Computers & Writing meets #CW09

For NWPers (and others) who could not attend the 2009 Computers and Writing at UC-Davis, a fairly full archive of audio and video from the sessions is available at iTunes U in the UC-Davis channel. This archive allows you to dip into the rich content of many of the sessions — and since so many sessions followed the relatively common ‘paper presentation’ format common to higher education focused conferences, the recordings give a fairly faithful representation of the official content of the program.

But 2009 might also be the year when a critical mass of attendees experienced the cross-walk of the f2f experience of the conference and the twitterfied experience of the conference at CW09. Several of the blog postings pick up this theme. So in honor of the somewhat addictive nature of twitter and the impact of twitter (or of the addiction, not sure which), it seemed appropriate to bring in a recent posting from Kevin Hodgson, one of the editors of Teaching the New Writing, about twitter. Kevin, who blogs as dogtrax at Kevin’s Meandering Mind, was motivated to serenade our twittering digital companion in song. Follow the link below to listen.

Twitter This by Kevin Hodgson

Lyrics
I get up in the morning and I twitter all my dreams
140 characters is just enough for me
Then, each moment of the day becomes a Twitter storm
until the world is at my doorstep and everyone belongs
to

This Twitter space
inside this Twitter place
I’ve got a little bit of smile
on my Twitter face
Take me as a friend
or leave me out cold
I’m gonna keep on Twittering
until the platform gets old

I’m reading all my friends — the ones I haven’t met
from all across the globe, it’s a safety net
We’re putting pressure on Iran — let the China wall fall
let the information flow so we can all crawl to

This Twitter space
inside this Twitter place
I’ve got a little bit of smile
on my Twitter face
Take me as a friend
or leave me out cold
I’m gonna keep on Twittering
until the platform gets old

 

Computers and Writing 2009

Computers and Writing is always a fabulous conference but this year was especially wonderful. The beauty of UC Davis certainly played a part in that.

I so much appreciate how welcoming and encouraging attendees are. Whether one is a graduate student, like me, or a first-time attendee, or a seasoned pro, there are always opportunities for dialogue, for engagement, and for support.

At the start of the conference, Joyce Walker, who is moving to ISU, identified newcomers to the conference and encouraged attendees to do their best to support new attendees by attending at least one newcomer session. It is this type of sensitivity that makes this conference so very good.

At a Town Hall meeting, Jeff Grabill told us that he has been has been thinking a lot about sustainability. He talked about the need to have shared concerns and asked a number of questions: What is really at stake? What do digital processes look like? What is the value of the technological investment? What is precisely digital rhetoric? These are big questions that we should be thinking about. Grabill noted how we talk a great deal about applications but less so about platform structures and contends that we need to think more about platforms, particularly as they relate to sustainability.

I can understand Grabill’s concern. The lure of new technologies is great. So: to get it out of my system, I’ll list below some of the new applications and practices that really inspired me, while agreeing that we do need to continue to think about platforms:

1. Twitter
Many were twittering while people were presenting. Overall, this was quite fun. I am still learning twitter etiquette though. One thing I’ve been thinking about: twitter critiques don’t twitter away and need to be made with the same diplomacy that we use in ftf conversations. A new technology you might want to try is TweetDeck—http://tweetdeck.com/beta/. It can help you keep track of your tweets and your facebook postings too.

2. Barbara Ganley reminded us of the importance of playing with new technologies. She got me interested in Prezi — http://prezi.com/ — “the zooming editor for stunning presentations. All online. She told me that she had just begun using it. You’d never know this from looking at her prezi presentation — http://prezi.com/108186/ — “Ecotones and Crossroads: Reimagining the Spaces of Learning in an In-between Time” I really like the fact that she made her presentation available online. It gives us all a chance to think about some of ideas.

3. Madeline Sorapure also introduced me to some new tools. Her excellent presentation, “Playing with Data,” introduced me to a number of ways that students can visualize data. They can study their iTunes music habits and present them visually as well as study more global and social issues.

Her are some links (many more are included on Sorapure’s presentation.

• Microcosm — http://mycro.media.mit.edu/ —Microcosm allows you to share snippets of the minutiae of daily.

• Bedpost — http://www.bedposted.com/ —can give you some insight into your sex life. Not sure how useful this one would be in the classroom

4. For those of you who would like to hear some of the sessions, you can do so at
the iTunes U archive of C&W sessions: http://deimos3.apple.com/WebObjects/Core.woa/Browse/ucdavis-public.2193375483.02193375496

 

Seeking a K-16 vision

Today at Computers and Writing 2009, many of us were reaching, in our different ways, for a truly K-16 vision for digital writing and technology. Many spoke to the need. Colleagues from higher education expressed how variable and diverse were the experiences and skills with new media of their incoming freshmen. They continue to see evidence of inequitable distribution of learning experiences and basic access. Yet their institutions were investing heavily in tech-focused environments that required these skills from the get-go. Not all of what was being invested in had student ‘production’ at the center, though, and one could see how significant investments in course management systems could be as limiting to teachers seeking to make a student-centered class as too little investment.

K-12 teaches, fewer in number at the conference, described the crazy quilt of ed tech access, attitudes, and administrative resistance that characterized their efforts to educate themselves and their colleagues about new media and to put it to work for important learning. Yet, when it all did come together for them, we could see that the learning experiences for students were powerful, creative, and collaborative. In some cases being able to get in the game a little later and leap-frog over some web 1.0 ecologies directly into 2.0 ecologies served them well.

In some ways these two worlds feel far apart. K-12 teachers face issues that don’t affect teachers in higher education: internet filters and blocks, COPA regulations, high stakes assessment and mandated curricula. Higher education teachers face complex issues of design for situations where they don’t see students everyday — or even at all. Yet across these worlds, most people at this conference express the commitment to students and strong interest in practice that tends to characterize the community of teachers of writing. And in that way, a K-16 vision seems a possible vision to achieve.

 

Session B2: NWPers ponder and problematize technology and pedagogy in GA schools

Always exciting to listen and discuss with fellow NWP folks! I have lots of interesting thoughts swirling because of this post, so I’ll share some here…

“I don’t want to lose credibility in front of my students.” ~Worry from K-12 teacher about abundance of technology available in her school, but fear about not knowing how to use it.

What presence do we have as NWPs, TCs, etc? What messages are we conveying about technology? How do we sustain the momentum, new meanings, tools we gain in SI as we move off into our individual schools and are back “on our own”?

Other things I’m wondering as we ponder what is implemented in the schools is what does it mean to enter these spaces? Either “school” entering spaces of “play” or vice versa. These two seemingly seperate worlds come together and then what? What happens? What are we “saying” when we do school on Facebook or ask students to get out their cellphones in class? Lots of questions more than answers.

Thanks for the great session Georgia Southern NWP!