Sister Wives

John Golden’s Reading in the Reel World defiantly appealed to me. In fact, I was reading the first chapter while waiting for my dinner at a local restaurant. The first paragraph describes me to a T. I don’t think of myself as nosey, just interested. I could spend hours just observing people and being able to hear their conversations, makes it even better. I do agree that this is probably why I love documentaries and now, reality TV. I do not miss an episode of Sister Wives and would be perfectly happy to have them as my neighbors. 

Of course it is a given that there is educational value in most documentaries, but this book reveals where some films are “created” instead of just happening. Like everyone else, I was totally taken in by Super Size Me, but I didn’t think about the fact that he only focuses on the overweight people. Those folks may or may not have frequented McDonald's on that day, or any other day, yet they are focused on as an example of a McDonald’s customer. Speaking of McDonald’s, watch the film Hot Coffee, eye-opening.

glog

http://craigm100190.edu.glogster.com/mediainclassroom/

"Crap Detectors"

"What's needed for being a good writer?"According to Ernest Hemingway, "crap detecting skills" (Hobbs 35). 

Howard Rheingold, the author of Net Smart: How to Thrive Online, has actually broken this idea down into a teaching model: C.R.A.P.

C- currency
R- reliability
A- authority
P- purpose/point of view

This provides us and our students with a useful way to break information down and to weed out the crap. Specifics can be found on the link below.

http://mrsmotivator.com/2012/04/22/c-r-a-p-detecting-the-essential-online-skill/

Distinguishing Useful Talk from Bullshit

He said, "As I see it, the best things schools can do for kids is to help them learn how to distinguish useful talk from bullshit....Every day in almost every way people are exposed to more bullshit than it is healthy for them to endure." (p35)  - Neil Postman 1969 National Council of Teachers of English. 

I found this quote to be a great summary of what we are learning in this class.  Some might interpret that Postman was focused on the classics, however, he was "...instead sharpening focus on the practice of critical thinking, the practice of questioning assumptions." (p35)  His goals are even more relevant today in the digital world we live in today.  Students today are often "plugged in" everywhere but in the classrooms.  Like the gentleman some of us heard at a school docs session, the argument for reading books is often part of the digital debate.  However, how many of us own tablets or kindle's that we use to read?  Regardless of the argument some want to make, the digital world is the reality of our students and clever ways to incorporate them in the classroom can only provide an eduation our students will not get on their own.  Like Postman said, and Hobbs demonstrated in chapter 2, we need to teach our students how to make educated decisions in the digital world and to use it to their advantage.  The use of reality shows came as a surprise to me, especially with some of the risky topics that are often the focus.  We often forget the risky topics that are discussed even in "classic" literature. 

A Few Resources for Teachers

Hi everyone.

During my time as an undergrad at Penn State, I interned at the Media Commons, which is a university-wide organization committed to enriching “the teaching and learning experience through multimedia technology, classroom training and direct support for students, faculty, and staff.” I became affiliated with the Media Commons before I even became interested in the education field, but its forward thinking approach and commitment to helping students achieve academic success in non-conventional ways truly opened my eyes to the advantages of utilizing media-related projects in traditional courses.

I posted two links below that might serve as helpful resources for you:

http://mediacommons.psu.edu/

http://symposium.tlt.psu.edu/conference/video_archive#2009

The first link is for the Media Commons’ website, which has a ton of great resources for educators. Although people who are not affiliated with Penn State cannot sign up for workshops and consultant support, everybody can access hundreds of software tutorials and an entire library of free, copyright material. I also think there’s some examples of student work available for viewing.

The second link is for the video archive of the keynote speakers from the Teaching and Learning with Technology (TLT) Symposium. This is a conference devoted entirely on using technology to enhance teaching, learning, and research (for those of you who went to the School Docs in D.C., the TLT Symposium’s similar to that but on steroids). If anyone is interested in using social media in the classroom, I would suggest watching Danah Boyd’s keynote from 2009. Boyd has devoted her research to studying how young people use social media as part of their everyday lives, and she brings up some interesting issues that all teachers should think about.

I hope these resources can help all of you in your pursuits to effectively implement media into your classrooms.

- Robert

Pregnant Girls versus the Salm Witch Trials

I can’t help but believe today’s students are receiving a far better education then I did. I never read anything with substance in high school, except for Romeo and Juliet and it is still one of my favorite plays. In fact, I have on DVD, the 1966 version and I love every spoken word. I have personally never read the Crucible, but I plan to. I am impressed with Sam Fisher using a reality show that is well known to teens to kick up some interest in the themes presented in the play. I am happy to read ideas like this because my thinking is not always so creative, yet I am willing to try a strategy that would engage students (when I get some of my own).  I believe most instructors look at the theme of the Salem witch trials rather then the angst in which the main character is experiencing. Hobbs’s notes, “Like The Crucible, it [sic 16 and Pregnant] featured a teen girl getting a lot of negative attention from family and friends for her behavior.” This certainly opens the door to facilitate an interesting discussion. My question is how do you limit the discussion so it doesn’t eat up too much instruction time? 

Lynn

Facebook: "Every Man is an Island"

John Donne gave voice to the idea that mankind doesn't thrive in isolation when he coined the phrase "No man is an island, entire of himself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main."  It would seem that social networking and social media serve to connect us and to bind us together more completely, but a recent article, "Is Facebook Making Us Lonely", in Atlantic Magazine argues the opposite.

Here is an excerpt:

"Our omnipresent new technologies lure us toward increasingly superficial connections at exactly the same moment that they make avoiding the mess of human interaction easy. The beauty of Facebook, the source of its power, is that it enables us to be social while sparing us the embarrassing reality of society—the accidental revelations we make at parties, the awkward pauses, the farting and the spilled drinks and the general gaucherie of face-to-face contact. Instead, we have the lovely smoothness of a seemingly social machine. Everything’s so simple: status updates, pictures, your wall."

I can see both sides of the issue, but I am more concerned about the implications this has for our students.  Are they experiencing more loneliness than previous generations? Are they learning to hide behind a screen instead of interacting with reality? From my experience, many of my students wait to ask questions via email--especially when it is about something as potentially awkward as a question about a grade.  My classroom atmosphere is generally one that students feel comfortable in.  I work hard to make it a community where students and their ideas/questions are welcomed.  Despite that, many still prefer to interact via email or my website.  Is this another type of "literacy" that we need to be discussing with our kids? Should be be talking about social media and the benefits/drawbacks to finding your voice behind a screen?

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/05/is-facebook-making-us-lonely/8930/#