Exploration 1: SOCIO-TECHNO INTERFACES


Exploration 1: Socio-techno Interfaces

It’s the year 2053 and I am in year 38 of my teaching career.  As I walk into my empty classroom, I am greeted with the prospect of my students soon to arrive.  I set up my virtual desk last night, in preparation for this morning’s lesson, and all the supplies are ready to be sent out to students when they access the password.  I made today’s “starynight”, as we will be painting constellations to go along with students’ astronomy unit.  They have researched a particular constellation on their ILD (individual learning device).  While I do miss the old days of setting out tactile supplies and using them to create ourselves, this makes my set up so much quicker and less messy.  The only thing that is more challenging is making sure the 3D printer is loaded with the proper materials.  It’s costly, but surely cheaper than supplies for all of my 450 students. 

Students enter my room one by one, some carrying their ILDs responsibly while others treat them like books, of which them resemble in aesthetic but certainly not in value or breakability.  Students sit at their assigned charging station (our work will take a lot of their ILD’s battery life), and plug in.  Their ILD projects their virtual workspace, that I have already formatted, in front of them. I scan with my ILD to take attendance and download my lesson file into each student’s ILD within five seconds.  I model how to use the virtual paints, set up my constellation, create a splatter image, and most importantly - how to save my piece so it can be downloaded in 3D printing.  Students enter the class password and begin.  It is easy to see who retained our lesson and who did not based on their ease with using the tools.  Some come out remarkable - images of the night sky with a constellation seemly heavenly but yet still clear.  I deal with some of the same issues almost every class, however.  One of my students is using her ILD to ask her dad to drop off her lunch. “Please be quick and get back to our art ILD space” I say, happy that she can do this but discontented that it is during my time in art.  Meanwhile, two students have printed 2D constellations instead of 3D because they did not follow the directions on setting the printer.  They won’t print again though, because 2D still has value, I say.  Other students finish and print to the 3D printer.  They continue to marvel at their ability to produce, which is understandable as they walk away with 3D galaxies of their own creation infused with constellations they’ve been researching. 

Each student unplugs and leaves with their ILD in hand as well as their creation.  The nice thing about their ILDs is that this project is saved and they can have it to edit and print again.  Student ILDs are their lives.  While school does provide them, students bring them home and use them for everything under the sun, meaning they are personalized in any and all ways a device can be - whether it be background and pictures within the device or digital stickers on the outside. THey use these for everything and cannot get through a day without them.  ILDs are used to order lunch, take tests, create assignments, watch videos, and most importantly to the students - socialize.  While they do enter a code when they enter the building that disables some of their social capabilities, this is still a major disruption at school. This week brought minor disruptions with this class and I look forward to next week when we start to plan and create a class mosaic using our ILDs to piece them it together.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Public Pedagogy of Everyday Objects

Image
My home is my nest. It is a space I have carefully constructed to feel secure, to feel protected. Each pillow, lamp, and chair carefully selected to create comfort. The colors and scents reflective of the image I present to the world. My nest is my space, when I enter it I feel a return to the familiar. The familiar is one in which I have constructed. After viewing  Pepón Osorio’s sculptures, I made a connection between the art in which he has intentionally and purposefully created and the narrative constructed often unintentionally in one's home. In contrast, Do Ho Suh brings forward the theme of home being a relative concept. Something not necessarily physically, but more of a spirit or embodiment of home that can be fluid or transfered. I connected with this as my home or feeling of home is often just a reflection of my sense of self. My sense of self can be transported to the cafe in which I drink my Sunday coffee or the yoga studio in which I teach my Tuesday night class. Most...
Read more

Exploration 5- Data Visualization Analysis

Image
  Exploration 5 - Data Visualization Analysis For my visual data analysis I wanted to take note of what is present in my students’ creations - what is present for them and how they chose to explore identity will be my next inquiry. To do this, with a central focus for my action-research thinking, I planned a three-day long collaboration with the music teacher.  We went about looking into how and why artists participate in portraiture, a cause creation, and finally the making of an identity map.  Through all of this, it was interesting to take note of what students chose to include (or exclude) from their creations.  DATA: There was a total of 27 students who participated in person (remote students kept their artwork).  Stand-out stats:  Hair - 20 out of 27 students included their hair in their self-portrait. Career/Interest - 15 out of 27 students mentioned a career they want to pursue or an interest/hobby that comes across blatantly in their self-portrait....
Read more

Exploration 3- Narrative Inquiry

Image
  The above illustration depicts the doodles collected in my sketch book after a week of reflecting upon identity. After explorations 1 & 2, the theme I kept finding myself returning to was the idea of identity and how who I am and who I perceive myself to be shapes who I am as an educator. This led me to ponder how the identity of my students influences who they are as learners and how they make meaning out of what they are learning. 
Read more