Posts Tagged ‘SharmaLDT505Fa17’
Where do I even start this week? So much to say.
When I think about how these three readings work together, the information that I’m left with it extremely thought-provoking. In Gee’s reading, we learned about the different categories of identity. In Pea, R., et al., we learned in detail about a case study of 8-12-year-old girls and how technology is affecting their identities, and in our final reading, Turkle looked at how technology is always present in our lives and its effect on us.
As I was reading Pea., R., et al’s., excerpt, I couldn’t help but think back to my own experiences with technology in middle and high school, and then from college to now. In middle and high school, I didn’t use technology much for “social networking.” I had AIM, and I messaged some friends, but not too much. I never really got into MySpace. I didn’t even own a personal cell phone until I was a junior and it wasn’t until I started getting crazy overage charges that we added a text plan. (I’m pretty sure I and my current husband had a texting bill that was over $100, I think it was 10 cents a text…). So, while I can’t completely identify with the pressures that pre-teens and teens must now feel, I do, to a certain extent, identify with them today. I feel that smartphones contribute more to that “always on, always on me” feeling, and the way that the girls in Pea., R., et al., answered their questions then my flip phone did. So now with Facebook and my “real friends,” I could ask myself many of the same questions given to the 8-12-year-olds, and as I really stopped to think about it, some of my responses were similar.
As I moved to reading Turkle’s chapter, it reminded me of a time I took a break from Facebook. It was midway through college and it continued for a few years after I graduated. I decided that I need to “unplug.” It.was.wonderful. I use my personal facebook page for a multi-level marketing business, and in the video when Turkle mentioned the exhausting for “performing” I really did identify with her statement! That break was nice, but it was also nice to reconnect with friends and family that were far away, my husband and I moved out of state and that makes keeping in touch, seeing pictures of everyone’s children growing up, much easier. This made me think of the different “identities” social media plays, all four types even. I would have categorized myself as a very open person online, I was in different “groups” (currently really enjoying the mommy groups), I was identified by society with my career highlighted as “teacher,” I’m sure others put me in categories I may not even know about. I’d never thought about the implications of technology playing into one’s identity.
As I rolled all these thoughts and new ways of thinking about technology and identify around in my head, it made me think about my students. Their multitasking (or lack thereof) skills. Their pressures of performing. Of seclusion. Of lacking social skills. There are a very high number of students in our school that have issues with anxiety and depression, I wonder how much our school is actually helping them…
How does all of this tie into education? Into technology? Into this program I’m pursuing?
I think Turkle would argue that technology has a place and a purpose but should be given boundaries. I know for me, working online and taking online classes makes it difficult to “unplug.” I feel that if my students need me, I should get back to them right away (I get emails and texts all throughout the day and night). I silence my phone, but do my students know how to do that? Should I then be teaching them technology “rules” and “etiquette?” One way I work around this issue is silencing my phone after I certain time, and trying to stay as “unplugged” as possible on Sundays.
It’s difficult to see how else I can incorporate it. I literally have to make phone calls each week for students that aren’t on their computers for a certain number of hours. (Read: We won’t get enough funding if they aren’t logging their hours). 5.5 hours a day to be exact. Now, with 5, 45 minute live classes, that should be too hard to meet, you’d think there would be at least 30 minutes of outside of class work given over 5/6 classes…but still, it is healthy for a kindergartener to sit in front of a computer that long? A middle schooler? A high school student? Do they feel the need to check their emails like we do? Their to-do lists? Their grades?
I never asked my teachers for grades. I think it’s extremely rude. But these students constantly see their grades, feedback, when an assignment was due when they turned it in…the rules are different. Contacting their teachers 24/7 is different (I never texted or called my teachers!). I wonder now, how this is affecting their identities, their feelings about social interactions…how does it differs from regular homeschooling, from brick and mortar schooling, from students that have done both / only one? So many questions, I now want to give them all surveys to fill out to get some answers! 🙂
A side note
“The behaviors that get many a poor teenager into special education get many a richer teenager labeled as an intelligent “underachiever” who needs to be challenged,” (Gee 110).
I have to mention this quote from Gee’s reading. When I read this I stopped immediately and thought about my students and what I think about them…and why. I was really disappointed in myself for not only understanding what Gee was getting at with this statement but have done this with my different groups of students multiple more than I care to admit.
I also really stopped and looked at his definition of identity, “Being recognized as a certain “kind of person,” in a given context, is what I mean here by “identity.” In this sense of the term, all people have multiple identities connected not to their “internal states” but to their performances in society,” (99). The word that really stuck out to me here was “performance.” Their performance in society. I wonder what Gee had in mind when he used that word. Was it the same type of performance that Turkle mentioned, that I identified with? Or did he mean what one does in society?
Meme Assignment
This is how I feel everytime I find a fun new website that I could incorporate into my lessons!
And then this is how I feel after I’ve tried using it. For example, commonlit.org is a great website, very interactive, lots of great reading material, etc. I tried to introduce it into my lessons this Unit and it has been such a struggle for some of my students. Losing passwords, confused on what to do, not sure how to submit their work in our LMS. What was a really neat idea, turned out to be more of a headache than I imaged.
I won’t give up though! More and more each year are “getting it” and the 9th-grade teacher and I are on the same page so now they’re starting to use more websites like this in their other classes so it’s becoming more familiar!
Gee, J. P. (2000/2001). Identity as an analytic lens for research in education (pages 99 through 111 and 119-121 [the rest is optional]).
Pea, R., et al. (2012). Media use, face-to-face communication, media multitasking.
Turkle, S. (2008). Always-on/always-on-you: The tethered self. (pages 121 through 137).
I’ve viewed the video by Mimi Ito in another class and found it just as interesting watching it again as I did the first time. I love her perspectives and ideas about learning and socializing and playing being connected and not separate from each other.
In my online classrooms, there is a “chat pod” for students to interact with each other and me. Many students, before class begins or after class is over, like to come early or leave a little late, to “chat” with each other. Commonly, they share usernames. Gamertags, etc., when they realize they have common interests outside of class. I find this fascinating. They virtually “hang out” in school, and then they’ll go off and virtually “hang out” outside of school. In many ways, I’m sure that my students “hang out” with their friends as much as or maybe even more than maybe students that are in brick and motor schools.
When I first graduated from school and went out into the schools on the teacher side, I think there was a very real discomfort or even, fear, of technology in student’s hands. When Ito said, “There really is a gap in perception and understanding between generations about the value of engagement with online activities,” is made me remember this. I’m not sure if it’s now my constant connection with students online, but at least for me, most of that fear is gone. Could it just be that my generation also had access to similar technology (be it AIM and basic text messaging and Xbox (the original)…you know, before live was a thing…), so we understand a little more about what students are drawn to/experiencing. We also have kept up with it, at my house, we have an Xbox One (weird, with a 4 month old, it’s more used for dust collecting than gaming now). My dad had a flip phone for awhile…and he doesn’t even have that anymore. My mom on the other hand finally has Facebook, mostly to see pictures of her granddaughter regularly, but she still refuses to use a profile picture…
When my students jump in the chat and start talking with emoticons, using “tech language” and talking about video games that are popular, I might not always know what they are referring to, but I do usually have a good idea. I’m not afraid to jump in on their chat conversations in class, they also like to text me about questions vs. calling, or even coming to my live help hours (where they could still use the chat box). Yet, they don’t ask for my gamertag, but they will ask if they can follow me on Snapchat or Instagram. So it seems that they do still like some places to keep to themselves.
My students tell me, a lot actually, that they love to be home (not surprising considering their schooling choice) and that their parents/guardians worry about them being online so much and disconnected from the outside world. They make the argument though, that they are in fact, very connected. Below is a picture that Xbox Live has for some of their marketing, doesn’t that just look fun, inviting, socially connected? That certainly is what Xbox Live is trying to sell.
I think about the advances in technology and education a lot. Aside from my role as an online teacher, I’m also pursuing this masters degree, but also, I’m an online student in general. “We have the opportunity to design learning differently: linking people in real and virtual worlds, creating learning communities between people on the move, providing expertise on demand and supporting a lifetime of learning,” (Sharples, M., et al. 232). This is a quote that makes me excited about the future of education. It’s also one, that I know is being met with, and will continue to meet, challenges, especially, I feel, in the K-12 setting.
Both a challenge and an opportunity was pointed out by Sharples, M., et al., “Young people are appropriating technology designed for adult work (e.g. SMS messaging and media file sharing) into their social world. This has deep implications for learning, if we consider, for example, why people would need to memorize facts when they can look them up on Google,”(238). Which then brought them to the issue of plagiarism.
Plagiarism is by far one of the larger issues I face with my students daily. Google makes it so easy to search and find the answer to countless questions. Explaining to students and parents the need to rephrase, summarize, directly quote, and to cite their sources is a battle. The temptation to bypass the hard work and similar copy and paste a perfectly crafted essay is tempting for every student.
It is important that we “[s]upport learners to reach personal understanding through conversation and exploration; support learners’ collaboration in order to construct common knowledge; use technology to enrich learners’ collaborative knowledge building with other learners and teachers; support learners’ transitions across learning contexts,”(Sharples, M., et al., Naismith and Corlett (2006). It is also important that we use technology effectively, I particularly liked Sharpes et al., list of success factors for mobile technology, “access to technology, ownership of technology, connectivity, integration, and institutional support
learning projects.” And as Bransford, et al., said, “giving students a set of standards that are universal (students and adults in the same spaces that are safe) get inform and informal learning working together” should be our overall goal which echoes Ito, “I think for teachers and schools and classroom learning, there’s still an incredibly important role to play, which is about giving kids access across the board to a baseline set of standards, literacies, expectations, about what they need to participate in contemporary society to be reflective.”
It’s an exciting time to be in education!
Bransford, J., et al. (2006). Learning theories and education. (pages 209 through 244).
Ito, Mimi. Connected Learning, Children, and Digital Media by Dr. Mimi Ito from UC Irvine.
Sharples, M., et al. (2009). Mobile learning: Small devices, big issues. (pages 233 through 249).
As we sat in our teacher based teams this week, we were tasked with the challenge of finding something to implement in our classrooms (across each grade band) to improve our instruction and engagement in our live learning classes. Over the last year or two, our conversations have naturally gravitated to adding poll questions throughout our lessons, conducting reviews with Kahoots, and including more Pear Decks – these seem to be the things time after time, that “work.”
In Pachler, N., et al., they said that “‘no single “killer application”’ for mobile technology in learning, but has offered promising scenarios such as the use of graphing calculators and handheld response systems in classrooms, the use of PDAs to structure small group working, handheld tools for basic learning including foreign language and numeracy skills, handheld tourist guides…,” (14).
Kahoot will lose its charm, something new will replace it, I think that that is just the way things are with technology, but the concepts behind them, this “clicker” type question, the discussions boards, the handheld capabilities, learning management systems…all will adapt, it seems, and continue to be the best delivery for effectively integrating learning with technology. This has been supported in several of our readings so far this semester and in others.
It didn’t surprise me at all to read in Kukulska-Hulme, A., et al. that effective technologies are described as needing to “support contextual life-long learning” that included being highly portable, individual, unobtrusive, available anywhere, adaptable, persistent, useful, & easy to use (Kukulska-Hulme, A., et al.). Pachler, N., et al. had a similar list they broke down into mirco, meso, and marco levels, in this reading, they were described as the “general goals for assessing usability, educational effectiveness, and overall impact.”
I think about the advances in personal cell phones (integrating cameras/video, Google Drive, email, apps like Canvas even). Personal laptops and tablets, that are affordable and have larger screens are making online learning available for many that previously would not have had access, as we learned more about last week. These types of devices are checking off more and more of the items on these lists. These technologies address the need for mobility; mobility in conceptual space, mobility in social space, learning dispersed over time.
It wasn’t so much a single device that achieved these goals, but the advances in cloud computing (icloud, Google Drive, learning management systems with logins that are accessible on any devices, etc) (Kukulska-Hulme, A., et al). It made me chuckle a little in Pachler, N., et al. when I read, “when people carry converged phone/camera/media player devices that can capture everyday sights and sounds to a personal weblog. Then, the opportunity for schools will be to exploit these personal devices for learning” (11). The technology now exists, and I think we’re well on our way to this situation where a vast majority of individuals own their own personal devices, especially with these devices being used for personal, professional, and educational reasons – and being made with higher qualities and becoming more affordable. a quick search on Amazon shows smart phones as low as $30, simple laptop as low as $160 – fairly affordable. It seems that this is the new issue, I’ve seen several teachers in our class already mention this – that, “to accommodate children equipped with powerful personal
The technology now exists, and I think we’re well on our way to this situation, a vast majority of individuals will (or do) own their own personal devices, especially with these devices being used for personal, professional, and educational reasons – and being made higher in quality and are more affordable than ever. A quick search on Amazon shows smart phones as low as $30, simple Chromebook as low as $160 – fairly affordable. It seems that the new issue, and I’ve seen several teachers in our class already mention this – is that, “to accommodate children equipped with powerful personal technologies and new and disruptive skills of informal collaboration and networked learning,” ((Kukulska-Hulme, A., et al. 6). While not my current issue in that it’s disruptive to my teaching, it is interesting to think about the distractions that my students are facing and struggling with on a day-to-day basis that I cannot see or directly address.
In our final reading, we got a glimpse into the global technology advances / or lack there of from a few locations/peoples. I felt that the number of people involved in these studies was rather low to get a good picture though. I would love to read more about other countries in larger studies, numbers, and how they’re using technology.
My favorite part of this section was the idea that was brought up about mobile phones linking otherwise disconnected people. I thought this was such an interesting point! Both in how it could link the people of nomadic or disperse tribes, but also the benefits to technology during things like, natural disasters (how very fitting with Irma & Harvey). I also loved the m-novels. How amazing that 34,000 times these novels were read, 4,000 comments were made on them (Pachler, N., et al.).
Thinking about access to global information and comments, of course, made me think of Facebook. My husband has a lot of family that lives in Germany. They love posting on our daughter’s pictures and videos – the new Facebook translate feature is so helpful in facilitating our conversations. The way Facebook shares access to articles, news, comments, videos, pictures, lifestyles, it’s the perfect researching and social experiment.
The readings this week certainly got me thinking about global uses and current functions of technology. I would love to take the time to see how other countries are using technology in the K-12 setting!!
Kukulska-Hulme, A., et al. (2009). Innovation in mobile learning. (pages 13 through 35).
Pachler, N., et al. (2010). Mobile devices as resources for learning. (pages 73 through 93).
Traxler, J. M. (2013). Mobile learning . . . . distance, digital divides, disadvantage, disenfranchisement (pages 129 – 141)
