Elgg?

My Space? Bebo? Facebook? Collaborative learning tools that teachers are saying no to, because they are seen as a distraction and now Elgg? Elgg is an open source social networking with academic success in mind.

Now I can understand why schools will say no to myspace or facebook as they do provide quite a distraction, however they are collaborative constructionist tools that drive learning.  Students, and also teachers can each get a profile page, a blog, photo sharing and friends lists, and they can create and join on-site discussion communities. Some of these features might cause tutors to be scared, but Elgg’s creators say the collaborative, conversational exchanges in which today’s students have become so fluent outside class are the best way to deliver learning inside it.

Broadly, Elgg represents a shift from aging, top-down classroom technologies like Blackboard  to what e-learning practitioners call personl learning spaces– they include spaces comprising del.icio.us feeds, blog posts, podcast widgets.

Elgg is freely downloadable and being used in 50 schools around the world, it may be no match for sites like Myspace or facebook but Elgg is definitely merging it allows teachers and students to share their work and communicate. Even if it does act as another social networking tool in an academic sense it gives children the opportunity to collaborate with each other and the their teacher outside the walls of the classroom.