<strong>Radio WillowWeb</strong> is a podcast for kids and by kids from the students at Willowdale Elemetary School in Omaha, Nebraska.

Seventy percent of the jobs available in the workforce will somehow be related to the acquisition and manipulation of digital knowledge. Workers will need to be able to access information, evaluate it for its worth, use it in creative ways, and be flexible enough to change their work product as the information changes. Ninety percent of those jobs will go unfilled if this need is not addressed today in the schools. The time is now.

To me, technology facilitator isn’t just about bringing technology into the core classrooms, it’s about the process - the process of learning how to plan a new unit in a new way, using new tools…

Indeed, blogging acts as an important motivational tool for learning, said Dean Shareski, head of digital learning for the Prairie South School Board. Students are more motivated when they realize hundreds of people can view their work, Shareski said, noting interest in writing has increased since the blogs began.

"People think that kids today somehow grow up magically knowing how to use new technologies," he adds. "They don't. The difference with this generation is that if students don't know how to use a technology, they aren't afraid of learning."

<p>The style of learning will be completely different. The new centres will open from 7am until 10pm in both term-time and what used to be known as the school holidays. At weekends, they will open from 9am to 8pm.</p> <p>Youngsters will not be taught in formal classes, nor will they stick to a rigid timetable; instead they will work online at their own speeds on programmes that are tailor-made to match their interests.</p>

Only 4% of the students said they'd ever had an online conversation that made them uncomfortable, and only 2% said an online stranger tried to meet them in person. In fact, after surveying 1,277 students, the researchers found exactly one who reported they'd actually met a person from the internet without their parents' permission — and described this as "0.08 percent of all students."

In fact, 76% of parents expect social networking will improve their children's reading and writing skills, or help them express themselves more clearly, according to the study, and parents and communities "expect schools to take advantage of potentially powerful educational tools, including new technology."

Virtual schools are growing fast, though, at an annual rate of about 25 percent. Estimates of elementary and secondary students taking virtual classes range from 500,000 to 1 million nationally, compared with total public school enrollment of about 50 million.

For several years, many of us have been trying to make a case for thinking about education in new ways, largely as a result of technological advancements and their affects on how we use information.&nbsp; I think that many education leaders are listening now.&nbsp; I think that they are ready for clear images and stories about 21st century classrooms and what teachers and students should be doing to better prepare a generation of new century citizens.

I almost lost it when I read, in Cheryl Oats’ comment, “<em>..someone told me they didn’t want to learn one more new thing, they didn’t like new things..</em>“&nbsp; I would want to ask, “You call yourself a teacher?”&nbsp; Who more than teachers should be willing and eager to learn new things?

"The creativity it brings to all of us is remarkable," said Schlachter, who teaches fourth- and fifth-graders at St. Catherine of Siena School. "I'm teaching in a totally different way as a result."

When students know that anyone in the school with an Internet connection – or around the world, for that matter – can read what they have written or created, it is remarkable how quickly their thinking improves, not to mention the final product.