Using Google Sites/Google Docs to organize I-search research portfolios

Check out the class google site I created and read more about my project in my folder.

I am on the last academic unit of the school year with my students, “I-search,” which inspired my last technology project.  My Cooperating teacher said her dream would be to move the paper-based “I-search” (students research a topic of their choosing) to wikispaces when she implements it next time, and I decided to imagine this movement to Google Sites/Google Docs. 

I created a Google Site with research resources, timeline of homework assignments, a tab for students to upload their Google Doc Portfolio link.  In this student tab, I also included a model example of a portfolio, in terms of how I want students to organize its contents.  In terms of permissions for editing pages, I gave my roommate, Janani Sridharan, permission to edit only the Student Links Google page, and only viewing permissions for the other pages as a test (which worked).  Then, I created a google group and gave this group the same sets of permissions as Janani.  I made a fake gmail account (using my friend's name Vanessa Lai).  "Vanessa" asked to join the google group, and after I used my own email address to grant her request, she was also able to edit just the "Student Links Google" page.  Through trial and error, I realized that students could join a class google group, much like our tech one, and varying access could be granted based on the group's permissions, as opposed to individualizing each student.  

My intention was to see if the front-load of setting this site up would be worth it for the affordances of a paper-less transaction between myself and students.  For the most part, I think that it is worth it because the teacher and the student could have simultaneous access to the portfolio at any point.  The teacher can monitor the work on an ongoing basis to see if students are being accountable for each journal and draft (as they are due).  Last but not least, peers can easily share portfolios with each other for feedback, and future students could easily reference to this work.  

My only concern is that it's hard to imagine what this implementation would look like with over a hundred students, as opposed to the few imaginary students on this site.  

Review of “It Makes it More Real”: Teaching New Literacies in a Secondary English Classroom Nancy Bailey

Nancy Bailey writes about Carol’s 9^th grade English class, and how Carol reconfigured curriculum to get students excited about interpreting literature through a multimodal lens.  Now that we’ve digested a series of articles that pertain to various teachers and how they incorporate multimodal, technology-based curriculum into the classroom, I wanted to reference to a few statements and how I’d like to reflect on them in a synthetic fashion. 

Bailey states that theorists of the New Literacy Studies argued: “If teachers do not use new technologies, the authors say, they ‘attach them in unengaging ways to the anachronistic curriculum’ (p.127).”  To say that educators who aren’t buying into New Literacy theories are practicing “anachronistic curriculum” sets this dichotomous-two-schools-of-thought frame in which educators are presumed to occupy either stance, and I don’t think that is the case.  As I was wary about from the start of this class, many schools (particularly urban, low-income based schools) are not well-equipped enough for teachers to facilitate learning that utilizes heavy technology.  Although we do not get insight as to how Carol utilizes equipment and resources from her school to implement her projects, we do know that her class of 28 students are from a suburban, middle-class background in the Northeast (she asked them to watch “Friends” to analyze literary elements, so that might look different in an urban, West Coast school). 

Also, as I have reiterated before, another issue other than resources is teacher training.  I appreciate that preservice teachers are to take a technology course during credential training, but I think that realistically, schools should have ongoing professional development and workshops catered to technological pedagogy.  I know that that might be an idealistic and extreme suggestion that is obviously beyond the scope of me, but I think that teachers need some sort of “homework” or accountability piece for technology integration, since they are so busy with the rest of their daily demands.

Moving on, Bailey states that: “getting freshmen to become engaged, interested and excited about something, especially reading and writing, is an extremely difficult task.  However, by incorporating technology, I have found a way to ‘hook’ them and keep them ‘on the line’ for the rest of the year’ from Graduate Course Position Statement (p. 215).”  I really like this analogy of technology being the sugar on the spoon that feeds the “medicine” for kids, and I don’t see what’s so problematic about that (I have 9^th graders now and I relate, that it is so hard to get 14-year-olds excited about literature). 

--BUT, I might just be saying this because I haven’t been able to discern how to integrate technology in English curriculum in a seamless way and not as a “staple-on” or afterthought.  To digress a bit, I’ve used “traditional quizzes” this semester (mostly to follow my CT’s structure) to monitor student’s reading of the text, and I’m not sure what “authentic assessment tools” might look like – maybe an oral element??  But that still wouldn’t be using technology.  Maybe next year, in a CT-less world, I’d have more liberty to integrate tech.  Maybe I can implement the Audacity project (Project #1) I envisioned for students to discuss the text’s essential question in an auditory, multimodal way, as opposed to writing a “traditional” essay.  Maybe I can ask students to submit their I-search paper (or any essay that is extensive and contains lots of drafts and notes) as a Google Folder URL link to me (my Project #3) and we can begin to move to a paper-less world.   

I appreciated how this course expanded my thinking and I will try to be less skeptical of technology integration (and the internet cutting out on me when I want to play a video).

Synthesis of "Writing in the Wild: Writer’s Motivation in Fan-based Affinity Spaces"

“Fan fiction is what literature might look like if it were reinvented from scratch after a nuclear apocalypse by a band of brilliant pop-culture junkies trapped in a sealed bunker. They don't do it for money. That's not what it's about. The writers write it and put it up online just for the satisfaction. They're fans, but they're not silent, couch-bound consumers of media. The culture talks to them, and they talk back to the culture in its own language.”

—Lev Grossman, TIME, July 07, 2011

             This week, Curwood, Magnifico & Lammers discussed how adolescents use online, fan-based affinity spaces to produce multimodal transformative works, such as websites, avatars, blogs, videos, maps and podcasts.  The focal examples were based on the virtual worlds of The Hunger games (dystopian novels), Neopets (web-based game tending for virtual pets), and The Sims (a life simulation and computer video game).  The authors wonder: “How can research on adolescent writing in online affinity spaces shape teachers’ writing pedagogy? (p. 683).”  

CRITIQUE:

Tygue’s fear:
"As much as I think students could learn from interpreting literature [from a fan-based affinity space], I still can't help but fear fan fiction for all reasons apparent HERE:"

 
             Tygue’s push-back was also expressed in the idea of participation being self-directed, multifaceted and dynamic.  Though this sounds wonderful, the self-directed part threw him off when he began thinking practically, “how are educators to develop an EFFICIENT system for evaluated truly self-directed student work?”

Evan’s concerns:
"My chief concern while reading this article was doubt that many (or any) of my students engage in such spaces… they suggest that teachers "attune the practices" affinity spaces, but if students aren't experienced with fan culture in online communities then you would still practically be starting from scratch in establishing such a collaborative, transformative culture in your classroom. I'm just not sure the extent to which this would be building on my students' socio-linguistic reservoirs, whereas in a more socioeconomically advantaged school it most certainly would be." 
             I agreed with both Tygue and Evan, as I struggle to define and envision what “self-directed student work” and “transformative work” looks like in my classroom.  I particularly appreciated Evan’s mention of how the article does not account for diversity in socioeconomic classes, which would inevitably influence student likelihood of engaging in these fan-based spaces.  

PRAISE/POSSIBLE APPLICATION TO TEACHING:

            Tygue was interested in how the audience for these fan-based affinity spaces could complement student writing.  He thought that this article called for educators to create “self-directed and internet-based opportunities” to help students share work with an “authentic audience (p. 678).”  Students’ beliefs about their academic and particularly, writing abilities, are heavily influenced by their topic, genre, and feedback from readers.  Affinity spaces provide a passionate, public audience for content, and this level of thorough and invested feedback could provide student writers greater opportunity and motivation for development and revision. 
             Evan thought the article exemplified many benefits of this fan-based affinity space framework.  One example is Eve (focal student for the Sims affinity space), as Tygue thought she was perhaps able to display her strengths in a space less punitive toward mistakes in writing.  Evan also thought educators should value these kinds of “out-of-school writing in online spaces” so that we can understand how these experiences could contribute to academic writing.
             Tygue focused on how the framework could enhance writing engagement: “the contemporary tools and spaces for writing that are available to youth are essential for their achievement and engagement (p. 677).”  This engagement, however, would not be possible without establishing a classroom community, which is essential to “all the tips” but what I see to be essential to everything implemented in a class. 

Review of “Online Personal Learning Environments” by Helen Barrett and Nathan Garrett

Barrett and Garrett’s emphasis on the institution, or university, controlling digital archives made me think of how we sort of have online portfolios but they are scattered across different social networks and drives.  The idea of “what happens when a student moves to another university” made me think of how at some point this school year, I decided to primarily use my gmail account for school correspondence as opposed to my Berkeley email account because I knew the data would be out of my reach in the next year or two.  This article made me think of how future technologies could enable educators and students to consolidate information, presentations and related archive for easy access and sharing.   

On a broader note, I appreciate Barrett and Garrett’s idea of reconceptualizing the tools so they’re not just for students and not just contained within the institution.  The article gave an example of how families should have a digital repository, and how senior citizens might find it useful to have post-retirement “legacy” stories.  It is true that portfolios are more relevant in certain professions and fields, thus, might have more a personal than professional incentive for some folks.  I wonder what a digital archive might look like for a teacher?

I found the diagrams in this article somewhat useful to my understanding of processes implied in a digital archive, but without a techie/programmer/designer’s eye, I’m not sure what a digital archive looks like?  To what extent could a digital archive contain information?  What variety of information are digital archives capable of storing and sharing?  The authors mentioned RSS (Really Simple Syndication) as an example of a software solution.  RSS reminds me of the archaic Google Reader, which allowed me to subscribe to various news sites and read newly published articles from these sites.  Thinking of other examples provided by the authors, such as LiveJournal, various webhosting websites for pictures and files gives me the impression that this digital archive notion is still largely decentralized.  I’m still unsure if their vision is a “lifetime personal website” or a mixture of a public website with private storage settings.

As a future teacher, I am interested in an online system or digital archive that could store grades, parent correspondence, assignments and assignment copies, and correspondence updates about changes in the class or the school, and maybe even model examples of student work.  Obviously, information such as grades and parent correspondence would need access restriction (student should be able to view their grades but not the parent correspondence).  I can see grades and parent information being stored on a system like ABI (OUSD) or school loop (SFUSD), and information about assignments, examples of student work on a personal/school website, but it would be superb if all this information could be consolidated onto one vessel to facilitate learning and communication for parents and teachers.

Review of Henry Jenkins’ “Multiculturalism, Appropriation, and the New Media Literacies: Remixing Moby Dick

Henry Jenkins mentions a cartoon that “…captures some of the contradictions surrounding the relations between Media Studies and the ways that Literature is most often taught in American high schools (p. 104).” This piece reviews ideas that we have already touched in this course, such as incorporating multimedia to advanced learning and this notion of “remixing.”  Jenkins frames remixing as a form of mash-up, using Herman Melville’s “Moby Dick as the prime example.  When he described students’ process of “…remixing those elements, retooling that language, and retelling those stories, they created something that felt fresh and original to their readers,” I wondered if students were taking a step beyond analyzing literature to produce creative writing?  If so, I wondered how this unit was imagined, whether digital tools were integrated, and how this mash-up analogy of blending and infusing genres panned out for student writing.  This piece expanded our prior discussion of “remix” as a buy-in for students, but was more theoretical and less guided for practical or practiced examples.

Jenkins’ piece that I found more theoretical was less informative on how to integrate multimedia and digital practices in English curriculum and more insightful about definitions of creative expression, and how we might teach our students literary concepts like “allusion” in unconventional manners that might be more engaging to their daily engagements with technology (by comparing it to a remix).  As Jenkin states: “seeing remix as another way into thinking about allusion suggests an answer to a question we often receive from teachers: How can you tell if a remix is good?  How can you tell if an allusion is good? (p. 109).”  Teaching literary concepts via media, particularly music is of interest to me because I have been examining relationships between rhetorical devices in poetry and how they are analogous to hip-hop music, which is widely consumed by our students in urban school settings. 

A grand idea that Jenkins’ highlights is how the digital era has expanded and complicated notions of authorship:
“So, we are making two seemingly contradictory claims here: first, that the digital era has refocused our attention on the expressive potential of borrowing and remixing, expanding who gets to be an author and what counts as authorship, but second, that this new model of authorship is not that radical when read against a larger backdrop of human history… we need to help them to understand the growing centrality of remix practices to our contemporary conception of creative expression, and we need to help them to understand how modern remix relates to much older models of authorship (p. 109).”

Though I am still trying to unpack the complexity of these dual claims, I think it is helpful to help students in urban settings see connections between canonical texts and some of the media that they consume, whether it is hip-hop, contemporary television shows, etc.  Rhetorical devices is one approach (literature/poetry and hip-hop), but looking at themes and human struggles could be another (literature/prose and television).  For students to assume some sense of authorship (without plagiarizing), they have to assume some authority on the content, and what more convenient way to leverage this than to bring in media that we know speaks to them?    

I’ve never implemented any sort of remixing-kind of unit this school year, but I conducted independent research that compared and contrasted the late Bay Area-based emcee Mac Dre and the Shakepearian Fool, Yorick, as he appeared in Hamlet.  Mac Dre was at the height of his popularity for the hip-hop subgenre “hyphy music” when I was a high school senior, and if a teacher compared his clownish mannerisms and lyricism to Shakespeare’s “Fool” character trope that is prevalent in a number of his most famous plays, I would have definitely been more engaged in trying to understand and interpret Shakesperian work. 

Project #2: Evaluation of Collaborative Writing

My Project #2  evaluated Collaborative Writing (CW) as an educational tool.  The purpose of the project was to research two focal digital tools, and early on, I knew I wanted one tool to be Google Docs.  My project consists of theoretical background literature on CW and its definitions.  As a result of refining CW’s definition and perusing existing CW tools, I chose “Draft” as the second digital tool because like Google Docs, its emphasis is on heavy writing on a document interface (as opposed to examining a tool like Twitter which isn’t text-heavy).  Draft cannot enable multiple users to edit in real time but unlike Google Docs, Draft does enable version control, or in other words, “a master document.”  Users can accept or reject partial changes created by other collaborators. 

Because I am still confounded by the lack of technological access in urban school settings (where students do not necessarily have access to their own laptop or computer), I was more interested in CW as a means for teachers or more learned peers to provide feedback on student writing, than CW as a means for students to write simultaneously, or to take turns to contribute to achieve a collaborative, high-quality writing product.  In this sense, features of Draft make it more suitable for the former purpose and Google Docs is more designed for the latter purpose. 

In conclusion, I’ve rarely seen high school students use Google Docs (or any CW digital tool) for CW purposes.  Google Docs, however, is very efficient for undergraduate and graduate settings, and I would imagine businesses.  My project highlighted a teacher using Google Docs effectively in a high school classroom, but I think it was because those particular students had access to individual Mac laptops.  As a process of proposing design alterations to Google Docs for my project, I realized that adapting CW digital tools to smart phone apps might be more suitable for secondary educational settings.  Students have both more access and facility with smart phones.  I definitely think CW is useful for secondary schools, particularly in English classes, but it only seems plausible to implement such type of assignments on structured lab days, and not so much mini-lessons on a day-to-day basis.