iMovie with Chels!

Update On Final Project

So far I've created a blog on WordPress.  I started playing around with it for awhile.  Next, I went through themes and picked one out for my blog so that it looks a little nicer than the regular layout.  I may try to change it to something different later.
Originally I wanted to work a little bit with CSS, but I think that I can just manipulate the blog with the features that it gives me in order to get what I want.  Also, in WordPress it looks like you have to pay to use and manipulate the CSS code for WordPress.  Fortunately, its looking like I can pretty much do what I wanted with the features that this blog offers.
Next, I created a post for my Dad.  I wrote just a little bit about him and I hope to post a picture of him eventually.  In WordPress the links for the posts go towards the right so each person in my family will have a little link over there.
The one thing that has frustrated me so far is the fact that I am having trouble changing the title of my blog.  I originally made it "A blog for English 240", but I'd like to change that section and use it more as a section to write a few words about the blog.  I need to keep looking, but so far I haven't had any luck.
Eventually I need to delete some of the features that the blog displays on the right because it's a little bulky over there and I want the focus on my family, not on the features.  I still have a lot to do.  I plan on getting each person's little bio done soon and then try to add pictures for each person.  After that I'll just have to work on making things clean, neat, and pretty.

Prezi

This is my Prezi!

DIY Definition

To me, DIY is creating with your hands and mind, digitally or not, for a specific purpose. This purpose could be for a specific source of activism like an anti-war protest. In Craft Hard Die Free, Black and Burisch show many different examples of craftivism, like the pink military tank that is done in protest of the War on Terror. In that case, there is a specific source for craft. In other cases, the reason behind DIY is not so specific. For example, my reason behind wanting to knit was the nostalgic feel. The Stitch ‘n Bitch article by Stella Minahan and Julie Wolfram Cox goes through five different themes which relate to DIY craft. Craft however, is not the same thing as art. Although they are very similar and sometimes have blurry lines they are two different things. Buzek explains in his Introduction, “craft theory cannot be assimilated neatly into that of contemporary art, but instead merits its own language and measures” (13). Craft can be beautiful like art, but gets used. It is not created just to look at. There is activism or use behind craft. Jackson, who wrote Men Who Make, talks about craft in relation to work and leisure. Jackson believes that craft has a place outside of work, but that in a lot of cases it can be an extension of the regular, paid work people do. This type of work, but at the same time, leisure is described as flow. This feeling of concentration with the right amount of challenge, but not too much, is a part of craft. However, a certain amount of frustration can happen too. In my own experiences I felt a ton of frustration and while listening to other people explain their mid-term projects, so do a lot of other people. DIY culture has a lot of emotion in it. In regards to the digital world, DIY is included in that. People can digitally create their own work with reason and use behind it. Edupunk is just one thing that can, and does many times, use technology and digital works in DIY culture. Learning things on your own is using both your hands in order to create and the mind while learning. Ideas are bounced around and statements are made just like with regular craft. Malcolm McCullough states in his article, Abstracting Craft, that tools and technologies working with the hand are craft. He purposely added the “and technologies” portion to explain that digital work is part of DIY culture and craft. Jenkins goes through many examples of digital work making a statement in DIY culture in his book. He discusses how virtual worlds, memes, and videos added to elections. He also discusses Star Wars culture. This online group and DIY groups in general create community among its members. All in all DIY is a culture with a purpose and a specific fan base. It does go far beyond that though. Defining DIY and the culture that goes along with it is very difficult to define for me.

Guzzetti et al. and Anderson/Balsamo

Guzzetti et al.

Barbara Guzetti is a professor at ASU. Her expertise is in new media and technologies, gender studies, popular culture media, and literacy. In regards to literacy she focuses on adolescents and technology literacy. She is also interested in DIY in education. I don't know if I found the correct Kate Elliott. The one I found is a science fiction and fantasy writer. She seems pretty well known. Diana Welsch works at the University of Texas in Women's studies. Other than that I couldn't find much on her.

This article reminds me of what I already have learned in my curriculum and instruction classes. We don't sit and talk about technology. Usually when we talk about a students funds of knowledge, which is the knowledge each child brings to the classroom, its usually in terms of their culture, race, or background. It makes sense that technology could easily be a fund of knowledge as well. Basically anything could be useful information. Students offer a lot to the classroom. Gauging their interests and deciding what to put in their syllabus is a huge job for a teacher; the things in the syllabus should be things that interest the students. Otherwise, they get absolutely nothing out of the learning.

Another reason teachers should learn DIY media is the fact that they need to stay up to date on what their students are interested in outside of school. That way they have things in common and can talk about academic things in those terms and in those contexts. It's all about the student.

Also, these students will need these technological skills later on in life. The world is moving towards that direction and in order to stay up to date schools and teachers need to keep up to date and teach their kids. Some students, especially urban minority students who don't have access to technology need to learn these skills.

The article also discusses how traditionally, "boys resist school literacies" (5). However, they engage "more often and on more sophisticated levels" than girls do in media literacies. This gap could be because of cyber-bulling; girls are more likely to be victims of this. It's good that they addressed this. It's an issue teachers are going to have to be dealing with now.

Also, after school programs focused on either girls only or boys only helps to make this gap smaller. However, I'm a little skeptical of if these programs really work. I did a research paper on girls only and boys only schools and classrooms and if they are more effective than co-ed classrooms and their is never really enough evidence to go either way. In the real world, boys and girls will have to work together. But at the same time, when kids are that young they are self-conscious and sometimes prefer working with children of the same sex.

DISCUSSION Q?'s:

The article describes teachers as "digital migrants", people who haven't grown up with the new literacies that their students have. What will change with this new generation of teachers that have grown up with all this technology?

In co-ed classrooms, how should teachers deal with the gender gap in regards to DIY media literacies?

Anderson/Balsamo

Balsamo is a professor at USC in the School of Cinematic Arts. Her work focuses on the relationship between culture and technology. I couldn't find the correct Steve Anderson, there were too many when I googled his name. I tried to associate him with MIT, but all I could find were Steve Anderson's that attended MIT.

This article was kind of weird for me. I want to be a teacher in a classroom, with students that don't sound like holographs. It just sounded like a made-up game to me. The other article gave, what I thought could potentially be really great advice for teachers. Maybe for a teacher who wants to do an entire class online, this would be great help, but it just didn't suit me as well. They talk about these games that the holographs play with different tools. They can switch up their tools between games if they wish. Also, things that are relevant to school now, like socioeconomic status are talked about, but again, not in the context that I'll see in a real classroom. Sure, technology and how much they have of it at home shows socioeconomic class sometimes, but financial ability to enroll in "reality-based" programs are considered the wealthy.

I do agree with the fact that as teachers, we need to view students as technological beings and from a different generation. In my case though, I grew up with lots of technology as well. Maybe not as much as the students I will have one day though.

The author discusses "Original Synners' which are people who "develop strong abilities to critically evaluate the veracity and reliability of information sources" (245).

"When this happens, the teachers will have as much to learn as students" (245). I do believe that this statement is also true. When their is a disposition in generations, teachers do need to learn a lof of what their students are doing. Their outside learning and how they do it is vital in the classroom like I said above.

Open, Hybrid, and Media Rich sites are discussed (definitions on pg 247). This connected back to the DIY U article. DIY believes that open-source education is a great thing for people that want to learn outside of the traditional university system. They also discuss MIT OpenCourseware, which was discussed in the DIY U article as well. This is a small step that a lot of other colleges should, in my opinion, follow. Putting information online helps the students going to the university as well as other "students" that may not be in school, but are trying to find their way. It helps society in general by making it more educated.

One of the parts of this article that I agree with most is the fact that teachers should be Synners too. Especially if even just one of their students is. The article describes that new technologies will bring teachers problems, but also "opportunities for productive experimentation" (254).

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:

How far is technological education going to go? Is the classroom that is described in the beginning of this text a better option than classroom education? Or should we be spending money on making class size smaller or getting more resources to the classroom instead of putting that money into classes like that?

Edupunk Notes

Definition: Edupunk is a student-driven, mostly self-taught or non-traditional way of education. Technology isn't a must-have for edupunk, however it is valued.

Definiton (quote from Brooks article): "In short, edupunk is student-centered, resourceful, teacher- or community created rather than corporate sourced, and underwritten by progressive political stance."

Jim Groom is an Institutional Technology Specialist at the University of Mary Washington. He focuses a lot on higher education and primarily, in instructional technology. He was also the man who coined the world Edupunk.

Leslie Madsen-Brooks works is interested in English and history studies. She also studies women/gender. However, she is very interested in "how digital technologies-and especially mobile devices-can democratize learning and engage broader audiences with science and history.

Anya Kamenetz is a writer at for Fast Company Magazine and Tribune Media. She has written a few things about EduPunk and about higher education in general.

Edupunk in general is trying to work towards a different type of higher education for students. According to the DIY U article not a large number of people go to high school, directly to a four year school, graduate, and find a job. I thought most people did this. The biggest thing that article addresses is the fact that not everyone is meant for higher education. It's expensive and not everyone is meant for the "college experience".

I think technology is an incredible resource for people who want to participate in Edupunk, but it isn't completely necessary. The internet allows the user to a ton of information. The article gave a few colleges as an example. These schools put lectures, notes, etc on the web for others to use. Also, the Internet is great for researching different options for higher education.

"Edupunk, he writes, is opposed to capitalist co-optation of the labor of educators" (Brooks). Universities are a business to a lot of people. People make a ton of money off of the students that go there and in many of these universities students and their needs are not ever a top priority. Money and politics run higher education. That's what Edupunk is against.

The New London Group is a group of ten people who came together to work on issues of literacy pedagogy and how the world is supposed to address the change of this literacy due to globalization, technology, and increasing cultural and social diversity. They also coined the word multiliteracies, which is a new type of literacy based on what I've just mentioned.

The main point of this article is to extend the pedagogy of literacy farther than what it is currently defined as most of the time. The authors defined it as, "...restricted to formalized, monolingual, monocultural, and rule-governed forms of language" (1). The authors describe how "the languages are needed to make meaning are radically changing in three realms of our existence: our working lives, our public lives (citizenship), and our personal lives (lifeworlds)" (2).

The worklife in this world is changing and the authors argue, that as educators, we need to be aware of that change and teach it. Skill levels, types of work, etc are changing from the Ford-like production line to "fast capitalism" type jobs. The language for these new jobs are changing as well because of new social changes and new equipment is being used. Work places have changed to much more informal places with more informal relationships. All of these examples of change show that this new literacy must be taught in schools in order for students to eventually fulfill employment. "These new workplace discourses can be taken in two very different ways-as opening new educational and social possibilities, or as new systems of mind control or exploitation" (3). The authors talk about how the definition of success has to change too; away from just economic terms.

Citizenship and our public lives are drastically changing as well. After the 80s the authors say that there were many changes. These changes sound really political to me. Media has also changed our lives. The last big change is that our lives are becoming less private and more public. Boundary lines between various "communities" (ex: Italian-American community, LGBT community) are blurring. People are parts of more than one communities, move between them, etc.

"Every classroom will inevitably reconfigure the relationships of local and global difference that are now so critical. To be relevant, learning processes need to recruit, rather than attempt to ignore and erase, the different subjectivities, interests, intentions, commitments, and purposes that students bring to learning" (8). That quote describes what should be happening now in schools. The authors also discuss the fact that there are limits on how much schools alone can do with teaching this new multiliteracy. Schools have to discuss "fast capitalism, emerging pluarlistic forms of citizenship, and of different lifeworlds" (10).

The term "design" is used to describe managers, teachers; as designers. Also, design science is starting to be used to look at different professions like teaching or office work. They like using this word because it doesn't have a negative feeling like "grammar" or other subjects. Also, design has multiple meanings so it fits many words. Order of discourse describe the way that each discourse relates or speaks to each other. "...Available Designs-that take the form of discourses, styles, genres, dialects, and voices to name a few key variables" (11). Available design is a part, or sub-group of order of discourse. The authors then discuss what designing is. To me it sounds like creating new things based off of your knowledge. Designing does not simply just re-use available designs though. Redesigning is yet another term that the authors describe. A good definition for that is "the resources that are produced and transformed through Designing" (13).

Teachers need to use a sort of metalanguage, a language that describes language, to talk about this new pedagogy/design. The primary purpose of this language is to "identify and explain differences between texts, and relate these to the contexts of culture and situation in which they seem to work" (14). This metalanguage used to describe linguistics is supposed to focus our attention on "representational resources". (Look at table on page 17)

All in all this article describes different ways to name things. It looks at Visual, Audio, Spacial meanings and creates a new language for it because of the changing public, work, and school life that we live in today.

QUESTIONS:

I didn't understand the first paragraph about citizenship/public life. It was about politics. I didn't follow much of it.

Available designs confuse me. Are they ideas and then designing shapes them? -->Look at chart on page 13.