Dear everyone,

I have been reading a recent publication, which I have found very interesting and would therefore like to share with you:

Paolo Ferri, 2008, La scuola digitale, Milano: Bruno Mondatori Ed.

The first part of the book deals with Web.2 tools, and it is in my opinion very clear and well-structured. The second reports data and reflections about the way in which the digital generation (‘digital natives’ opposed to the ‘Gutemberg natives’), and relates to the web and to new technologies with specific reference to the possible impact and changes it can have on schools and education.

Last week I bought a new mobile phone and… I have to confess that the feeling is that of being a ‘Gutenberg native’ without any hope, if not that of being an” immigrant” in the best of cases, into a new world - the new millennium world of digital generations: the ones who were born with a remote control in their hands.

I am trying. I have been trying both within this community of practice and in other on line courses, not merely to “keep up to date” with the resources offered by new technologies, but out of a real sense of curiosity and need to learn and understand. I am grateful to this community of practice to have given me the opportunity to arouse curiosity even further. I do believe, and more and more so as I go on reading about the topic, that they (and Web.2 in particular) can offer great potentialities to transform learning. To connect classrooms with real life. To speak the language of our students. To put collaborative and cooperative learning in practice. To move from a teacher-centred to a student-centred way of operating and thinking in designing and realising didactic activities.

Nevertheless, the feeling is that of an immigrant in a world I did nor grow up in and with. Of all the wonderful things my new mobile phone can do, including podcasting, creating/sharing/using and what else God knows with multimedia files, I find it difficult to find my way and use them all. While I am sure my 15-year-old son, or even his younger mates, would just plunge into it and do it. It is not only that I do not have a try-and-error approach – it’s just that my mind very likely works in a gutembergian linear way, and “advanced” hypertextual ones feel at times more like a labyrinth than an opportunity. With a consequent feeling of frustration – because I want to learn and to do/use all those wonderful things. Probably the same feeling of frustration some of our students go through using “our” linear books and ways of dealing with knowledge. Once more, it’s probably good to be “on the other side of the desk” from time to time, but… but: so many question marks. And once you seem to be able to cope with one tool, it’s out of date already, and there are so many new other ones to learn about…

Will I ever be able to manage in a sufficiently self-confident way these tools in order to use them with my students? And together with me how many educators? Is this feeling of frustration and insecurity what keeps technology out of real school projects and practices (data in Ferri seem quite dramatic in this respect).

Help from a Gutenberg native! ;-(

Paola