ENG W 412

2007-04-04T08:22:00.000-07:00

Here are the things that I thought were most important and the most interesting:

a) Blogger.com announcing in January of 2003 that it hosts over one million blogs, b) the emergence of presentations about blogging at the 2003 Conference on College Composition and Communication, and c) the interest in blogging that surfaced during Gulf War II.

-weblog uses in writing classrooms: weblogs as journals, weblogs as research tools, and class weblogs for sharing ideas. weblog genres (what we call journal, notebook, and filter weblogs)

-Weblogging seems like such a potentially rich set of online writing activities because it is relatively low-tech compared to producing hypertext or websites, and it incorporates familiar writing skills like summary, paraphrases, and the development of voice.

-Rebecca Blood She envisioned that the small community that might start up around a weblogger would encourage that person to continue writing where he or she might otherwise stop, and that readers of weblogs might in turn begin their own blogs and reap similar benefits.

-the writer who is self-motivated

-The web is remediating all media that has come before it (print, music, film, television, radio, paintings, email, etc.); therefore in our teaching we wanted to emphasize for our students that weblogging is not a radically new way of writing, but a repurposing of familiar (we hoped) print genres.

-we also needed a more specific way to address the pedagogical problem of teaching aims, forms, styles, and strategies for writing

-Charles Bazerman “When we travel to new communicative domains, we construct our perception of them beginning with the forms we know. Even our motives and desires to participate in what the new landscape appears to offer start from motives and desires framed in earlier landscapes”

-We noticed in our own weblogging that we immediately gravitated to the kinds of print genres that have motivated us in the past

-an engaged and motivated weblog writer will become a better writer of other genres, better able to represent him or herself in writing

- “blogs” (what we call journals): “short-form journals. The writer's subject is his daily life, with links subordinate to the text,”
- notebooks: “Sometimes personal, sometimes focused on the outside world, notebooks are distinguished from blogs [journals] by their longer pieces of focused content,” and
- filters: “organized squarely around the link, maintained by an inveterate Web surfer, personal information strictly optional” (pp. 6-8).

1. Familiarity with a genre does not necessarily correspond to motivation.
2. The preference for journal weblogging is a generic issue (in terms of form and motivation) that instructors will want to heed.
3. The notebook genre seems likely to be most successful in a community or team weblog where ideas and entries are receiving responses.
4. The complexity of the filter entry cannot be overlooked, nor can the need for extremely high level of motivation when working with this genre.
5. Working with technology (regardless of genre) has the potential to motivate student writers.

-Journal weblogging is likely to remediate a familiar print genre that has positive connotations, but the prevalence of this online genre will likely cause a certain amount of generic interference for instructors asking students to write notebook or filter weblogs.
-Notebook weblogging is more likely to succeed as a genre within a collaborative weblog than when assigned as an individual weblog project. Notebook weblogs might take as their guidepost online discussion boards rather than print notebooks.
-Filter weblogs have the potential to be an intellectually rich genre for students to work with, but their complexity is buried beneath a deceptively simple presentation of link(s) and analysis.

I enjoyed reading about this because this is a great resource for me as I start working on my final project. I plan to make a set of lesson plans using webloging, somehow, not sure what yet. I can't wait to see how it works out.

2007-03-07T08:04:00.000-08:00

This quote is very true of todays society, "Our students have been raised in a culture in which they communicate very informally and put things out about themselves that we never would have dreamed of sharing with other people."-Penland
In saying this, I wonder if technology and blogging has brought about a change in students attitudes and behavior?, "Besides being overly informal, today's students soemtimes show a lack of respect for authoriy."
This is very interesting, "There's an assumption that you can be informal regardless of who your audience is. Being professional is not just merely being polite, it affects your credibility in the legal and busness world."-Penland. She makes an excellent point, I never really thought about this until now. We do need to be careful how we respond to our professors and employers, even through e-mail.

2007-03-07T07:45:00.000-08:00

I like this quote, "If we look beneath the context of weblogs, we can observe the common ground all bloggers share--the format. The weblog format provides a framework for our universal blog experiences, enabling the social interactions we associate with blogging. Without it, there is no differentiation between the myriad content produced for the web." This really says it all, about blogging anyway.
"...a blog post is often an opening to a discussion, rather than a full-fledged argument already arrived at." This is definitely true, this really makes sense. We are blogging to strike up a conversation, not necessarily present the fact.
"A weblog can be identified by the following distinguishing characteristics: a date header, a time stamp, and a permalink."
"When we talk about weblogs, we're talking about a way of organizing information, independent of its topic. What we write about does not define us as bloggers; it's how we write about it." This sums up what she has been talking about, and it sums up what blogging really is.

2007-03-07T07:36:00.000-08:00

I do use myspace, but not as often as many of my friends. I think that this article is true in stating that people, especially teens are very fickle and change quickly from one thing to the next. Many teens get tired with something after awhile and want to find something new and more interesting. I don't think places like my space or facebook will ever completely die out, but I do think that they will change over time.

2007-03-02T20:01:00.000-08:00

His comics are amazing. The use of color and images, the way he sends you in all different directions, but at the same time letting you see his path. It is all awesome...I never knew this kind of web comics existed, I can't wait for our "field trip" I think it will be great. Very interesting and enlightening. I especially liked, "Porphyria’s Lover" it was amazing. The story was wonderful, and definitely enhanced by this visual graphics. It was almost poem-like, but much more than that, I really never knew comics like this existed on the web. He is a truly gifted artist. I am taking Intro. to Poetry right now, and I keep trying to think "out side the box" that's what his work makes me think of...thinking outside the box, the norm. I am interested in learning more about him as a writer/artist. This sort of web art, with words, may be something for me to consider for my final project?! Who knows, I'll look into it...I think it might be really fun.

2007-02-28T11:48:00.000-08:00

"As we eagerly embrace this technology and the possibilities it offers for enhancing writing instruction, we must become aware of how computer technology does not simply augment traditional teaching strategies--supporting and making these more student-driven and hands-on." I think this explains this chapter, and helps you to understand their focus.
This is very true, "computers have transformed and will continue to transform writing instruction."
"As Myron Tuman argued in 1996, digital literacy 'is likely to entail a radical reworking of all the most basic terms and practices of our print-based society'."
Cynthia Selfe's thesis is: "Whether or not we teach with computers--or even use computers--we've complicit with the digital technologies that have changed our world, not always for the best, and that thus demand our critical attention, our engagement."
This is a great point, "failing to engage digital literacies positions us to be victims of, rather than voices in, policy decisions that affect the ways we can do our jobs."
This is the thing that I fear, "writing teachers struggle to find a 'happy' medium that accommodates and challenges both groups of students." I am worried that if I do have a technology based classroom that those students that are not familiar with certain technologies will fall behind.
I have also been wondering about this, "Institutional settings exert strong influences not only on how instructors use technology in the classroom but also on how they envision the relationship between teaching and technology." I am wondering if at the middle-school, high-school level if administrators will be open to a technology rich classroom...???
I like this point a lot, "technology never merely augments teaching practices: It transforms them."
I wonder what this means for new teachers, "use of technology in teaching writing sooner or later begs teachers to examine their pedagogical assumptions." I think that new teachers already come to teaching with more assumptions that incorporate technology than teachers than have been in the classroom for 20 years...???

Questions to ask in guiding you to use digital literacies:
Is electronic availability the best criterion for selecting texts?
What do we lose when we exclude materials found only in archives or print?
Will students be likely to want a portable, hard copy of the text, and how much will printing pages at campus labs cost students?
To what extent has the Internet, that vast conglomerations of personal, institutional, and marketing choices, become the teacher, selecting for us the content for our discussions?

I like how they put this, "writing instructors need to make sure that the furniture [computer] doesn't become too comfortable; they need to explore and cautiously use the drafting potential of word processing computers."
This is definitely true, "The spell checker doesn't catch every misspelled word...A grammar checkers is imprecise and inaccurate, and, although useful, is only vaguely suggestive revisions." These tools do however give us a place to start revisions.
"Technology adds to the management skills necessary for effective class planning."
"In networked classroom, writing teachers and students alike need to become cognizant of potential breaches of privacy and professional ethics."

When piloting a new technology you need to consider:
-Writing instructors using computers in the classroom need to be committed to teaching new digital literacies.
-Instructors need to determine whether their campus is technology rich, technology bound, or ill-equipped.
-Instructors need to determine whether sound instructional technology is valued on their campus.
-Instructors will need to negotiate time issues, especially when first teaching with technology.
-Instructors need to envision the kind of classroom they are trying to create.

2007-02-21T09:17:00.000-08:00

It is interesting to see that "the faculty in English departments are rarely (if ever) consulted in institutional matters of computer literacy."
"Students need both functional and critical literacies (as well as other types of literacies like the rhetorical and visual literacies involved in Web site design and production)." I agree with this and think he makes an excellent point.
This was interesting to me, "teachers of writing and communication are not used to thinking about functional literacy in positive ways." That doesn't seem like it should be the norm.
I definitely agree with this point, "the content of functional literacy training should reflect the needs and motives of the groups served."
Education goals: "A functionally literate student uses computers effectively to achieve educational goals."
Social conventions: "A functionally literate student understands the social conventions that help determine computer use."
Specialized discourses: "A functionally literate student makes use of the specialized discourses associated with computers."
Management activites: "A functionally literate student manages his or her online world."
Technological impasses: "A functionally literate student resolves technological impasses confindently and strategically."
"There is no reason why funtional literacy, which offers certain kinds of important access to a culture, cannot be reconceived in a more positive way as well as articulated with other types of literacies."

2007-02-08T07:11:00.000-08:00

I agree with the themes of this article. They discussed; Literacies have life spans, People can exert their own powerful agency in digital literacies, Schools are not the sole gateways through which people gain access to practices digital literacies, The specific conditions of access have a substantial effect on people's acquisition and development of digital literacy, and Families transmit literacy values and practices in multiple directions.
Literacies have life spans: I believe this to be true because the technologies we have today are not the ones we had ten years ago, and the ones we have in ten years are going to be different still.
Schools are not the sole gateways to digital literacies: This is definitely true in today's society. Kids today have access to cell phones with text messaging, internet with chat rooms and much more. Most children learn more about computers and other technologies outside the school than in. However what we teach them will enhance their knowledge of technology and it's uses.
The specific conditions of access have an effect on people's development of digital literacy: I know this is true because the child who's parents don't have the money for a computer, or other technology, is missing out on opportunities other kids might have. This in turn makes it hard on schools who are technology centered to teach everyone the same.
Families transmit literacy values in multiple directions: This is very true in today's society. Many students have a cell phone, a computer and several televisions at home. In these families technology is valued vary highly. But in the family that does not have the funds to get a computer or digital cable, that student does not understand the importance of technology and it's uses.

2007-01-30T07:07:00.000-08:00

In Brandt's article I relate most to Michael May, Genna's grandson. We were born about the same time, and therefore we had a lot of the same experiences. He was brought up in a house filled with books, and television. He also remembers his first experience with a computer being with his mother.
I relate to him because at my house there were always books to be read, things to be written, and a television in every room of our house. My first experience with technology was also with my mother and computers.
I also like what Brandt says about literacy piling up and extending out. She says, "Literate ability at the end of the 20th century may be best measured as a person's capacity to amalgamate new reading and writing practices in response to rapid socail change." I definately agree with her, the way things are giong now children and adults will have to know how to use a computer, a cell phone and many other technologies that we did not have only 50 years ago. Brandt says, "Literacy had literally spread out across the century, reorganizing an array of economic, legal, political and domestic activities." I believe this to be very true in today's society. I think that the use of technology has broken down many of the social and economic barriers that we have had in the past.

2007-01-22T13:10:00.000-08:00

In this article he mad many interesting points. However, the two technologies are so different that for me it is hard to compare them. I think that the stereo-type of English teachers being afraid to use computers as a tool for writing is pretty accurate, However it is becoming more and more widely used throughout the curriculum in many schools. I did like his research about chalkboards, however I do not believe that it will predict how computers will be used in the future. I do think that computers are becoming more and more "natural" in schools and the classroom.

2007-01-17T11:28:00.000-08:00

The time articles were really interesting. I love the quote from Thomas Carlyle, "the history of the world is but the biography of great men."
However it is true that we have fallen to a new low, instead of stepping up to what we could be as men and women.

To me it was interesting that the "person" of the year was a computer. I know that they had just started to become popular, but it seems odd to me.