[Yr7-10it] block it all

[victor rajewski]

Our school has just invested in NetSupport School - among other things
it lets the teacher in the classroom at the time to whitelist and
blacklist sites as they come up - and includes the ability to easily
see which site each student is visiting. It is quite nice. But what
would be more useful to schools that can't put the money into a system
like this would be a teacher-friendly interface to the proxy server
(such as edupass) where they can do a similar function. This wouldn't
be too hard to write - just needs a bit of will from the powers that
be.

Even so, technical measures are not a replacement for engaging tasks
and knowing what and how your students are doing. They just make it a
bit easier sometimes.

On 3/1/07, Cameron Bell <bell.cameron.p at edumail.vic.gov.au> wrote:
> I don't have the time to block every site that may come up as "not
> wanted" by staff. I tell the staff that it is their job as a classroom
> teacher to monitor what goes on in *their* classroom. If I see a kid at
> a site that is clearly not relevant, I simply tell them to get on with
> the work as required and follow it up by keeping an eye on them and go
> through the usual steps I would with any kid who wasn't doing the
> current activity.
> The alternative is to ignore the rest of the class while I kick the kid
> of the computer while I check the history, find the site, get the URL,
> determine the category, logon to the proxy, submit the filter.....
> It's so much easier to say "Get on with the work or I'll........."
>
> Cameron
>
> Geoff Hutchison wrote:
> > You are being too subtle Rob.
> >
> > Reminds me of my days working at a regional TAFE - VIC.GOV.AU was suddenly blocked, classified as porn (sic). Didn't even bother ringing our techs, took them over a month to unblock it.
> >
> > This blocking is just another case of the tail wagging the dog. Schools should decide what to block, and by schools, I mean the teaching staff. School and dept tech support should deliver what schools want, not what they decide schools can have.
> >
> >  Which reminds me, Netspace is our ISP, and via an email a week ago, they informed us all that, due to many requests from schools, they were going to block many 'game' sites - they would decide what amounted to a 'game' site.
> >
> > SIGH.
> >
> > If schools just got off their own backsides, and instigated their own filters AS THEY ARE REQUIRED TO DO.
> >
> > I could go on ................
> >
> > cheers
> > Geoff
> >
> > *********** REPLY SEPARATOR  ***********
> >
> > On 01-Mar-07 at 3:32 PM Costello, Rob R wrote:
> >
> >
> >> Reading about more filtering -
> >>
> >> http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/youtube-ban-for-victorian-schools
> >> /2007/03/01/1172338754827.html
> >>
> >> Personally, I think every student should be satisfied with 24/7 access
> >> to the official VELS site, and maybe the curriculum planning guidelines
> >>
> >> What more could they ask for?
> >>
> >> Google, blogs, email, flickr, and all such web 2 apps should be banned
> >> by decree
> >>
> >> They might be used to communicate - and the risk of communicating is too
> >> high
> >>
> >> I look forward to a world in which every interesting and interactive web
> >> site is finally blocked, and we all have handheld devices, on which we
> >> can access an approved list of 3 sites
> >>
> >> Paper and pen might also need banning, as there are reliable reports of
> >> these media being used for obscene drawing and note passing in class
> >>
> >> Rob
> >>
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