Teacher/Student: are they interchangeable in the digital age?

Back in the late 80s, early 90s I made it through college without ever even using a computer. All my papers were typed out on a typewriter, all my notes handwritten in spiral-bound notebooks and on index cards. Textbooks were heavily highlighted. The school in which I taught had computers, but I think only the high school Business class and front office personnel used them. Teaching, and learning, was accomplished in a pretty traditional way, mostly lead by me in sort of a lock-step manner. I'm not saying there is, or was anything wrong with that, but the way people learn and teach now has completely evolved because of digital media and mobile technology.

Now students use Facebook to take and share notes in the classroom. They tweet a question about integers to "followers" on Twitter and use Evernote to organize class notes and just about everything digital on any device or platform the user chooses. Students can connect via Skype with another classroom half a world away. All free, btw.

The teacher and the student: are they interchangeable now because of internet access, wi-fi, mobile technology, apps for this, apps for that? If I don't know the answer to something, I "google-it." In other words, I'm self-directing my learning. Often times I wonder, if I was still a third grade teacher, how would I teach kids to be in charge of their own learning, to make a connection between an individual's passion to learn and the resources to learn it.

This brings up the questions of resources and basically the whole reason for this blog. I haven't been in classroom lately, so I'm curious to know what technology/digital media resources teachers have in the their classrooms (or don't have). I'm also hoping this blog will eventually become an online mentoring community where teachers and learners can collaborate through social media to exchange information, ask questions, recommend resources, and share best practice ideas.

Technology isn't going to go away and I'm wondering how teaching and learning are going to evolve with 21st century learning.