Weebly
Weebly was the first technology that the class was introduced to (alongside Twitter) and while the theory behind it was not difficult for me to grasp, as I was already on Tumblr, a similar blogging site, the class-relevance and frequency with which it had to be used caused me probably the most difficulty throughout the duration of the semester. Numerous times I would find myself trying to discern a theme for the Twitterive or work on the Collaborative Research Project, or any number of other assignments for other classes, only to remember at the las minute that I had to check the assignment page for the course, read an article or two, and respond to them. There was a certain intangibility to the basic coursework that made it inherently forgettable and unless one was to go on Weebly every day to blog about this or that, they might forget completely that the site was there at all.
This was also combined with a sense of isolation with the site. It felt like the blog might as well have been a series of typed responses that in other environments we might print out and turn in for a physical grade. There wasn't a sense of community, there wasn't a feeling of togetherness within the class, and many times students probably forgot that their peers had blogs that could be consulted and cited when necessary. A shift in attitude then was only inevitable, as throughout the semester the assignments that were to be posted to Weebly dwindled and interest in the site itself soon followed in a similar fashion. It's not a problem with the site as much as it was my disinterest in using it. It felt like a stepping stone. A lot of the time I would find myself wondering what the assignments had to do with larger, more work intensive and grade-relevant projects, and I would put Weebly on the back burner as I progressed with those. It was a basic tool for publishing that went largely unnoticed in terms of relevance to the coursework.
With that said, I think I reconciled with these problems fairly well, as it appears the rest of the class was also able to do. I was, for the most part, able to successfully post blog responses on time and I think I gave about as good of a response as I might have given in print or otherwise. All in all, I think there needed to be more direct accountability with Weebly to keep students, myself included, on top of assignments.
This was also combined with a sense of isolation with the site. It felt like the blog might as well have been a series of typed responses that in other environments we might print out and turn in for a physical grade. There wasn't a sense of community, there wasn't a feeling of togetherness within the class, and many times students probably forgot that their peers had blogs that could be consulted and cited when necessary. A shift in attitude then was only inevitable, as throughout the semester the assignments that were to be posted to Weebly dwindled and interest in the site itself soon followed in a similar fashion. It's not a problem with the site as much as it was my disinterest in using it. It felt like a stepping stone. A lot of the time I would find myself wondering what the assignments had to do with larger, more work intensive and grade-relevant projects, and I would put Weebly on the back burner as I progressed with those. It was a basic tool for publishing that went largely unnoticed in terms of relevance to the coursework.
With that said, I think I reconciled with these problems fairly well, as it appears the rest of the class was also able to do. I was, for the most part, able to successfully post blog responses on time and I think I gave about as good of a response as I might have given in print or otherwise. All in all, I think there needed to be more direct accountability with Weebly to keep students, myself included, on top of assignments.
Twitterive
While Weebly and Twitter were the most cumbersome technologies we had to use for class, the Twitterive is easily the most distressing assignment we had over the duration of the course. My prior experience with Twitter in Professor Bill Wolff's 'Technology and the Future of Writing' module of Intro to Writing Arts had already left me with a predisposition to hate the micro-blogging tool, and a full-fledged project based on it put a bad taste in my mouth from day one. This hatred of the site and its user base continued into this course and through the duration of the project, I could only Tweet when I was reminded that I had to do so for a grade. This established the ironic theme of my narrative as that of discomfort with technology for a digital native.
Originally, my intention for the Twitterive was that I would tell my own story, across my lifetime, of how I had grown up with technology but then began experiencing discomfort with the prevalence that it now had in everyday life. Parallel to this story would be one of mankind as a whole, which I thought I would be able to execute well, but ended up being a fatal flaw with the first draft of the project. I was trying to do too much to really overcompensate for the fact that I didn't have a solid project simply because I couldn't effectively use Twitter. My discomfort with and resistance towards Twitter had limited the potential for the project and so I was left with truly one option. I had to scale down the project and make it solely a personal one, as I suppose it was intended to be, and tell only my own story.
For the final draft of the Twitterive, which will most likely be the last thing I complete for the course, I have decided to tell the story of my time at college and how technology has seemingly influenced the process and my experiences with writing. Having only relented and created a Twitter account for a course, and subsequently reactivating it for another, shows that the course of education itself has seemingly changed, attempting to be adaptable and evolutionary. To me, it still sounds like something of a flimsy thesis, which as far as I'm concerned isn't a result of a lack of effort or academic interest on my part, but rather of the project itself and my own unwillingness to utilize a technology that I see as pointless and self-indulgent when there are other ways to approach and complete such an assignment.
Originally, my intention for the Twitterive was that I would tell my own story, across my lifetime, of how I had grown up with technology but then began experiencing discomfort with the prevalence that it now had in everyday life. Parallel to this story would be one of mankind as a whole, which I thought I would be able to execute well, but ended up being a fatal flaw with the first draft of the project. I was trying to do too much to really overcompensate for the fact that I didn't have a solid project simply because I couldn't effectively use Twitter. My discomfort with and resistance towards Twitter had limited the potential for the project and so I was left with truly one option. I had to scale down the project and make it solely a personal one, as I suppose it was intended to be, and tell only my own story.
For the final draft of the Twitterive, which will most likely be the last thing I complete for the course, I have decided to tell the story of my time at college and how technology has seemingly influenced the process and my experiences with writing. Having only relented and created a Twitter account for a course, and subsequently reactivating it for another, shows that the course of education itself has seemingly changed, attempting to be adaptable and evolutionary. To me, it still sounds like something of a flimsy thesis, which as far as I'm concerned isn't a result of a lack of effort or academic interest on my part, but rather of the project itself and my own unwillingness to utilize a technology that I see as pointless and self-indulgent when there are other ways to approach and complete such an assignment.
Collaborative Research Project
The Collaborative Research Project, then, was probably my favorite phase of the course because while it suggested the use of technology and 21st century innovation, it also was the most free-form assignment, allowing groups to work as they saw fit and come up with an end product that didn't necessarily have to have many remnants of technology in it at all. Our group, for example, wrote a simple research paper after completing two interviews that we had turned into two pieces of creative non-fiction. We communicated largely in person but sometimes through e-mail, and didn't shoot a second of video footage or edit a single clip of sound. The most advanced piece of technology we used was a computer keyboard, which was used to simply transcribe what had been jotted down on paper by a pen.
This freedom in terms of technology allowed us to get the most out of the assignment, which was, at its core, a research based one. As a whole, our group researched, read, quoted, and learned more effectively because the means with which we were allowed to do so were more traditional. Rather than being asked to use technologies we used personally on a professional level, we proceeded as we always had as students. By falling back into this more traditional role, without the academic system trying to force us into progression to make up for its own antiquated style, we successfully completed a project that we could be proud of.
This freedom in terms of technology allowed us to get the most out of the assignment, which was, at its core, a research based one. As a whole, our group researched, read, quoted, and learned more effectively because the means with which we were allowed to do so were more traditional. Rather than being asked to use technologies we used personally on a professional level, we proceeded as we always had as students. By falling back into this more traditional role, without the academic system trying to force us into progression to make up for its own antiquated style, we successfully completed a project that we could be proud of.
Concluding Thoughts (Borrowed from the Twitterive)
I recognize that this course was intended to give us a full understanding of writing, research, and technology, and that all of these things are equally important in becoming a successful writer and communicator in the modern age. I think though, that it fell into one of the many traps that all college courses have begun to fall into in that it stresses too much technology. It puts too great an emphasis on turning the websites and technologies that we digital native students use everyday in our personal lives into academic tools. By doing so, it calls on us to use them in the same ways we would in our daily lives, but this itself is an impossible task because the personal and professional will always need to be separate. Technology will influence our writing and our methods of communication, but it should be allowed to do so in natural and unimpeded ways. Maybe looking at how it effects our thoughts and works retrospectively would be more effective than making it an active and forced participant and catalyst. By pushing it into the scholarly circle, academia is doing the nearly impossible; it is making digital natives feel uncomfortable and unwilling to take part in technology. Because of its own fear of being left behind in a world of technological advancement, schools impose technology on writing and research when really it already has a natural place in them. Students can be made fully aware of this with time and teaching, and can learn to utilize it effectively, but forcing us to do it is the same as forcing us to write and think what we don't want to. It will only be met with resistance and inevitable failure.