Welcome to my very first blog.  As the term goes on I plan on making this blog more and more creative, but seeing as this is my first blog, and I have no background in blogging (as you will read in my autobiography) I thought it best to keep it simple.  

In Blogs,  Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms, (pgs. 26-27)Will Richardson discusses some basic aspects of blogs that make them an attractive addition  to a teacher's toolbox.  In particular he suggests that the content created by teachers and students becomes part of a wider body of knowledge that the internet represents for people to be able to find and search.  Therefore the overall audience has shifted  and having student work out there on the World Wide Web not only acts as a motivator but creates a shift in how  we as teachers think about assignments.  Therefore we are no longer contained by the wall of a classroom as a result of blogs.  Also, blogs allow us to portfolio work in a very simple way and opens up the door for supporting different learning styles. Another benefit of blogs is that if a student is wanting to gain expertise in a certain area, blogs facilitate this. William Kist touches on this point too when he describes a central advantage of access to the blogosphere being the ability to connect with people across the world, including experts on whatever topic is being studied. ( The Socially Networked Classrrom p. 81)  Probably the point made about blogs that stands out the most for me is that, "blogs teach students the new literacies they will need to function in an ever-expanding information society." ( Blogs,  Wikis, Podcasts, and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms p. 27). Another  For all of the above mentioned reasons, I know that gaining understanding and skill in this area is very important both personally and professionally.

 

 

Autobiography of a Tech User and Creator

        This autobiography will highlight my experiences with technology starting with my personal technology use, the impact technology has had on my life, my experiences living and working in an online world, and how I navigate reading and literacy in an online world.  Before I get into these sub-topics, it should be known that I have tended to be very resistant to technology until lately.  In fact I tend to try to live my life by that saying “keep it simple stupid” and am often teased by my friends about how I am living my life 1960's style (even though I wasn’t even born until the early 70's).  So it’s quite amazing to me that I am slowly becoming a self proclaimed technology geek for better lack of a term.  As an example, yesterday at the gym I laughed at myself as I realized I was riding the stationary bike reading about blogs, wikis and podcasts instead of my usual gym reading material about one of my two passions, amazing running races or chatelaine’s latest recipes.  As you will see from the format of this assignment being a written report, I have not yet ventured to ‘techy’ side of voicethreads or prezis etc., but I’m starting to sense a shift coming in the not too far off future.  Better late than never

        In all honesty, my earliest recollections of using a computer were in Grade 6 (1986) at my elementary school with my computer teacher Mr. Northy.  Even then, while other kids found it so fun and cool to work on the computers I was totally resistant and frustrated by the process, as I remember my work constantly getting lost on the computer.  It’s amazing how first impressions can really set the stage for future opinions, as I really remember seeing computers as a total source of frustration as opposed to a convenience or an asset.  From this experience, I then remember my parents getting a big huge computer for home so that my mom could do some book keeping for my dad and so that my sister and I could start to do some school work on it.  I was probably in grade 8 by this time, and my opinion of computers really had not improved since my grade 6 experiences.  Also, the computer was set up on the landing between my bedroom and my sisters and I remember fairly frequently “f bombs” and other utterances escaping my mom as she lost data and her way on the computer.  From here, my next experience on computers that I remember was learning to type at highschool in the computer lab.  This was my first positive computer experience and I was probably in grade 10 at this stage (1990).  I remember really loving my typing course and not running into any “computer issues” at this stage, perhaps because nothing “outside of the box” was being asked of me in this use of computers, rather it was just logging on and going into the typing program.

    My next real computer memory was in taking Computer Science in University.  My negative thoughts about computers really came to a head in this course.  I’m a very visual learner and this course and my brain did not mesh at all.  In fact, two degrees later, I think this was probably my most challenging course I ever took and it probably steered me away from computers as long as I could, or at least kept me only trying the very basics.  By this time in university (1992+) word processing was the norm so I adopted that as opposed to handwritten work, but delved no further than that into this unknown world of technology.

    I bought my first computer (a Toshiba laptop) just 6 years ago in 2006, and this is probably where technology really started making an impact on my life. .  I had my “techy”sister and brother in law advise me on what to buy and then they helped me get started with the basic workings of my computer.  I remember my friends bugging me about not being on email and talking to me about how it would make my life so much easier if I used email.  Me being me and always wanting to keep things as simple (perhaps some might think archaic) as possible dug my heals in on this until my work started urging staff to begin using email. 

    Technology started to impact the way I communicated with others around this time (2006) as once I started down this road of email I was very glad I did as it turned out to be a great way for me to communicate to many people.  In my work at the time (a very small and modest private school in Victoria BC) the technology expectations were still very minimal, so I was slow to advance my skills as a result of my job.  As a result, I was also very slow and timid to warm up to the internet. Then two scenarios changed my use of the internet.  One was that I was on my own with a two year old and I started to like the distraction in the evenings once my baby went to bed of surfing the net.  The other scenario was that I love to adventure and when I started seeing that I could look for my own flights and accommodations online I starting booking really great trips using my computer, and I seemed to develop a knack for finding cheap airfares etc.  To this day my excitement for this continues and I have gone on many adventures and found many great travel deals for friends and family as a result of  the online world.  Aside from technology impacting my life in these ways, I have found it very useful in the past few years as a documentation tool.  For instance, when a disagreement comes up regarding a plan or a fee that was agreed upon, when it was done through email, there is a written record to refer back to.
   
    With regards to living online, other than booking flights and accommodation online, my textbooks for this course, and the odd conference,  I do very few purchases online.  Perhaps this is because I’m not much of a shopper, and other than travel, only buy what I need, which I have routines in place for that involve physically going to the store.  As for online banking, I’m set up to do online banking, and tried starting down this road, but ran into a glitch once that took extra time and hassle to sort out, so went back to my 1960's system of going into the bank to pay my bills.  I know this ends up taking more time, but I still am a stickler for face to face interactions and leave the bank “knowing” that what I needed to get done got done.  When I do things online, I still have this fear of trusting that the transaction actually went through and hence my obsession with printing off all confirmation numbers for things I book or pay online.  I know we’re trying to move towards a paperless society, but I’m not ready for that yet.

    Both my work and raising a child in the 21st century are the two things that are driving me to move forward in technology.  It was my work as a TOC that prompted me to buy a cell phone.  I really don’t like having a cell phone and in fact still feel mildly irritated when it rings, but on the flipside, like the convenience that it can provide.  I soon need to go and get a new cell phone as my little $49.00 Nokia has been dropped so many times that it’s finally on it’s last legs; that and the fact that peoples’ jaws drop when they see me using it as it’s so out of date compared to what is out there now.  I have to admit that I’d love to be able to text from a mini keyboard as opposed to the way that I have to do it using the number pad.  Sometimes I just call texters back because the time it takes me to text on my phone is more than the time it takes me to phone.  My very accepting friends all know what’s going on when that happens, and of course it gives them a chance to tease me about my old Nokia. 

    In my work as a Librarian, I am understanding more and more that I need to grasp technology and act as more of a leader in this area both with staff and students.  I am slowly looking forward to taking on this role as my confidence in the area of technology is growing and expanding.  Also, so much of the communication in my district and school is through computers and technology, so staying in “my cave” is no longer an option and really hasn’t been for a number of years now.  With regards to raising a child in this age I am constantly reminded of technology being an everyday part of our world.  For example, information from school and out of school care is all emailed to me.  As well, at least 50% of my son’s birthday invites are in the form of evites, and for that matter, probably 90% of my invites are in the form of evites or email.  Also my son is becoming interested in looking up factual information and pop culture information which without a computer we would not get to as readily, as doing it at the library would take time that we don’t always have.

    When it comes to reading and literacy in the online world, I would say I’m somewhat engaged in this area.  I take advantage of some reading and literacy in the online world, but mainly in the area of reading/researching on the internet and writing through email. I am much more engaged in non-print text now than I ever have been and I foresee this growing more. There are still some things that I prefer paper copies of though.  For example, I love the ritual of reading a paper newspaper from front to back on a weekend morning, and have not yet adopted non-print for this purpose.  Also, I love to read fiction books and so far have not entered the world of ebooks partly for the same reason as with the newspaper in that I still love to hold a book and physically turn the pages. So therefore,  the types of materials I borrow from the library, so far is limited to traditional print/text as opposed to ebooks, and e-audiobooks.  As mentioned previously in this paragraph, where I do make use of non-print text is in non-fiction when it comes to researching topics that interest me. 

    As I stated at the beginning of this paper I have been very slow and somewhat resistant to adopt technology into my world.  Having said that, I definitely feel that  I’m at the brink of being about to make the leap forward into a much more technology infused world.  As I’ve been reading through the text Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts and Other Powerful Web Tools for Classrooms and learning about new tools such as RSS feeds and Prezi etc. I’ve been realizing that there are some web tools out there that I would really appreciate.  Where I continue to dig my heels in and don’t forsee it changing is in the area of social networking using such sources as Facebook.  I have and continue to see this area of technology as a somewhat shallow and socially desperate time sucker. Or perhaps it’s just the 1960's style personality in me that likes the notion of face to face meaningful interactions with a few quality people as opposed to hundreds of online “friends” filling up what appears to be a superficial social life.  Whereas tools that are able to streamline information and provide me with readings and visuals  in areas of interest to me, I know I will start moving towards in the near future.