So when I say "I am dumb"...

... I am not saying, "I am unwilling to learn new things, and I am unwilling to know less than my students." The opposite is true; learning new technologies is thrilling to me. Generally, I love to discover a new competency with kids I work with, and I'm certainly not beyond being told I'm wrong. What I am saying is this (and for some reason, I can't use my enter key to make a new paragraph to say it in): teach new technology, be willing to be bewildered and have to putter... but don't ignore teaching some core competencies to achieve your goal. There is a level of competency beneath which students give up and become apathetic. I am not talking about me here. (although I've been tempted to give up on the Mac's) These are the students who are happy to take a 'd' because they just can't get it. If a class is racing well beyond these core competencies, and no one backs up to teach them, it's more than a loss; it's inexcuseable.