Teaching in Global 3.0 - Post #1

Two quotations stood out to me from this week's reading in Friedman:

1: "Just as we finished creating this new, more horizontal playing field, and companies and individuals primarily in the West started quickly adapting to it, three billion people who had been locked out of the field suddenly found themselves liberated to plug and play with everybody else" (211).
What this means for ELA teachers-- Ok, so schools aren't companies and we don't live in the "West" that Friedman refers to, but it's as simple as what the quotation says- we're free to "plug and play with everybody else." Teachers no longer have a small network of colleagues simply within the same school, or even the same district, but they now have a global network where ideas, curriculums, lessons, and theories can be exchanged and put into use. I've found many resources helpful in my pre-teaching experiences: I've used several online education forums for ideas on lessons plans and activities for certain texts. Information has become limitless... I know that even at 3am as I'm cramming to prepare lessons for the next day's class, I'm not really alone with my struggle; and neither are the thousands of other teachers in the same position.

2: "And take note, these new players are often stepping onto the playing field legacy free, meaning that many of them were so far behind they can leap right into the new technologies without having to worry about all the sunken costs of old systems" (215).
What this means for ELA teachers- Our class is at the very cutting edge of almost total technology integration. Before us, teachers simply used computers for word processing and simple internet searches. Our generation, however, is the "legacy free" generation that Friedman speaks of- we should be free, eager, and open to trying all sorts of new programs, software, and even some hardware in our classrooms. Some technologies may fail horribly while others may be just the hook that students needed to fully comprehend a concept. Who knows which technologies will and will not work?? It's for us, the legacy-free generation, to decide. True, we do have a small concern with outdated computers and other technology. (I remember in 4th grade we had this GIANT CD player which played DVD type interactive programs on television- the CD's themselves were about the size of a large vinyl record!!!) Some of these things may be brand new, but already obsolete. Maybe part of our job is to resurrect those technologies for one final go-around?