Final Developments in our Final Project

One of the biggest developments that has occurred over the weekend is the decision to leave the "Consume, Create, and Connect" pages open on the Backpack 2.0 Wiki site open. I was slightly reluctant to do this, but in the end, I realized this was the best way for people to collaborate on our website and add their own tools. Anyone with our website URL can go to one of these three pages, and hit the "Edit" button at the top of that page:

This is SCARY for me. It means that anyone (I don't know why they would, which makes my fear a little irrational) could come online and maliciously change the page for their own purposes! I know, it's a bit of a ridiculous fear, but it is genuinely one I have.

Now, if any of you have AMAZING digital tools that are available online, and would like to add them to our website, please visit: backpack2.wikispaces.com. Collaboratively, this could become an extremely useful website to anyone who visits it.

If you have feedback, you can E-mail me at: sparax88@gmail.com

Education 2.0 and our Digital Tool Sites

When we talk about Education 2.0, our final project falls perfectly into this topic. Education used to be going to class, reading your textbook, doing assignments, and then taking tests, with the final result being a diploma or a degree. How much does that degree really mean in our world today? Yes, it does usually give you a higher salary, but what does it have to do with your abilities? Does it mean that you are proficient in the field you studied?

The fact is, having a degree doesn't mean that you know everything in your given field. What it means, (hopefully), is that you have learned how to learn, and that you can continue your own education outside of the classroom by your own motivation. Does the schooling we receive nowadays help us accomplish that? Hopefully, but I'm afraid that there are still many classes across the country, and around the world, that are still stuck in the traditional form of classrooms.

This is why you HAVE to take your own education into your own hands. You need to become proficient in your field, AND you need to learn how you can continue to learn throughout your life. Without the ability of continuing your own education, you will be left behind in this rapidly changing world.

Enter: Our group's final project. The tools that we are organizing on our blog and wiki sites are there as a source for others to continue their education on their own through the many wonderful tools available online. Without being able to consume (intaking useful and usable information through use of the internet), create (adding new, and noteworthy contributions to the internet), and connect (making connections with others in your given field so that you can continue to learn and collaborate with others throughout your life), you will never be able to truly be a help to your given field, or to the world in general.
We are hoping that these websites will eventually help others to learn many of the wonderful tools that we have learned to use in this class. We are hoping that they will also give others the ability to contribute the tools they have found useful to our sites, so that this project can be ongoing.