Inquiry Blogs: The Real Question

One thing that I’ve given serious thought to because I saw the movie Freedom Writers ages ago and I have a Hollywood image of how powerful it could end up being to build an ideal classroom environment is, of course, keeping a daily write journal. Another thing that makes me want to explore journals in the classroom is that I’ve recently been tricked into picking up journaling by someone who gets paid to talk. An article from Julia Cameron’s The Artist’s Way about something called morning pages was thrusts onto me, and after reading it I figured I’d give it a go, because why not. I don’t follow all the directions, but essentially, you’re meant to write 3 pages by hand first thing when you wake up to get the creative juices flowing and the cobwebs cleared out for the day. I don’t write it longhand because, well, it’s 2019. But otherwise, I find it really helpful when I engage with it at doing just what I was told it would do, and it’s definitely shaped how I write a considerable amount in a far less considerable amount of time.

Like the example blog that seems to be addressing journaling that was linked on a resource page, I too have too many things in the running for my attention in this blog. There are so many things that I want to know more about that I mean to try to incorporate into my classroom, so deciding on what I plan to do for this blog has been a tough one.

Of course, I have to consider my field work and what experience I have with high school aged children in my life, and that makes me want to explore using multimodality more often and offering it as a choice that can be made on any project. But, I took an entire course on that not too long ago, so I’m not sure I would be willing to devote more blogging to it right now (even though in honesty, it’s probably the single most helpful thing that I can imagine to get more students to engage with course work). There’s a lot of potential with multimodality. It allows for a lot of choice for students and it engages them with technology, which are both likely to get you that precious student buy-in that I keep hearing about.

Hang on a second.

Not to slam on the brakes of your internal reading voice, but I believe my writing what you’ve just read has led me to a painfully obvious resolution to my now silly dilemma. Blogs are multimodal journals. For my inquiry blog I’ll be exploring the use of blogs in the classroom. For anyone that knows me or has read anything I’ve written, I’m sure you’re shocked at the slight meta level that blogging for a classroom about blogging for a classroom has about it, but it does honestly remove the need to choose between the two.

What I already know about blogging is expressed below this in previous blog posts and above this very sentence as I described (as vaguely as possible) what I know about journaling and multimodal composition. A few things that I’d like to know going forward is how to effectively set up a blogging platform that might be able to stay in a closed loop for my classrooms (so it can provide the level of privacy that the classroom walls do), how to ensure that students that may have less access to technology have a chance to participate with the blogs, and probably a ton more that I haven’t even considered yet. I'm not sure right now what resources I'll be using to further research this outside of the book I mentioned earlier, the internet, and perhaps even an instructor that has integrated blogging into their classrooms well. This is about twice as long as this has to be (I mean, if it had to be any length, but, as you may recall, this is certainly not required) so I’m done, for now. Thanks for your time.

this is a digital notepad. it's a metaphor.

Welcome Back

Hey there folks, I'm still James Thomas, and I'm still blogging entirely of my own free will. I’ve put below this post one warning not to proceed, and if you’re reading this you’re probably in my blogging group or just really lost on the internet. I’m currently enrolled in a Currins 545 apparently inaccurately titled “Reading in Content Areas: Middle, Junior, and Senior High School.” As someone that often allows my learning to spill over into my very personal and voluntary blogging, it’s likely that any post following this one for some time may be related to what I learn there, so be ready for that. For now, though, here’s a picture of my two cats, Cat (the mostly white one) and Charles. Also, a link for your clicking pleasure. 

Whoa Now, Slow Down!

Past this point on this blog (a blog that has definitely been created out of ambition and not as a result of force) is content from a previous stage in my life. In that stage I was a different person, doing different courses, and addressing different topics. If you continue reading, I can make no guarantees about the quality and relevance of the information. 

Final Required Blog Post

So, I have a confession to make. I haven't been entirely honest with you (my audience of 2) about the purpose of this blog and how it came to be. The truth is, it definitely was a required blog, and all of the posts were also required. Now that that weight is off my shoulders, I'd like to take a moment to reflect on the content of the blog because, well, it's required. Reflection has always been the hardest part of any composition process for me, and I'm sure this will be no exception. We've been asked (we is myself and other students in my class for the internet archaeologists that will inevitably  stumble upon this some day) to reflect on the posts we've made on our blogs and decide which posts best fit the categories of "professionalism, design, creativity, and people’s choice (as defined as a class)."

All of the posts I'm going to address will be able to be found under this one so long as the meaning of the word under or the default layout of this blog doesn't change, but I'll also be including links in case your scroll wheel or space bar is broken.

For professionalism, I'm going to go with my first blog post titled Smartphones and Social Media can position a class in the Real World. I'll pick that post because it's the least unprofessional, not that any posts are immediately unprofessional though. It was early in my blogging career, and my mind hadn't yet been corrupted with the notion that I can write something relevant and then ramble to get credit for the posts.

For design I'll have to settle on What Does Multimodal Even Meme? this one is mostly because of the fact that I designed something for the post. Though it may be small, I actually had to design that 1st class meme you'll see if you click that link (or scroll down just a tiny bit, it's just below this one). I suppose that makes it my most well designed post. I'm not sure I'm doing this right, but who cares?

As far as creativity, for me the most obvious answer is Getting Drunk on Writing. I felt pretty creative just rambling on, pouring my actions out as words in a blog post in real time to create the post. It's probably technically the least creative in that aspect, because it required such a small amount of actual creativity and was just a documenting of movement in its own creation, but again, who cares if I'm doing this wrong?

After all this self reflection, we've (same we as before, please try to pay attention) been tasked with picking a blog that best satisfies the categories established by the people (this people is the aforementioned we). I'm going to go with Maggie's Blog for obvious reasons if you just click that link (this time you can't just scroll down, turns out that's an entirely different website). Most important in my decision making process was voice, and I couldn't really care less about the other categories the people established (though her blog performs exceptionally by those standards as well). Other categories the people set are categories that could probably be achieved well by a program designed to use relevant images or have "engaging media" and post a ton of videos, but voice is probably not something computers are at the level of creating on their own. So, before society is overrun by Skynet, go read Maggie's blog and experience some human voice.

Also, images are required, so here's the first entirely original image to be posted on this blog. It's a screenshot of the blog. I hope you enjoy it.

What Does Multimodal Even Meme?

I’m going to take a moment and be more vulnerable than I have before on this blog. Multimodal compositions are painful. Their production (and even being sure what is and isn’t one) is very outside my comfort zone. I missed a previous post that I could have done because it also focused on multimodal things, and those sorts of things are apparently scary. The internet defines multimodality as “The use or availability of several different modes, methods, systems, etc.” (en.oxforddictionaries.com), and as you can tell by that very clear and precise definition, a lot of things are probably multimodal. But how multimodal is multimodal enough? If I use my computer to type half of this blog post, and then seamlessly transfer to typing on my phone, have I accomplished multimodality by using multiple systems, though? My computer has Word (where I’m currently typing) and my phone doesn’t, so I’d be forced to use something else to continue my composition. Maybe my notes app? Unfortunately for me, this is likely not multimodal enough. Maybe just a regular run-of-the-mill meme with a picture and some texts pasted over it is on that line of enough? That also takes my phone and many other methods than just typing words, because there’s no way I’m going to make a meme that’s as outdated as the ones https://imgflip.com/memegenerator suggests I make on their home page (though I'm sure they're very helpful in actually producing memes). No one’s seen the Philosorapter in ages (they’re extinct), and Chuck Norris hasn’t been funny since 2007 (though, I suppose there’s potential he could swing back around (that’s a roundhouse kick joke, for the uninformed)). Anyway, I’ll have to see what sort of memes are doing well today, so standby.

Okay, don’t read the next part for about 15 minutes, that’s how long I was gone. I imagine memes have real names in whatever community just loves memes, but I don’t know what those names are, so I’ll just do what I can to explain them. A few that seem to be doing okay today are Charlie Day playing his role in It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia standing by a wall he has strung out a conspiracy on, the boyfriend distracted by a passerby meme, and “You vs the guy she tells you not to worry about.” I can’t stress enough here that I have no idea what I’m doing, so the following attempt at a meme that I’ll try to pass off as multimodal text should be extraordinary, as all things I produce are.

I'd like to thank twitter user @pixelatedboat for posting the meme she told me not to worry about, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia for having such an outrageous character for the internet to latch onto so I could use it later, and her, for telling me not to worry about that other meme.

What an experience. The picture really guides what the words can say, because you expect something outrageous from Pepe Silvia (I've learned recently that's the name of the Charlie Day meme) as well as having to have contrast because of "you vs what she tells you not to worry about." Appropriation is the real meat of memes, because without a TV series to take a crazy character from or previous memes having been popular and already having an established meaning On The Line, they would just be pictures. I suppose the real challenge is in the production of new memes, and I honestly don't know enough about internet culture to be able to work toward making something new that would be popular enough to be categorized as a meme, so I'm happy I was able to appropriate nearly all my work other than a single sentence from other sources.

As for amplifying learning, I don't know where this would fall. This surely invites the creator to learn more about the culture that the memes exist in. It makes me question what the memes are outside of my culture, and even if I would recognize them as funny. There may not be a lot that can be taught about ELA through this particular multimodal form, but there's certainly room for learning around it in other arenas. Promoting civic engagement is easy through memes, actually. Though what I created doesn't exactly have a call to action, a lot of memes have subtle calls and function like political artwork used to in the thing we used to call "newspapers." There's also a lot to learn about tolerances in other nations, like which memes are illegal in Russia, and what sort of liberties are being taken away from The People when those sorts of things are regulated and outlawed. Perhaps there's more to memes than I initially considered, which of course makes them less approachable.

Writing Coach "experience" - An Exercise in Patience

If this were a required blog (which it isn't) and it had required posts (which it certainly would never) it's possible that this post would have been required some number of days ago. It's also possible that I would have been required to write a blog entry on my hypothetical experience as a writing coach attached to this blog on that potentially earlier day than just now. Fortunately for me (if you haven't noticed yet), this isn't a required blog, and as not such, there are no required deadlines. Unfortunately for me, however, is that my experience as a writing coach is all but entirely fictional and surrounded by my thoughts of what I think it might be like to be a writing coach. I'm getting to the point, stay with me. Over the past few months, I have sent emails to quite a few students that, at least to me, exist entirely on the internet to express my excitement to be working with them as their writing coach (a thing I'm sure for them is Definitely Not Required™). In those same few months, I have received 1 set of poems from one student on time, another set of poems from another student one month late, and an entirely blank page from a third student who I assume had problems with formatting. After all that experience, I can say without a doubt, I have learned a lot about writing and being a writing coach (this is one of those rare times I'm being serious again). Patience. At first I was eager to give feedback, then concerned that wires had gotten crossed, then worried that my intro letters came off sounding too different from how a writing coach should sound, and finally I realized that students involved with their writing (whether I or their teacher like it) will do so, to some extent, at their own pace. And they'll certainly share it with an internet stranger at their own pace, even if that pace is measured in negative speeds (this is a math joke).

Separate from my direct experience with students I was meant to coach in writing, I experienced some fun things. Plagiarism happens, and should be dealt with on a case by case basis. This entire blog post was copy and pasted from Reddit. Does my saying that make it not plagiarism? Case by case, friends. And there was a lot of reading about how to be a better writer (like this) and an effective writing coach. Work from most important stuff to least important stuff, be honest with feedback, work at the writer's pace, and so on. Also, I've never read Lord of the Flies, so thanks for indirectly avoiding asking me for feedback about that (although, I don't need to have read a book to tell if you used evidence from it effectively to support an argument). Anyway, dear audience, thank you for being patient even though this has no potential for being late. As your reward, here's a picture of a puppy.

Getting Drunk on Writing

This is a picture of Lindores Abbey, somewhere in Scotland, the home to the first scotch whiskey ever mentioned in writing (according to Wikipedia, anyway) and where people just started reproducing whiskey in 2017 after a short 522 year hiatus. This picture, like all things, is irrelevant and arbitrarily selected. Until it isn't. Let me tell you about my writing process. For me, my writing process is simple and straightforward. Step 1 pour an invisible glass of whiskey made in Scotland. Step 3 I need my glasses to write; I better put those on. Step 2 remember I gave up even imaginary drinking for clarity of mind and pour out my glass. Step E pet the cat and tell him I’m too busy to pet him. Step R determine a labeling system for the steps in my process. Step (Netflix intro sound) put some words somewhere in space. And that’s it, then I save/publish to my blog the product that I have.

The truth is, if you ask me what my writing process is in a situation where I don’t have to write anything in that moment, I’m probably going to lie to you on accident. I’ll say something like, “You wanna make an outline (I’ll omit that I do this part in my head while browsing youtube) then put that together in a draft (again, I’ll omit that my drafts are often just me mocking what a draft is “supposed to be”) and after that you just polish your work until you have your finished product.” I’ll say that because that’s what I was told for a long time, and for nearly as long, I thought my less than conventional writing process was more mistake than method. I just googled scotch whiskey, and suddenly googling scotch whiskey is now part of my process while writing this blog post. I’m not procrastinating, I’m thinking while I do something less productive with the rest of me. Anyway, in their article “A cognitive Process Theory of Writing” Flowers and Hayes refer to stage models of writing (like my very truthful explanation of my method and then my not so truthful explanation in this paragraph) are flawed mostly because they are in stages. Stages discourage us from going back or working ahead, something anyone who has ever written a single sentence has probably done. They also explain what the real meat of a writing process is, and they do so nicely. Know your audience, answer some questions, know what you know and tell people about it. More or less.

Enough of that. What is actually the writing process for me? Well, that up there is a little bit of it. I don’t have the time to explain everything about my process to you, my fictional reader, but I can try to set out the real meat of it. I do work first to establish who my audience is, and then I work quickly to decide I’d rather talk to myself with my writing because I like my opinions better. That is one of the rare times I’m being genuine, I do this because who wants to read anything that’s written cautiously trying to cater to what the ideal reader is looking for? Some time around the same time as that, maybe after, maybe before, maybe during if I’m really trying, I figure out what it is I really want to write. Not do I want to write a blog post, or a narrative essay, or the next Great American Musical, but literally what I want to write. That first paragraph is the sarcastic nonsense I wanted to write, it didn’t go where I was hoping it would. Unless it did, and that’s how I got here, but I’ll never tell. And then as soon as I put the first letter to the page, I begin to edit. I don’t believe my process is one to be followed, for several reasons, but mostly because it isn’t anyone else’s process. Probably very few others want to write about their messed up labeling systems while talking about fake whiskey to start their writing (this sentence started out with no one else wants to… but I decided maybe there are a select few in the world that are on the write (this was intentional) path).

A quick final note about my writing process and a message to anyone who’s working on theirs. Try to pay attention the next time you sit down and write and forget about that perfect writing process that has been pounded into your head for the past however long. Eat that snack (or argue yourself out of it). See what’s new on Instagram. Find out if Bill Gates really did drop out of college (he did but the story behind it is worth the read). It doesn’t matter how you write, or really even what you write, (at the risk of sounding corny) it only matters that you write and pay attention when you do.