The little voice was heard!

The state of Tennessee has made a decision about allowing students to access Whyville.

There has been some discussion here as to whether we should unblock it or not. The reason we have had it blocked is because there is a chat feature on the site and the sites rules clearly states that they do not moderate that chat. As you know, chat is a category that is blocked according to the guidelines set by the Tennessee Schools k12 Cooperative. However, since the site is so educational and we believe will be used under supervision of teachers, we have decided to go ahead and allow the site for now.

Of course, it seems that this is a trial basis and if there are complaints or they find that students are abusing the chat feature, it will be blocked.  The good thing is that there are chat lessons and a test that participants in Whyville must pass before they are allowed to chat.  Although this does not do the whole job of teaching digital etiquette, it definitely will help.

Some more information on Whyville:

Whyville In-Depth Review, from Worlds in Motion

Whyville’s ‘Cool Factor’ Helps Industry, Learning, from Worlds in Motion

Working for Clams in Whyville, from Business Week

Whyville: the place girls love to go for science, from Christian Science Monitor

Q&A with Numedeon’s CEO Jim Bower, from Worlds in Motion

Now, time to start working on those lesson plans!  I bugged people about this, so I suppose this means I had better make it count.

I tried to get a website unblocked through the state, but it was denied because of the chat feature.  This was one of the main reasons that I wanted to have access to the site!  The site is called Whyville.  The link I provided was to the Wikipedia entry, as anyone in Tennessee would not be able to actually view the site at all. The entry can provide all the information about this science-driven interactive world.

One article about Whyville reported:

In Texas, Whyville recently received grants totaling $440,000 from the Texas Workforce Commission to build Whyville Biotech and Whyville Advanced Manufacturing Center.

The site’s designers created Whyville Biotech to teach kids how to develop vaccines against WhyPox, a flu-like epidemic that erupts each year. WhyPox causes kids’ avatars — their virtual characters — to break out with red spots on their faces. Last fall, during real-world flu season, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention virtually vaccinated 134,000 kids in Whyville.

Through the Texas grant, kids also will learn about drug design and discovery, as well as new techniques in computational biology, Bower said.

Eventually, Whyville citizens will build biotechnology companies in Whyville, Bower said.

“From a work-force standpoint, this is huge,” he said. “We have a ‘cool’ factor, but we’re also doing something very useful for these industries.”

Whyville features all kinds of simulations of real-world events. Residents recently dealt with Tropical Storm Alice and are learning about the effects of global warming. The J. Paul Getty Museum of Los Angeles teaches kids about great works of art at its Whyville gallery.

But science is the main focus.

“You cannot learn science through textbooks,” Bower told a group of Texas educators at a conference in San Antonio last month. “It kills science.”

Kids go to Whyville to socialize, but they also participate in fun activities from science quizzes to writing articles for the Whyville Times, the town newspaper, Bower said.

“It’s a big, big world, and lots of things are going on,” said Yasmin Kafai, associate professor of education at the University of California at Los Angeles. She received a grant from the National Science Foundation to study Whyville.  Read more.

I understand the message I received from the Tennessee K12 Cooperative.  It has a chat feature.  Yes, I understand that, but there is something called moderation.  Secondly, how in the world are we going to teach students to be good digital citizens if we block every website that allows them to actually apply what we’ve taught them?

Because so many students are using technology as it is part of almost every aspect of their lives, the role of technology in education should be to teach them digital citizenship, how to use technology appropriately, how to problem solve issues, and how to learn via digital sources.  Our administrators need to encourage experimentation from teachers, allow types of technology that they are blocking, such as instant messaging programs, text messaging, blogging, chat rooms, message boards, and other means of digital communication.  We cannot expect students to learn how to use these sorts of technology appropriately without guidance, therefore we need to incorporate their use into learning in the classroom and teach digital citizenship while students are actually getting practical application.  The real life classroom must also become a digital community.

I’m going to apply for an authorized override, and explore the site some more.  If I really find value in it, I think I’m going to challenge this whole blocked business.

To any parents reading, go and check out the site for yourself.  Read the online safety procedures and recommendations that Whyville provides, and see if you can’t at least provide this engaging world of science for your own child at home.