’s so different from the way we teach writing now. The paper essay is a statement of opinion. The Weblog entry is a statement of opinion in progress. I’m not saying we shouldn’t teach the former. But if we believe the future rests in digital communication (which I do, btw), how can we ignore the latter? If our students don’t have the skills to negotiate their learning instead of state it, are we really preparing them for their futures?

The latest issue of Phi Delta Kappan is all about the challenges educators face in a changing world. Only the wrapup piece is free online, but it’s worth the read.

The implications of these changes are not completely clear, but it is clear that the changes will be profound. Information, people, and ideas now traverse the globe with unprecedented speed and frequency. Perhaps even more important, such internationalization affects every field of endeavor. Yet somewhat ironically, our educational discourse is largely stuck in a time warp, framed by issues and standards set decades before the widespread use of the personal computer, the Internet, and free trade agreements. But we can no more afford to isolate ourselves educationally than we can economically or in terms of national security.

Another peg in the “Web Changes Everything” argument, perhaps? “Time warp” definitely feels right.
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Jeff Jarvis e-mailed me this link to a Wall Street Journal article on blog banning.

As parents wring their hands about Internet predators, many teens are worried about a different kind of online intruder: the school principal.

Students are blogging about schoolyard crushes and feuds, posting gossip about classmates on social-networking sites like MySpace.com and Facebook.com, and sharing their party snapshots on public Web pages. Increasingly, their readers include school administrators, who are doling out punishments for online writings that they say cross the line.

Pretty interesting stuff. So maybe we should have every student, teacher and administrator read this guide to student blogging from the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

The Bloggers’ FAQ on Student Blogging addresses legal issues arising from student blogging. It focuses on blogging by high school (and middle school) students, but also contains information for college students.

Bottom line, however, is that case law just hasn’t been blogified yet. In light of the current discussions, this part is pretty relevant:

Is My School-Hosted Blog a Public Forum?

A public forum is one where the student bloggers, not school administrators, have the authority to determine the content. Whether a school-hosted blog would be considered a public forum, and therefore not subject to Hazelwoodcensorship, is determined on a case-by-case basis, looking at the school’s policies and statements. If your school has an Internet Policy or Terms of Use for its site-hosting services, look it over carefully to see if the school has a right to edit or censor content.

And, of course, the ultra bottom line is that we need to get EVERYONE up to speed on this stuff as quickly as possible.
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After mentioning that Tucker was taking to blogging, Darren e-mailed and said that he new of some really young bloggers that
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