Social media has had an effect on almost every aspect of life in America. Like it or not, use it or not, agree with it or not, social media has changed the way we live our lives in America no matter what the generation is in which we reside. There are some aspects of our culture that are affected more. Certainly News, Entertainment, and Advertising are areas that all would agree have most dramatically been changed with the social media intrusion on our culture. The speed at which that change took place was accelerated by the quick adoption of strategies by those industries to harness the power of social media to advance their respective industries.
Now let us consider the education industry. There are still educators saying things like: We need to prepare our students for the 21st Century.” Students graduating for the last two years began their education IN THE 21ST CENTURY! The time for preparation has long past over a decade ago.
Social Media is a large part of the 21st Century, which is our present. Of course to understand and utilize social media to our advantage as educators, we need to call upon our knowledge of digital literacy. It is the very digital literacy that all educators will be held responsible to teach under the common core. Of course for educators to teach digital literacy and administrators to assess lessons on digital literacy, we must assume that our educators are digitally literate. The last thing we need to improve education would be illiterate educators.
What does it mean to be digitally literate? Trusting the ever-controversial Wikipedia, a product itself of social media, we have this: Digital literacy is the ability to effectively and critically navigate, evaluate and create information using a range of digital technologies. It requires one “to recognize and use that power, to manipulate and transform digital media, to distribute pervasively, and to easily adapt them to new forms”.
Understanding the use of technology and teaching it is one thing, using it to advance educators and education is a step further. The idea of connecting educators digitally for the purpose of curating and sharing information, collaborating with other educators, creating lessons and methods for teaching and learning, discussing and exploring mandates and political edicts in a transparent way are all strategies that engage technology in a meaningful way for education. The technology has made what was never before possible, a commonplace occurrence among connected educators.
What is resulting from all of this seems to be different types of educators. Those who are digitally literate and using that literacy to learn and share with other educators. These are the connected educators. Relevance is a primary concern. They don’t want to read about change, they want to lead it, or at least be involved with it. They write blogs and Tweet rather than email. Those educators, who are somewhat digitally literate, but choose to be strictly consumers of information through technology are semi-connected educators. They want to be relevant, but are content with reading about what is relevant. They may use that information in face-to-face discussions. They read blogs and they email. The unconnected educator is more in line with the 20th century model of teacher. Access to the Internet is limited for whatever reason. Relevance in the 21st century is not a concern. Whatever they need to know, someone will tell them. If they email anyone, they will follow it up with a phone call to make sure it was received.
These are the results of the effects of technology on educators that I have observed.
These are just my musings that you may agree with, or dismiss at will. I do however travel in big education circles, and I do engage, and observe educators regularly about education as a profession and as a passion. I think many of my observations are more accurate than not.
October is going to be Connected Educator Month, #CEM. This initiative is so important that it is sponsored and funded by the U.S. Department of Education. I would urge all educators to take advantage of the sources, which will be provided to connect. Being a connected educator does not happen in a day. It is a mindset. It becomes a great part of who you are as an educator. It enables you to hone in on your needs as a learner. I could not recommend anything else more strongly. If there is one thing that could best advance educators and education, it is teachers and administrators becoming connected educators.
Nice post. I think you’re spot on in the assessment of the general level of educators at the moment, as I’ve seen similar levels.
One area of concern that exists outside of the three levels, and that I believe serves as a (negative) mediating factor, is the role of self-appointed “experts” that have an outsized influence on the semi-connected educators. The desire of educators to become informed without delving into the research side of things has created an information vacuum that is largely being filled by consultants, some of whom are legitimately thoughtful educators, and some of whom are semi-informed and bring nothing more than dubious opinions. I hope that the edtech movement drives folks towards putting in enough work on the front end so that they can really decide which voices are worth listening to and which value smoke and mirrors over solid content.
Adam, What is important here is that those in the know speak up and post related to content that may be “semi-informed.” When it comes to “knowing” there are so many levels and so much continual change. That’s why we need to speak up and comment often on blogs, in response to tweets, and during webinars–that’s the only way we’ll bring the best of what we know to be true and right out into the open. Thanks for bringing this issue to light.
Resistance to being connected has, apparently, quite less than futile as I find even new teachers who are not “connected”.
Should have been “still quite less”
How about “become” instead of “still”? (This is what happens when I try multitasking)
Once again Tom – you nailed it! Your description of the connected layers parallels what I have seen. As I posted recently, many educators like to speak the language of mindset and lifelong learning, but this no longer seems possible without connecting to other learners through social media. I agree with you, getting connected with other learners is essential to growing as an educator.
Hi Tom, I had the chance to spend a considerable amount of one-to-one time with my 22-year old son today before he embarks on his next adventure. He said to me, “You seem much more into your job these days.” I responded, “My connections to social media and all the great teachers I’ve met online have changed my craft, ability, knowledge, and interest significantly, and for the better.” I’m with you–if you make the time to connect, you’ll never turn back as the information, ideas, and support available is incredible and those interactions make a considerable positive impact on the work you’re able to do with the children you teach. Thanks for leading this charge. – Maureen 🙂
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[…] Social media has had an effect on almost every aspect of life in America. Like it or not, use it or not, agree with it or not, social media has changed the way we live our lives in America no matte… […]
[…] Connected, Semi-Connected, and Unconnected Educators. […]
Don’t forget another group – ‘Connected and 20th Century’. There’s a few of us out there.
Adrian, tell me how you define “20th Century”–is it age, strategy, outlook?” I believe there’s actually no “century” to learning, but instead learning is a process that evolves, a process where hopefully the “cream rises to the top.”
Traditional methods. Lecture, testing, grades, homework, discipline, deadlines, accountability etc.
[…] just finished reading Tom Whitby’s recent post on Connected Educators. It is a straightforward explanation of why one should be a Connected […]
[…] As stated in the about section, this space is dedicated to learning. For me, students, colleagues, friends, and anyone who stumbles in by action or accident. So this past week has been a whirlwind of reading, lurking (I am not actually ready for full-fledged tweeting) and trying to negotiate my way through a myriad of technology and social media applications that might transform me into a “connected teacher”. […]
Tom, this is a wonderful and insight full post. I found value in the categorization and distinction you’ve made for teachers along the connectedness spectrum. I believe the only points I’d like to add is recognition that connectedness is a spectrum and thus, one’s state is not static. With this said, the categorization you’ve provided is valuable in the fact that it enables one to both identify where they are and where they have the potential of going.
With that said, I’ll remind folks that connectedness is not a tool, but a state of mind and a means of engaging with others. True connections are reciprocal. True connections involve sharing. True connections are personal. True connections happen one at a time. A true connection will energize you.
[…] how many semi-connected or unconnected TEACHers “read” this […]
[…] Tom has calculated (or made a “calculated guess”) that there are only 200 to 300,000 “connected” educators in the US (the ones that would probably have a Twitter account and do loads more on-line stuff). This is from a population of between 7.2m to 11m EDUcators…across the USA – that’s around 4% or 1.8%, if we use the extremes (read his post to find out why no one “knows” how many American teachers there are). […]
[…] first instance of “unconnected educator” that I can find is from Tom Whitby’s blog in 2013, which describes the unconnected educator […]