Learning Side by Side

Today I was taking the morning off from work to go to my son’s “Daddy and Me Day” at his school this morning.  When it was over, I had a couple of hours to kill before I had to go back to work.  So I sat in the El Sereno Public Library here in Northeast Los Angeles, pulled out my laptop, and worked uninterrupted.  But as I was working, I had a good view of the public use, Internet-capable computers.  They were all being used, but everyone was delving into their little niche into the Web 2.0 world.  A couple of people were using their My Space accounts to send out information.  One person was checking out the latest American Idol episode on YouTube.  Only one lone person was filling out an application of some sort.  I just wanted to log this in as a reflection of where our world is coming to.  And let us ponder where our schools are at in this world.  Are we missing the boat when it comes to tapping into the information/social rich world of the Read/Write Web?

By the way, even though I expected there to be a free wireless access point at the public library, I was excited to discover and use it myself. The only thing I had to do was agree to the terms of use policy of the Los Angeles Public Library. Very “right on”!!! (http://www.lapl.org)