EricHoefler.com

Not long ago, I posted an entry in which I supported maintaining the freedom to access and share information, tools, and resources. I still agree with that. I also understand the dangers that some of the information, tools, and resources bring with them. However, I don’t believe that the right response to those dangers is to pretend they don’t exist or simply say “don’t touch that.” Anyone who’s spent any time with kids knows that “don’t touch that” never works–in fact, it often has the opposite result.So what should we do? Well, as educators, we should educate. We should open the things up–look at the information, tools, and resources–and point out how they work, how they might be used, the dangers they present, and the opportunities they afford. We should open discussion and allow students to express their curiosity, interests, fears, frustrations. By hiding things in the dark, we don’t help our students.

As educators also know, we are educators, not parents. Parents have always borne the responsibility to guide their children and help them navigate successfully through the world. Technology is another part of that world now, and another area through which parents must help their children navigate, not simply abdicate responsibility because they are “out of touch” with the technology.

Here, too, educators can help, but only if they are learning about and working with these tools, not ignoring them or hiding from them. Which brings me to the point of this post. A recent entry on the blog “The Road to Know Where” is just the sort of work that educators should be doing to help parents and students navigate this new world of technology.

So, I’d like to point you to the “Parent’s Guide to MySpace” as a resource to provide to parents and as a resource that teachers themselves should know.

Freedom is worth protecting, but freedom brings responsibility that we can’t ignore without putting oursevles and our children at risk. Handling technology responsibly doesn’t mean ignoring it or shutting it out, though. It means learning about the technology, understanding its dangers and its benefits, putting the technology to its best use, and helping others to do the same.