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So the shift to public display, a shift to expected social interaction, changed the way the students learned and the effort they put into their education. If that’s not an incentive to experiment with and use social software I don’t know what is. Social software isn’t just a new way to work, it changes the effort we put into that work. Now there is a sound byte for social media consultants.

The British government is proposing that Twitter is to be taught in primary (elementary) schools as part of a wider push to make online communication and social media a permanent part of the UK’s education system.

Kids will be taught blogging, podcasting and how to use Wikipedia alongside Maths, English and Science.

A three-year research project, headed by Mimi Ito, involving 28 researchers and 800 subjects, and sponsored by the MacArthur Foundation, finds that the stereotypical idea of the Internet as a soul-devouring, anti-social wasteland for our kids is just plain wrong. If you suspected otherwise, now you know you were right.

The researchers identified two distinctive categories of teen engagement with digital media: friendship-driven and interest-driven. While friendship-driven participation centered on “hanging out” with existing friends, interest-driven participation involved accessing online information and communities that may not be present in the local peer group.