Speech Blog

My Group's Topic

For this blog I am going to discuss the mash-up my Team will be exploring and define what that looks like.

First of all, my group is made up of five members, from the USA. One from Georgia, Illinois, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Massachusetts. We don't have any foreigners in our group so it might be a little easier when it comes to collaboration (due to the time differences).

Our group is working on Gesture-Based Learning, and the freedom aspect of it. I really can't tell you what that is going to look like but I think it's basically the freedom of gesture-based learning. Have you ever seen those crazy sci-fi films when the technology is so far advanced that the computers look like they're just floating pieces of glass in a large room and it's all touch screen and super fast? Well, this is part of the gesture-based learning. The Wii, touch screen things, and even the newer video games that use your body as a controller are all new technologies that help us learn through gesture-based learning. I think that things like this are pretty cool. Instead of drawing on paint with a mouse, we can draw on a huge canvas and maybe get better effects. Instead of using a controller to karate chop someone, we can actually do the motion and get the work out we need!

This will be a very interesting topic to research, I'm happy I'm in this group.

The ways teachers can embrace the 8 norms.

In this blog I will discuss how teachers could change their style of teaching using Tapscott's Norms to make lessons more appealing and easier to learn for today's learners. As I said in my previous blog, net generation learners have (according to Tapscott) eight norms for what we want to have happen and who we are. The first things that teachers must realize is that instead of being angry for our push for complete freedom in the classroom, teachers should embrace the fact that we enjoy taking charge of our own situations and put that into their classrooms. We also enjoy customizing our lives, so maybe in some private schools students should be allowed to wear whatever they want. Let's get rid of those dress codes. Collaboration is another factor that teachers can take into their classwork. Many teachers already allow students to work in groups, but I think that we should work on more things in group projects. It's good for us to learn from every perspective, including our peers. Another thing that will need to be put into some classrooms is entertaining education. Most of us net genner's are used to constant entertainment, constant focus, never a dull moment, you know? But I think that teachers are also going to have to start taking that into consideration when they are teaching their classes. It's going to be a tough thing to keep us concentrated on a overhead projection or a constant lecture before long. Also, instead of dragging on with certain topics, teachers should try and speed up their lessons. Students are used to everything being fast now and days.

Tapscott's Eight Norms

For this blog I am going to discuss Tapscott's eight Net Gen Norms (the traits that the Net Generation expect of technology) and how those Norms appear in my use of technology. The eight norms for the net generation are freedom, customization, scrutiny, integrity, collaboration, entertainment, speed, and innovation. Freedom to do what we want when we want. Customization lets us express ourselves. We need to be able to determine what is fact versus fiction. We like to be honest and fair, and we like to work together. We like life to be on the fun side. We like to work at a fast pace. We enjoy being creative. These descriptions of our generation fit me, as well as mostly every one of my classmates. I don't know what I would do if I didn't have the freedom to look up whatever information I wanted to know then I would be very frustrated. I like knowing every little whimsical question that passes through my brain. I also like people to know what kind of a person I am. Sites such as facebook allow me to project my "self" to my peers, and I make sure that the information that I put out there is truly customized to define me. It is obvious that not everything that is online is true. The old saying that people should believe anything that is in black in white no longer applies to everything that we read today. It is very easy to make up information and post it online. I also need my technology to work very quickly. Like I said before, if I don't have easy, unlimited access to information, I can become vary frustrated.

The Importance of Deadlines

Deadlines are basically unavoidable. There is a deadline for everything. Especially when it comes to school or work situations. But the bad thing about deadlines is that they tend to sneak up on a person. I have countless deadlines that are thrown upon me in my school situation. I have a deadline when I wake up in the morning. I have to be ready to go and totally prepared for school by 7:50 otherwise I will be late for school. I have to be at school and in my seat by the deadline of 8:20. I have to have my homework turned in or be prepared for a test at a certain time, my school has a deadline for how long it runs, I have a deadline to turn in a scholarship application, I have a deadline to apply for college, I have a deadline to finish my lunch at a specific time, I have a deadline to finish this blog. We even have a deadline that our body gives us to blink and breathe. In the work situation deadlines become extremely important. You have to be to work on time, there is that deadline again. You have a deadline to get something done, you have a deadline of what you have to get done in a day. Deadlines can become very stressful to some people. But others are actually benefited by deadlines and seem to work better when pressured to get something done. Think about it, are you hurt or helped by deadlines?

Accepting criticism of your wiki posts and netiquette involved with criticism/comments

A part of being a writer is knowing that somewhere along your journey, someone will criticize your work. Now whether you ask for it or not, your audience will create opinions about your writings. It is a well known fact that everyone has their own thought processes and ideas about a topic, and being a great writer or blogger means that you can face and acknowledge others' opinions about your work. Another part of criticism is that you can comprehend that you can and will make mistakes in your lifetime. Someone using proper netiquette may and will inform you of your mistake in the hope that you will comment back a thank you to them and change the mistake they found immediately. This may be an embarrassing ordeal for you to witness but I look at it like this; if you can't take the heat, then don't enter the meet. I use the terminology "meet" because I run track and field but that is besides the point. You enter the world of communication and be aware that you are vulnerable to every person to whom you are communicating with.
Now switching to the other side of this criticism world, when you are criticizing another person's work, you have to use netiquette. Make sure that you are sticking to the subject and not rambling on and on about nothing at all. Everything that you are posting to anything online should be relevant to the topic, that is just common sense. Researchers say that a majority of the population has some form of ADD or ADHD but that is not a valid excuse for creating nonsense on other people's pages. So if you are going to comment, be polite and constructive. That is the best thing to do.

Using Wiki to Communicate Information

We are starting to use Wiki's to communicate our research on digital communication tools. Wiki is very public, and very easy to use. This can be both good and bad. A major topic on Wiki's right now is the infamous Wiki-Leaks. I view this as a very very bad thing. Not only is extremely private information being broadcasted to the public but it is also a huge security breach. I feel very unsafe with all of these classified things being just open for everyone. Embarrassing things can be broadcasted and be somewhat permanent, I know that the first of the Wiki Leaks made our Ambassadors look very unprofessional with the things they were saying about important international figures. Just imagine all the immature garbage that teens can put on wikis about peers or things they don't completely understand. Wikis are basically a database that I would relate to blogs or a newspaper, a magazine.. anyone can read through them and if the wrong information or information that was meant to be private is read, then that can completely screw up someone's life. That is why we need to be careful as to what we post on the internet. People tend to forget that everything they post online is not only permanent, but it is also very public.
So next time you use a wiki or use a blog to communicate information.. make sure that you are exceptionally careful and wise with what you post. The last thing anyone should want to do is to hurt the feelings of someone else.