Joni Dunlap and I presented about our instructional uses of Twitter in the classroom at EDUCAUSE 2009. Our PowerPoint slides from that session can be viewed online.
These slides alone however don't capture the story we told at our presentation. Luckily, after doing some networking, I got an opportunity to talk to the editor of EDUCAUSE Quarterly (EQ) who mentioned that she was looking for an article for the next issue of EQ focused on Twitter. That was all the motivation Joni and I needed. We ended up writing Horton Hears a Tweet and it was published in the December of 2009 in EQ. If you get a chance, give it a read. We focus on the reasons why someone might use social networking in general and about our personal experience using Twitter. Give a read or even better, give it a tweet.
Dunlap, J. C., & Lowenthal, P. R. (2009). Horton hears a tweet. EDUCAUSE Quarterly, 32(4).
Teaching students how to design and develop Web-based learning environments (or what we call “EdWebs” at the Information and Learning Technology program at the University of Colorado Denver) can be challenging. Students typically begin the program with a wide range of previous experience with Web development. Some have been developing Web pages for years while others have no prior experience with Web development.
Especially those new to Web development struggle with meeting their own expectations to develop beautiful award winning style Web sites. The reality though (in my experience) is that while it is important to design aesthetically pleasing Web-based learning environments, a good and asthetically pleasing EdWeb does not need to be that complicated.
The following are some examples of different types of EdWebs to help give people and idea of the genre of Web-based learning environments or at least the “typical” self-paced Web-based learning environment. If you click on the image, you will either see a screen shot of the EdWeb (which is essentially all you need to get an idea of the overall look and feel) or in some cases you will go directly to the EdWeb.
Abstract of the article:
AECT has recently (yet again!) redefined our field, reverting back to the use of the term educational technology. We believe this recent change is problematic for a number of reasons, but primarily because of the weak rationale offered for the change. This change affects how external audiences view our profession and is likely to confuse practitioners in corporate and higher education settings in particular. We offer a review of job postings, program titles, and listserv discussions to support our case. The labels we use to define ourselves are critically important – and we hope to see a stronger case made for changes for our foundational definitions in the future.
I have a history of focusing on how language effects the things we do–from my Master’s thesis in religion that focused on how the language of the time shaped China’s reception of Buddhism to papers presented at AERA 2009 and AECT 2009 that focused on how online discourse communities are shaped by the language we use. While a totally different focus, John W. White and I published a paper on the language used in educational reform. This article can be accessed at the eJournal of Educational Policy. We have another article under review which focuses on academic literacy.
I am a strong believer in attending and presenting at conferences for professional development. Each year I try to attend the annual meeting of the American Educational Research Association (AERA) —http://www.aera.net/AnnualMeeting.htm — as well as the annual meeting of the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) — http://www.aect.org/events/.
So when I plan to attend a conference, I strive whenever possible to also present at the conference. Often, I will even try to present more than once.
Well this last fall I went a little overboard and during basically a three week stretch I presented 11 times at three different conferences (two of the presentations though involved two parts so it was actually only 9 different sessions). To be fair, when I originally completed the conference proposals, I never expected to have them all accepted. But through this process I learned a few things that I will take with me moving forward:
1. Never present more than 3 times — ideally strive for only 2 presentations — at a conference.
I enjoy attending sessions as much as I do presenting at sessions but I found that when I attend a conference where I present more than 2-3 times, I rarely attend that many sessions because I am spending most of my time preparing for my own sessions. Also, be prepared that they might accept any and all proposals you submit so think twice before sending in a bunch of different proposals. If you want to present 2-3 times, only send in 3-4 proposals (assuming at least one will not be approved).
2. Always bring business cards to each session.
3. Find the room you are planned to present in.
Checkout the room you plan to present in before your session to get an idea of the location, room size, layout, Internet access… to name a few. During EDUCAUSE 09 I spent over 30 minutes trying to locate the room where the poster sessions were being held. I barely found it in time to put up my poster before the session began.
4. Show Up Early.
Be sure to show up at the room earlier enough right before your session to ensure that such things as an LCD projector are there. At AECT, the hotel would remove the LCD projectors at the end of the day which meant that the first sessions each day often began with a rush to locate an LCD projector.
6. Determine the how many handouts you need.
Ask people who have presented in the past and/or the conference staff how many people typically attend each session so that you can have the right number of handouts. Most presentations, in my experience, tend to have 10-15 attendees. Therefore, you are often safe with 20-25 handouts. However, during my last three week conference stretch, I had one session with over 75 people in it and another with about 35.
7. Avoid traveling on a day you present.
This might be silly but try to avoid this if possible. At AECT this past fall I had to present on Halloween but I really wanted to get home in time to trick or treat with my kids. I carefully picked my flight to help make this all happen but guess what… my flight was delayed.
I am sure I am forgetting a few things but this list is a start.
I have been thinking a lot about understanding Computer-mediated Discourse (CMD) as a legitimate type of new literacy. I recently returned to this idea after some debates on ITForum.
Basically, a few listserv members wanted to unsubscribe from the listserv but rather than follow the correct steps to unsubscribe (or what others perceived as not even trying to look up the correct steps to unsubscribe) they simply kept sending messages to the entire list (which has over 2,000 members) that they wanted to be subscribed. This angered some members of the list and insults were exchanged and the flaming began.
While a number of people talked about ways to improve the listserv, I kept thinking about Will Richardson’s idea–where do we teach Wikipedia? Now when he mentioned this in a keynote I saw online, he wasn’t focusing necessarily only on Wikipedia as much as he was about how do we or when do we (if ever) teach students how to participate and contribute in this new Web 2.0 world we find ourselves in.
For me the bigger and more foundational question is when and how do we teach students (or anyone for that matter) how to effectively communicate in computer-mediated environments (e.g., listserv’s). Susan Herring has argued that CMD is different than F2F oral communication and yet also different than written communication and somehow a blend of the two. But this type of literacy like all literacy is situated, contextual, and specific.
I have written in the past (with different colleagues) about different conceptions of literacy and the importance to acknowledge and sometimes explicitly teach these different types of literacy as well as how important it is to pay attention to the language and labels we use (Lowenthal & Wilson, 2009; White & Lowenthal, 2008). For instance, John White and I have argued,
The New Literacy Studies (NLS) have shown that literacy is far more complex than the simplistic definition of being able to read and write (Colombi & Schleppegrell, 2002; Street, 1995). NLS posits that literacy is more usefully understood when examined as a tool for (and function of) relationships between people, within groups, or in communities rather than as a set of individual skills (Barton, 1994; Barton & Hamilton, 2000). Specific environments and situations require specific kinds of literacy; relationships of power within these contexts affect literacy uses and the meaning resulting from them (Bizzell, 1982; Corson, 2001; Gilligan, 1993; Heath, 1983, 1991; Hymes, 1971; Medvedev & Bakhtin, 1978; Nystrand, 1982; Pratt, 1998). NLS highlights the fact that what counts as literacy is not the same in all contexts; different domains of life require specific kinds of literacies.
Given this, CMD appears to be a not necessarily new but increasingly used literacy that is permeating every aspect of our life. Now I am thinking this is more than just digital literacy or information literacy; or at least something different that overlaps these two ideas in ways. But we aren’t spending time teaching people how to effectively employ CMD. Rather, we assume that people can learn this on their own and that they can figure out the differences between emailing, postings comments on a blog, taking part in a listserv or even tweeting. And while everything we need to learn in life doesn’t have to be formally taught and in fact many would argue that the most important things in life aren’t taught in a formal learning environment, as CMD increases, we need to start seeing courses or opportunities out side of courses on how to read, write, communicate and exist in mediated environments.
Back to the beginning of this, I wasn’t that surprised with those who were willing to send multiple emails to be “unsubscribed” to over 2,000 people (which includes possible future employers I bet) but I was surprised when arguably literate CMD users were willing to get nasty (in front of over 2,000 people) with these new and arguably illiterate (at least when it comes to listserving) people. We need to think about what it means to be literate when it comes to CMD and how we can explicitly teach it or at least model it for others.
After writing this post in the middle of a conference, I later created a Pecha Kucha on the same topic. The following is a rough recording of the Pecha Kucha.
