My Digital Journey: Final Narrative

                                     

                  I have always loved languages. I grew up in a bilingual home in the Warwick suburbs. My mom is an immigrant from Guatemala and my dad is a transplant to Rhode Island from Pennsylvania. I am a simultaneous bilingual, learning English and Spanish at the same time, though my early accent when I spoke in English would indicate Spanish is my mother tongue. I distinctly remember a trilingual book I had at home about a young girl’s "Keys to Her Kingdom." It was in English in the first line of every page, with the second line being in French and the third in Spanish. Even at seven or eight years old, I loved to attempt the pronunciations of the French words, though I had never in my life been exposed to the French language. As a sophomore in high school, I reached my wit’s end when I had to take Spanish for the fifth year in a row so a couple other emergent bilinguals and I, each already fluent in a language other than English, petitioned our head of school to start a French class for us. We were given permission to self-teach until the school was able to find a teacher for us later that same year. I took French the rest of my high school career and it was my double major in undergrad which allowed me to study abroad for a semester in southern France and refine my French proficiency.  I would now consider myself an emergent trilingual.

                  Since I had been an emergent bilingual myself in my first three years of school and I was now trilingual, I pursued a career as a teacher of emergent bilinguals, otherwise known as English as a Second Language. I was fortunate enough to find a job teaching emergent bilinguals in Fall River, Massachusetts. Fall River as a school district is poorly funded and it was frustrating to me that I did not have the technology I wanted to use in my teaching available to me. I had a school-issued laptop and that was it, not even a projector because there weren't enough for everyone. It was frustrating since growing up I always had access to technology because my dad has always worked in Information Technology as the “computer guy.” I remember having a large monitor and computer set-up in our living room where I would play with “Paint,” play games off of floppy disks, fly airplanes simulators, and lived and died on the Oregon Trail. Even when we lived in San Diego for a few months while my dad was on a business trip, we had a computer. I remember sitting on my mom’s lap while we designed our dream home on an architectural program. As time went on, more and more technology was available to my family and me. We started watching movies projected onto the wall from a computer. I got my first laptop in high school, my first cellphone at 15 and each of us in my family has his or her own technology to use in the home. We sit in the house, all within 20 feet of each other, each of us on our computers and/or phones. While the art of conversation is not dead in our house, I have watched us become more and more reliant on technology and have known for a while, but not necessarily acted upon the fact that it “[does] not substitute for conversation” (Turkle, 2012).

                 Prensky would most likely label me a “digital native,” someone who is a “native speaker” of modern technology (2001, p. 1). I happen to disagree with his terminology because as Boyd states, it does not mean that I knew how to be "critical of the content they consume” (2014, p. 181). I certainly have not been. I was not explicitly taught to be. Anything my parents considered “bad” for me was censored by them, rather than teaching me to analyze and critique for myself, especially when it has such a strong influence in our society. Prensky also seems to make the assumption that because my generation is considered digitally native, that reading of traditional texts plummeted. According to him, “Today’s [in 2001] average college grads have spent less than 5,000 hours of their lives reading, but over 10,000 hours playing video games” (p. 1). I assume that he may think it could only get worse from there. I was 9 in 2001, the year this article was written. I have no exposure to traditional video games, even in my adult life. I spent most of my childhood with my nose in a book, and not on the computer. Having access to one did not mean that I was constantly on it.

                 Given my technological background, as a teacher I would consider myself to be a techno-traditionalist (McKenzie, 2005). I use GoogleDocs for my lesson plans, share many types of documents with my colleagues, collaborate on online forms with my colleagues, use my laptop on a daily basis for lessons, grading, submitting referrals and use my projector (which I got as a Christmas present from my IT dad) for lessons whenever possible. Even with limited technology in the classrooms, I would say that most of my colleagues are techno-traditionalists though I can certainly think of one or two that would be technocrats since they only use their laptops when they absolutely have to (such as for attendance or referrals) but use them and projectors on a very limited basis otherwise.

                 As a teacher of emergent bilinguals, regardless of the technology available to me and to them, I am driven by my “why.” As Simon Sinek says, “people don’t buy what you do, they buy why you do it” (2009). Without my “whys,” there would be no significance to my teaching and my teaching would only be a means to an end: a paycheck. No, the following are my core beliefs about why I do what I do:

1. Emergent bilinguals learn best when given time to language and translanguage - Hesson, Seltzer and Woodley (2014) write that “language” is a verb in that language is something you “practice” and not something you own or have. When we use English, we are languaging (note the -ing suffix) and if we are translanguaging, it means that we are using the linguistic features of more than one language. Translanguaging is the idea that everyone has one “linguistic repertoire” that society has broken down into “languages” depending on the linguistic features a speaker chooses. Allowing students to make use of their entire linguistic repertoire provides them with the tools they need to make sense of content in the classroom and negotiate meaning with their teachers and peers (p. 2-3).

2. Emergent bilinguals’ development of English progresses fastest when all teachers take responsibility - I am not the only one responsible for the language development of my school’s emergent bilinguals. Their English language development depends on their content teachers as well. I am unable to be with my students all day long to ensure their language development myself, therefore, content teachers bear the responsibility with me. The ESL teacher is the “expert” in language development and cannot be expected to know each content area and neither are the content teachers experts in language development, therefore it is imperative that content teachers collaborate with the ESL teachers, to ensure that there is language development throughout the day, allowing emergent bilinguals to language and translanguage all day. The Massachusetts Guidance (2017) states “ESL teachers, in collaboration with other content teachers, should continue to develop awareness of the language ELLs need to be able to process and produce in general education classes to reach high levels of performance. Likewise, general education teachers need to develop awareness and strategies to support the disciplinary language needs of ELL students” (p. 58)

3. Emergent bilinguals’ language learning depends on making content accessible - The education of our emergent bilinguals needs to be equitable. Native English speakers have the advantage of being such and are able to access content much more easily than non-native English speakers do. Therefore, in order for the education of emergent bilinguals to be equitable and accessible, it is the teachers’ job to ensure that emergent bilinguals have the tools they need to access their education. As quoted by
Garcia and Kleifgen (2010), Justice William O. Douglas wrote in the Lau v. Nichols case (1974), “There is no equality of treatment merely by providing students with the same facilities, textbooks, teachers and curriculum; for students who do not understand English are effectively foreclosed from any meaningful education…” (p. 30).

4. Emergent bilinguals deserve to be bilingual and biliterate. - I strongly believe that language is part of a person’s identity. I am easily able to be myself in either English or Spanish but, even though I’m proficient in French, it is still difficult for me to portray myself as myself in French because it is not a language I grew up with and easily identify with. Many programs focus on the development of English only and “[put] the English language in a sole position of legitimacy” (Garcia et al., 2008, p. 7) and instead we should be focusing on developing both languages so that they can “function in their home language as well as in English, their new language and that of school” (Garcia et al., 2008, p. 6).

                 With these core beliefs in mind, I am faced with a daily problem at school. I believe that all teachers of emergent bilinguals need to collaborate and by acting on this belief, the others will be fulfilled. However, I work with 70-plus students across grades four to eight, which amounts to 16 classroom/content teachers and three special education teachers. There is simply no time to be able to meet with them all on a weekly basis for sharing my expertise on language development with them. Without that collaboration time, my classroom teachers do not have access to all the scaffolds they could be putting in place in their classrooms, aside from those they learned in the RETELL (Rethinking Equity in the Teaching of English Language Learners) class required by Massachusetts to receive an SEI (Sheltered English Immersion) endorsement. I have so many that I want to share from undergraduate classes, graduate classes, and Professional Developments I have attended. It’s all in a large Tupperware storage bin in my bedroom as a mess of piles of paper. I had thought of putting together binders for each teacher with all the resources at my disposal but that seemed too overwhelming both for the teachers and myself. I put it on the back-burner until I could find a better solution.

                 I had planned on making these physical binders this summer but now that I have taken Digital Media Literacy, I have a much more efficient manner in which to share what I know and what I have. I had absolutely no idea that livebinders.com existed, allowing for the creation of a shareable, online “binder.” On this website, I can upload documents, images, websites, and videos, create tabs just like in physical binder with subtabs, even a cover page! Best of all, there is a sharing option. All I have to do is click share, get a link and share it with my colleagues and they will instantly have access to resources, scaffolds and advice directly from me. While the ideal is still to collaborate in person, being able to share my knowledge is a step towards that. I now have the beginnings of an online binder with online resources, key terminology, external websites and scaffolds, strategies and protocols broken down by language domain. Included in one of the first pages of the binder are my core beliefs. If teachers know why I made it and why I share it with them, they will (hopefully) be more likely to actively use it. Once I have more resources in it, I will be able to share and add to it. With this binder (that can go anywhere with me and teachers!), my colleagues and I will be able to select what is needed by our students in order to fulfill my other core beliefs: emergent bilinguals will be able to language and translanguage, content will be accessible and we will be working towards their bilingualism and biliteracy.

                 The creation of this online binder has started moving me from a techno-traditionalist to a techno-constructivist. I am not simply moving things from paper to something digital for my own use: I am sharing this with my colleagues so that it is a go-to resource for them too, to improve their pedagogy around teaching emergent bilinguals and in the hope that my core beliefs will resonate with teachers and inspire them to actively seek out pedagogical improvements. While I may still be a techno-traditionalist in some aspects, I am now also a techno-constructivist. Regardless of my colleagues’ positions on technology and regardless of whether they consider themselves digital natives or immigrants, I hope that my “why,” becomes an integral part of theirs.

Pecha Kucha: https://docs.google.com/presentation/d/e/2PACX-1vQp6tQ3eUku7GYERgvW4oUUxaI6PF3c-YZ8FemNeykYRCqiUOvVEHxytxrVQImzAro83EUoMTVBv73d/pub?start=true&loop=false&delayms=20000&slide=id.g3d428e84db_0_64 


Self-Assessment

References

Boyd, D. (2014). It’s complicated: The social lives of networked teens. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Garcia, O. & Kleifgen, J.A. (2010). Educating emergent bilinguals: Policies, programs, and practices for English language learners. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

Garcia, O., Kleifgen, J.A., & Falchi, L. (2008). From English language learners to emergent bilinguals. New York City, NY: Teachers College, Columbia University. Retrieved from https://ofeliagarciadotorg.files.wordpress.com/2011/02/ell-to-eb.pdf

Hesson, S., Seltzer, K., & Woodley, H.H. (2014). Translanguaging in curriculum and instruction: A CUNY-NYSIEB guide for educators. Retrieved from
http://www.nysieb.ws.gc.cuny.edu/files/2014/12/Translanguaging-Guide-Curr-Inst-Final-December-2014.pdf

Massachusetts Department of Elementary and Secondary Education (2017). Guidance on identification, assessment, placement and reclassification of English learners. Malden, MA. Retrieved from http://www.doe.mass.edu/ell/guidance/guidance.pdf

McKenzie, W. (2005). Multiple intelligences and instructional technology: A manual for every mind. 

(2nd Ed.) Eugene, OR: ISTE.

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants. On the horizon, vol 9 (5). p. 1-6.
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B-JcBFAuLc-0Z01KNkdIWjdsNk0/view

Sinek, S. (2009, September). How great leaders inspire action. Retrieved from
https://www.ted.com/talks/simon_sinek_how_great_leaders_inspire_action#t-795903

Turkle, S. (2012, April 21). The flight from conversation. The New York Times. Retrieved from
https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/opinion/sunday/the-flight-from-conversation.html

Digital Media Literacy Haiku

Pause to Analyze
Break the Glass to Change Mindset
Inspire Wonder

Tech vs. Conversation

What is the relationship between Turkle and Wesch? Do you see them as allies, or opponents in this discussion of new media and technology? 

Sherry Turkle’s article on “The Flight From Conversation” focuses heavily on the fact that we live in a time when we are almost co-dependent on our electronic devices, to the point where we have “sacrificed conversation for mere connection.” She writes how we always have a device on us, we can be in a roomful of other people and be engaging with them, but also engaging with a world outside that room. For example, I can be sitting in a Professional Development in my school building and pay attention (somewhat) to the presenter, but also be on my computer doing things unrelated to the PD. It’s to the point where we feel better about ourselves the more “connected” we are. I’m guilty of this. I might share something on Facebook, and check back regularly to see if it has been “liked.” The more people I’m connected with “like” it, the higher the rush of those feel-good endorphins. And we are not immune to that effect! Sometimes it's unintentional.  This is a real post I put up on Facebook, sharing my journey in controlling my OCD, with the intention of raising awareness of mental illness which I'm sure it did, but a side-effect of this post, whether I was looking for it or not, was feeling good about myself seeing the number of likes! That's not what I meant for it!

Wesch’s article “Anti-Teaching” focuses on how students do not see the significance of education in their lives and how this is a by-product of the institution called “school” and what teaching has become: dumping knowledge on students, rather than allowing them to explore, ask questions themselves and learn from each other and their experiences. Wesch writes that “meaning and significance are assured only when our learning fits in with a grand narrative that motivates and guides us” (p. 6).

In my opinion, Wesch and Turkle are both allies and opponents, depending on the perspective you take. I see them as allies in that students (and perhaps even teachers, too) are not being challenged to ask deep questions. Wesch says, “the best questions send students on rich and meaningful lifelong questions, question after question after question” but the kinds of questions students typically ask are about the formalities of the class: how to pass, what will be on the test, etc. (p. 5). Turkle says that because of technology, “we start to expect faster answers. To get these, we ask one another simpler questions.” They are allies in that they observe the people in their social spheres asking simpler questions that do not facilitate an exploration of the world around us, which in turn would lead to learning.

They are opponents, to my understanding, in that Turkle is seeing technology as detrimental to society. It is something we need to be more disconnected from in order to maintain meaningful relationships with those around us. We are missing out on a lot by constantly being on our electronic devices. She even ends her article with “So I say, look up, look at one another, and let’s start the conversation.” Wesch on the other hand, writes that he has used technology, including social media, in the classroom to kick-start conversations and prompt students to ask the types of questions he seeks (p. 6), contrary to Turkle’s statement that social media and connectedness is detrimental. Instead, he is using it as a tool.

I think that there needs to be a balance. Technology is of course a great tool we can use in educating our students. But, it can’t be the only tool or what we are teaching our students.

References

Turkle, S. (2012, April 21). The flight from conversation. The New York Times. Retrieved from
        https://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/22/opinion/sunday/the-flight-from-conversation.html


Wesch, M. (2010, August 5). Anti-teaching: Confronting the crisis of significance. Education

          Canada, p. 5-7. Retrieved from https://www.edcan.ca/articles/anti-teaching-confronting-the-                crisis-of-significance/

Let's Make Stuff Workshop

https://drive.google.com/open?id=11m-4wEc1hW0_CxxYlE5Y2AYFbYsJgNv4

I worked with Hayley and Dena for this project.  We had some initial trouble trying to come up with an idea to either inform or resist Disney/Princess culture but we eventually landed on portraying a black girl and a white girl, seeing the same scene in Cinderella, and showing the effect that it has on different girls.  Once we had an idea, it was much easier to go forward with the project, making the props and the script for a video.  Our video concluded with the question of what effects Disney culture is having on our younger generations.  In the classroom, we have to be aware of the media that our students are consuming so that we can teach them to be more critical of their media consumption as well as attempt to counter the effects that media has on them so that our students' social-emotional needs are being met.

LiveBinders Tutorial

Have you been wanting to organize all the paperwork, PD handouts, and lesson plans? LiveBinder is a digital way for you to organize all those piles of papers that LOOK chaotic on your desk, but somehow you know exactly where everything is.  It’s a great way to organize and manipulate the materials as well as make some room on your bookshelves and desk.

SETTING IT UP

1. Create your account at livebinder.com. 

2. When you are logged in, you will be brought to the homepage of your account. At the top, you can select “New Binder.” 

3. Describe the binder. You can make it public or private. If private and you want to share it with a specific set of people, you can create an access key for them to use. Create your binder! 

4. Take the tour!

Set up

Tour

GENERAL SETTINGS

1. Click settings at the top. You can change the name of the binder under the “Name” tab, make an access key for when you want to share a binder under the “Access” tab, change the colors of tabs and the background of the binder under the “Colors” tab. 

2. You can create a cover page for the binder by clicking the “Cover” tab and upload your own image or search on Flickr through the link they provide. 

3. Under the “Layout” tab, you can change the positioning of the tabs in the final product, whether you want them on the top or on the side, scroll or stacked. Make sure you click save!

TABS
1. The site automatically starts you off with 3 tabs. You can name the tabs by clicking in the white space. The red arrow by each tab gives you a variety of options including adding, deleting, clearing and moving tabs, as well as creating sub-tabs and changing tab colors.

2. You can add content to the tab by either adding a URL directly into it or clicking “Content” in the top menu bar. This gives you the choice of uploading documents directly from your computer or your drive, adding a text box from a few choices of templates, videos and images.

3. You can also use the buttons at the top of the webpage to manipulate the tabs within the page.

VIEWING
When you want to see the page as it will appear outside of “edit” mode, click “View” at the top right, then click “Present.” All your changes should be present there.

SHARING
1. By clicking “Share” at the top right of hte page, you can choose how you want to share your binder. You can share by simply giving a person the link, or you can share through other means such as email, Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

2. Viewers can leave comments if they create an account and log in.

                                           

American Girl

Article Read: “Marketing American Girlhood” by Elizabeth Marshall, p. 131 - 135

It was a rite of passage in my family to get an American Girl doll from the grandparents when you turned 7. Every girl on my dad’s side of the family got one. I distinctly remember ripping paper off a long rectangular box, revealing that my grandparents had bought me a Josefina doll, the one Hispanic doll sold by the American Girl brand. With her I got several books and a few accessories. I remember that, even at 7 years old (though I couldn’t articulate it), I was thrilled about having a doll that I could identify with, being Hispanic myself. Eventually I got other books that were marketed for other American Girl dolls and feeling like I learned a lot about their lives in the era they were born in and I could still probably spew some random things at you that I learned from the books. I learned a lot, right? 

WRONG. 

Marshall writes that “American Girl products warrant our attention and cannot be dismissed as innocent and/or innovative girlhood materials” because it is all “under the guise of education” (p. 135). American Girl, from reading the this article, I would say is very insidious in its marketing strategies and how it “teaches” girls history lessons. On the surface level, American Girl appears to be this corporation that seeks to teach girls history lessons and be able to connect to girls in history (p. 131). 

But the girls are only placed in historical contexts, they do not participate in the context. Rather than participating in the history that American Girl purports to teach, the history only happens to them (if at all! Oftentimes it’s just a time period they happen to live in). And regardless of the time period, the girls are all portrayed as having “limited independence and [emphasized] ‘good girl’ behaviors” (p. 132) rather than agents of change which would empower girls of today. Rather than using passive characters, American Girl could have instead used real-life girls as their dolls who were agents of change in their era (p. 133).

In addition to the girls being passive characters in the stories, the books are subtle ads for the American Girl products through their descriptions of the things the girls own, many, if not most, of which are sold in the catalog. 

Worst of all, however, is how “white-washed” the history presented in the narratives are. The books included historical information at the back for little girls to read and supposedly learn history. But the stories, specifically with Kaya and Josefina, are placed in time periods before significant conflicts between Native peoples and white people. What angered me the most (and makes me want to throw out my precious Josefina doll), is a section that Marshall quotes from the Meet Josefina book

          Although Josefina would never have imagined it when she was 9 years old, she would one day 

          be an American-- and the cultures and traditions of the New Mexican settlers and their Pueblo 

          neighbors would become part of America, too (Tripp, 1997, p. 83).

ALL OF THIS IMPLIES THAT LOSING YOUR LAND AND SOVEREIGNTY IN ORDER TO BECOME AMERICAN IS A “BENEFIT.”

This is all very problematic! If we want to teach girls to be agents of change, we have to give them role models to look up to and historical contexts in which these role models participated. Otherwise, American girlhood is defined only by being passive participants to whom history happens, furthering a patriarchal society in which girls are limited players. 

References

Marshall, E. (n.d.) Marketing American girlhood. In E.M. Editor & O.S. Editor (Eds), Rethinking 

          popular culture and media (p. 131-135) (2nd Ed.) Milwaukee, WI: Rethinking Schools, Ltd. 

   Tripp, Valerie. (1997). Meet Josefina. Pleasant Company Publications.

Disney and Frozen

What is your relationship to Disney and animated children’s culture? What role did these texts play in your life as a child, if any? In that of any children you share time with? How do your memories challenge or reflect Christensen’s claims? How does Frozen meet or challenge your memories of princess culture?

It’s funny to be asked what my relationship to Disney is because rather than it being “positive” or “influential,” there was actually a giant, uncrossable pit between Disney and me. Having been born in 1992, one would think that Disney was a staple in my family’s household. But as I mentioned in my last blog post, my father is a pastor: a strict, conservative, Southern Baptist pastor. Disney was absolutely not allowed because it was “fantasy,” “witchcraft,” and “sinful.” I did watch The Lion King in 3rd grade at school on field-day (the only movie I watched in school that I can actually recall, most likely due to the fact that it was forbidden in my home!). But actually independently watching something related to Disney in my free time? Not until I was 15 and had my own laptop, giving me my first access to Disney; I watched Beauty and the Beast.

Because I grew up most of my life without the influence of Disney, I don’t think that I was as susceptible to the implications of the ideologies presented in Disney movies since I was 15 by the time I started watching so I’m not sure as to whether my memories either challenge or reflect Christensen’s claims in Unlearning the Myths that Bind Us. I never noticed for myself or critiqued the ideologies presented in Disney films, though they are certainly there. Perhaps I should categorize myself amongst the students that don’t know how to critique the media they consume, as mentioned by Christensen when she writes “Young people, unprotected by any intellectual armor, hear or watch these stories again and again…” (p. 176). Whoops. Guess I answered that question after all… And through my parents’ censorship of what I consumed, they inadvertently created a “generation living by rules and attitudes they never question” (p. 178), I never learned to critique because anything that truly deserved critiquing was censored for me.

Frozen met some of my memories of princess culture. There was still a damsel in distress (Anna), a man to save her and both Elsa and Anna are slim, hour-glass figures with white skin, wear dresses and live in castles. However, there are some key contrasts to the typical princess in older Disney movies. Elsa never needed a man to save her. Instead she saved herself with only a little bit of help from Anna, her sister. Even Anna’s “knight in shining armor,” was different in that he wasn’t royalty and he was actually quite a humorous and independent fellow who was by no means looking to save anyone (quite the contrary, Anna had to assert her authority in order to get him to help her). The villain, Hans, was not the obvious villain until the very end unlike other movies where we know instantly whom we should hate (Gaston, Ursula, witches). Rather, Hans was handsome and one is led to believe throughout the movie that he is the knight in shining armor. Watching Frozen with a critical lens really opened up my eyes to the ideologies society holds valuable and although it starts to move away from several of them, such as the damsel in distress, there is still lots of work to be done.



Reference:

Christensen, L. (n.d.) Unlearning the myths that bind us. In E.M. Editor & O.S. Editor (Eds), Rethinking popular culture and media (p. 175-186) (2nd Ed.) Milwaukee, WI: Rethinking Schools, Ltd.