AU REVOIR (For now)

 Stepping into this blogging arena I was intimidated and nervous. I've read blogs before and I just didn't feel like my writing style fit into the genre of a blog. Now I could've been overthinking things because blogs are very diverse in writing style and content, but I did not have the confidence in myself. As I write my final blog for the class, it honestly wasn't as hard as I thought it would be. Through writing my own and reading posts from my classmates, blogging is truly a space to get creative and leave the overthinking behind.

Professionalism 

Out with the old, in with the new

The way I set this blog up, the words I used, and the amount of citations I provided makes me feel that this is my most professional blog post.

Multimodal Design

Digital Storytelling #4

While I don't feel this comes close to any of my fellow classmates and their multimodal posts, for me, the hyper links, pictures and the whole premise of the blog is my best example of Multimodality.

Creativity

When getting creative goes right

The blog post itself isn't the most creative, but the Zine that I created is the creative aspect. I took a chance and created something for the first time, and I'm actually very proud of the Zine I made and displayed in this post.

Civic Engagement

To AI or not AI

This post receives the civic engagement award due to the topics discussed. I feel as if I'm provided some great information to the audience on ways learning can become hindered due to AI, and how critical thinking and face-to-face communication is slowly diminishing with the use of AI and other technological platforms. Creating this post even prompted me to have discussions with my children about AI and asking them if they use it, and providing real evidence to them as to the harmful nature of these programs.

People's Choice Award

Em's Nook

Looking back at all her posts, and knowing how she is generally a reserved individual, she truly put a lot of herself into these blog posts. You could tell she was speaking from the heart, and used the blog as a way to be more vocal!!

When getting creative goes RIGHT!!!!!!

 I’m a product of Elm Creative Arts Elementary school, and Roosevelt Middle School of the Arts, during the time where the art programs were plentiful and robust. I can remember doing stained art projects, creating books and making paper from pulp. For a moment in my life I considered myself an artist. By the time I reached high school, writing heavy assignments started to take over those once creative pieces, and since I didn't supplement this in my spare time much, I feel my artistic touch vanished. While I do make candles in my spare time (I once operated my own candle business), when it comes to certain artforms my confidence level is ZERO!!!!!

                                                                          

When thinking about what to create for this blog post, I went out on a limb, took a change and created a Zine. Initially I was nervous and super self conscious about my diminishing lack of drawing capabilities, but I wanted to challenge myself and do it. Using different pieces of paper I recycled from past projects, adding bits and pieces of the original article in the form of images wasn’t as difficult as I thought it would be. I was actually having fun. According to Jenkins, “Many of the forms of expression that are most important to American youth accent this sampling and remixing process”. While I’m not an American youth, even at my age I felt a real sense of creative expression while putting my Zine together. 

My Zine was inspired by the piece from Mari Copeny, a young girl from Flint Michigan concerned with the harmful drinking water in her city. After noticing how sick the residents were becoming, and how the water stunk and was turning colors, she wrote a letter to my forever president Barack Obama informing him of what was happening. To her surprise the president responded back to her and even showed up to her city where he made a promise to provide the city with the necessary funding to make improvements to the water pipes. In my Zine I highlight some of those moments.

After completing this experience I would love to implement Zines as a way for students to display their creativity, and comprehension of a text. Every culminating task does not need to be lengthy papers, as I experienced myself while making this Zine, allowing students to get creative activates so much in their brains!!! I felt young again making this Zine!!

 If you're interested in making a Zine and it's your first time, check out this link for some ideas and assistance Bre.

Encouraging writers

Writing is an expression and form of art, so while critiquing someone on their writing you must remember many people are sensitive about their works of art!!!

Receiving feedback for many people is hard in general. Putting something you create out there for others to give you their opinion on is not easy and receiving feedback takes practice and work.

Participating as a writing coach in this way has been new and a little confusing. Traditionally if I am helping students edit their writings and assisting them along their writing journey, I like to have dialogue with them to get an understanding of why they are writing the way they are and what is the overall message they are trying to convey. I have former students who are in college who reach out to me to give them assistance on writing scholarship essays or class essays and the biggest thing in my opinion is talking to them about their process, as well as telling me what exactly what it is they need my assistance with. In the class reading by Capt. Rebecca Segal, U.S. Army, A Writers Guide to Giving and Receiving Feedback, she states, "If you have specific things that you want the editor to focus on, provide those instructions when you reach out to request edits." Verbalizing what it is you are in need of will prevent the editor from ripping your writing apart in ways you did not ask for. 

While its been interesting reading the works of the middle school students during this writing coach process, it has been a little difficult since there is no communication with the writers, and I'm blindly leaving comments/suggestions on their pieces.

Teachers and writing coaches play differing roles which may intersect along the students writing journey. While the teacher assigns the work and sets the parameters/rubric the writing coach assists in the student achieving their overall goal or properly projecting their intended message to the appropriate audience. Peer reviewing comes in as another method for input on the writing with the insight from a fellow peer and possibly bouncing ideas off each other.  

Writing can be a stressful process with lots of ups and downs, the need for healthy honest feedback and dialogue can come with rewards and roadblocks, but in the end helping create a stronger more confident writer.

For students looking for additional supports in the area of writing, Priyanka Gupta on her blog page, gives some great tips and additional resources to weed through those moments of discomfort and anxiety during the writing process. On My Canvas. 

Digital Storytelling #4

    During my time at a previous school I worked at, where I taught as an English teacher, I would introduce the 9th graders into the course an interactive slideshow about the history of storytelling and how it has changed overtime. At the end of the slideshow I would ask students to create their own slideshows where they told the story of who they were and things that interested them. Since it was the beginning of the year and I knew writing a traditional journal entry was not something that would interest them, I figured this was a good way to shake off those summer cobwebs to get back in the flow of reading and writing. It was nice to see the creativity from the students, some created cartoon slideshows which told the story of themselves and their lives, while others took a more traditional route and added images to slides with associated pictures.

I personally don't have much experience with digital storytelling unless we count my posts on social media......

    From the selection of multimodal compositions the two I selected were PSA's and Video Book talks. Linked are the two from the listing that I enjoyed the most.... Food Waste (PSA, This was my favorite) & Harry Potter One Minute Book Talk (Video Book Talk).... Both of these examples are great ways for students to get creative and show their personalities while discussing something their passionate about or giving a quick break down of a good book!!! 

Chisholm and Trent in their piece, Digital Storytelling in a Place-Based Composition Course, explain how digital storytelling can give students many tools that they can use to show comprehension and critical thinking toward material that extend beyond the class curriculum. When thinking of the youth of today and the ways in which they interact daily and consistently with online platforms, allowing them to compose multimodal works could be a great way to get them to dig deeper than just surface level yes and no answers or lengthy paper.

Its okay for students to use multiple ways to show proficiency and mastery of topics, as educators we should encourage students to think outside the box and take risks at creativity!!!