Wiki and Blog Blog

What is the pedagogical value for asking students to write in public spaces?

I am of two minds about this. On the one hand, I think that there is value in asking students to write in public spaces because it will help teachers “teach rhetorical situations” that will help students “understand writing as the decontextualized product of a single, isolated worker” (Lundin 432). I agree with Lundin on many levels, but I think that teaching with blogs and wikis can be a bit complicated in a 101 classroom. However, because it is (in many cases) an introduction to writing and rhetorical skills, I think that using the mediums will require a great deal of preparation and constant explaining of each medium. Although it may reduce anxiety about writing for the public, I think that it is important for students to be comfortable writing for a shared audience before other people (who will and can be mean) critique their work. I often think that some students will be scared by negative experiences with public writing in the initial stages of their academic careers. So, I think that using public writing beyond English 101 may be more useful (and I am writing with the assumption that public means that anyone outside of the people enrolled in the classroom can view the information).

What successes or failures have you (or do you foresee having) by using wikis or blogs?

I admit that this was rather premature of me, but I attempted to use blogs my second semester of teaching. Although I feel as if I have more a theoretical understanding of how to use blogs at this point, I am not too comfortable with using blogs in a 101classroom. I do think that “weblongs facilitate sharing and building community” as evident from our Teaching with Technology class (Lowe and Williams 7). However, I am not sure how the use will fare in 101, especially given my experience teaching with them as students really did not engage with one another. It was also daunting to have to read 52 blogs each week. Essentially, I have to find a better way to use blogs in 101.

How would you overcome technological barriers using blogs or wikis?

It is good to have sessions that focus on the technology. I know that some teachers may disagree with me, but I usually take a class period to show students how to use the Maimon handbook. I think that the same needs to be done to help students understand mediums before they are asked to perform in them. So, I would do some type of demonstration and then walk students through setting up accounts and posting information on the medium.

If you were to use public writing in your own classroom, how would you go about doing so?

At this point, I am really interested in using Twitter in the classroom. I am becoming more drawn to wikis for brainstorming, too. I think that it would be a great way for students to compose and think about the early stages of their papers. I would try, however, to control the site so that at a certain point, students will only be able to see their own writing (not sure that this can be done though).

Me, Facebook, and Teaching

Post an image of one of your social networking profiles (twitter, facebook, etc). Rhetorically analyze/break down the identity you've constructed on this site. In this analysis, you should discuss your audience.

As I look at my facebook profile, I see myself as a family oriented person who likes to help people. I have my religious affiliation there as well as 6 groups that I'm apart of. My quotes listed are from Hebrews and Dr. Maya Angelou. I also have a link for people who are interested in helping with Haiti relief through Wyclef Jean's organization. My favorite quote is a portion of a Negro spiritual. I also have my e-mail address available. This profile portrays a small piece of the southern person that I am...

I use my facebook site to network with new people. Sometimes, I become friends with people that I have met before but I did not (will not) get to know in person. So, essentially, my profile is mostly used to keep in touch with family and friends that I do no live close to. One side of my family even used facebook to get attention about the family reunion that we had this past August. Very recently, students and community people from my hometown have requested to be my friend as well. I also have a lot of people from my undergrad (professors/students) and my sorority sisters and fraternity brothers who are friends.

I have included limited information about myself mostly because the people who are my friends already know me (and if they don't, then, I guess that they could ask). I did notice, however, that I have 360 pictures that I've been tagged in, but I do not make those pictures available to anyone else. Vie notes that, "Facebook force (s) instructors to confront and challenge the labels placed on individuals in academia; student, teacher, administrator, and so on. Individuals behaviors in these sites may force us to reenvision what it means to be an academic today, what a classroom looks like, or what good writing entails" (20). As an scholar and as a regular person, I don't feel like I can say some things online, especially in a status. I have former and current teachers as friends as well as older people from my community.

At any rate, I agree with Vie in some respects because I do censor myself in this space. I do wonder about the degree to which my identity on facebook could mesh and interrupt my identity in the classroom if I used it ( and as students can find me and see some information if they chose to do so too). I think that this happens a great deal because most of the people that I know who use Facebook in the classroom do so under a separate account. So, there is a bit of personal space that I think teachers should not expose in an online setting (that can be taken out of context, especially in a photo). However, I am trying to be convinced by Vie's claim that "compositions [need] to begin looking at online social networking sites through an academic lens to examine the complexities these sites showcase and the ramifications they may hold for pedagogies and our field" (21). I think that she has a point here as many things have been looked at through an academic lens that were not necessarily created for such, i.e. some films, novels, youtube videos(Dodson in particular), and others. Thus, we are able to find pedagogical reasoning for critically analyzing these texts. I see no problem with looking to advertisements on social networking sites to do the same. My worry is that profiles and profile pictures will be analyzed as well, which will create a new type of judging/silencing/categorizing that plays into the same types of structures that some of us are trying to work against. Is it possible to separate the personal from the pedagogical if we use social networking spaces in classes? And to what degree are teachers and students willing to share that much of themselves with a class?

Gee and Learning

Consider how you might take a few of Gee’s learning principles and apply them to the composition classroom without the use of video games. Think about the learning principles that might be applied to assignments or the classroom in general.

In a composition classroom, I think that it is always good to have common goals for the semester in general and for each assignment. I always ask myself “what are you trying to accomplish with this assignment?” This question helps me to put things into perspective. In a similar vein, I think that Gee provides some useful ideas on how to create realistic goals for a class. I have chosen four that I think are feasible and attainable in a 16 week period. The four principles that I chose, along with a brief description of how I would use them, are as follows:

Active, Critical Learning Principle: All aspects of the learning environment (including the ways in which the semiotic domain is designed and presented) are set up to encourage active and critical, not passive, learning.

The Active, Critical Thinking Principle is one that I could use to talk about writing in general. Using it to begin each writing assignment would teach students the importance of engagement; it would also show them that they have a goal/purpose with all types of writing.

Multimodal Principle: Meaning and knowledge are built up through various modalities

(images, texts, symbols, interactions, abstract design, sound, etc.), not just words.

The Multimodal principle will help me to do what Cynthia Selfe speaks about in terms of meaning making in different modalities. I could use this principle to talk about genre and audience.

Transfer Principle: Learners are given ample opportunity to practice, and support for, transferring what they have learned earlier to later problems, including problems that require adapting and transforming that earlier learning.

The third principle is important because I do think that teachers should have appreciation for the different backgrounds and knowledge bases that students will bring to the class. This principle will help in terms of providing an open space that will help students to develop ethos as writers. In other words, the transfer principle will teach students that they are indeed writers that have something to say.

Affinity Group Principle: Learners constitute an “affinity group” that is, a group that is bonded primarily through shared endeavors, goals, and practices and not shared race, gender, nation, ethnicity, or culture.

The Affinity Group principle could facilitate class success as it speaks to community building and listening. It is important for a class to be able to not only listen to the teacher, but to actively listen to other peers as well. Listening is a sign of respect, really, and I think that this principle would promote a type of needed decorum in the classroom.

My thoughts about Live Chat on Angel

Describe how the chat went for you. What did you enjoy? What drove you mad? And what would you do as an instructor if you chose to use a space such as this?

• For me, the Live Chat on Angel was frustrating. There was just too much going on that I had to resort to Rovai's conversation about lurking. I found lurking to be comfortable in this space because 1.) when I typed something, it seemed irrelevant or 2.) things were just moving to quickly for any type of engagement (so, I could not really focus on one comment for too long). Although I commented a few times during the chat, I found lurking to be my most viable option.
• Moreover, Faigley's discussion relates to my (our) experience on the Chat as it moves us from a current-traditionalist mode to a new rhetoric platform; he mentions that the text and the teacher become “decentered” in InterChange. He also talks about this idea of equal exchange within the online system. After engaging with the Live Chat, I began to think about Faigley’s online discussion form. It's really crazy to me that I am about to say this (because I'd like to believe that I'm a proponent of new rhetoric) but I think that the teacher as "decentered" greatly depends on the medium and the purpose of the assignment. So, I don't think that new rhetoric should be excersied all of the time. I think that teachers much strike a nice balance and that is what I hope to do as an instructor using Wysocki's idea of "new media."
• As a person who is used to face-to-face interaction in a variety of different ways, then, I don't think that I can afford to try to make the online space something that it is not...and I think that we tried to do that by attempting to focus in our discussion in Live Chat. Simply, I think that Live Chat would be useful for team building (collaborative projects) where small groups of students could brainstorm; I could see myself using Live Chat in this capacity.
• Also, I am reminded of the multimodal event that Cynthia Selfe and Doug Hesse engaged in at CCCC last year. While watching it in Dr. Monroe's class last year, the Live Chat seemed to work well when there was a major faciliator (via Skype) and the chat function was used to comment on the discussion. Although there were many things going on at once during the multimodal event (video, chat, phone), there seemed to be some focus...I don't think that there was any real "decentering." I do think, however, that what we want to do is bring the classroom to the internet...I don't know if that can really happen in a place like Live Chat ...

Response to Peterson (with images)

Represent your experiences/perceptions of online learning with 3(ish) picture/symbols/etc. and briefly explain how your choices relate to Peterson’s three key issues.

Teacher Role:
Peterson notes that some composition specialists think about online education as “decentered, thus inviting students to become co-constructors of knowledge in the classroom” (375). I am not sure if I buy into this concept, but I like Peterson’s discussion of how binary thinking will lead us nowhere. So, thinking about the quote above, this picture of a table comes to mind as the students and teachers are able to co-construct a space that will be comfortable for both parties. They are all able to “come to the table” to talk about needs and wants in the virtual space (and I thought that the orange slices add a nice touch).

Educational Goals:
The author also highlights information from Sharon Crowley noting that, “any time a new population has been admitted to higher education, a learning crisis has been identified (or constructed) due to the challenges posed by the outsiders to the traditional structure of the university” (378-79). I think that it is interesting that she uses the word constructed because it speaks to hegemony (in my eyes). Nonetheless, issues of access come up again. Peterson alludes to Selfe a great deal here to validate her claims about nontraditional students and questions of access. I chose this picture to represent educational goals because I do think that it is a structure that has fewer people at the top who make the decisions.

Student Learning:
Peterson’s discussion about how online education is teacher-centered makes great sense as it models many state and federal programs. Even more, many administrators in our own academic systems make rules and regulations for faculty, staff, and students to follow with little feedback from those who will be impacted by the decisions. Thus, Peterson brings up some important points pertaining to student’s feelings of isolation and the potential lack of communication with teachers in the virtual space (381). I hope that these feelings can be alleviated by some kind of merger between students, teachers, and administration...that we move away from the image that I mention in the education section to a more inclusive model. This image of arrows remind me of student learning. Each arrow represents a student because most students have similar goals (to obtain an education), but they have different modes or ways to reach their goals.

Note: All pictures were pulled for google images.

Response to Lessing's Remix

First, provide at least TWO questions about/around/surrounding Lessig you want to discuss in class (realizing your peers may respond as well). Second, and this is purposefully very open, what do you think so far of Lessig's points?

Question 1: How will the merger between RO and RW change the way that we approach the teaching of writing? Will we work to add to Selfe’s idea of composing in different modalities with a sprinkle of what Johnson-Eilola speaks about in regards to synthesis/articulation?

Question 2: In his discussion about RW as important, Lessing says, “It is the history of literacy --- the capacity to understand, which comes from not just passively listening, but also from writing” (106). To me, Lessing gives much credit to writing, but what about listening? What about hearing? As teachers and future teachers, what do we really count as literacy?

Lessing’s discussions about RO (read only) and RW (read/write) cultures are provocative because he brings up so many relatively current online spaces that participate in what he calls “sharing economies.” From Flickr to Wikipedia, Lessing outlines how people use these spaces, “people participate in the economy are terms not centered on cash. In each, the work that others might share is never shared for the money” (172). His reasoning is that people simply want to; these people have a desire to be intellectually simulated and sharing helps to curve the craving (173). I am not sure that I buy this idea of intellectual stimulation. It sounds more like control to me (and I don’t mean it in a bad way). Really, I think that those who are able to change or add to a database in a significant way are trying to control how they are viewed. They are trying to leave a digital mark or footprint for others to see. I guess that if we think about the function of academia, particularly at a research university, we work to gain some type of footing, too. We are told to present at conferences, to try to publish, and to make a name for ourselves. I’m sure that we are here for intellectual stimulation, too, but that is not all. In other words, I think that Lessing is being a bit modest with this idea of sharing communities. Even if there is no immediate monetary gain, people participate for more than just intellectual stimulation (or we could say that they participate for different types of stimulation).

The chapter that begins with hybrid economies (ones that marry to commercial and the sharing) is interesting as well. One economy cannot exist without the other, Lessing notes, but the differences between the two have to remain the same. One example that he provides is YouTube. I found it thought-provoking that he quotes Tim O’Reilly saying that YouTube’s fame “wasn’t because [people] thought it was cool. It was because YouTube figured out better how to make it viral. Viral is about making it serve the people’s own interest, so that they’re participating without thinking that they’re participating” (qtd. in Lessing 224). So, this idea of thinking, but not, is intriguing to me. Does this mean that people who participate are passive users? Has the notion of thinking been remixed? Is a certain type of thinking only relegated to those who can create/maintain the interface (I am totally thinking of Selfe and Selfe…and Gramsci here). What, then, does critical thinking mean?

Week 5 Post

First, do your best to sum up what you see as the key arguments from these three readings. Second, see if you can make any connections between these key arguments and A) Weinberger, B) any other course readings we've done.


After reading Johnson-Eilola’s piece about symbolic-analytic work/fragmentation/articulation, I have decided to experiment with my blog. The bullet points will serve as my short summaries of the key arguments for the three texts that we’ve read for this week. The rest of my prose will be my attempt at making connections to our previous course readings.

 Johnson-Eilola’s piece, "The Database and the Essay: Understanding Composition as Articulation,” works to show how writing is social and the ways in which intertextuality informs our writing practices. The author posits that articulation theory and symbolic analytic work should be used to explain writing in tangible ways (not as just ideas or abstractions). Johnson-Eilola goes on to talk about how capitalism in regards to copyright/intellectual property has become apart of academia that cannot be denied.


 Sorapure’s article, "Web Literacy: Challenges and Opportunities for Research in a New Medium," speaks about the need for teachers to teach students how to understand, interact, and compose in different modes, particularly when it comes the World Wide Web. The author provides reasons for why students should be permitted to use the Web as a primary source to broaden perspectives about the Web’s potential as a research tool. She also discusses how students should have rhetorical awareness and how the mode impacts the message being sent.


 Sidler’s piece, "Web Research and Genres in Online Databases: When The Glossy Page Disappears," outlines five steps to help teachers encourage and provide meaningful ways to teach students about online research. The author explains how teaching metaphors for research on the World Wide Web could help students become more familiar with how the research process works in academia. She notes that students could look to the Web as a type of “textual marketplace” in which they can shop or evaluate different merchandise.

For me, the three readings coincided with Weinberger in different and important ways. The most significant was Johnson-Eilola article. Her work is relatable to Weinberger’s idea about knowledge and fragmentation. Weinberger notes that “Indeed, we are making knowledge our new currency. But everything touching knowledge and everything knowledge touches is being transformed … Is knowledge being fragmented? Are we being fragmented along with it (200)? This sentiment speaks to Johnson-Eilola’s claim about intertextuality and how writing is very much a social act. Although this notion of fragmentation is often pitched as a postmodern argument (which Johnson-Eilola alludes to) I think that it is important to discuss how interconnected writing is to the social, the political, the economic, and the personal. Even Weinburger speaks of knowledge as currency (as quoted above), and Johnson-Eilola’s writes extensively on how intellectual property battles have become more economic than ever.

Sorapure’s article parallels Adam’s Bank’s discussion in Race, Rhetoric, and Technology and other writers that we have encountered, especially when she says “The Web is unfortunately like the typical academic library, and like most of academia, in that it reflects and perpetuates inequalities of language, nationality, ethnicity, gender, and class. To these biases, the Web adds a heavy dose of capitalist values and consumerism” (348). Sorapure, then, brings up a systemic problem in academia that infiltrates the core of our studies. The issue of critical/meaningful access comes up (in my mind) and the ways in which capitalism (and the other isms that fuel it) cannot be dismissed from how we think about any of the issues that she outlined in the quote.


Sidler’s piece reminded me much Selfe and Selfe’s argument about the interface as a map of capitalism and privilege. Sidler talks about power and how it “comes from the use of space, and even the power ‘to control textual space’ … changing the contexts with which documents are reproduced and as such, the possibilities such texts may have”’ (352). This idea of power, then, controls how certain information is presented and defined in a virtual space. Sidler wants students to use metaphors for understanding their position in a virtual world by looking at themselves as consumers, as people who can shop to evaluate the sources within the online structure.

The connections that I see with these readings all point back to Weinberger’s idea of miscellany/fragmentation/metadata. However, in order to really make strides to see how these things work, I think that our readings are forcing us to confront how capitalism (and other isms that fuel it) work to exclude many demographics. Weinberger talks about how sharing knowledge is important to reaching an understanding, but what if all ideas about what constitute knowledge are not heard? Well, there is a problem. He notes that organizing knowledge will be varied, “Some ways of organizing it—of finding meaning in it---will be grassroots; some will be official. Some will be small groups; some will engender larger groups; some will subvert established groups. Some will be funny; some will be tragic. But it will be the users who decide what the leaves mean” (230). This would be a great idea, a democratic thought in many ways. But, it seems to me that what Weinberger brings up is a continuation of a hierarchy that excludes many voices. I think that we have to be optimistic as teachers about what is happening, but at the same time, we have to be real, too.