Wikiflick and Webpod? Huh?

"Hi, Honey! How was your day at school?" asks Mom as she sits at the kitchen table with her daughter Caitlyn who is enjoying an after-school snack.

"Oh, Mom! It was awesome! We have this really cool teacher this year. She doesn't even have books in her room."

"What? No books? Well, how in the world are you gonna learn anything if you don't have any textbooks?" Mom was seriously contemplating calling this "really cool" teacher as soon as this conversation was over. She wanted to find out what was happening to all the tax dollars her family pays so that her daughter can get a good education.


"Oh, Mom. Books are great, but we are in a new age. We are making new advances in technology everyday", Caitlyn happily explains to her dumbfounded mother. "In fact, today my friends and I talked to some kids all the way in Australia. We have a class weblog and we even posted some cool stuff on Wikipedia too. When I finish eating my snack I've got to start working on my WebQuest. I haven't decided yet if I am going to use the Flickr site to help me create a virtual field trip about our state or if I'll just record a podcast. Which one do you think I should do, Mom?


Not wanting her daughter to know that she had absolutely no idea what language she just used, Mom confidently replied, "Oh, I don't know, Honey. I think that a wikiflick might be nice, but that webpod thing sounds pretty interesting too. I'm sure you'll do a great job no matter which one you decide to do. Now, would you mind driving to the store and picking up a gallon of milk?"


As Caitlyn stands to take her plate to the sink, she giggles loudly,"Awww, Mom! You know I'm only in the second grade!"


Other than the mother asking a second grader to drive to the store, this scenario surely takes place in kitchens across America on a daily basis. Children as young as preschool are more technologically advanced than many adults. Today's classrooms are moving from pen and paper to laptops and various wireless gizmos and gadgets. Instead of reading about a speech made by a famous politician, they can now watch it on sites like YouTube. They can even re-create the speech and post their own video on YouTube.

As I watched a video for one of my online classes the other day, I had to chuckle as I listened to the professor tell about how everyone was just so astounded by the invention of the blackboard. In most of today's classrooms the blackboard is just as extinct as the tyrannasaurus rex. Then I realized that when my daughter is my age, she will be chuckling at how astonished we were by our "technology". What's even more awe-inspiring is when I consider what the classrooms of my grandchildren will be like. Will there even be classrooms anymore? Will there come a day when students can just stay home and learn everything they need to know from the screen in front of them? Anything's possible, I guess.