The World Has Gone Hybrid

If all hybrid cars were this sweet,
I’d own two

I’m coming toward the end of my time here at San Francisco State University, and one thing that’s been on my mind since last week isn’t where am I going to apply for work or do I need a tweed sport coat now since I’m going to be an English instructor?  Instead, I’m debating on whether or not I should fork out additional $2.50 on a new highlighter with so little time left as a grad student.  Digitally, I can highlight a PDF file all night long, but since all my readings aren’t available digitally, I’ll probably have to suck it up and buy (or steal) a highlighter to get by until December 13^th (my last day, hopefully, wink, wink to you Kory, the greatest instructor of all time).  I actually find myself beginning to finally embrace the whole digital literacy world…and perhaps even preferring it.

While diligently reading this weeks texts, as I have since day one of the M.A. Program, I couldn’t help but take a liking to the section about hybrid classes from Warnock’s Teaching Writing Online: How & Why.  I think that since my time here in the program, and for sake of ENG 708, I’ve definitely changed my views in terms of digital literacy and how we cannot just utilize it but take full advantage of it in our composition classrooms.  From being skeptical in my first blog and second blog of this semester, I can honestly admit that I’ve finally come to realize how digital technology can enhance a classroom and broaden our students in this new age, as opposed to frighten them and cause them to resist this new age of digital reform, which were how I generally viewed such practices.

Now don’t get me wrong, I’m still proud to admit I’m a member of the old

My hybrid dog, Alabama
One part yorkie, one part poodle
She keeps me warm and safe

school.  I hand write checks, I buy CDs and I even call my friends when I want to see how they’re doing.  I know though that not everyone can be as groovy as me, especially these youngsters.  So that’s where the idea of the hybrid class comes into play.  I think the hybrid class is a way for someone such as myself to reach students on a classical level, one in which I’ve been a part of my whole life with the teacher in the front, and a class full of students at desks.  But it’s safe to say, that students, and more importantly, people are moving towards, if they haven’t already, into a field dominated by computers, smart phones, email and all other various forms of technology.  In a sense, we’ve taken the basic skills technology class, and mixed it with the composition class.  I feel it’s only fair to combine the two, especially in the age in which we find ourselves today and where we see ourselves in the future.  I’m curious if perhaps, the hybrid class will eventually drop the word hybrid and simply just be called English Class?  I feel that where we are going technologically speaking, it may be difficult to avoid the inevitable.  Perhaps if not in the next five to ten years, then perhaps at least in, say, 20 or so years from now.

Farewell my good friend

I’m glad I’ve finally come around and have convinced myself that digital literacy is not just some form of technology out there for some of us.  In fact it’s a tool which is available for all of us, especially as English instructors.  If a groovy, old school dude such as myself can be convinced, then I’m sure the rest of this crazy college place can as well.  Besides, imagine all the money we’ll be saving on highlighters!

The Digital Literacy Train…Departed Two Minutes Ago

I used to get the feeling, and I hope I’m not alone here when I say that all this: technology, digital literacy, blogging, wikis, podcasts, iLearn, instant messaging, I could go on forever…was almost causing me to have some sort of an extreme sensory overload.  One in which my brain felt like mush and I got this overwhe

Hop onboard the digital train my groovy friends

lming anxiety that I had arrived at the train station in the middle of no where Czechoslovakia about two minutes too late because I overslept from drinking too much the night before and no one spoke my language and people were looking at me thinking, “he’s shit out of luck” and there I was lost in a country that I had no clue how I got myself into in the first place and if I didn’t act fast I was going to miss the next train if there even was one…I guess I have better stop there.  But that was sometimes the feeling I’d get when I thought about how rapid this world has changed into the digital literacy only party of creation and expression, and there I was, on the edge of it all, still trying to figure out to what I was going to wear and unsure if they’d even let me in.

If anyone got the opportunity to read my techno-literacy narrative, then they might understand my initial apprehension to this new groove.  But after examining this weeks reading and past readings, I’ve come to realize that this new fangled technology is something that I’ve actually partaken in and is more welcoming than I anticipated.  It isn’t the exclusive club where shirts and shoes are mandatory, but we still hope everyone will at least cover up.

Arrrrrr…where’s me mom with me PB&J?!?!

Larry Lessig of the TED Talk: Laws That Choke Creativity brought out an amazing point about what he refers to has ‘our kids.’  They’re the creative ones that we have labeled as ‘pirates’ due to the fact that they’re using copy written images and songs and in a sense, tweaking them into their own creative designs which some criminal, very mafia.  But in actuality, they’re simply, as Lessig explains: re-creating, and in fact not stealing.  The videos he’s showed and the various other videos we’ve all seen, or music we’ve listened to or images which have appeared via the internet are examples of our kids and how Lessig says: how they speak, how they think and how they are.

Kurt Vonnegut, a satirical science fiction author I feel would appreciate this new form of digital literacy always use to say, and so it goes.  So here we go, ‘we’ being instructors, ‘go’ as in going on this trek though something which Will Richardson, author of Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, explains in chapter 1, that today’s students, of almost any age, are far ahead of their teachers in computer literacy.  They prefer to access subject information on the Internet, where it is more abundant, more accessible, and more up-to-date. (6) I’ve been struggling in English 710 to find the perfect textbook for my students, but I’m just wondering if after a few months, and according to Richardson’s theory that students want information that’s more up-to-date, how up to date is my textbook really going to be compared to the free info we can find on the web?  Now I know the composition classroom will need those textbooks, and us instructors need them just as well.  But it’s fair to say that our best, most useful and our student’s favorite textbook is in fact their computer and the Internet.

I also feel that it’s unfair for us to limit our students and the hard effort they put into their essays and ideas strictly to their classroom and their one and only reader: me.  Elizabeth Clark, author of The Digital Imperative: Making the Case for a 21st-Century Pedagogy points out the fact that we should encourage our students to keep up to date with ePortfolios.  Having their ePortfolios on the web, students are able to easily communicate with each other, receive feedback faster and are able to share with others, not just to classmates: This sense of network-situated self allows students to see how they function within different communities. Students connect across courses, across a college, and across the world. (29)  I really got into Clarks paper for the sake that it’s the most technologically advanced paper I’ve come across through my two years here in the M.A. Comp program.  It had this ‘bloggy’ feel to it due to all the various links we come across while reading her essay.  I’m curious if perhaps this is the future of papers to come?  Rather than just getting a tiny blip or a some quote scattered here and there throughout a paper, instead we might be getting links to the entire articles instead.  Fun to think about!

Unfortunately for me, I was extremely slow when it came to my own discovery of digital literacy.  I feel now I am far behind many people in my field and I’m definitely behind students and where they are now, compared to where I was as an undergrad.  The digital world is changing and before hand, when I felt like I missed the train in Czechoslovakia, I now feel as though I’m on board here in the good ol’ U.S. of A.  Even though it might be filled with hairy knuckled geeks and pimply pip-squeaks, it still feels nice knowing that I’m on the train and we’re all heading to a better place.

Technology, Identity & Nintendo-Legs

I can recall a couple of years ago, an old lady friend and I were out having some lunch.  It was my first day off in a few weeks, and I just wanted to spend the day relaxing and didn’t want to exert myself too much.  But like my old man always says, “if it wasn’t for bad luck, I’d have no luck at all.”  This lady

Your texting skills are no match for Cell Phone Girl!!

friend of mine dropped her phone, splitting it in half.  It was obviously broken, and my day of taking a breather, I knew, would turn into a day of desperation and working against the clock.  Oh the calls, texts, emails, facebook updates she’d miss!  How would she survive!?  I on the other hand would be thrilled to be cut off from the world…but not her!

I feel technology has become such an intricate part of our lives, that for some, actually it seems that for many if not most, technology and digital literacy is more than just a simple way to communicate.  It’s shaped us and our identities into who we are and how people socially perceive us.  Do we define technology, or does technology define us?

British Sociologist Lord Anthony Giddens, who’s written more books then some people read in a lifetime, has done extensive research in regards to the relationship between social identity and technology.  Modern individuals have to be constantly “self-reflexive,” making decisions about what they should do and who they should be. The self becomes a kind of “project” that individuals have to work on: they have to create biographical “narratives” that will explain themselves to themselves, and hence sustain a coherent and consistent identity (9).

It seems that technology is doing more than just making the world and information more convenient.  It’s also defining and creating peoples identities.  Myself for example, am one that really only uses technology when I need to and when it’s convenient for me.  When I have to write a paper, write an email, look up the score of a game, when my two weeks are up and I have to call my parents, etc.  I’m one of the few people that I know of who doesn’t have facebook, I’m slow to respond to texts (by choice) and don’t really use technology to shape my identity, and because of this and various reasons I tend to avoid technology, I’ve become somewhat of a recluse in the eyes of many.  What ever happened to just picking up the phone and giving me a call the old fashioned way?  It makes me wonder what people did before cell phones and the Internet.  Were there people as stark crazy about staying in constant contact with others 24 hours a day back then like now?  If so, did they use to sit at home by the phone, and wait for someone, anyone to call?  Did they constantly check their mailbox, a dozen times a day to see if anyone wrote them a letter?  Or, was society way back when, not as caught up with maintaining today’s theme of being an active member of a communicative society?  What were people’s identities like before the technology boom which seemed to occur over the past 20 years?  Were people judged by how many real life friends they had as opposed to today when some judge others by how many facebook friends they have?

Also, has technology made our world any better?  Some say yes, and I’d have to agree to a certain extent.  We are now at an age of the “net-generation.”  One, which utilizes the computer and the world-wide-web for their instant source of news and commerce. “N-Geners” are “hungry for ex- pression, discovery, and their own self-development”: they are savvy, self-reliant, analytical, articulate, creative, inquisitive, accepting of diversity, and socially conscious (13, Buckingham).

We are able to get various accounts of news from all over the globe at the click of a button, so to say.  It has, made the world a lot smaller and has created a more open-minded society.  A medium for social awakening,” which is producing a generation that is more tolerant, more globally oriented, more inclined to exercise social and civic responsibility, and to respect the environment (14, Buckingham). And according to Brant and Myers, the emergence of technology has allowed us to get away from the global superpowers and has given the smaller countries a voice in the world (664, Hawisher).

Nintendo-Leg’s Fearless Companion!

But at the same time, it is worrisome.  Is technology making us lazy?  I recall when growing up, my best friends little brother was a lot more in tune to technology than we were, but we didn’t say that, we called him lazy.  He’d spend hours upon hours playing video games and surfing the net.  We use to joke that he had “Nintendo-Legs,” a wretched disease which causes one’s legs to be extremely thin and brittle due to long hours of sitting on one’s keester and playing too much Super Nintendo.  Now though, Mr. Nintendo-Legs has a job where his technology skills as a kid have made him into an adult with savvy computer skills.  He just bought a fancy car and his older brother rides a bicycle to work (and not because he’s thinking green).

Technology has radically shaped our lives and our society.  I feel it’s created more people such as myself to become more reclusive, but I really don’t mind.  In the past, I might have consulted my friends and family in regards to deciding where to possibly go on a weekend get-away.  Now, I just Google where to go, “best weekend get-aways near me.”  I’ve become more independent as have many others thanks to technology.  Is all this a good thing?  I’d say it’s still up for debate in my mind.  I’m not sure people really are as social as they once were, at least not in face-to-face interactions.  Why go to out and spend my whole night finding the right girl to buy a drink for when I can just parooze Match.com, or hell, even craigslist!  All technology and literacy’s have life spans, it’s just a matter of time before we’re on to the next, so I guess we had better prepare for the worse…er, I mean best!