Digital Frustration

OK. I am officially annoyed.  Today, mid-afternoon, I continued to calmly try to figure out Doceri, the platform I am using for my digital presentation.  I think the right term for what I'm doing here is called doing a screencast.   Still could not figure out how to upload it to You Tube so people can see it.  Decided to switch to a different platform altogether--and did that, moving to WeVideo.  Ok, fine.  Uploaded all of my photos.  Then could not figure out how to do a voice over.  It seems only to do video, and I don't want to do video.  I have all of these writerly artifacts that I've gone to great trouble to photograph and comment on--I want to use those.

So now I have to move from my place of denying frustration to fully embracing it.  I am frustrated!  Dave offered to help me do a video on a program he knows, but I don't want to to that. It's like cheating--I need to be able to figure this out on my own, not have someone "fix" it for me.  So I declined his well-meaning offer, and I am just going to school tomorrow with my "evidence" of two projects, and hope that it does affect my grade too badly.

I will also say this: what a good learning experience for me.  I mean, I assign digital things to my students all the time and then turn them loose to figure it out.  Of course, I am very lenient about how far they may actually get, acknowledging that students digital masteies vary widely.  I know what it feels like to be a student who isn't quite sure how to do something and now isn't going to be quite prepared for class.

And PS:  This is the thanks I get for starting work on this project on FRIDAY!!!! I am a master procrastinator, so I'm especially annoyed that my goody-two-shoedness did not pay off.    

Wed., 7/3 SI: Demos

So glad that Demos are part of SI.  It's great to learn from each other--I got so much out of Jashonai's and Kendra's demos today. I'm thinking that Jashonai's demo about brainstorming memoir topics will work great as a slightly refigured literacy narrative assignment.  I like this idea from her demo about focusing on one idea--one important moment.  I would like to use her ideas and remediate them for literacy narrative work to help students focus on the one idea rather than write their life stories, which are usually pretty much the same and very boring.  I think the students are bored too, when they write them.  So new idea for that!!

Kendra's demo about "good writing" was amazing.  I am so stealing this.  Like Kendra, I want to do this exercise early in the semester to help us open up discussions about writing, about their experiences and expectations, and about my expectations for them as writers in my class.

In other news, feeling a bit under the gun about my digital presentation. I know what I am doing as far as what I'm covering.  I storyboarded my ideas, which are going to center on a lifetime of writing or a lifelong writer.  I want to use this site called Doceri, which is on my iPad.  I am not the greatest digital person so this assignment is a challenge for me.  But I am going to figure it out and do it!!! And then I will be proud!!! 

Tues., 7/2 SI Oral History & Writing Group

Now I know how my students feel when I ask them to videotape themselves for their auto-ethnographies.  I felt inarticulate and unoriginal in my videotaped oral history.  It is also possible I'm being too hard on myself . . . but it was cool to hear what Sarah and Kendra had to say about themselves. Our group talked a lot about how we define "writer" -- we have different ideas about what it means to self-identify as a writer.  I think anyone who writes is a writer--but I do think that our own definitions are somehow compromised by cultural definitions and expectations.  I mean, if you tell someone you are a writer the first question they ask you is what you've had published. How "the world" defines a writer and how those of us who write in various genres, either regularly or occasionally, define a writer are not necessarily the same.

The writing group experience was so good! We have a great group but I feel bad that two of our group members did not have time to share:  Jashonai and Meredith.  We need to be better time managers.  I kind of looked to Sally to kick it off since she is Madame SI but I could have spoken up myself and gotten the ball rolling. On the other hand, the kind of chit chat our group engaged in while we were eating helps to build community---so you don't necessarily want to shut it down.  Regardless, though, what we need to do is take the time we have available and evenly divide it among the group members so that everyone has time.  Also, I wish we had written down our reactions.  Maybe we can do that next time.

Finally, I want to comment about the feedback I got about my book. It was the best thing I could have heard.  If I had held up a card that read, "Please say this" it could not have been better!!!  My group said that that they can really hear Zippy's "voice."  This is great.  I'm trying to write from a 12-year-old's point of view and I really need to know if it's working. I need my readers to buy into these journal entries--they have to ring true.  So I was so glad to hear that this entry works!! Zippy has a voice, and it's authentic!!!          

Monday, July 1 SI. Writer's Timeline, Inquiry Question "Yes, And," & Murray Cards.

I loved doing the writer's timeline!

   This is part of mine.  What I noticed after I drew this is how I've really written all of my life--since the age of 6--and how much validation I've received. Not that this is why I write--not at all. But I've really been identified as "The Writer" so often that it's just part of who I am.  I think that's why it's was so hard for me when I wasn't writing.  I am just so thankful for Jan Rieman,who was the one who spoke the truth to me and told me to start writing again.  (Not sure why I needed to be "told" but I did.)   There is someting, though, about being seen and heard as a writer.  I don't write just for myself--I want that audience.  Some people write and never show what they've written to others--I cannot imagine doing that.  I think from a very early age I became used to sharing my writing so that it's just part of my writing process now.
* * *
Also want to talk about how exciting it was to see my inquiry question as one that was chosen by a group to work on.  I have not had time to unpack what they said, but I will make notes on it today (before it's erased.) 

 
As I quickly look over their comments, I wonder if I'm not already doing some revision work--just not calling it by that name?  This is definitely an issue for me and I want to continue to think about it. 
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Murray Cards
OK: this was a really cool thing to do.  You start to detail and write about whatever you like, going deeper with each card.  I wrote about my Kindertransport novel, of course.  When we were being coached through each card by Lil, at one point I thought, "I don't have anything else to say."  Then, BAM!!!!! I absolutely wrote down two fantastic ideas for the book. Here's what I wrote on card 4 (purple), when we were to change the POV: "I can have Olive write about the time Zippy comes to breakfast wearing her Jewish star on a sweater. That could evoke Olive's hatred of the Nazis--she can write about that.  Could also have Olive reflect on Zippy's reticence to enter or a shop or go to the cinema.  Zippy can educate Olive on the Nuremburg and other laws that denied rights to Jews."  The other idea I got was to have the English people try to Anglecize Zippy's name.  Her name is Tzipporah, and her nickname in Germany is Zippy.  Maybe they call her Tiffany? 
Love, love, love SI!!!
That's it for now.     

Thoughts about Summer Institute Orientation

Energy. Excitement. Engagement. Those are my "Three E's" about Orientation. The energy in the room was palpable. Lots of teachers who have lots to say. I am looking forward to learning from them. I really need this time to get focused on my teaching again, after working in Admin for 4 years. (I can't believe I did that job for so long.) I know that my classes suffered --- it's inevitable, I think, when your head is so focused on administrative day-to-day. But now I'm shifting back into what I love to do . . . teach. And I cannot wait until the Fall. I'm looking forward to revamping my teacherly identity. What excited me about SI is my research focus, which is on Revision. It is no secret that I am ambivalent (that's putting it nicely) about revision. I hate it. I don't think our students really have time to do it. By that I mean in a semester we don't have the luxury of time to set a piece of writing aside and go back into it later. Maybe the issue for me is how I am defining revision? Maybe I am thinking about it too narrowly?

Technology

Sometimes I feel overwhelmed by technology. I write this in Digital Learning Day and the irony does not escape me.

I wonder how other people stay caught up and on the cutting edge?

Laptopistan

Thoughts on Laptopistan

"Only Connect." -- E. M. Forester

I wonder what E.M. Forester would say today if he knew the ways in which his cry for less alienation and more humanity has been completely co-opted by the technical junkies of the 21st century?

An article in the Sunday NY Times, "Destination: Laptopistan" by David Sax is the essay I've been waiting for. You can read the article yourself by clicking here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/05/nyregion/05laptop.html

He points out the techfaux pas -- things such as speaking above a whisper or daring to address a comment to a fellow coffee-shop patron-- of this brave new world of isolation and 24/7 connection. Well, that's my response to what he's talking about, anyway.

And Sax is right. It's really not O.K. to talk to strangers anymore but not for the reasons that you might think. Whatever happened to cordial pleasantries--the ones that used to make us more connected to each other and aware of the existence of another human being? Last Saturday, as I sat down to wait for my sister to doctor her cup of coffee at a walk-up kiosk in a mall in Chapel Hill, I struck up a conversation with an elderly lady in a wheel chair. We chatted about Roses--the discount store, not the flower. (Yep--this mall actually has a Roses and it is a step back in time, let me tell you. They even have a "Health and Beauty Aids" section. Love it.) My point is that this lady and I talked. We had a conversation. I didn't pull out a cellphone and immediately start texting someone. She didn't bop to music streaming into her ears from discreet ear buds. We chatted. We made eye contact. We laughed. We identified with each other. I wondered about her health; why was she in a wheel chair? I didn't ask. I'll never see her again, probably. Days later I still remember her friendliness, her smile. You don't get that in Laptopistan.