Digital Writing Reflection

As the semester comes to an end, every single class has asked me to write a reflection about the class in some form or another. In total, I have written seven reflections, including this one. Why such an emphasis on writing reflections?

Reflections allow us to, well, reflect. Without reflection, is true learning actually taking place? John Dewey once said, "We don't learn from experience. We learn from reflecting on experience."

I am not sure I learned much about myself as a writer through this blog assignment. Perhaps I was more reminded that I need to set time aside for writing, no matter what the topic may be. To take the time out to write because only through practice can I become better at it.

I think the thing I learned from this writing experience is about how vital being active in the blogging community is. It is important to have people who read and comment on your blog, even it just starts out as your family, friends, or classmates. To have that support system and know that people are actually reading your posts, feels good.

Challenges: Figuring out what to write about for open posts, Taking the time out to sit down and write

Successes: Completing all the posts, learning another blogging platform

In the future, I will try to incorporate blogging into my curriculum as a choice for students to write. Blogging is not everyone's cup of tea, but offering it as an option to my future students is a great way to connect writing to their technology-centered lives.

Thanks for a great semester everyone~ I might continue to use this blog to post about my trip to Seoul, South Korea this summer if anyone is interested or you can follow me on my Instagram @caitidaisy to see my adventures.

I wish you all nothing but the best and happiness in your future endeavors.

The Digital Writing Workshop

Collaborative Writing with Digital Tools

Digital tools allow students to share, revise, and collaborate on their writings.

Top Tools:

• Google Docs
• Wikis
• Podcasts
• Blogs
• Photo-Essays
• Video Production
• Screencasting

Tip: If you have a concern about privacy with student blogs, there are sites such as epals.com and thinkquest.org. Tutorials can be found on the companion website to this book, digitalwritingworkshop.ning.com. 

Wordless Wednesday

Dinosaur statues leftover from a failed themepark in Dunlawton Sugarmill Park in Port Orange.

Tech Creation

Memes are a vital part of current social media. Students use them, share them, and can even create their own on social media. Using something relevant to our students' lives will help them connect to what is being taught especially if you can tie it into the current pop culture.

I always try to use memes in my powerpoints and lesson when I am teaching. It helps the students better connect with the material, gives them a chuckle, and helps break up the text. I have always just searched for my own online, but sometimes you cannot find the exact meme you want. So, I decided for my tech creation I will look over different meme makers and which ones I prefer.

The first one I tried is called MemeMaker.net. It is pretty simple as you choose an already existing meme background and then you can add whatever text you want to on the bottom and top. It also lets you adjust the text size and color. It does have an option to uploaded your own image for a meme, but I found that the quality, once it was uploaded, was not the best.

The second site I tried out is called imgflip.com. I like it slightly better than the MemeMaker site as it gives you a few more options when you are creating your meme, but is still fairly simple. I also like that it has a search bar you can type in a keyword to find already existing meme backgrounds. I think you would be able to use this to create your own memes as a teacher, but you could also use this as an assignment for students to create a meme based on what they are learning in class.

Technology Can Be a Blessing Or a Curse...

Or at least that's how I feel sometimes. I do not hate technology by any means. In fact, it can be quite useful in many situations. But other times...

 

I use technology at my work (as a manager in retail), in school both as a teacher and a student, and in my personal life. I perhaps am not as tech-savvy as peers my age, but I always like to at least try out new technologies. For example, my friends kept going on about Snapchat so I downloaded the app, but a week later I deleted it. I just did not understand it and was not willing to put in the extra time trying to understand it. However, as a teacher I know it is important to incorporate technology and I have tried to become more open-minded in trying out new digital technologies. 

One such digital tool that I have come across is Padlet. I came across this in my Digital Literacy Strategies class and have enjoyed using it. It is a simple and easy to use as a teacher and as a student. It is a great way to have students post a short response, reaction, or idea about what they have read. They are able to add images or speech bits too, so it allows them to be creative in their responses. It is a great way to share the students' responses with the whole class without knowing who wrote what (so the students do no fear being judged). 

Just as teachers need to cognitively challenge their students with their lessons, they must also do the same with technology. It is important that you have them use technology that has them engaging in higher order thinking. Digital tools like Flashcardchallenge are great for having students focus on vocabulary, but does not challenge them to think critically about the material. Teachers need to incorporate a variety of digital tools into their lesson plans to make sure all levels of Bloom's Taxonomy is addressed. 

I just actually found out about a new digital tool last night, that I am excited to try out. It is called EDpuzzle. It is a free resource where you can edit youtube videos. You can trim clips so they are the length you want, trim out inappropriate scenes or sensor curse words, and you can add in questions that pop up as the video plays. A current teacher recommended this as a great way to edit videos that add value to the lesson, but ones you have concerns about the content. 

My Creative(?) Outlet

Once again I was stumped over where to go with this week's post and I sent out an S.O.S. again.

This week's S.O.S.

My friend Jess and I talked about what exactly a creative outlet is. Does that necessarily mean it has to do with an art form in some way? Or can it be anything that is an outlet for you and in that way, it is unique or creative? Either way, I was clueless as to what my outlets were.

But then I realized what my main outlet is, although it may seem a bit odd. There is not an exact word to describe it that I can think of. I know a word often used is "fangirling", but I dislike that term for many reasons. I guess you could say my outlet is appreciating artists?

There are a few Korean artists that I absolutely adore. I appreciate their music and them as artists so I want to spread awareness of them. So, I translate their tweets, Instagram, and other social media posts they make so other fans who cannot understand Korean can enjoy them too. I also translate and sub videos from time to time (although subbing is the biggest pain in the butt no matter what program you try to use, rest in peace all my patience).

So in a way, that is my creative outlet. For several hours it is just me and my computer. Translating, posting and sharing with fellow fans.

A fairly familiar sight when I log in to Tumblr. Most likely all translation requests. 

Curse of a Libra

I am one of the most indecisive people you will probably ever have the pleasure of meeting, all because I am a Libra. Constantly weighing my choices on the scale, but never actually coming to a decision. Libras are known as peacekeepers because of this ability to maintain harmony and balance by taking into account all views and positions. However, it just means that when it comes to making decisions for ourselves, we are extortionately indecisive. So, when a Libra sees the word "open post", they will most likely cringe, staring at a blank post with the cursor blinking ominously at them and debate for days about what they should write.

In fact, some Libras might wait until the last moment and then ask their friend to make a decision for them, because they are still incapable of committing to one idea (ahem, thanks Jess).

In the end, I (read Jess) decided to write about a topic that I have found interesting in my language studies. I have studied several languages (Turkish, Spanish, German, and Korean, slightly dabbled in some Gaelic) and always find it interesting how there are words that do not translate into English well or we do not have an equivalent to it in the English language. These words always leave me wondering why we do not have these words in English? Is English an unimaginative language? Do we simply use English to get a point across and that is all we care about? Or is it something else?

For example, one I came across the other day is the Hawaiian word "akihi". The word means "the forgetfulness felt upon walking off after being given directions".  One word to describe a feeling we have all felt before. The word takes something that may seem mundane and beautifully captures it in one simple word.

Another example of these types of words that I love, especially in relation to books!

So, why do we not have words like this in English? As a future English teacher, I honestly do not know what the answer may be. I wish we had more words like this as I feel it would add another layer of depth and beauty to our writing. Perhaps in the future, there will be a shift in our language and we will start creating our own words that describe a feeling or scenario beautifully in one word.

If you find this topic interesting, I recommend browsing or following this Tumblr. They post these types of words from many different languages and you can even submit your own!