Overhearing my class

I thought I'd try something different while my students are talking about readings in small groups. I usually don't sit in on groups because I found that they tended to stop talking and focus on me as they discussed. By not going, it gives them the space to talk about whatever they want. 

So tonight, right now, I am sitting at the computer in the main classroom as one group is discussing the reading. I'm listening in - overhearing - on the conversation. I'm sure they know I'm listening but I'm not "in" the group so they are just going at it. 

We read the last chapters of Gee's 2004  book, Carole Lee's Is October Brown Chinese article, and Lewis and Fabos's article on IMing practices of youth. The readings are very rich and challenge traditional conceptions of literacy for most students, so I love to see how people's minds change. I worry a bit that some students tend to move very quickly to "how do we do this" questions rather than see the mindset shift that is necessary in contemporary times. They get there though, somehow. 

Why do we focus so much on how to take what kids are doing in everyday life and co-opt it for schools as they are now (e.g. for the 1950's)? I worry a lot about colonizing children and youth practices for school purposes. Schools need to change pretty radically on epistemological grounds in order for relevancy to return, but taking practices from outside into the same old thing won't get there.