Summarization: This chapter dealt with Social Networks like Facebook and Ning. Facebook is more a social community and I belong to this so didn't learn a ton of new stuff about it. I did play around with the "create a group" feature a little to see if I'd want to use that in the classroom. The book also suggested to look into "Courses" on Facebook. From the posts I saw it looks like it didn't work very well and lots of people had issues, so I don't think I'd use it.
Ning is more a place for people for shared interests. There is a charge for Ning, so I didn't sign up for an account as I'd never use this with middle schoolers. The other thing I found interesting in this chapter was on page 145 when talking about kids misusing the computer. I found the quote, "when kids cross behavioral lines at school, we don't shut them down, we address the issue and try to learn from the experience." very interesting. This is so true with technology that teachers, administrators, and districts shut down or block something, yet we accept all kids. We need to treat technology not as something to be feared, but something to be taught how to use repsonsibly and respectfully. We owe it to students to teach them what they will need to deal with in their life and technology is a big part of this!
Application: I might use Facebook as most students are familiar and have accounts. When I tried creating a group I was only able to invite current friends, and really don't want to friend my students. I guess I'm wondering if there is a way around this? This would probably be the easiest place to post pictures of students in class so they would actually go and look at them. I would be more likely to check this and read posts and comments.
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