The Bass Players Blog

Zurker

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Wed, 20 Jun 2012 22:51:00 +0000

I signed up to a new upcoming social networking site today, Zurker - I can sense the groans, "not another one of those damn Facebook things", but if I'm being honest, I'm getting a bit bored of Facebook and its rather deep integration with all my other web activities. It seems as if I can't do much these days without Facebook and my 'friends' knowing about it, whether it's reading a Guardian article, or watching something on Netflix, or any else of a similar day to day nature. Point is, I figured that it was time for change, and the thought of something similar but different, run by people with different and less corporate ideals and rather more optional approach to sharing (just like the good old days) was too good to turn down.

Check it out, invite only for now, with the benefit being every time you invite someone and they sign up you get a share in the company - cool! http://www.zurker.co.uk/i-248387-xfuzrqyshq

Sean.

Find the Best

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Thu, 09 Feb 2012 20:28:00 +0000

We live in an age in which we can find the answers to pretty much anything we need to know with the aid of one simple tool - a search engine. I'd say that these days most people can't go a matter of hours without using one to search for something or other. Nothing underlines this more than the statistic that search giants Google racked up a staggering 1 Billion unique page views last May - and yes, I did find that after a google search. However, there are still some things that these search giants haven't quite mastered, and that is comparisons. More often than not you are left to do all the legwork when it comes to comparisons, and depending on what you are looking for, this can be rather time consuming and often frustrating. Well, I've recently been pointed in the direction of a website which makes the comparison process an absolute breeze - FindTheBest.com.

What I like most about this site is it's flexibility, there seems to be no end to it's comparing talents, whether you are looking for the best smartphone to buy or the best hotel to stay at, Find The Best collects and screens data from around the internet and lays it out in an easy to read format, which can be easily manipulated and refined to suit your needs. It is this simplicity and ease which sparked my interest in a particular search category on the site - Education. With this specific section of the website you are able to find and compare data relating to many different aspects of education, for example it allows you to compare colleges, which by default lets you see at a glance the number of enrolled students, the acceptance rates, tuition prices and SAT scores (and more!) of the American Colleges and Universities. There is also a 'smart rank' given, which combines a number of these different aspects and ranks them accordingly, it is this rank that is used by default but you can rank the results however you like in a matter of a few clicks. It isn't just college comparisons that the education section deals in however, it also allows you to search for the best college scholarships and even has a new section to help you find the best test prep classes, in order help the revision process along. All in all FindTheBest could just save you some time when it comes to picking which University to apply for, or which scholarship to apply for, it may even help you find the best revision material to help you get your way through once you get there!

Have a look and see what you think, unfortunately for now the site is geared more towards an American usage, but it's still worth checking out if you live somewhere else in the world, as hopefully it will spread its wings and include us all someday.

Sean.

2011

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Sat, 31 Dec 2011 22:23:00 +0000

This year seems to have passed like a flash of lightening for me, and now that I'm left sitting here with some much needed time off I have the time to look back at what 2011 had to offer. When looking back at happenings both in my personal life and in the world around me I must say I'm rather taken aback at just how much has actually happened, and in a year that was promised to have ended in May. Oh, and then October as well. It may be a bit clichéd to provide a 'most important happenings list' coming in to the new year, however I'm going to jump on the bandwagon and provide you with my personal view on the 5 defining moments of 2011.

1. Osama Bin Laden's Death

Years of cat and mouse between the American military and the now former al-Qaeda leader finally came to an end early this year. In an operation taking over a year to plan American soldiers swooped a high walled complex in Abbotttabad to shoot dead Bin Laden and take his body, later to bury it at sea and open up a controversy filled can of worms regarding the manner of his burial. One of the most unlikely things to unfold from the whole incident was the unintentional coverage of the raid by a local on twitter.

2. The English Riots

This has to be one of the most infamous moments of 2011 for the UK, and I unfortunately found myself right in the heart of Birmingham throughout. Starting out in Tottenham in apparent response to a police shooting of Mark Duggan following an attempted arrest, these protests soon became violent and rapidly escalated, prompting many copy-cat acts of crime throughout London and many in cities across England. Crimes included looting, vandalism and a large number of violent acts. For those sitting watching it all unfold it may have seemed as if any basic sense of decency and consideration had been lost for many, however we were all reminded of the many out there ready to rally together and stand up for their local communities with operation cup of tea.

3. Libya

There was a large chunk of this year in which Libya found itself dominating the news. The whole saga began early in the year with an anti-government protest by a group of Libyan citizens, which saw Gaddafi's security forces firing on the crowd, escalating tension and playing a hand in the beginnings of a rebellion. The rest of the world watched intently as the resulting civil war spanned many months and saw large scale clashes between pro-Gaddafi and rebel forces. However, with the hangover from both Afganistan and Iraq still in mind the only outside actions taken were a seizing of Gaddafi's assets, a restriction of movements on his inner circle and an imposed no-fly zone over the country by the U.N., along with a promise to use "all necessary measures" to protect Libyan civilians. The war found its resolution late in October when Gaddafi was found, captured and killed, and the news being met with widespread images of celebration from the Libyan people.

4. The death of Kim Jong-Il

The end of the year saw the death of another one of the worlds most infamous leaders. Kim Jong-Il has been the leader of North Korea since the death of his father in 1994, and has managed to continue the communist state built by Kim Il-sung. Hunger and poverty has been rife under the power of the former leader, with his priorities seeming to lie in other places, such as the countries nuclear and chemical weapon capabilities. The prominent question now that Kim Jong-Il has passed away and his son Kim Jong-un has taken over as 'supreme leader' is what is yet to come politically for North Korea, and how does this new leadership affect the relationship with the south of the peninsula?

5. Japanese Tsunami and Earthquake

As natural disasters go this was one of the most serious seen in recent years, the initial earthquake measuring in at 9 on the richter scale and causing a devastating tsunami which travelled no less than 10km inland. The results of these events were massive, seeing tens of thousands confirmed dead, and hundreds of thousands left homeless. Arguably the most distressing thing to have come from this distaster however is the resulting damage caused to the Fukushima nuclear plant, putting the facility in to a meltdown given a severity rating of 7 - a rating only previously reached by Chernobyl. This meltdown managed to irradiate much needed food and water supplies for the country, along with contaminating many of the plants workers and emergency service teams that fought to keep the radiation levels at a minimum. Have a look at National Geographics "20 unforgettable pictures" of the whole disaster.

What would you regard as the most defining moments of 2011?

The Bass Player

Think Before You Post.

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 11:44:00 +0000

I was listening to a debate on Radio Scotland this morning about the consequences of posting things to various sites like Twitter and Facebook. One of the main arguments presented was that there are many people out there that feel they can hide behind their keyboards and post things that if said in 'real life' situations would be regarded as abusive, offensive or simply unacceptable. I would agree, there are still many people out there who regard their online identity as something far separate from their real life one, and many who think that what they post online can only be seen by a carefully selected 'friends list', which is on the whole far from the truth. I count myself lucky for having entered the world of social networking and blogging at a relatively young age, as the experiences I've had and the people I have come in to contact with have always left me considering my actions - although I feel I'm relatively level-headed anyway.

I've been posted a lot to Twitter, Facebook and of course this blog over the years, putting both my feelings and opinions out there for the world to see. I have however, always had my own set of guidelines and opinions for staying safe and free from controversy - and not always those that I would recommend to others. First and foremost I conceded from the beginning, that whatever I posted was out there for the world to see, and that I could hide nothing. I feel that no matter what my privacy settings on any site this is a good thing to keep at the back of my mind, because with this in mind I think I would struggle to post something that people could be offended by (although that seems to be rather difficult in this day and age). My second and final guideline for myself is that I treat my online life in a similar way to my 'real' one. Although there always has been and always will be a degree of separation between both my online and real life identities, I will always try to act the same online as I would offline. I've always used 'the bass player' as my online identity around the web, as much for security in the younger days than anything else - although I'm sure it wasn't particularly difficult to find my real name somewhere out there. I never used this online identity as an excuse to act differently, as I feel is an important rule to go by. There are some out there using screen names as excuses, using them as something to hide behind while being abusive to others and behaving in what would be a publicly unacceptable manner, and I for one don't like it.

I think it's important to think of the online environment as purely an extension to real life, not an alternate reality. You wouldn't walk down your local high street, or in to a restaurant and spout abuse at someone you don't know (or at least few people would). Just as you wouldn't walk in to a cinema and shout about how much you hate someone else, or how much they've annoyed you by going out with your ex girlfriend or boyfriend. These things are socially unacceptable, so why are there people who think that just because it's happening online it is acceptable? The effect of a status update or a tweet is not dissimilar to taking a megaphone down a local shopping centre and saying it there, and I think that there are people out there who definitely need to realise that. Employers for a few years now have been looking at the popular social networks as part of character references for candidates, and there's every chance that universities will do the same in the future. With social networks becoming ever more prominent in todays society, is it really worth posting something without taking the time to think? After all you never know when it might come back to haunt you.

The Bass Player (Sean Law)

Ups and Downs of University

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Sat, 09 Oct 2010 00:35:00 +0000

I'm just a couple of weeks in to my second year at university, but I've learned a fair bit already this year. Between lectures, workshops and practical classes I can feel my skills as a musician beginning to develop, which is a rather awesome feeling. But if I'm honest, I'm finding this a rather strange stage of my life at the moment. It's weird to think that by the end of the year I'll be half way through my degree, and that in as little as 5 years time I might possibly be working as a professional musician. I mean it's fantastic, it really is... but I don't know if I'm ready for it yet. Besides, I'm only 19.

Four years ago I started writing this blog, and at the time, although some of my writing was reaching some rather large audiences I had no sense of fear, no trepidation for what lay ahead. I guess that's normal, no regular 15 year old really has much need to look any further ahead than the date of their next exam. But here I am now, having to take control of my own life; look for extra work, manage my finances, cook and clean. But then underneath it all lies constant anticipation for what lies ahead, and where I'll be in the next couple of years time. I always had this picture of student life being filled with fun and partying all the time... mainly because it's the common perception, and I guess to a degree it's true. There is however that whole other dimension that people have either forgotten or haven't experienced. That layer of stress, worry and angst that comes from not only the new found independence but from the sense of expectation surrounding your success. I guess all in all student life just isn't as plain sailing as everyone makes out.

However, all that aside... I'm having one of the best times of my life. I'm loving learning all this new stuff, and I most definitely love watching my playing improve on a daily basis. Whatever passion I had for music before seems to only be amplified here due to the fantastic input from the staff, and the mountains of opportunities around me. I'm getting to play in big orchestras, folk groups both big and small, I'm doing masterclass, performance classes and getting more and more opportunities by the day. I couldn't possibly ask for more. That however is the strange bit, this huge mix of emotions to be encountered and battled with on a daily basis. I find myself tired after just one lecture, or napping in the afternoon... not through laziness, or being out all night, but through sheer tiredness, and emotional stress. It's a combination of the ups and downs that does it I think, I mean I'm sure I could handle either by themselves quite comfortably, but combined it's like some sort of virus ready to drain you of life. The only option though is to battle on and get through, in the knowledge that you'll come out the other end with a piece of paper and some vague grasp of what you want to spend the rest of your life doing. Whether that piece of paper will help remains to be seen, and is an argument ready to be had another day.

For now though, it's late on Friday night and seeing as there's no rest for the wicked, I need to go in for practice tomorrow, but hopefully this has been a relatively coherent brief insight into the world of a second year music student. Thanks for reading.

The Bass Player

Center'd

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Mon, 02 Mar 2009 00:26:00 +0000

I got an email a couple of weeks ago from a guy called Mike over at Center’d.com asking if I’d do a review of their site. Now I don’t usually do that sort of thing, but I do always like checking out the sites that are forwarded to me. I must say though that I was rather impressed with Center’d when I took a look… so much so I decided to take the plunge and write a quick post about it!

I suppose it’s best to start by explaining what Center’d is, and for that I’m going to cheat and copy it from their site (There’s a one sentence summary after the italics if you want to skip it);

We just love it when a plan comes together. Unfortunately, that rarely happens without heroic efforts, hundreds of emails, and a fair amount of anxiety.

Who is going, where are we going, when are we going. Easy, right? Well, not so much. In fact, no one has created an experience that combines the best of planning tools with the best of local search. And until someone does, we will either continue to endure, or stop making plans altogether. Sigh.

But wait! At Center'd, we’ve been thinking about how to solve the challenges that exist in making plans. From the smallest get together, where you just can’t decide on where to eat and oh-my-goodness-I-can’t-take-it-anymore-maybe-I’ll-just-stay-home-and-wash-my-cat, to the large fundraisers and school activities that require signups and hundreds of emails and weeks of meticulous planning, one thing is clear: We can help you spend less time planning, and more time enjoying yourself.

We do this by focusing on three categories:

People - Connect to people you trust, and get their opinions and information to help you find that perfect place or make successful that successful plan.

Places - See what the crowds think by seeing ratings and reviews from across the web, or find out what your trusted friends think.

Plans - Easily invite friends, find out where everyone wants to go and when with place and time voting, empower volunteers to sign up for tasks, and stay on top of it with reminders and notifications.

So basically, Center’d gives you a platform to create and manage events with minimal fuss (as large as you like or as small as you like), but within that there is a platform for finding places like bars, coffee shops, halls etc and add the locations to your event. What I like about it is the simple and clean interface, and the overall ease of use… I was able to put together a demo event in a minute or two, which is brilliant for those small meetings or spontaneous events that come up. You can find the demo event here by the way, feel free to mess around and have a tinker.

I have to say, the thing I like most about Center’d though is the fact that you don’t need an account to be a part of an event, and to take part in the organization of it once it’s been created. This really saves time for those who just want to click on an email link and say “yup, I’ll be there”, but also means that those who want to be a little more involved in the event don’t actually need to have an account to do so. Although I had to make an account to create the demo event, it only took the same amount of time to do so as it did to make the demo itself, which again, is another bonus.
Creating events themselves is very stress free, and includes all the things you could need; Event name, description, location, time, whether you want to make it invite only or public etc, whether you want to track RSVP’s and whether you want to be able to ask volunteers to sign up for your event. It even lets you add a little picture for the event, you can choose from the default ones, which are taken from flickr or you can add your own from the web or your desktop. I should also mention that you can choose to have a vote on the time and location on the event.

Once you send out the invites and links to the event page your invitees will see a cool little page that details the time location etc and allows them to vote on these if you have requested a vote. It has a google map to map out the event location(s), an attendees section and also a comments section. Along the top it gives you the options to add tasks for the event, share the event, and send messages (as of yet I’ve only tried the sharing bit).

There’s not much bad to say about Center’d (apart from the fact we spell centered like that in the UK so I’ve had to correct my spelling every time I’ve typed it!), what I will say though is that I had difficulty adding my locations into the event and found I had to type a specific place otherwise it would take an American bias… but apart from that, I love it and as event tools go it’s a very good one. I must also say though that it’s got a lot of potential to be used in a school environment, they even give you templates for typical school events (which can be found here). Overall a very nice little tool for a multitude of situations!

The Bass Player

(p.s. If you think I should do a few more of these please say in the comments)

Business and innovation

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 23:43:00 +0000

Take a minute to imagine the education system as one big business. It shouldn’t be too difficult, I mean at the end of the day it has a lot of similarities to a business. It has a product (teaching), which it delivers to its clients (students). It has the same sort of staff hierarchy, it has its sets of rules and its policies and it has a reputation, which can be considered proportional to its success. There are however the differences; no foreign call centers, no company cars and definitely no multi-million pound/dollar bonuses (or is that just banks that get those…).

But I suppose the biggest difference of all is the fact that because of the way the education system works it just wouldn’t survive in the cut throat world of business when put up against the likes of Google, Sony or Apple. Why? Well, the main reason is innovation. Companies thrive on innovation, it’s what makes or breaks them. Unless you innovate in business you get left behind, and are overtaken by your competitors. This is something that the education system just isn’t used to, and because of this it’s been stuck in an endless loop for decades. Granted, there are glimmers of hope here and there, when the government tries to mix things up a bit, but there are never any notable changes.

It’s just a shame there isn’t a structure in place where schools are in a way made to innovate, as if they were a business and as if they had competitors to try and stay ahead of. It’s a shame because it’s only once a structure like this is in place that our schools governing bodies will even begin to think about stepping outside the box, and consider letting our teachers improvise rather than supervise. I guess this is where my comparison between the education system and a business really rings true, because these governing bodies I speak of are no different to CEO’s and Presidents of global companies. They only care about the facts and the figures that - every year - equate to better results. Results that they can boast to shareholders about… or in this case, tax payers. They won’t deviate from a system that is getting them the kind of results they can put in headlines and say “look, the number of people passing English is up by whatever percent”, so they need something else to make them change things, and properly for once. We need to put something in place that gives them the statistics they so desperately crave, but actually helps the students learn skills that will be useful in todays society, not last centuries.

So here’s my idea; I think we should put in place some sort of scheme, where a districts funding (or part of a districts funding) for education is dependent on how well they can innovate, and introduce new things to the classroom. Not only this but they should have to dedicate a reasonable amount of time to preparing our young students for life outside of school. Money should be taken away for turning that bit in to any kind of formal lectures or talks, and money should again be awarded for creativity. I also think that districts should be allowed to keep any money they save by switching to open source software, or by moving things like student planners online. I do however think, that one of the main points on the list should be making sure our students feel like they are a part of something, and actually making them a part of something. While all this is happening though the districts need to keep a good level of achievement with exams etc to thus satisfy the statistic lovers. Feel free to object, and make suggestions but I believe this to be a good compromise, and a good method for not only opening up our education system and modernizing it, but allowing it to continue along a similar vein to which our Governments wish to keep it.

We need to understand that our schools have been safe, and stable with the current structure for decades upon decades. What I’m worried about now is how much longer the structure will hold? Do we stand by, watching and waiting till the global education crisis creeps up? Where what teachers are told to teach becomes irrelevant, and our text books simply aren’t fact anymore. Where exam results mean nothing in a world where free thinking and true learning outweighs the ability to regurgitate information. Our Governments need to prepare for this, and stop relying on a system derived at a time when people didn’t even know what electricity was. We need innovation in education.

The Bass Player

Photo 1. by what what on flickr

Photo 2. by Rob Shenk on flickr

Think Different

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Thu, 07 Aug 2008 14:28:00 +0000

Here’s to the crazy ones. The misfits. The rebels. The troublemakers. The round pegs in the square holes. The ones who see things differently. They’re not fond of rules. And they have no respect for the status quo. You can praise them, disagree with them, quote them, disbelieve them, glorify or vilify them. About the only thing you can’t do is ignore them. Because they change things. They invent. They imagine. They heal. They explore. They create. They inspire. They push the human race forward. Maybe they have to be crazy. How else can you stare at an empty canvas and see a work of art? Or sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written? Or gaze at a red planet and see a laboratory on wheels? We make tools for these kinds of people. While some see them as the crazy ones, we see genius. Because the people who are crazy enough to think they can change the world, are the ones who do.

Some of you may recognise that as the famous Apple ‘Think Different’ text, others may not, but I guess whether you’ve read it before or have read it for the first time there, we can pretty much all agree that it’s an inspiring piece of text. The thing that surprised me was that when reading through it I realised that all you need to do is change one tiny piece of the text to change the whole context of it.

“We ~~make tools for~~ educate these kinds of people”

In my mind, that’s now one hell of a motto for a better education system.

Let’s face it; the current education system just doesn’t know how to handle these kinds of people. “The round pegs in the square holes,” as Apple refers to them. The system doesn’t understand creativity. It robs all students of their creative consciousness and replaces it with structure, structure, and more structure, only to prepare them for a 9-to-5 job, Monday to Friday, every week of every year for the rest of their lives. Art, Music, Drama… you name it, the current system has a course for it. But that course doesn’t do any form of justice to the many greats that have over hundreds of years created amazing works and done incredible things, demonstrating how beautiful these arts can be. Students aren’t told to let passion drive them forward, or let their inspiration flow and their imagination stop at nothing. They are told to follow the rules, and do whatever it takes to get a ‘pass.’ Where would we be if Bach was told his Brandenburg concertos ‘didn’t quite meet the required standard’? What would have happened if Van Gogh was told his paintings just ‘didn’t make sense’?

It doesn’t stop at the arts. The suppression of creativity is seen in all fields of learning within the current system, giving no room for our real geniuses to shine. And why? Because the system has an obsession with testing, and at the end of the day you can’t test real genius, because you just can’t grade it. Who really has the right to say that a piece of music is an A or B or whatever else? Why should someone sitting in a fancy government office be able to sit there and write the rules that decide whether this piece of writing would make the grade or not? Why can’t the people deciding our futures for us be content with having some classes that have no exams? Classes that are solely there to help stimulate the different skills we all possess, without having to put us under the constant pressure of being bombarded with test after test and grade after grade. Do they see this as ‘non-educational’?

Think of the wealth of talent that is being and has been squandered due to this system. How many people would have become the next great composer if they had been given just that little bit more leeway? How many people would have had the courage to write their own novel, because they wouldn’t have been told they ‘weren’t good enough’? How many people failed to ever recognise their own potential because they were too busy striving for the best grades possible? Only so they could get a ‘good’ job in an office, with a ‘good’ salary.

Don’t get me wrong, we need the people in offices to do the things that keep our public services running and our economy going, but we also need the people who create, invent, and change things. We need the people who “sit in silence and hear a song that’s never been written,” because Apple is right; they push the human race forward, and have done for as long as the human race has been around. But they can’t continue to do so if we don’t help them realise they are capable of doing so. They can’t invent the cure for cancer, or compose a great symphony, or write a magnificent piece of literature if our education system tells them exactly how everything should be, and what they should learn, and what they are aiming to do with their lives. Give them the opportunity. Let them decide.

We make the mistake of thinking that the people that do well in school are the ‘smart’ ones, but that isn’t always the case. These people may just be good at retaining information and reciting it back under pressure, or may just be good at problem solving. Our schools teach these kinds of people well, because they know how to deal with them. All you need to do with these people is throw facts and figures at them and tell them they need to know them to pass, and get become qualified to get a good job... which is not even proper learning. There is no regard there for our creative ones, or even the ‘smart’ ones who can probably do so much more given the opportunity. There is no other option, no fork in the road, not even a way to have the best of both worlds. Just one path for everyone to follow, with the same goal in mind—to fit in, and become another round peg in a round hole.

Let me make myself clear right now that this is not a dig at teachers, who do a superb job. What it is, however, is a cry out to the people in suits who decide what we learn and how we learn it to change their philosophy. To realise that some people can achieve more, and that the people who will eventually find the cure for cancer, or create the next breakthrough piece of technology, or discover new planets and galaxies are in our schools. These children/students or whatever you want to call them are waiting on these people to realise and do something to help them on their way to greatness. To give them the opportunity to shine, and achieve things that both us and them can’t even imagine yet.

It really is time for our education system to start ‘Thinking Differently.’

The Bass Player

Photo 1 by nilson

Photo 2 by tim7423

Question for the Prime Minister

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Fri, 23 May 2008 20:16:00 +0000

Today I noticed on the Prime Ministers youtube channel that he is giving members of the general public the chance to upload video questions for him to answer. I felt this was a good opportunity to hit him hard with some school related technology stuff so I got to work drafting my question, and here it is...

By using Youtube to get your message out there and interact with the public I gather you are aware of the power that the internet holds in our society today, and how the tools of the internet can be really useful in many different areas of work and of course leisure.
So my question is, with our society becoming ever more technologically dependent and the internet being such a prominent and useful tool in many different areas, why are our schools not making good use of technology - the internet in particular. Why also are this countries students not being shown how to use these tools effectively to aid their studies, which at the same time will prepare them to use the technology that is so important in the outside world today.

The Bass Player

Almost yearly reflection

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 21:40:00 +0000

I know the usual time for a yearly reflection is around about new year, but I’m choosing to reflect a few weeks late. Partly because I didn’t have much time for reflection at new year, but mainly because soon I’m going to be a year older... and each teenage year that passes is a landmark, one which marks the beginning of a new stage on your journey through adolescence. So, with almost 2 weeks remaining before I turn 17 I started thinking about what I have achieved this past year...

Achievements are important in society, we are trained from a young age to recognize them... I suppose this is why that was the first thought in my mind when beginning to reflect. People who excel in something specific are usually seen by others as greater beings, never is this more true than in education and in other areas around school. If you do well in exams you are seen as a better to those who don’t do well, if you excel in sport you are seen as a better to those who don’t. There are unfortunately many ‘achievements’ that go unnoticed or are overshadowed, and there are many people who are not recognized just because they are mediocre.

Now, I know I’m digressing, but I’m doing it for a reason... and that is, while I was looking back over my year I realized the amount of cool things I have done is phenomenal - mind blowing from my point of view. The thing is though most of these things are not normally acknowledged as ‘achievements’. In fact, very little of what I have done this year can fall under that category. This doesn’t really bother me in the sense that I personally am not getting noticed for these achievements, this doesn’t actually bother me in the slightest. It more bothers me because this may put people off doing some really amazing things that can be a great experience and also open up doors to a whole new world.

You’re probably thinking “what the hell is he talking about”, so I should probably start being a little more specific. What I’m talking about is web 2.0, something that truly has had a major impact on me over the past year for a number of reasons. It’s something that can help you achieve anything... And take you anywhere, including places you never thought you could go, or never knew existed. It’s something that has taken me from utter obscurity and placed me right in the heart of an international debate, something that has helped give me a place me in a team with some amazing students from around the world, something that has given me the tools required to create, collaborate, communicate and most importantly learn. It’s there for everyone… but very few have taken advantage.

Students are the worst hit… they are rarely exposed to the power of these tools. Besides they’d rather be out doing something that will get them noticed over their peers, but why blame them for it? Achievements will get them noticed by society, they will label them as the cream of the crop. Taking time outside of school to do creative things with the internet and the likes wont do anything for them in their eyes, and it certainly wont do anything for their college applications.

I’m drifting further and further from my main goal in this post. I guess that’s because looking back on what I’ve done I just can’t help but think that these opportunities weren’t just opportunities open to me, but ones open to every single one of my peers, yet I was the only one there to take advantage. The main reason for this is, well it’s why we blog; these technologies aren’t used in classrooms, and therefore aren’t commonly known to students, yet they could open up a whole new world of possibilities within education (and beyond), a world that most of us still can’t fully comprehend.

So, I guess that’s it… six paragraphs and I didn’t even manage to reflect fully on my year, but such is life. It’s not my birthday till Feb the 12th anyway… so there’s still time for another (shorter) post.

The Bass Player.

Photo credit - Reflection "III" by VisualAge on Flickr

Blocked

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 23:18:00 +0000

I'm going to take some time to go back and again post about one of the most pressing issues with the school 2.0 idea... fear. As you can probably guess from the title of my post the biggest consequence is the blocking of so many useful internet tools, it's something that really gets to me in school. The one thing that gets to me most about it though is it never seems to be consistent, you can access something one day and not the other. And well, I think that this shows that the authority deciding what's to be blocked and what's not aren't quite sure themselves about it all. And surely if this is the case they need some kind of guidance?

For example, I remember for a long time I wasn't able to access blogger in school, I think the category it fell under for being blocked was either "chatrooms" or "forums", and to me, this shows that the authority for this content blocking need some sort of education about these sorts of tools, to settle in their minds what these technologies do and why they are not a risk. This is a huge task, educating so many people and making them more comfortable with the technology... in turn giving them the confidence to leave the technologies unblocked, but it's a hurdle which needs to be overcome for School 2.0 to succeed. Now of course, there's a difference in opinion, while I may not think this is asking for too much, many may disagree and say that spending the time money and effort to teach about these technologies and show they aren't a risk, then re-haul all these content filtering systems is a huge ask. However, it depends how you decide to weigh it up... from my point of view, the benefits outweigh the costs, then again, I'm not in the know when it comes to organising training and re-defining content filters in schools... but what I do know is how much potential is there, and I've seen that they can be so useful in classroom situations, and if the word of a student isn't good enough then you can wait for the results of a small experiment I'll be carrying out soon with Mr. W... but I'll tell you more about that later.

Like I said, it's just a matter of opinion, and I'll leave it to you, but I just think it's such a shame that a lot of this useful content is blocked... and especially seeing as if it remains the same, School 2.0 can't happen as we would hope it could. By now I'm sure most people are agreed on the potential of all this technology in schools. But for me, I think it's time for action, and time to really put the point across that we need to start moving forward with School 2.0, one small step at a time, my ideal starting point being with this, the blocking of such useful web technologies.

Blogged with Flock

The Benefits of School 2.0

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 18:47:00 +0000

I was sitting in maths earlier this week, learning about some formula that I'm almost certain I'll never see again after my exam in May (unless I fail that is...) when I turned to the guy sitting next to me and told him about the Blog I wrote a couple of days before hand, and how there were people out there taking a serious interest in my opinion... which to be honest really surprised me. When I had finished the story there was a pause. He then asked me, "What's a Blog??"... My only thought after that was if only he knew. If only he had discovered. Not just what a Blog is, but what a Wiki is, what an RSS or and Atom feed is. How it could benefit him. If only he had been taught... There are those people who don't know about Web 2.0, what it is or what it could do for them, but there are also so many people out there that fear the whole Web 2.0 or school 2.0 idea, there are even those who still fear the whole concept of the internet. But why? Well, like I said in my last post, people fear it because they don't know the facts, the benefits or the potential. This is human nature, people fear the unfamiliar. So why aren't people made aware? Why not eliminate the fear and let them discover what all these tools can do for them. Give them the opportunity... at least if they knew the facts they could make their own educated decision about whether to use it or not.

I would like you to think about how it could be if school 2.0 was put into place... there are teenagers my age that could be in school not only learning about English, Physics or History, but gathering their own information about whatever aspect of that subject they need to know about, not only relying on that one person standing at the front of the class telling them how it is. They could be writing Blogs or making Wiki's about what they have just learned about, and discussing it with others, not just from the same class as them, but from different parts of the world as them. What's more is that it will all be there to refer to when exam time comes around. All the notes they've made, all the Blogs posts they've made and all the discussions they've had can all be accessed by typing in the URL... no more sifting through a years worth of notes crammed onto sheets upon sheets of A4 paper. This is one of the main reasons I value the idea of School 2.0 so much. But why stop there? Music, art, film, literature, people have so many different hobbies and interests, so what's to stop them making Wiki's about these interests, what's to stop them blogging about the latest film or album. Taking what they have learned about Blogging, Wiki's and RSS (among other things) and using it as a recreational tool as well as a learning one. The potential is there, people just need to know the potential, know what the tools can be used for and know how to use them. It's in the hands of our education system, do they stick with the same old methods or do they upgrade and develop along with technology? Well, If our education system takes the next step then these next generations can still learn what they need to know, but in a much more advanced, a much more modern and a much cooler way. If they stick with the same methods then yes, students still learn, and still find out what they need to know to pass exams... but does this help them in todays society, one which is becoming more and more reliant on computers... and especially the internet?

The Bass Player

A technology literate generation.

noreply@blogger.com (Sean Law) — Sun, 26 Nov 2006 14:55:00 +0000

Blogging, a term you hear a lot these days... It's like a community in a lot of ways, one made up of hundreds of thousands of different people, with different interests, different points of view and different ways of expressing themselves. What an amazing concept it was to allow all the internet users around the world the opportunity to express themselves in this way. I mean we all know that the internet is the place to find out anything about anything, but the thing about Web 2.0 is it not only lets us do this, but it makes things like Myspace, Flickr, Wikispaces and of course Blogger possible. Now, with these tools, not only can we find out about whatever we may be interested in, but we can comment on it, discuss it, keep up to date with it through use of RSS and Atom Feeds and so much more. Most importantly we can express ourselves and our different points of view unlike any other way. No wonder so many people are becoming a part of this. The use of Blogging, and many more of the webs tools, allows anyone with internet access to say whatever they want to say, to a prospective audience of millions. And all this can be done at any time we want, with all the tools of the internet there to use at our own discretion.

The one problem with the way I'm looking at the whole web 2.0 thing is, I've never seen the internet any other way. It's something I'm so used to by now, I'm only 15, and by the time I got my own laptop all these tools were commonly used. Yet I still never used them for myself, maybe this is a fault of my generation. We are the generation that has never seen a world without computers, or the internet for that matter, and it seems that we take most of it for granted. Fine we can get our way around computers, and find whatever we want on the internet, most of the time with much greater ease than our parents, but most of the supposed technically literate generation are stuck in some form of vacuum. We can't see past sites like Bebo, Myspace or whatever other sites there are where we can view profiles of our friends, leave them comments and read their "blogs". I have no objections to these social networking sites, I use them, I really enjoy using them. The thing I can't quite grasp though is why most of the people my age can't see past them and see the wider potential of the internet. I look around Myspace and the blog feature often doesn't get used, even when it does it's being used as a place to put surveys and quizzes. I must admit, I was also blind to the internet's full potential as little as six months back, and I most likely still am blind to many of the ways in which the internet can be used creatively. Look at me now, this is only my first post on a proper Blogging site, I have had my Blogger account sitting around gathering dust for a while, and all because I didn't really know what to do with it. I think this is one of the main problems with other people my age, we know that all these tools exist and have a vague idea of what they do, or are used for, but we have never been taught how to use them.

Thankfully I have managed to break free from the vacuum, and have become a user of things like Wikispaces, Flickr... and as from now, I'm a Blogger, even something as simple as RSS is something many people my age do not have a clue about. I don't know about you, but I find this a real shame. Surely there is some way of teaching teenagers how to use all these magnificent tools that are easily accessed with a mouse, a keyboard and an internet connection. There is always the approach of teaching this in schools, but most teachers, parents and even some pupils will argue against this and say it is a waste of time, money and effort. In some ways they have a point. After all, we go to school to learn, and pass our exams, not to piss about on the internet. The thing is, it may not just be that people my age are stuck in a vacuum, it sometimes seems that people in general don't really know much about the whole web 2.0 idea and its features like blogging, and see it as more of a distraction than a tool for learning, creativity and communication. I can kind of understand it if I think of it that way, after all the internet is only about 24/25 years old (correct me if I'm wrong), so we can't expect everyone to know its full potential, especially when it is ever changing. Maybe this is the problem that needs to be dealt with. Rather than just teaching the technically literate generation more about the tool they all know and love, maybe we need to educate everyone on how useful web 2.0 can be... but again I ask, how can we do this?

I know that there are teenagers out there that have found out the benefits of web 2.0 like me and some of my mates have, but for some, their parents have brainwashed them into thinking that the internet is an bad place, filled with some sort of evil breed of cyber pixies or something of that ilk. I know that if you are reading this, you are most likely not one of the people who view the internet as a breeding ground for evil, and know that (for the most part) there is little wrong with web 2.0 and the internet, if you don't go looking for trouble that is. It's a major problem trying to convince people otherwise though, and that's one of the reasons more people my age don't get involved with stuff like blogging. I'm just glad that I have realised some of the really cool things web 2.0 has made available, and along with some of my mates I've taken the time to discover these amazing tools and use them in my own day to day life. Hopefully other teenagers out there will discover the real potential of web 2.0, or at least be able to identify what it is.

The Bass Player