Videos as supplementary instruction

Here are a few YouTube videos I taped recently for RHETx, a two day “Ted Talk” even at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. Andrew Hollinger, who supervised the event, asked for a few short videos (the longest is four minutes) on “Threshold Concepts” in writing for first year students.  

Production values are poor. I taped them quickly on an old HP laptop, the only computer I had handy with a camera. What I like about these video is they illustrate the diversity of digital pedagogies. Andrew showed these videos between the talks. I will download them to the website for the first year class I teach, as well as make them available to any of my colleagues who’d like to jump-start reflective thinking for their students by providing an alternative perspective on writing.  

Writing is a Conversation https://youtu.be/g6YTZovKYJE

Writing is Identity https://youtu.be/yOElDve8H3o

Writing is fun: https://youtu.be/o3EvbilqfxE

Writing is risky: https://youtu.be/fZXaO-qJ_VA

Writing Never Ends https://youtu.be/AgkK0zyVbtc

Writing is Situational https://youtu.be/s50Z7M1ImIY

Looking forward to THATCamp in Austin in January

The Variable

The most intriguing thing: the variable wasn't the technology or support. It was the individual teacher. Makes you think online instruction is not that different from f2f.    

https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2015/06/10/report-finds-successful-online-2-year-college-courses-california

http://http//www.ppic.org/main/publication.asp?i=1152

OER or Pirates?

Some of the sites on this reddit list may be skirting the law. Some may be over the line. But there's some fascinating stuff here. 


https://www.reddit.com/r/trackers/comments/hrgmv/tracker_with_pdfsebooks_of_college_textbooks/c1xrq44

An OER Resource for Writing Teachers

Thank you, Colorado State. Quality OER resources have been sorely lacking for writing teachers--other than resources for technical and business writing.

This is a wonderful resource for anyone working in first year writing.  


http://writing.colostate.edu/textbooks/

UT Austin's Digital Writing and Research Lab

UT Austin's Digital Writing and Research Lab has some informative, and creative, projects on digital writing.  Well worth a look

http://www.dwrl.utexas.edu/

Ethnicity and Social Networks

Here are some interesting websites and statistics on Ethnicity and Social Networks.

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2015/02/03/social-media-preferences-vary-by-race-and-ethnicity/

http://www.pewhispanic.org/2013/03/07/ii-internet-use-3/

http://www.statista.com/topics/1867/hispanics-in-the-united-states-internet-usage/

http://www.capturagroup.com/whitepaper/hispanic-online-market/

http://nbclatino.com/2013/03/07/study-digital-divide-disappearing-as-latinos-catch-up-on-internet-usage/

http://www.adweek.com/news/advertising-branding/technology-meets-culture-149178

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/hispanics-turn-to-internet-for-political-news-but-use-is-determined-by-several-factors-fau-poll-finds-300049658.html

http://www.hispanicoutlook.com/mark-blankenship/2015/8/6/how-social-media-can-and-should-impact-higher-education

http://www.joanganzcooneycenter.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/02/jgcc_aprendiendoencasa.pdf

Though these statistics provide insight into student social interaction using technology outside of the classroom, and perhaps give clues how technology might enhance social interaction inside the classroom, these statistics also provide yet another method for labeling Hispanic students that may complicate those students’ interactions with each other, education, and the culture that tends to label them, and at times, manipulate them.

The possible benefits and problems are illustrated by the white papers from the Captura Group. At question is how do we use that information. The Captura Group sells that information to corporate clients.

College Open Textbooks Website

This is probably the best (at least the best I have found) resource for open source textbooks.

http://collegeopentextbooks.org/

It's Complicated, The Social Lives of Network Teens, Response II

“As teens move through different social environments—and interact with different groups of friends, interest groups, and classmates—they maneuver between different contexts that they have collectively built and constructed” (Boyd 41).

As I read these words it struck me that standard class policies about cellphone use are as antiquated as the standard lecture format. I wonder what would happen if, rather than trying to situate the class outside of social networks, we intentionally situated the classroom in that matrix of social networks. The naïve idea that the classroom can exist in a space prior to technologies that spawned the term social networks is as unworkable as all utopian ideals. If we are looking for ways to encourage student interaction, why do we seek to limit that interaction? (In another post, I suggested we distrust technology because it takes control out of our hands. But, that control was always illusionary in the first place.)

Ah, but how to create that space. That's the rub. 

Boyd, Danah. It's Complicated, The Social Lives of Network Teens. 2014: New Haven CT, Yale UP.

A Possible Motivation for Resisting Online Teaching.

In "Arts of the Contact Zone, "Mary Louise Pratt writes that, “The lecturer's traditional (imagined) task" is "unifying the world in the class's eyes by means of a monologue that rings equally coherent, revealing, and true for all, forging an ad hoc community, homogeneous with respect to one's own words” (39).

I can't shake this image of the lecturer in control, creating a community in his or her own image. Ah, it's what all of us long for. Yet, is it the best way for students to learn, particularly if our goal is for students to think for themselves? 

I remember one of those experts that the administration periodically invites on campus, usually for large sums of money. He insisted that critical thinking consisted of teaching students to think like us. I was always uncomfortable with that idea. 

If our goal is to teach students to think for themselves, certainly what I mean by critical thinking, then the measure of our success are those students who disagree with us, who think differently than we do, who reject our assumptions. If students all come out of our classes thinking like we do, we have failed. 

Yet, if we go online, there is the danger that we might lose control, that students might have a different "take away" than we envisioned, that they might actually be able to think for themselves instead of letting us do that for them. 

   

Teaching writing and resisting the textual

I think that it is particularly ironic when writing instructors resist online teaching. After all, we teach writing because we believe it is more than simply a critical skill; it is necessary to critical thinking and dialectic. We teach writing because we think it has intrinsic value. We teach writing because we think we can reach out and touch others through what we write. Then we insist that students need face-to-face interaction to really learn.

If we then add multimodal writing, something that has become increasingly valued in writing classrooms, the resistance to online becomes even more baffling. Why teach students how to include video, illustration, audio in their texts, how to design webpages, how to communicate clearly and effectively through internet mediated texts, if we don't think we are capable of communicating that way ourselves?

It's Complicated, The Social Lives of Network Teens

Reading It's Complicated, The Social Lives of Network Teens, by Danah Boyd. (Yale UP, 2014) Was thinking about writing a review, then decided that periodic reading notes while working my way through the book might be as effective. I like reading notes because they allow me to return to what was going through my brain as I was reading. All too often, thinking about a text after reading it revises previous thought processes.

In the introduction, Boyd argues that "most teens now go online to connect to the people in their community," that these online communities provide "a space to hang out and connect with friends." She goes on to write that, "Teen's mediated interactions sometimes complement or supplement their face-to-face encounters" (4-5). Thus, the internet has replaced the Mall, which, with the advent of another technology, the car, replaced the neighborhood, as the local for teen interaction. Thus, public spaces have become what Boyd refers to as "networked publics" (5).

I'm willing to buy this argument, which counters the dominant narrative that social networks are replacing real, that is face-to-face, relationships. But, I'm going to need more. Read on, right?

At question for me isn't whether her basic thesis is right, that social networks simply "mirror, magnify, and make more visible the good, bad, and ugly of everyday life" (24), but whether she offers insights that those of us who teach, whether our teaching is face-to-face, hybrid, or online, can use to engage the students we teach.