Sheryl's Blog

http://www.nbc.com/saturday-night-live/video/george-and-lenny/669622/

I created this digital movie with PhotoStory 3 for Windows as a class project.  I found PhotoStory 3 very easy to work with even as a beginner.

This ad for a new Burger King 7 inch burger recently ran in Singapore.  US newspapers such as Fox News  immediately condemed the obvious message comparing eating a burger with oral sex. I find it interesting that even though this ad was run in Singapore, the text is in English and the woman is anglo saxon.  When we talk about media literacy, should we discuss the boundaries that society draws and imposes upon messages?  How do we as individuals influence these decisions?  Is censorship appropriate in certain mediums?  Why or why not?

The site Kreative Soul mention’s Burger Kings official statement on the ad (“created by separate ad agency in Singapore for that market only”) and offers comments of their own.

In Chapter 7, Richardson’s BWP takes us into an adventure in pictures at Flickr.com.  I’ve browsed around this site before but didn’t really realize that you can use Flickr as a repository of your own photos; for example, a classroom can create a “photo stream” for field trips, special speakers, projects, etc. (100).  I also had no idea that you can tag pictures and then have chosen tags fed to your GoogleReader aggregator account using an RSS feed.  Wow.

I especially love the annotation feature in Flickr that “allows you to add notes to parts of the image simply by dragging a box across an area and typing text into a form” (101)  I’m going to give that one a try.  I’ve seen this done with team pictures (each name pops up on the screen) but it could be a wonderful teaching tool in the classroom. 

Check out Alan Levine’s “What Can We Do with Flickr?” which is run entirely through an annotated picture.  Click here to begin.

OK … the quote above (Borg lore that I love) is from Will Richardson’s book Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts. (83)  Richardson speaks in such easy language about the urgency of trying RSS (Real Simple Syndication) that I signed myself up on the spot.  I now have a new Google Reader account and have subscribed to about 10 feeds.  I’d love to use this technology in the classroom, but will first need to become used to synthesizing and using this type of information feed.  Richardson walks you through the process from basic start up to advanced use (in only 12 pages, I might add) so I will definitely come back to this resource as I become more familiar with the process.  Amazing application potential – beyond what I can even consider at the moment.

If you want to find the GA Performance Standards for your ELA classroom, go to the website gastandards.org.  You may be pleasantly surprised at additional resources available at this site.   I enjoyed clicking on the “Frameworks” tab and then “Reading Glossary.”  Here you can find a list of literary terms and their definitions.  What I REALLY liked was the annotation to these terms which explains that students should be able to apply these terms to texts but not necessarily define them in isolation.  Cool!  Our KSU grad classes preach that the way to make information long lasting for students is to have them analyze and apply, not necessarily memorize a list of facts. 

You can also find sample unit plans at this website and an interesting technology feature that is new to me — video podcasts.  Select a video by teacher and topic and see a live lesson in action.  Very helpful.

As a part of KSU’s technology class this summer, I’m reading Will Richardson’s Blogs, Wikis, Podcasts, and Other powerful Web Tools for Classrooms.  Chapters 2 and 3 discuss one of the most applicable technology tools for the classroom today – weblogs (or blogs, as I’m writing here).  As you know, this is my first blog.  As a newbie, I’m interested to hear how Richardson defines blogging.  Although blogs can (and are) used for many activities, real blogging begins when the reader/writer

Links with analysis and synthesis that articulate a deeper understanding or relationship to the content being linked and written with potential audience response in mind (31).

I love the idea of audience response.  How many times when writing a paper would you love to have asked a question of your reader and actually get a response? 

Of course, Richardson encourages the newbie to start small with your first blog (whew!).  I could start by posting assignments for a class on the blog (a class portal), having students journal (record of activities), posting links, or posting links with descriptive annotations or some simple analysis of the content of the linked site. 

Here are a few links to blogs that Richardson recommends for the newcomer to this new genre of writing and reading:

David Jakes’ blog “The Strength of Weak Ties” – this is a popular “edu” blog

Secret Life of Bees – collaborative space between students and author

Anne Davis of Conyers, GA and her “The Write Weblog” – 5th graders love blogging!

SupportBlogging.com – peruse blogs of interest

Edublogs Award site

Enjoy these sites if you are new to blogging like I am.

After reading “Literacy for the 21st Century” at the site medialit.org, I came away from the experience feeling that a propaganda truck for teaching multi-media had just run over my body.  The article (can I call it that?)  is really a marketing tool to sell an outline for teaching a course on media literacy in today’s classroom (emphasis on today … the reader does not want to be left behind in the wake of technology).  The authors of the booklet pose the question, “What does it mean to be illiterate?” (3).  The reader is cautioned that no longer must the student just be able to read text and decipher said traditional text for meaning, but today’s student must be able to “learn, unlearn, and relearn something” in order to find literacy in our multi-media culture.  This “literacy for the 21st century” is not fact driven, not an accumulation of data, because students already have access to this information at the touch of a button.  No, according to the authors, students really need to synthesize, analyze, and interpret with a new set of vocabulary that charts our modern culture with its media driven society.

I do understand that high schoolers today live in a world of techno-gratification – Facebook, MySpace, Twitter, texting, blogs, online gaming worlds, and the list goes on.  But is this what we have come to as a society when we define literacy as navigation of these worlds?  It doesn’t take much research on Wikipedia to find that traditional definitions of illiteracy in American are potentially catastrophic.    In 1993, the most comprehensive government study to date on adult literacy in America found that, “21% to 23% of adult Americans were not “able to locate information in text”, could not “make low-level inferences using printed materials”, and were unable to “integrate easily identifiable pieces of information.”^[2] 

^{As educators, do we now feel that 1 in 4 Americans, who are illiterate in reading and deciphering plain text, will become literate if given access to unlocking the meaning behind multi-media presentations?  Is it more important to be able to understand the commercial you just saw or the movie you just watched than being able to fill out an interview application or read a neighborhood school’s newspaper article?} 

OK … I am definitely the most biased member of my group regarding Wikipedia.  I attended a lecture given by the librarian of my daughter’s elementary school about 2 years ago cautioning parents against their children using Wikipedia as a resource for class.  Because of this lecture, I tend to steer clear of this site and I’ve never really compared it as a potential source. 

There is no doubt that this site is extremely easy to use and you will access information immediately.  I’ve tried to help my kids use the school’s online enclyclopedias and they are screamably frustrating.  In fact, you have to have the password to even use these sites and the passwords change each month! 

Wikipedia’s entry on “Geraniums” gave a far more comprehensive write up on these plants, as well as over 8 pictures on the first 3 pages of information, versus the 1 picture and 3 paragraphs of the hard bound Enclycopedia we used as a comparison.  Is this too much information for my 12 year old who wants to write about this plant?  Probably not.   But I do think it would be overwhelming for my 8 year old.  Plus, the language is for adults.  I’ll have to check out the Wikipedia for kids … is it edited as often?  This is a whole new world for me that I will need to explore.

Here is a video that we watched in Levy’s class on writing.  I love this clip because my daughters are totally sold on the idea that a thesaurus needs to be used in order for your paper to sound “smarter.”

I also recently read Stephen King’s On Writing where he says, basically, don’t dress up your words … they will be like household pets in costume – so embarrassed!