Since I first posted project ideas exactly a month ago, I have considered at least a dozen different possibilities. For some reason, I've had a really hard time settling on a direction that I found compelling and doable; or rather, settling on just one. Here's what I think I've decided:
I'd like to explore the pedagogical implications of "digital literacies" in the composition classroom. Most (though not all, and this is a matter for consideration) of our students could be considered "digital natives," born about the time I sent my first email and weaned on computers and the internet. In "Technology Learning and the MySpace Generation," Susan McLester compiled 30 characteristics of "digital natives," including less fear of failure, surface-oriented, thrive with redefined structure, instant gratification, all information is equal, extremely social, need a sense of security that they are defining for and by themselves, nonlinear, less textual/more modalities, and many others. I'm wondering, then, not only how do we (and should we) incorporate digital technologies into the comp. classroom, but how might we best teach writing to and with the strengths (and weaknesses) of digital natives.
I'm still not sure how to represent this in a non-seminar paper format (which I know is an option, but I would rather do something different), but perhaps this is exactly what I'll be trying to figure out as I explore ways to teach writing multi-modally. I'll post more of a "plan" soon.
A few potential sources:
Brandt, Deborah. Literacy in American Lives. Cambridge: Cambridge UP, 2001.
Hawisher, Gail E., and Cynthia L. Selfe. "Becoming Literate in the Information Age: Cultural Ecologies and the Literacies of Technology." CCC 55.4 (2004): 642-692.
McLester, Susan. "Technology Learning and the MySpace Generation." Technology andLearning. 15 March 2007.
Perkel, Dan. "Copy and Paste Literacy: Literacy Practices in the Production of a MySpace Profile." Dan Perkel. Blog.
(P.S. Anne, I know this is a far cry from thirdspace and Second Life. Even though I would have a strong theoretical background for writing about thirdspace and the internet/Second Life, I'm feeling a bit burned out on the subject and would like to focus on something different and something a little more immediately applicable pedagogically. We can talk....)
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3 comments:
NO problem with wanting to move away from third space -- although what you propose (a mighty fine direction) still seems connected. The spaces of digital technologies are certainly not all third spaces, but they do comprise spaces that are not first or second (as Soja defines them)>
But you might want to get away from that all together?
It seems to me you could also easily take this wondering -- "...how do we (and should we) incorporate digital technologies into the comp. classroom, [and] how might we best teach writing to and with the strengths (and weaknesses) of digital natives? -- and connect it up with some of the class readings about gaming, which have talked precisely about learning but not about learning writing. (You would obviously need to define pretty carefully what you believe you are teaching in your comp classes... [insert smiley emoticon here].
Ah, yes...defining what I believe I am teaching in my comp classes. THAT'LL be EASY! Maybe easier than defining exactly what I AM teaching in my comp classes. :-)
You're right: Thirdspace certainly may still fit in here, and perhaps that's what I'm going for—coming at this (whatever this is) from the pedagogical angle rather than the spatial-theory angle and seeing if and where they converge.
I posted before reading "A Pedagogy for Original Synners." Obviously, that will be a good resource for me, as well.
Actually, I was going to ask, "So... how does this all fit into thirdspace. Or Thirdspace. Or Third space. Or tHurDDD SPas?"
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