Almost everyone in class knows my claim of the first thing I learn but I feel it will be a story I tell when asked about this class, so let’s start this blog off with that C- story once again. The first day in class we were told to do was to write down what we considered literacy and I jotted down a wide, what I thought at the time, inclusive work that included: books, blogs, poems, online readings, magazines, and I believe comics. A wide, vague, body to work, but then it was brought to my attention about lyrics for songs and instantly my mind blew, nuclear. Music lyrics are such an important part of my daily life, oftentimes I sing to calm myself from a bad day, repeating my favorite lyrics whilst in a good mood, or curing disturbing silence with my awful voice. How could I forget such an important part of my life, an important literacy that I use everyday.

Looking through my blogs, I feel, is a good indicator of what I valued throughout the readings, such is the example of my second blog: Hamilton’s theory of Literacy, “Visible literacy events are just the tip of the iceberg: literacy practice can only be inferred from observing evidence because they include invisible resources.” Through every work of literacy we find we, as future teachers, scholars, and thinkers, must understand that there is the product, the purpose, and work behind it. We know the product, we can find the purpose, but the work behind it we may never know, an unknowable element in every piece of work. From works crafted by masters like Hamlet, to simple labors of love like fan fiction, the author behind it had hours, of thinking behind every line, attempting to craft the picture in their head on written word. Txt’s themselves, the rising language of us modern youths, has been considered a literal language with rules of its own, thus an underlining of deeper thoughts.

Keri Franklin’s piece, #PleaseHelp: Learning to write (again) on Twitter, Sponsor idea really spoke to me. I think out of all the ideas in all the works we read this one will stick with me the longest. Sponsors are all around us and in several forms, from actual people to ideas and concepts in other works. We can’t escape them and we shouldn’t try, instead we should embrace them. Learning from others, their ideas, breakthroughs, and failures, is how humanity managed to establish themselves as the apex predator. It had little to do with our physical feats, even our communal element isn’t uniquely ours. Through adapting and building off our society will improve, just as our literacy will improve.

Our group projects taught me that group work doesn’t have to be awful, it can even be fun. First off, picking a category is probably the best way of selecting groups, you already know you at least have one thing in common. The problem with picking your own teams is that it creates tension among friends, not everyone is comfortable to tell their friends how they truly feel. Not to mention it forms bonds with strangers that can lead to its own friendships. To be honest, if I had my way I would have little-to-no human contact, and that’s no way to live, not us social creatures. Also the project sharing element allowed us to build on every individuals strength, especially for the gaming group were everyone had a specific job, that breaks the project down to its bare essentials. This teaches us how to tackle problems, using others strengths to replace our weaknesses while contributing our own strengths into the fold. Together we made a better project than alone and I think that’s what I usually hate about projects, others hide under the strength of one, giving no input. This doesn’t inherently mean they are lazy or have no ideas, it can mean that each group is dominated by a powerful personality and the more introverted and less confrontational of us simply go with the flow. Don’t get me wrong, at times I’m sure I am the aggressive personality, but this allows more opportunity for others to include their own ideas.

How about the blog? Well I’m doing a blog right now! I feel my best blogs are done with as little amount of guidelines as possible, but others felt the exact opposite and that’s okay… they can be wrong if they want to they can leave their friends behind. I do understand some of it, at times it felt tedious, and I feel those blogs show in my blogging history, but in all it is a wonderful experience and ties to the core concept of our readings. Technology should be included in our education, learning to use digital resources is important and will only increase its importance in the future. Through blogging I felt a side of my writing that combined a side of my personality in it. Is this the best for critical analysis? It isn’t the worst. It’s said that the person who actually understands something is the one who can explain it to others, a simple idea but true. It is more important that you actually apply your knowledge to you than learning it, unused knowledge is stored and eventually forgotten. So to those who find it tedious, perhaps it isn’t the best form of getting their ideas out there but to me it felt like a golden opportunity to expand my creative voice, a step into new progress.

The major thing I learned in this class is the very thing I learned on day one, not to say that was the only class that mattered. Literacy is beyond categories, a list, or a definition. Literacy is ever-changing, ever-adapting, and ever-present in our lives and to understand it isn’t a simple list but an endless pursuit. Be forewarned, this is an endless rabbit hole you tread but in the end, isn’t that the best thing to hear, literacy has no end. The pursuit is ongoing and forever important. Yes, it is an endless rabbit hole you tread but better to stride endlessly than wait aimlessly.

The two most joyous times of the year are Christmas morning and the end of school.

-Alice Cooper

This semester has been quite a ride and I was glad to have been a part of this class. Honestly, when the semester first began I hadn’t been quite sure to expect. My perceptions of literacy were simply that of it relating to academic reading and writing and that’s about it.

But reading articles like Szwed’s piece about how literacy is more than just reading from a textbook but a tool that we can use to understand not just text from a book but the environment around us began to open my eyes to how much more complex literacy is. Literacy is everywhere and in everything we do. Literacy is not just in a textbook or in a classroom it’s in our everyday lives even when we are not intentionally picking this up. Everything is literacy and it’s not just through pen and paper/books or textbooks anymore it’s in our media, in our technology, in our clothes, or even tattooed on our skin.

Literacy is involved in the way we interact with the other people and the world and some people have more advantages than others with literacy. Whether it be their familial background, their financial stability, the environment each affects the way that we’ve interacted with literacy and have been sponsored or not sponsored to read, write, and interact with text of any kind. Literacy is connected very much with that and certain people have better advantages in having higher skills with literacy than others do. Brandt’s piece about sponsorship also really hit home with me. When I was second grade, I remember being put in the reading group which all the other students called the “slow group” or if they were being particularly mean the “stupid group”. So I really had tried to move up into another level and practiced reading the assigned book but even when I thought that I could handle the challenge of the more complicated books my teacher didn’t let me try to move up. I had made more than one attempt to get her to give me a chance but I had no luck in convincing her. So this idea of sponsorship and access is so important to me because I honestly feel that certain people have more access or sponsorship than others and that it can impact how a person views and interacts with not just literacy but I think life in general and that’s not something that we often think about but it’s important to thing that needs to be discussed more.

I’ve learned so many things about literacy but I found that I was able to express my ideas in ways that I don’t usually in other classes. I don’t talk much in a class setting mostly because I have a hard time making what I want to say sound understandable to the other person. So when we got to look at video games-something that I love and am so passionate about- and be able to examine and discuss them in class I was internally very happy because if it’s video games I could talk about for days and never shut up about them. So even though I still struggle with being able to express my opinions fully, I think that this class helped in improving my ability to look at texts and converse more fluidly among my peers especially when it came to group projects. I personally hate group projects but the fact this class really made me not hate them. They never felt forced or awkward or frustrating and I actually learned something from them. I enjoyed the freedom we had to look at topics of interest to us (like video games) and be able to express our ideas through mediums we were interested or passionate about in way that was engaging to not just the specific groups that covered those topics but also to the rest of the class when we presented and shared about those topics.

I’m really going to miss this class but I’m happy to have been able to take it, experience it, and learn from it.

 

I cannot believe that the first semester of my sophomore year is already over. People really weren’t joking when they said that high school goes by fast, but college flies by. This semester I was really lucky to have such great teachers. It was my first semester that I took major courses, as I just declared English Education. I have learned a lot- specifically, from this class. Meeting Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays wasn’t always ideal, but turned out to be rewarding in the end. I got to fulfill my manifesto of learning something new every day when I went to this class.

I think that I was the most successful in getting the work for the class done. For most classes, I do assignments just to get the good grade. Rarely do I see their relevance to my life or future career. However, each assignment or blog that I did really taught me something. I loved writing the blogs in our class. I loved being able to write whatever came to my mind and be encouraged to voice my own opinion rather than conform to that of a textbook. The book clubs were great- I thoroughly enjoyed getting the opportunity to “relive” junior high by reading the book “Just Girls” with my book club. I pulled out new ideas from this book as well as from hearing other group’s findings. I am eager to apply them in the future when I am a teacher, or even use them as a student myself.

I learned so much in this class that I don’t know if I can fully debrief and unpack it in a simple blog. Going into this course I wasn’t too confident on what literacy really means. It is much more than the simple ability to read and write- it is the mechanics behind that, and how we communicate with one another. Reading novels and texts was once what was considered the practice of literacy and learning, but our generation has changed that definition drastically. I think as a future educator it is so important to acknowledge that literacy isn’t limited to the old fashion practices. We read and write so frequently, but it has just taken a different form. Although I don’t play video games, one take away from the gamer group that I got was the idea of failure not being shunned, rather being encouraged. This theory gives students the chance to learn from their mistakes and master a certain subject. We need to take into account that each student learns differently and no way is better than the other.

Before taking this course, I was on the train of being disgusted with where technology is taking us. I felt like essential parts of learning, playing, and growing up have been destroyed. The destruction was mainly attributed to things like social media, cell phones, or video games. I came out on the tail end of the generation that didn’t grow up with this, and so I saw a huge difference in myself versus those younger than me. This class taught me that just because the technological generation is different, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it is bad. It means that we need to find new ways to reach out to our students, to relate to them, and to encourage them to learn.

I think the biggest thing that we discussed that I will apply in my classroom is the idea of a repeat, like in a video game. One of my junior high teachers did this, and I remember having to relearn the material in order to retake a test. However, I think that this method is both effective as well as encouraging. It shows students that it is okay to fail and makes them more apt to learning and the process of it. Instead of getting frustrated when they don’t immediately comprehend a topic, they feel that a second chance is acceptable and deserved.

I am kind of bummed that this is my last blog. I have really enjoyed someone being forced to read my thoughts that made me feel valued as a student. I am certain that the things I learned will help me become a better teacher and contribute to the future of our society.

“End? No, the journey doesn’t end here.”

And the journey never ends for us. There are always new paths to take, new people that we include on our journey, and new ideas that change our resolve. I must say that this past semester has rocked every notion of education I have had before to its very core. For the first time ever I look at the new trend of ‘fanfiction’ as an avenue for expression, or that video games can truly change the world. I’ve never felt so sure about something I’ve believed in ever before until I took this class. For the first time, in a long time, I saw realization flash in someone’s eyes as I explained video game theory. In those moments I hushed realizing that I had changed someone’s views and strengthened my resolve in what I believed in. It was a semester of reading and breaking down things that changed everything I thought or understood about education.

I would start with Szwed but I’ll be honest when I say he wasn’t the one that changed my mind about education. In reality I would start with Deborah Brandt whose writing about sponsors changed everything about what access was to me. Voices and ideas now exist in an environment with the ability of total lock down (bills like SOPA and PIPA). This is where my views began to change as from then on my views of what literacy was changed drastically. It was furthered by the Ted talk and writings of Jane McGonigal whose voice and strength makes me believe this message of video games and how they can change the world, has ground.

The course itself had many aspects that I loved. This here, the blogs, was probably one of the most interesting things to do as an English major. At first I was confused because I was always so used to writing essays that writing blogs seemed so foreign to me, but as the semester continued forward I found them to be really enjoyable as areas of venting or reflecting about the reading. It just felt far more personal than just writing an essay. We were able to put our voices in these instead of just playing by the rules of a professor and learning how to play the game. This felt like building up from our own ideas and our own forms of structure.

I also really loved the group projects and how they operated as a form of test taking for us, yet were able to inherit the identity of masters of the subject we are studying by presenting it in front of others. This takes into account video game theory and identity when a student takes on the role of something else. In this case we are learning far more because we had to create these points of learning instead of being given points of learning to regurgitate like tests. I really enjoyed these as a new way to express what we had learned.

And so, here we are. Half a year later, many sleepless nights, too many gallons of coffee and energy drinks (that can’t be good for my health) and here we are. I would be lying if I didn’t say I hadn’t learned a lot. Honestly this has been the most hectic, fast-forwarding, exhausting, sleepless, years I’ve ever had. It has been a year, to be honest, of some nights thinking about giving up or just doing nothing, but this has been an incredible experience. It’s a year I would never give up for any other and its one that will be a staple in my life.

First off let me start by saying that this semester has been a blast.  I think that I have gotten more out of this class than any other here at csuc. Okay, now on to the actual reflection of what I have learned over the semester.

• There are different ways that people are literate. A person can be facebook literate but not twitter literate. It by no means mean that person is not literate, but literate in different ways.
• Literacy is an ever evolving entity. Literacy is its own being that has evolved over time. Starting from the understanding and practice of reading and writing to computer literacy, social literacy (memes, brands, movies, television, etc), and beyond. Literacy also evolves in the workplace. A person may start a job when they are young and have a certain set of literacy skills and by the time they are nearing the end of their career they have gained different sets of literacy skills, that they can use in and out of their place of work.
• Literacy takes sponsors, both visible and invisible. A sponsor can be a person, an institution such as a school, or the cultural society you are surrounded by. In order to have some of these sponsors it takes privilege. A sponsor that can give you access to ways of literacy that can better your future situation in live takes privilege. . . or luck but I wouldn’t count on that 100%.
• Gaming helps learning and literacy for all people, not just gamers. People really like games. Video, board, real life (sardines, hide and seek, etc), LARP, card games, the list goes on. Through book club I learned that gamers are more inclined to try harder levels, but not necessarily harder assignments in school. Why is that? The education system does not teach in a way that gamers can relate to. Their style of learning, while combined with ways that traditional educators decide to teach, has a different style all together, one that in possibly not fully understood.
• Finally, I learned possible ways to work my future classrooms that can work and engage future students. Seeing how this class was running I can see the benefits of having such a learning space, assignments, and self directed learning in a way that was beneficial to those involved.