Just as a preface my students are post high school students enrolled in Automotive Technology (a two year program) at Kirkwood Community College.

A concern that I have is that we will have the students using all of these neat communication tools while in school but that they will become overwhelmed with the number of different locations that they must check to keep current on all of their classes, personal items, along with other uses and because of the sheer number of places and things to check they will miss assignments etc.

Another concern is with all of the neat stuff that can be added to each site, we will have a tendency to add this stuff. That is fine as long as the student has a broadband connection to the internet. However several of my students this last year did not have a broadband connection (dial-up) due to cost.

Not every student that attends post high school training will have access to or be able to afford broadband. I had two students that did not even have a computer this last semester. With their computer skills being very low level they needed to have someone that could assist them on fairly a regular basis that knew how to use a computer and had a basic knowledge of the web sites or programs being accessed.

I also had several students that were attending school from 4 to 6 hours a day and still working a 40 hour work week to pay for their student’s bills. This limited the amount of time that they have available to complete all of the stuff required of them for school. We also needed to remember that they were living alone and need time for things like cooking food, cleaning, laundry, and etc.

We also assume that ALL high school, middle school, and elementary students’ families will have sufficient funds to afford a computer and also have access to a fast internet connection. This will not happen so the instructor is now left with providing students information via the internet and by some other means within the class room. We cannot penalize a student because they do not have access to the internet.

I believe that we need to let the student explore and use these methods of communication however we need to keep the students limitations in mind when we use blogs etc for communications to each student on a individual basis. These areas of communication can be used by students to communicate to other students or people while in a school setting but to expect that to happen for every student outside of school ………………….NO WAY!