-- 
Paul Allison, Monika Hardy, and Chris Sloan

There's room in the Hangout. Let us know (by commenting below) if you have some string, and would like to join us.

+Fred Mindlin was inspired by the session we had with teachers using Minecraft, where we explored an online game world via another virtual world, http://edtechtalk.com/node/5102 and I was intrigued by whether it would be feasible to explore a meatspace game in our virtual Teachers Teaching Teachers forum. Hope you can join us!

Fred says that he sees string games as a gateway to keyboarding and creativity or finger calisthenics, and computer keyboarding: media magic for tradigital storytelling

Playing games with string is a human cultural universal. This ancient art form is surprisingly helpful in developing both the manual dexterity and strength needed for computer keyboarding. The approach I use for teaching string games to groups also provides a helpful practice ground for some of life's essential skills: creativity, resilience, cooperation, and storytelling.

Mindful use of digital media means thinking about what we are doing, cultivating an ongoing inner inquiry into how we want to spend our time. I outline five fundamental digital literacies, online skills that will help us do this: attention, participation, collaboration, critical consumption of information (or “crap detection”), and network smarts. I explain how attention works, and how we can use our attention to focus on the tiny relevant portion of the incoming tsunami of information. I describe the quality of participation that empowers the best of the bloggers, netizens, tweeters, and other online community participants; I examine how successful online collaborative enterprises contribute new knowledge to the world in new ways; and I present a lesson on networks and network building.

There is a bigger social issue at work in digital literacy, one that goes beyond personal empowerment. If we combine our efforts wisely, it could produce a more thoughtful society: countless small acts like publishing a Web page or sharing a link could add up to a public good that enriches everybody.

Download theI ntroductory Chapter and Table of Contents  

Buy the book

Paul Allison, Monika Hardy, and Chris Sloan

Join us at http://edtechtalk.com/live-ttt

Like it or not, knowing how to make use of online tools without being overloaded with too much information is an essential ingredient to personal success in the twenty-first century. But how can we use digital media so that they make us empowered participants rather than passive receivers, grounded, well-rounded people rather than multitasking basket cases? In Net Smart, cyberculture expert Howard Rheingold shows us how to use social media intelligently, humanely, and, above all, mindfully.

Howard will be joining our conversations next week, Wednesday, April 2.

Please take a look at this New York City Writing Project http://nycwritingproject.org teacher's assignment or "mission" and give us your thoughts: http://youthvoices.net/node/38057

Also feel free to engage any of the students as well. You and your students are welcomed to leave comments!

What do you think might be the next steps for these students? Maybe this mission? http://youthvoices.net/node/34240

We'll be Livecasting from +Joel Levin's/@MinecraftTeachr's server with+Liam O'Donnell /@liamodonnell, +Chad Sansing /@chadsansing,+Diana Maliszewski /@MzMollyTL and +Denise Colby /@Niecsa. Join us. 

Watch at http://edtechtalk.com/live and make fun of us in the chat as+Paul Allison and +monika hardy learn first-hand what's so engaging about Minecraft! 

(Also any volunteers? We have another slot open for anybody who wants to join us. Just comment on this post or email Paul atallisonpr@gmail.com)

Consider this an "in-world" follow-up to these TTT episodes:http://edtechtalk.com/node/5001 and http://edtechtalk.com/node/4980And also 21st Century Learning's recent interview with Joel Levin:http://edtechtalk.com/ett21_166

Should be fun!

We'll be talking about the introduction to +Howard Rheingold's new book, Net Smart, which is available for free http://mitpress.mit.edu/catalog/item/default.asp?ttype=2&tid=12827&mode=toc 

We'll also be talking about a High School Syllabus that Howard "compiled." He considers this to be a rough draft and he wants high school teachers to help him re-make it so that it' s appropriate/useful/exciting for high school students.

Please join us at http://edtechtalk.com/live where we'll Livestream the Hangout, and where you can participate in a chat. Tell us what you find to be most resonating part of Rheingold's book so far. What resonates with you as a learner and as a teacher? Also bring your questions about Net Smart.

We will be meeting again about Net Smart on April 25, then Harold Rheingold will be joining us on May 2. We hope that you will be able to join us on those Wednesdays as well.

What have you been talking to your students about this? Here are some of the things that have been going up on Youth Voices this week:
http://youthvoices.net/taxonomy/term/33223

And the articles we have been reading and annotating together. (Click on each individual title to see students' comments.
http://youthvoices.net/node/36643

I'm ready to suggest that we create a "Walking While Black" mission (set of assingments on http://youthvoices.net ) where students tell stories of what it's like to be on the streets of America. And given that it's poetry month, I'm wondering if it might not be a powerful poetry unit.

If you've clicked on the links above you can see evidence that I am working through some of this with students. 

Yesterday, when I walked into my teachers room, it took about 4 seconds of talking about what my students were doing for three African-American colleagues to talk in wide-ranging ways about violence and protecting children and dress and racism... and... I just listened as carefully as I could. I'm not even sure what the questions are.

We plan to have this conversation on http://edtechtalk.com/live-ttt tomorrow evening, Wednesday 4.4.12. Perhaps it's a time for white folks to listen. 

As Dan Cantor wrote recently on the Working Families blogs: ...What is new and welcome is that more and more white people are reminded or learning for the first time what the persistent existence of the color line means to millions of our fellow Americans. http://www.workingfamiliesparty.org/2012/04/my-son-doesnt-look-like-trayvon/

If this is a conversation you are having with students -- or you wish your were having. Join us in the Hangout. Let us know by commenting on this post that you might want to join us.

Or listen in at http://edtechtalk.com/live-ttt at 9:00 PM Eastern / 6:00 PM Pacific / World Times: http://goo.gl/rAfwW