Education for a Digital World Advice, Guidelines and Effective Practice from Around Globe, 2008a

26 – Techno Expression
blogs into the blogworld established by another”
(Patrick, 2005, para. 6).
If the students use online weblog sites that are not
controlled by the school or university, then you will
have to decide to what extent you will watch what they
post. While students should have full freedom of expression,
they may need coaching about what is appropriate
or inappropriate material. It is in the students’ best interest
to listen, as prospective employers may be looking
at these sites as well.
ELECTRONIC PORTFOLIOS
Instructors can use electronic portfolios to let students
demonstrate knowledge and skills, using a collection of
assets (e.g., essays, multiple choice exams, reflections,
video clips of performance, observation logs submitted
by experts, etc.). Following the concepts of universal
design for learning (see Chapters 10 and 11), students
should be able to choose different assignments to portray
their abilities. For instance, a student might pick a
history paper to represent his or her writing skills instead
of a paper from an English class.
ONLINE MEETING SPACES
Regardless of the online meeting space tool (WebEx,
Elluminate, Breeze, Horizon Wimba, etc.), students can
express themselves in a number of ways. Many of these
environments have options for real-time chat, polling,
and voice channels (or a conference call option in conjunction
with the online meeting). With these tools, you
can allow students to make presentations to the rest of
the class by virtually handing them the microphone.
Massively multiplayer online role-playing games
(MMORPGs) provide an unorthodox, but highly effective,
type of online meeting space. Todd Bryant (2006)
outlines this concept in his article “Using World of
Warcraft and Other MMORPGs to Foster a Targeted,
Social, and Cooperative Approach Toward Language
Learning.” He uses a fun environment that allows him to
facilitate language learning activities. MMORPGs combine
the social networking aspects of MySpace or Face-
Book with the entertainment value of video games. In
their books, What Video Games Have to Teach Us About
Learning and Literacy and Don’t Bother Me Mom—I’m
Learning!, James Paul Gee and Mark Prensky look at the
educational benefits of learning by doing and forcing
students to make decisions in a low-stakes environment.
If instructors can find ways to use them for education,
MMORPGs offer positive motivation for learning in
that they are fun for all ages, genders, and backgrounds.
For example, more people over 18 play World of Warcraft
than people 18 and under. Instructors can capitalize
on the students’ interest in MMORPGs by creating
their own learning situations in Second Life and other
virtual environments.
WEB-BASED AUDIO AND VIDEO CLIPS
Although the end product is an audio or video clip, you
can still make strong writing the backbone of these assignments.
Examples include digital storytelling, video
clips of student presentations or student teaching, and
audio clips demonstrating language proficiency. Hall
Davidson (2004) describes a scaffolded process in which
students do not always need a digital video camera to
produce videos that demonstrate understanding of the
course material. The Apple Learning Interchange
(http://edcommunity.apple.com/ali/index.php) contains
examples of teacher and student videos from middle
school, high school, and higher education.
PODCASTING AND VODCASTING
Remembering that podcasts and VODcasts are more
than just audio and video files, we must think of projects
that would require students to produce a series of audio
or video files to which people can subscribe via really
simple syndication (RSS). If you want to do this as an
entire class, individual students can each contribute one
audio or video file, then you could make one assignment
that requires each student to express his or her opinion
about a topic. Each audio or video file will then be
posted throughout the term as part of a series. You can
also ask groups to contribute several files each over the
course of an entire school term.
Examples of Techno Expression Assignments Using
Podcasts
Before, we had position papers. Now, we can have position
podcasts. Ask your students to take a position about
a topic in your class. Then have the students sign up,
individually or in groups, for a time slot when they will
produce an audio or video file to be broadcast. The collection
of audio or video position statements will become
a compendium of student opinions for that term.
Example of using student podcasts in literature
classes from Academic Commons:
“Each podcast assignment consisted of a “podcast
pair” (two podcasts); students made a 5-minute
reading of a passage from a novel, coupled with a
5-minute discussion of that passage: why the student
422 Education for a Digital World