Social Media 101

I was talking to two friends the other evening about the modularisation of university programmes and the various pro’s and con’s associated with it. We got on to talking about the education systems as a whole; concluding that the Irish and English systems are pretty good. Though one small area of disagreement cropped up regarding Primary School and what children are taught.

I for one think that every child should study History, Geography and Science. I see the basic information that is revealed to you then as essential everyday knowledge that is necessary for life. People should know their history and the workings of the world around them. IMHO.

All that may be changing though, for the English at least. As reported by the Guardian, there is a proposal in place for a major redevelopment of the Primary education system in the UK to require children to learn about Twitter and Wikipedia and Blogging! This would be the biggest change that the education system has undergone in at least 10 years.

I think this is incredible news. Having posted yesterday about Queen Renia’s progressive political use of YouTube, this is an even bigger revelation. Social Media is part of life. It’s something people have always done, but now it’s found digital incarnations. Why would you not teach children about them? You teach them about the printing press, why not teach them about Tweeting and Poking?