On Week Five

Boy was there a lot of work for me to do this week! I have my presentation today, Lesson plan 2 due using wikis and the readings (which were good but pretty intense and time consuming--especially once they got into the Q&A). A few point I'd like to make for Prof. Cessums.

1. I made the requested additions/revisions to Lesson Plan 1 regarding the utilization of a concept map in my lesson plan. Hopefully I answered your question and made myself clear.

2.I STILL DON'T KNOW HOW TO PUBLISH MY LESSON PLANS TO THE COURSE WIKI. I tried to access the course wiki last night several times and it kept telling me I didn't have access to it! This could be a big problem...

3. I don't think the rubric I created was appropriate for this week's lesson plan. I mean I think it sucked anyway, but it's even more off this time. If I had more time, I'd like to formulate a more appropriate, and just overall better, rubric.

4. My wiki is incomplete. I don't have an example of what I want the student's work to look like. When I saw the assignment required us to use course wikis I thought "Wow! I'm gonna come up with something that looks just like this !" But it didn't work out that way. So, needless to say, I plan to continue working on it...

I think that is all for now. If I have anything else, I'll be sure to post it. See you in class!

Online Youth Victimization

So the video series was informative, not what I expected at all. The panelists really seemed to set the record straight and the audience seemed receptive; they seemed to accept their ignorance like a good kid swallowing a bitter pill, out of necessity rather than desire, but they swallowed it all the same. Hopefully some good will come of the panel and some real-life, realistic changes will come about. Maybe they already have, online youth victimization isn't one of my areas of expertise.

1. Who are we making safe?

I think what this question is asking is who are we hoping to make safe through legislation, action, inaction etc...I believe that at face-value the answer is teens/children. The "targeted" group defined and discussed in the panel. The panel cleared up the misinformation on the group that is actually being targeted (vs. who the media tells us). Teens are the most "targeted" group.

"Targeted" is defined as, for the purposes of the panel, those who are victims of being taken advantage of in some way by older adults. One quote I like from Dr. David Finckelwhore (not sure if that's spelled correctly):

"[...]Criminal seductions that take advantage of teenage vulnerabilities[...]"

This is what we are guarding against (what we should be guarding against and hopefully future legislation, action by adults and those in power will work to guard against).

As of right now. Based on the information presented. Our current legislation and understanding of the problems is warped and outright erroneous in many instances. The panel took the time to disabuse the audience of many wrongly held beliefs (i.e., deception as a major theme, young children being taken advantage of, abduction a major issue etc.... I don't know if what is being done right now is working so it might not be making anyone any safer in actuality.

2. What are we making safe?

Like I said earlier, based on the current information things aren't being done the right way so we might not be making anything/one safer. But as far as future implications go, we will be making the Internet a "safer" place. Safer being defined as (to me) a place where we have lowered instances of cyber-bullying, harassment by solicitors, marketers and external groups, and unwanted solicitation of all sorts by all groups essentially.

The Internet will be safer in that it will be used explicitly for those things which it is desired for (social networking, research etc...)Is this possible?
A key point to consider: It was stated several times that in the overwhelming majority of these cases, the teen willingly took part in the "unsafe" process by engaging in sexual conversations with the adult/stranger and practicing generally "unsafe" Internet behaviors (*see "Internet Daredevil"). The point was made that only through education and the elimination/minimization of the root problem (in many cases an "unsafe" family/home environment)can we make headway in the problem of adult-child online sexual victimization.

3.What are the consequences of such decisions?

What decisions exactly Prof. Cessums????

I'll say that teens must understand the implications of the decisions they are making. Although the majority of them do (as evidenced by the statistics that show teens are limiting the amount of personal information they put online etc...), many teens still don't understand the long-term consequences that can result in 1.Getting involved in inappropriate conversations 2.Sharing sexual information online 3.Following up with strangers etc...

Once these are THOROUGHLY understood, explained in a REALISTIC manner that does not employ "scare tactics" or obviously unrealistic language and claims, teachers, parents, legislators etc... MUST be willing to 1.have uncomfortable conversations and 2.LEARN THE TECHNOLOGY. You cannot educate about something you don't understand. Kids know this and are able to take advantage of the ignorance of those in power (parents, teachers...).

I think these questions were to broad. I don't see how any of them touched on or tested my understanding of the video.

On Here Comes Everyone

I'll have to say that this was probably my favorite "reading" yet. Instead of doing an overview like I usually do I'm going to post the notes I took on the video. Maybe they will be helpful to my fellow classmates.

Reading: Here Comes Everybody: The Power of Organizing Without Organizations

Audience: General

-Effects of Internet becoming broadly social=> General Awareness-
-"Internet not a decoration on contemporary society, it's a challenge to it."-

I think this is a very good quote. It makes so much sense given the implications of the Internet in every aspect of society. I love it!

-We're living through the largest increase in human expressive capability in history-

*4 Revelations
1.Printing Press and Movable Type
2.Telephone/Telegraph
3.Recorded media, movies etc...
4.Harness Broadcast

Notice: The one's that create groups don't create 2-way communications and the ones that creat 2-way communications don't create groups.
*Peacock hitting windscreen

~GROUP ACTION JUST GOT EASIER!!!~
-Freedom of Speech, Press and Assembly now all the same freedom

-Humans natively good at group action
-*Complication of group formation=>
5 people=10 connections
10 people=45 connections
~"Adding more engineers to a late Project makes it later"~
*Diminsihing utility
-Native disabilities of groups past a certain size
*Hierarchy
-Set of tools=>Make each link easier to produce=>Larger, easier groups
~Ridiculously easy group forming~
*Email as afterthought on original Internet
*Reply-all Significance(Upsides and Downsides)

B/w 1974 and Now...
-Enormous social lag=>Social Capability has NOT transformed society...vs other types of apps b/c groups natively conservative

~"Curiously the moment at which technology becomes boring that the social effects become interesting."

"Once technology sinks deep into the culture the social effects that get built on it simultaneously REQUIRE the technology and ARENT ABOUT (IT) the technology."

*Internal combustion (Engine) moment with Internet
*About none of it and all of it at the same time

Ladder: Ways in Which Group Effect more than just aggregated individual action
1.Sharing
2.Conversation
3.Collaboration
4.Collective Action

~How much does the individual have to work to coordinate their actions with the group~

1.Sharing
*Delicious=>Lowered difficulty of sharing=>social effects afterthought
-"Me-first" utility
-Reverses old order of sharing
Congregate->Share
Tagging systems:Share->Congregate

Sharing as a platform invisibly changing media...

2.Conversation
*Community of practice and Hi-dynamic range photography
Media Sharing=>Platform=>Group gets better TOGETHER

~"Sharing + Conversation leaves residue of instruction"~
*Bronze Beta & Buffy the Vampire Slayer=>features as distractions

3.Collaboration
*Anime and Market failure

4.Collective Action
-Rarest pattern...FUTURE
*Airlines & Planes stuck on Tarmac
-Flier Bill of Rights & Kate Hanni

~"Thinking is for Doing"~
-William James
~PUBLISHING IS FOR ACTING~
=>One click away...change

Re: Lesson Plan 1

I would like to say that the mindmap on my lesson plan IS NOT MINE. I don't want to get hit with the plagiarism thing so I am clarifying I DID NOT CREATE THE CONCEPT MAP THAT IS FEATURED ON MY LESSON PLAN. I believe what happened, in the midst of my technological difficulties my concept map ended up not getting saved and I copied the incorrect url. Either way, I do not have an appropriate concept map.

But if I did, I would like to utilize the mindmeister format in that it allows the group to edit the concept map. So the way I see it, I might start a thread but have the students for homework each add a strand. The topic would be on the assignment, which assesses both how the student performs as an individual writer and how he/she performs in the context of the group (collaborating via Twitter, facebook etc...).

Lesson Plan

So I'm posting this at the last minute because last night my Internet crashed and I had to re-do a large part of my lesson plan. Luckily I managed to copy and paste the contents of my lesson plan into a Word document before my computer shut down. Anyhoo, I enjoyed doing the lesson plan. The Google spreadsheet is a very efficient format for a project like this. Additionally, I'd like to note that I did not follow the directions for the RSS lab. See I have a personal feed reader with Yahoo that I keep up with regularly so instead of following the Google Reader (which I am now subscribed to) I used Yahoo so I will report on my experiences with that.

Yahoo is a lot different from Google. It allows you to personalize your page and trick it out with backgrounds and pictures and music. I love NPR so I follow them and several of their feeds. Also, as a journalist, it is my business to keep up with the news. I like the Google reader format better because I feel like it's less cluttered and no-nonsense. With such varied interests, I find news feeds very useful. They allow you to get a taste of all the different types of news and choose which ones to explore more in-depth.

Because I am posting this at the last minute and it is now time to go to class, I will say that this week's assignments were very useful and I know that I can and will use them throughout my teaching career.

I'd like to add that I kind of stole some of Prof. Sessums' teaching techniques in formulating my lesson plan. The utilization of blogs, journals and twitter in instruction I modeled after the techniques in this course. Not because I'm unoriginal or trying to copy, but because I plan to use them in my own classroom. The tools are very relevant and students respond to things that are relevant to them personally.

Have mercy Prof. Sessums for my last-minuteness please!

Ciao

On Week 3 Readings

The professor did a good job of picking readings that were all related. Taken as a whole they provided a cohesive and thorough analysis of Active/Collective learning vs. the traditional classroom.

Reading 1: Active Learning
This reading provided an easy-to-understand summary of what active learning is and how to put it into practice. The reading incorporates different perspectives, tying them together to present an accurate, balanced analysis of active learning, how to implement it and its elements.

By giving a list of in-class active learning techniques, the reader is able to visualize what the active learning classroom looks like (making the concept of active learning real to the reader instead of a far fetched ideal).

Reading 2: What is the Collaborative Classroom?
I thought this reading was uneccessarily long. Although it started off focused, the background at the end on research methods and beyond worked to dilute the main message.

"New learning and thinking curricula require collaboration"

I think this goes to the heart of what the article was trying to get across. The collaborative classroom is the product of student and teacher efforts to keep the learning process engaging and meaningful for all involved.

Even though it was long, it was thorough and gave examples for how teachers and students should approach transitioning from a traditional classroom to one that's collaborative and meaningful.

Reading 3: Strategies for Engaging Students
I liked that this reading was specific, focused and succinct. After giving the suggestions, it gave examples of how these things can be implemented in the classroom. "Make Content and Assignments relevant to the students' lives," "Provide Students with a choice and a sense of control," "Encourage Self-Reflection on Learning," these are objectives that are easy for educators and policy makers to agree upon, nor are they difficult to do.

Reading 4: Problem-Based Learning
The shortest of the readings, I like how the article spoke to the student instead of the teacher. The use of this tone gave the article more meaning and made its suggestions more tangible for the reader.

The article made learning seem kind of scientific in that it provided a sort of formula, a scientific method of sorts, for the learning process.

Course Expectations

Even though this post is late I'm going to respond anyway so as not to fall behind...

1. I expect to learn a lot from this course. I know that's vague and pretty meaningless but the professor's passion for the subject matter coupled with my eagerness to become increasingly tech savvy and proficient with computers make me very excited about taking the course. I expect to discover new techniques that will help me become a better teacher. I expect the professor to make the course interesting and engaging, to encourage response and feedback as often as possible and to hold my and my peers' attention on a weekly basis. I expect him to hold us (the class) accountable for the information presented.
2. I expect my classmates to participate actively in classroom discussions and activities, to recognize their responsibility in maintaining an engaging and interesting class and interaction with all members of the class
3. I expect the instructor to maintain a realistic awareness of his part of the responsibility of ensuring that all members of the class are engaged and participate in the learning process. I expect him to keep the atmosphere fun and informal (non-traditional) by encouraging participation. I expect him to be understanding. I expect him to recognize each student individually, for his/her contributions, abilities etc...
4. None right now.

Mouse Cloud Black Cow

Written July 17, 2008 11:26p.m.

Mouse Cloud Black Cow (Unedited)

You never really notice the clouds at night. They’re just something else to take for granted like street lights or the sound of crickets. Well actually clouds aren’t like those things because with the latter objects you notice them when they’re not there, but how often have you looked up at the night sky, when you weren’t taking it for granted or doing something cliché like admiring the constellations, and noticed the seemingly cloudless night sky? Well I noticed the clouds tonight, only briefly, but nevertheless they were noticed. I think it’s because they (at least the particular cloud I noticed) retained the fluffiness that usually characterizes them during the day but somehow seems to dissipate when the sun goes down. This cloud seemed unusually bright too. I don’t want to say it was white, grey would be more appropriate, with the ebony opaqueness of the sky mixing and mingling with the ivory of the cloud to form this pewterish color. It reminds of the color of a mouse, so that’s what I’ll call it. Me and my mouse cloud, the unfairly pleasant night breeze—not too much humidity—and Steely Dan’s “Black Cow”.

I’m sitting at Alfred’s house, alone in his plain room. White walls, flat carpet, a shoe here or there. Things I’m choosing to notice right now. The list of important black people, people he should know (or at least that I think he should know) still on his mini dry-erase whiteboard where I put them last week. Lena Horne, Sidney Poitier, Harry Belafonte and “People you should know” with the “should” in big fat obnoxious dry-erase letters, still not erased. He probably still doesn’t know who they are.

Today was pretty nondescript. Even the class discussion in Magazine Production was uncharacteristically bland. I actually found myself getting quite bothered. We were continuing a discussion we’d previously started on writing. What makes a good writer? What are the top five things, traits you have to have in order to be a good writer? We filled up sixty minutes tip toeing around the responses to the last two traits. The “I’ll tell you if you don’t get them by the time class is over” game, the “Can you just tell us the last two…tell us what you’re looking for” game. And how disappointed I was! “Active voice” and “Be specific”. How lame. I feel like we could’ve used our time a lot more wisely.

“There is exactly one word for everything you’re trying to say” Prof Bo said. This was the greatest thing I learned today. And how true indeed. I have become sincerely enamored with words. Words as they are, as individual units, pieces of a quilt, or mosaic, or any truly great and beautiful compilation. Are words and vocabulary the same? Prof. Bo, the editor, chooses to use the analogy as words (or vocabulary) being the ingredients to a meal. But aren’t the best dishes composed of the best ingredients? That’s for another time.

I have a history test in the morning, and I should probably be going over some notes or something right now. But I’ll blow the few facts I do know up, inflate them so, sprinkle them with some exciting words or vocabulary and the Professor will scarf it down. It may not be gourmet but it will be palatable. I’m sure it will be tastier than many of the other essays she will receive, and while I do not make a habit of being so mediocre, I’m really damn tired. Which reminds me, I didn’t buy a Blue Book.

There is a bus driver that I’m starting to hate. You see hate for a total stranger has to be cultivated, like a bacteria culture in a Petri dish, or mold. Hate requires a strong emotional attachment, and that is something I do not have for this bus driver with him being a total stranger and all. I feel more disgust or pity, definitely genuine disgust. He makes it his business to give people an extra hard time about showing him their passes. “Make sure I can see the picture or I can’t let you on the bus”-- I just want to kick him in his big stupid face when he does this. Surely he takes his job too seriously; I just know they don’t pay him extra to be an asshole. But then I think to myself (this is where the pity can creep in) he is just a bus driver. That is who he is and who he must remain. Nothing more, nothing less. Sometimes I’ll try to entertain thoughts of him being a dad or a good spades player or maybe a choir singer, but I must stop myself. Because once he is no longer just a bus driver the disgust, feigned hatred, will erode— the drama will be lost. You can’t hate a guy who sings in the choir on Sunday’s and keep his friends entertained by given ‘em a good run at spades during Sunday dinner, who buys his kids candy from the corner store with extra change, and just so happens to have a crap job in the eyes of our status-hungry society; but just a bus driver—how sickening. Even as I write this I see his dumb face, hear his irritated, irritating voice, see his sagging pants, and am disgusted.

He makes it his business to keep his bus uncomfortably cold. Today was a mostly cloudy day, not unbearably sunny or even hot by comparison to most days. There is no reason why he had to keep it so cold. And, like whenever I board his bus, I see myself already home. I ride with a goal in mind, escape from the frigid interiors of the bus. I envision myself passing by the chemistry building, going past the strip on University, passing the unnecessary welcome center and track. I see myself having already passed the law school, already having overcome the longest part of the journey, the trip down 34^th street, already stopping at the light on the SW 35^th and pulling the cable which says to the driver “Let me the hell off” (it doesn’t really say this it says “stop requested” but I’m saying it when I pull it, especially on his bus). This mental going ahead makes the journey more tolerable. But today it was interrupted. As we made the turn at SW 35^th the bus driver pulled over to the side of the road and got off the bus. He then crossed the street (the gas station is on the other side of the street) and took a break. “What the f*** is this guy doing,” some guy asked me, “I have no idea,” I stated not trying to hide my irritation. As me and the guy, and some random chick with a double chin and hair bleached blonde (it reminded me of cotton candy) sat on that frigid bus I though about sarcastic remarks I could make upon his return “I wish you had told me we were taking a break, I could’ve went and picked up some donuts…”. He materialized about six minutes later with an orange pop of some sort in his hand; pants in their signature sag “Come on fat ass,” the guy in back of me said. When he got back on the bus and I noticed his stupid face, I couldn’t muster up the intestinal fortitude to say any of the things I’d thought about saying. His face looked so innocently dumb, so sincerely ignorant, and I decided to let it slide. I always threaten to report him to RTS, mentally that is. I just haven’t gotten around to it yet.