An interesting debate has taken shape over the past 5 years or so about the severity of content filtering within K-12 networks. When I say content filtering I mean school districts being asked, by law, to restrict access to sites that are potentially dangerous in some way for them to access.
Teachers have come into conflict with these restrictions time and time again because of the broad defintion of “dangerous site” to which schools are required to block student access. When teachers speak of blogs, wikis, and podcasting they are also talking about not just the tools, but the practice of authentic instruction.
Authentic Digital Experiences require some degree of freedom of access. There is the rub. How can districts work with their teachers to construct a amenable solution for both parties? More specifically, what can districts provide for teachers that won’t break the law or leave the district open for legal action from concerned parents?
Districts must begin by seeing beyond the tools.
Blogs, wikis, podcasting, and social networking applications are merely the tools for presenting a larger assessment of student learning. Students aren’t just making a poster presentation and calling it a blog post when the technology is utilized in an authentic way.
A blog is a journal of thought process, evolution, and observation of the information available to the author(s). Limiting access for others to read and react to a blog truly makes it a poster presentation, or a personal journal. Both journals and posters hold important places, but teachers certainly understand the different purposes for those artifacts of learning.
Teachers need to understand that districts are protecting teacher interests, student interests, and community interests. The facilitation of technology for the sole purpose of providing another tool with which teachers can assess student learning is only one component of decision-making.
There is a much greater awareness about the dangers of the internet for parents. The Chris Hansen “To Catch a Predator” series has exposed parents to the potential risks popular social networking sites pose. Digital literacy and digital citizenship are cornerstones of any 21st Century Learning curriculum, but the costs of failure are very high stakes in some cases!
This leaves both districts and teachers at an impasse. Or does it?
One possible solution…
When I was growing up all educational media (slide shows, videos, handouts, etc) all had to be provided by the teacher. There were rules associated with these materials like, “don’t make shadow puppets during the slide show” or “the video doesn’t need a running commentary.” The teacher acted, in this model, as a gatekeeper.
What if there were a way to empower teachers to configure workstations to request access to specific URLs for a limited time on individual machines or labs?
I envision the following process:
1. A teacher identifies a series of tools / URLs / videos online that will be appropriate for the lesson that is being taught.
2. The teacher identifies the lab / classroom in which these resources will be accessed.
3. The teacher then fills out an online request form which is submitted to a district media specialist who reviews, approves, or follows up with the teacher about the requested content.
4. The district media specialist can then select, via a web based application, the lab / classroom, dates, and URLs which can be accessed.
5. A nightly application runs, and creates the “hole” in the firewall for just the IP addresses associated with the classroom / lab for the next day. (Multiple days are picked up by this application for each subsequent day that is valid.)
6. An access code is e-mailed to the requesting teacher and is available via the web based application to the district media specialist who requested access for the teacher.
7. The teacher provides the code to the students which allows a firewall override for the resources that were requested.
8. When the duration expires, the codes become automatically invalid and the nightly application again restricts access to the requested resources.
This would add a few layers of protection, ensure that overrides were site-based, and provide some gauge for the district of what specific resources may be frequently requested so that they could re-evaluated for appropriateness.
The relationship between the district and the teacher should be amicable since both have the same goal of providing the best educational resources for students to succeed!
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