Deconstructing the Education-Industrial Complex in the Digital Age 9781522521020, 9781522521013, 1522521011

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Deconstructing the Education-Industrial Complex in the Digital Age Douglas Loveless University of Auckland, New Zealand Pamela Sullivan James Madison University, USA Katie Dredger James Madison University, USA Jim Burns Florida International University, USA

A volume in the Advances in Educational Marketing, Administration, and Leadership (AEMAL) Book Series

Published in the United States of America by IGI Global Information Science Reference (an imprint of IGI Global) 701 E. Chocolate Avenue Hershey PA, USA 17033 Tel: 717-533-8845 Fax: 717-533-8661 E-mail: [email protected] Web site: http://www.igi-global.com Copyright © 2017 by IGI Global. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or distributed in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, without written permission from the publisher. Product or company names used in this set are for identification purposes only. Inclusion of the names of the products or companies does not indicate a claim of ownership by IGI Global of the trademark or registered trademark. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data CIP Data Pending ISBN: 978-1-5225-2101-3 eISBN: 978-1-5225-2102-0 This book is published in the IGI Global book series Advances in Educational Marketing, Administration, and Leadership (AEMAL) (ISSN: 2326-9022; eISSN: 2326-9030)

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Advances in Educational Marketing, Administration, and Leadership (AEMAL) Book Series Siran Mukerji IGNOU, India Purnendu Tripathi IGNOU, India

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With more educational institutions entering into public, higher, and professional education, the educational environment has grown increasingly competitive. With this increase in competitiveness has come the need for a greater focus on leadership within the institutions, on administrative handling of educational matters, and on the marketing of the services offered. The Advances in Educational Marketing, Administration, & Leadership (AEMAL) Book Series strives to provide publications that address all these areas and present trending, current research to assist professionals, administrators, and others involved in the education sector in making their decisions.

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• Students as Consumers • Academic Administration • Technologies and Educational Marketing • Advertising and Promotion of Academic Programs and Institutions • Governance in P-12 and Higher Education • Educational Leadership • Consumer Behavior • Educational Finance • Academic Pricing • Faculty Administration and Management

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The Advances in Educational Marketing, Administration, and Leadership (AEMAL) Book Series (ISSN 2326-9022) is published by IGI Global, 701 E. Chocolate Avenue, Hershey, PA 17033-1240, USA, www.igi-global.com. This series is composed of titles available for purchase individually; each title is edited to be contextually exclusive from any other title within the series. For pricing and ordering information please visit http://www.igi-global.com/book-series/advances-educational-marketing-administration-leadership/73677. Postmaster: Send all address changes to above address. Copyright © 2017 IGI Global. All rights, including translation in other languages reserved by the publisher. No part of this series may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means – graphics, electronic, or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, taping, or information and retrieval systems – without written permission from the publisher, except for non commercial, educational use, including classroom teaching purposes. The views expressed in this series are those of the authors, but not necessarily of IGI Global.

Titles in this Series

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Challenges Facing Female Department Chairs in Contemporary Higher Education Emerging Research and Opportunities Heidi L. Schnackenberg (SUNY Plattsburgh, USA) and Denise A. Simard (SUNY Plattsburgh, USA) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 90pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522518914) • US $115.00 (our price) Moving Students of Color from Consumers to Producers of Technology Yolanda Rankin (Spelman College, USA) and Jakita Thomas (Auburn University, USA) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 301pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522520054) • US $180.00 (our price) Digital Tools for Academic Branding and Self-Promotion Marga Cabrera (Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain) and Nuria Lloret (Polytechnic University of Valencia, Spain) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 254pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522509172) • US $170.00 (our price) Methods and Paradigms in Education Research Lorraine Ling (Victoria University, Australia & La Trobe University, Australia) and Peter Ling (Swinburne University of Technology, Australia) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 397pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522517382) • US $190.00 (our price) Assessing the Current State of Education in the Caribbean Charmaine Bissessar (University of Roehampton Online, UK) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 367pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522517009) • US $175.00 (our price) World University Rankings and the Future of Higher Education Kevin Downing (City University of Hong Kong, China) and Fraide A. Ganotice, Jr. (The University of Hong Kong, China) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 534pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522508199) • US $190.00 (our price) Handbook of Research on Administration, Policy, and Leadership in Higher Education Siran Mukerji (Indira Gandhi National Open University, India) and Purnendu Tripathi (Indira Gandhi National Open University, India) Information Science Reference • copyright 2017 • 678pp • H/C (ISBN: 9781522506720) • US $295.00 (our price)

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Editorial Advisory Board Donna Alvermann, University of Georgia, USA Richard Beach, University of Minnesota, USA Aaron Bodle, James Madison University, USA Yuejia Soma Chen, Florida International University, USA Donald Gilstrap, University of Alabama, USA Colin Green, George Washington University, USA Stephanie Grote-Garcia, The Incarnate Word University, USA Anne Harris, Monash University, Australia William Kist, Kent State University, USA Stephen May, University of Auckland, New Zealand Ricardo Rosa, University of Massachusetts – Dartmouth, USA Brian Sullivan, James Madison University, USA Westry Whitaker, University of North Georgia, USA



Table of Contents

Foreword.............................................................................................................................................. xvi Preface.................................................................................................................................................. xix Acknowledgment...............................................................................................................................xxiii Section 1 Curriculum and Instruction in a Neoliberal, Digital Age Chapter 1 The Way It’s Going: Neoliberal Reforms and the Colonization of the American School....................... 1 Brian Charles Charest, The Nova Project, USA Chapter 2 Gender, Process, and Praxis: Re-Politicizing Education in an Era of Neoliberalism, Instrumentalism, and “Big Data”........................................................................................................... 24 Jim Burns, Florida International University, USA Colin Green, The George Washington University, USA Chapter 3 Liminal Learning: A Theoretical Framework for Reconceptualizing the Digital Space....................... 55 L Johnson Davis, San Diego State University, USA Chapter 4 Where Are We If Our Batteries Die? Seeking Purpose in Educational Technology............................. 72 Pamela Sullivan, James Madison University, USA Will P. Sullivan, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Chapter 5 The Dying of the Light: The Cause to Illuminate in this State of Fragile Democracy.......................... 85 Westry Whitaker, The University of North Georgia, USA

 



Section 2 Implications for Higher Education Chapter 6 The Use of ePortfolios in Teacher Education Programs to Support Reflective Practitioners in a Digital World....................................................................................................................................... 104 Valerie J. Robnolt, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Joan A. Rhodes, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Sheri Vasinda, Oklahoma State University, USA Leslie Haas, Johns Hopkins University, USA Chapter 7 Adapting Problem-Based Learning to Database Courses in the Digital Age...................................... 116 Samuel B. Fee, Washington and Jefferson College, USA Thomas E. Lombardi, Washington and Jefferson College, USA Chapter 8 Strategies for Implementing Digital Assignments............................................................................... 134 Paige Normand, James Madison University, USA Alexa Senio, James Madison University, USA Marlena Luciano, James Madison University, USA Chapter 9 Digital Storytelling and Digital Literacy: Advanced Issues and Prospects......................................... 151 Kijpokin Kasemsap, Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University, Thailand Chapter 10 Lessons Learned Building an Online Degree Program....................................................................... 172 Ottilie F. Austin, University of Virginia, USA Gail M. Hunger, University of Virginia, USA Julie J. Gray, University of Virginia, USA Chapter 11 Creating Connected Educators with Online Portfolios........................................................................ 183 Katie S. Dredger, James Madison University, USA Joy Myers, James Madison University, USA Pamela Sullivan, James Madison University, USA Douglas J. Loveless, University of Auckland, New Zealand Section 3 Implications for K-12 Education Chapter 12 Interactive Art Applications (I-Apps) in the Development of Younger Learners’ Creative  Thinking............................................................................................................................................... 202 Sylvia Vincent Stavridi, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt



Chapter 13 Technologies of Resistance: Facilitating Students’ 21st Century Thinking Using Material  Tools..................................................................................................................................................... 216 Ann D. David, University of the Incarnate Word, USA Annamary L. Consalvo, The University of Texas at Tyler, USA Chapter 14 Assessment Shouldn’t Be a Pay-Per-View Activity: Offering Classroom Teachers Authentic Student-Centered Assessment Activities............................................................................................. 239 Robert Williams, Radford University, USA Dan Woods, Radford University, USA Chapter 15 Incorporating Students’ Digital Identities in Analog Spaces: The Educator’s Conundrum................ 257 William J. Fassbender, The University of Georgia, USA Chapter 16 Living the YOLO Lifestyle: The Rhetorical Power of Memes in the Classroom................................ 269 Crystal L. Beach, The University of Georgia, USA & Buford High School, USA Katie S. Dredger, James Madison University, USA Chapter 17 Making Sense of Authors and Texts in a Remixed, Participatory Culture.......................................... 287 Crystal L. Beach, The University of Georgia, USA Compilation of References................................................................................................................ 303 About the Contributors..................................................................................................................... 346 Index.................................................................................................................................................... 352

Detailed Table of Contents

Foreword.............................................................................................................................................. xvi Preface.................................................................................................................................................. xix Acknowledgment...............................................................................................................................xxiii Section 1 Curriculum and Instruction in a Neoliberal, Digital Age Chapter 1 The Way It’s Going: Neoliberal Reforms and the Colonization of the American School....................... 1 Brian Charles Charest, The Nova Project, USA In this chapter the author argues that those concerned with the “the way it’s going” in public education can learn much from post-colonial theory about the relationship between education research and assessment technologies and education reform policy, curriculum development, and knowledge formation. The author argues that current neoliberal education reform in the US can best be understood through the frame of neocolonialism, where schools and communities take the shape of internal colonies, where teachers, students, and parents have little or no say about the technologies, curricula, and standardized examinations foisted upon them. Education research that supports the current policy paradigm largely benefits researchers, corporations, and policy makers, while ignoring the effects of such policies on students, teachers, and local communities. Such practices, the author suggests, are rooted in a type of colonial thinking and acting that have been rearticulated through the prevailing logic of neoliberalism. Chapter 2 Gender, Process, and Praxis: Re-Politicizing Education in an Era of Neoliberalism, Instrumentalism, and “Big Data”........................................................................................................... 24 Jim Burns, Florida International University, USA Colin Green, The George Washington University, USA The authors establish an analytical framework comprising the socio-historical and ideological formation(s) and re-formation(s) of hegemonic masculinities as part of a system of governmentality. They use hegemonic masculinity and heteropatriarchal settler colonialism as lenses through which to understand and critique the historically gendered, classed, racialized, and sexualized assumptions that underlie education discourses based on conservative modernization through analysis of the historic relationship between education and the military, particularly gaming technology as curricular and pedagogical tools for recruiting and 



transmitting military values and skills. They finally urge that the “hidden curriculum” underpinning the power and practices of the education-industrial complex be made more visible, stronger curricular counter-narratives asserted, and they seek to uncover spaces of disruption and possibility, cognizant of the constraints that arise from the totalizing nature of conservative modernization in education and schooling. Chapter 3 Liminal Learning: A Theoretical Framework for Reconceptualizing the Digital Space....................... 55 L Johnson Davis, San Diego State University, USA Current educational systems have been built around the faulty metaphor of industry in which human learning is equated to machine learning or learning that is computational, linear, and void of meaning. This metaphor has been extended to how digital systems and spaces are utilized in the classroom. Recent research and conceptual frameworks built upon human learning from a metaphoric mind perspective (learning built upon meaning making and experiential connections within a social matrix), may work toward recontextualizing the use of digital technologies as methods for understanding individual experience and documenting human learning at work. A novel conceptual framework describes the digital space as a liminal learning space in which the learner enters to co-construct meaning within a social matrix, which may be evidenced by current digital artifacts. Implications for contextualizing digital technologies as liminal learning spaces are explored. Chapter 4 Where Are We If Our Batteries Die? Seeking Purpose in Educational Technology............................. 72 Pamela Sullivan, James Madison University, USA Will P. Sullivan, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA This chapter explores the role of technology in literacy from an historical perspective. Using the examples of the printing press, Engelbart’s philosophy of technology use, and the Law of Amplification, compared with the current status of technology in education, the authors argue that the technology itself is less important than the framework and pedagogy that it supports. Chapter 5 The Dying of the Light: The Cause to Illuminate in this State of Fragile Democracy.......................... 85 Westry Whitaker, The University of North Georgia, USA These are dangerous times. In this chapter, the author illuminates and explores the founders’ complex and often contradictory perspectives on public education and democracy itself and their relevance to technologically-mediated educational discourses. This chapter demonstrates the importance of repoliticizing and historicizing public education with particular emphasis on defending public schools, public school teachers and the very concept of public education as a site of democratic solidarity. The author approaches this topic with attention to the corporatized war on education waged by wayward conservatives and centrist democrats. The author explores these battle lines while juxtaposing their stance and value for public education with that of the nation’s founders. The author expands upon this contrast by drawing critical awareness to the social, political, and cultural implications of information technology and the use of digital spaces to project our voices and faces loudly and vividly into the bedrooms of people never met.



Section 2 Implications for Higher Education Chapter 6 The Use of ePortfolios in Teacher Education Programs to Support Reflective Practitioners in a Digital World....................................................................................................................................... 104 Valerie J. Robnolt, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Joan A. Rhodes, Virginia Commonwealth University, USA Sheri Vasinda, Oklahoma State University, USA Leslie Haas, Johns Hopkins University, USA The use of ePortfolios to document and assess preservice teacher learning continues to be a prevalent method for encouraging student reflection. This chapter outlines the definition and prevailing uses of ePortfolios and describes the variety of ways that ePortfolios are implemented in teacher education programs. The authors describe the issues that faculty and preservice teachers face when implementing ePortfolios, particularly when writing for different audiences, such as accreditation agencies and to meet program requirements. The importance of technology knowledge and skills for successful creation of ePortfolios is outlined. Through the presentation of two cases, this chapter focuses on the development of ePortfolio implementation projects. The chapter concludes with suggestions for faculty to support preservice teachers as they implement ePortfolios in their teacher education programs. Chapter 7 Adapting Problem-Based Learning to Database Courses in the Digital Age...................................... 116 Samuel B. Fee, Washington and Jefferson College, USA Thomas E. Lombardi, Washington and Jefferson College, USA Over the course of the last two decades, the United States government has pursued a program of democratizing data. Public services have been transformed into data-driven enterprises. This enthusiasm for data collection, analysis and public reporting has important consequences for computing education. This chapter outlines a pedagogical strategy for educating citizens in the competent and responsible use of the data currently defining our national agenda. Specifically the authors argue that problem-based learning (PBL) provides a strong framework for introducing database concepts to a broad range of students. The design of databases constitutes complex problems with multiple solutions. Database problems are necessarily interdisciplinary involving both problem domain and technical expertise. Moreover, since databases support some real-world objective, problems in database design are inherently authentic and contextualized. These properties hold consistently across a range of problem types. Thus, common problems in the database domain are aligned with PBL definitions of good problems. Chapter 8 Strategies for Implementing Digital Assignments............................................................................... 134 Paige Normand, James Madison University, USA Alexa Senio, James Madison University, USA Marlena Luciano, James Madison University, USA In chapter, the authors draw from their in-class experiences, one-on-one tutoring sessions, focus-group interviews with students, and discussions with all of the course-embedded peer tutors about their experiences working in digital communication across campus, to discuss some of the “behind the scenes” issues that



students face that might be invisible to faculty. The authors’ observations and reflections over the past two years have led them to identify common hurdles on their campus and identify solutions for faculty interested in incorporating digital assignments into their curriculum. The chapter addresses the following obstacles faculty might face and offers solutions: (1) students do not understand the value of the digital assignment, (2) students are not confident the faculty will accurately evaluate their digital production, (3) students’ skill development is hampered by their anxiety about their aptitude and confusion about their process for digital production, and (4) students do not feel comfortable sharing honest concerns and anxieties about digital composition with their instructor. Chapter 9 Digital Storytelling and Digital Literacy: Advanced Issues and Prospects......................................... 151 Kijpokin Kasemsap, Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University, Thailand This chapter reveals the overview of digital technologies; the overview of digital storytelling in education; and the overview of digital literacy in education. Digital storytelling and digital literacy are very important in modern education. Digital storytelling is used to improve student’s learning through multimedia in the modern classrooms. Digital storytelling is the expressive medium that can explain even the most intricate topics in depth, integrating it with the rest of the curriculum. Digital literacy is the ability to use Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information, requiring both cognitive and technical skills. Digital literacy leads to the great increases in information that can be conveniently accessed. The chapter argues that developing digital storytelling and digital literacy skills has the potential to improve both teaching and learning performance in modern education. Chapter 10 Lessons Learned Building an Online Degree Program....................................................................... 172 Ottilie F. Austin, University of Virginia, USA Gail M. Hunger, University of Virginia, USA Julie J. Gray, University of Virginia, USA Many universities and colleges are moving courses and master’s programs to online formats. The Masters of Reading program at the University of Virginia has a history of providing professional development to teachers in the Commonwealth through course work and the online Reading Degree program. This chapter will outline the growth of a state outreach master’s degree program as it developed courses online beginning in 1999 and moved to a fully online degree program. The authors will discuss the importance of using a sound instructional design model and taking a close look at course evaluations to examine the design of the course and the quality of instruction. This chapter will discuss the success of our design, lessons learned and some of the challenges faced. Chapter 11 Creating Connected Educators with Online Portfolios........................................................................ 183 Katie S. Dredger, James Madison University, USA Joy Myers, James Madison University, USA Pamela Sullivan, James Madison University, USA Douglas J. Loveless, University of Auckland, New Zealand The authors explore ethical considerations, as well as logistical concerns of online portfolio creation by teacher candidates by examining how the Reading Faculty in one university instituted a cross-course



online portfolio that followed students as they progressed through their Master’s degree in Teaching (MAT) program. This grassroots online portfolio initiative, while collegial, became a microcosm of technology use in education today where faculty attempted to provide students with a job-seeking tool while also encouraging reflection on their growth in the teaching profession. This tenuous line in an environment of hyper-standardization and accountability left unanswered questions. Faculty worked to transparently examine costs and benefits to stake-holders. This chapter describes how the online portfolio project developed, and offers vignettes that illustrate some of these issues faced by the teacher educators who implemented the project across their courses. Section 3 Implications for K-12 Education Chapter 12 Interactive Art Applications (I-Apps) in the Development of Younger Learners’ Creative  Thinking............................................................................................................................................... 202 Sylvia Vincent Stavridi, Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt Interactive art-based application is an informal approach to new creative learning methods, in which younger students are visually stimulated, and actively engaged to discover nature and grasp the original concept of core content areas in academic disciplines, such as science, mathematics and geometry from a broad perspective. This chapter tries to explore the means to further young children’s creative thinking in today’s techno-scientific world. But much of the analysis holds more generally for the intersection between visual art and interactive aesthetics, and how the exploration of visual art forms shapes new ways for primary school students to reform their creative practice to effectively interact in an increasingly smart setting. The chapter then concludes with a focus on the attribution of aesthetic value in integrating digital technologies with human ideas as an interactive tool to infuse immersive visual thinking into children’s fun learning apps. Chapter 13 Technologies of Resistance: Facilitating Students’ 21st Century Thinking Using Material  Tools..................................................................................................................................................... 216 Ann D. David, University of the Incarnate Word, USA Annamary L. Consalvo, The University of Texas at Tyler, USA A key paradox of education in the 21st century is the simultaneous focus on standards, accountability, and assessments, alongside the call for schools to prepare students for the ever-changing digital world. Educational technology is often touted as the solution to all the problems that supposedly plague education. Teachers, though, often resist educational technologies for good reason, but resistance can lead to student not having opportunities to engage in 21st century literacies. The authors propose that teachers can tap into material technologies—like sticky notes, chart paper, markers, scissors, and tape—and frame those multimodal compositions as 21st century thinking. The chapter offers extensive examples of material, multimodal student compositions, and descriptions of the instructional practices that supported their creation, all from middle and high school classrooms that were under heavy pressure to teach toward success on the state standardized test. The examples are organized around the concepts of self-representation, academic literacies, and artistic expression.



Chapter 14 Assessment Shouldn’t Be a Pay-Per-View Activity: Offering Classroom Teachers Authentic Student-Centered Assessment Activities............................................................................................. 239 Robert Williams, Radford University, USA Dan Woods, Radford University, USA This chapter begins with a consideration of the state of school-based assessments as an unavoidable consequence of the contemporary societal emphasis on accountability and curricular prescriptions at the state and national level in the United States of America. Additionally, the authors comment upon the potential inaccuracies inescapable in large scale, high-stakes, standardized assessment instruments, especially when such instruments are turned to the task of evaluation—whether norm- or criterionreferenced—in a teaching and learning engagement. Likewise, the chapter concludes with suggestions and templates (elaborately configured with specific activities and assessment rubrics included) to support teachers who want to develop their own, rigorous, valid, and reliable assessments instruments embedded seamlessly in student-centered learning activities, and that accommodate the reality of literacy as a culturally situated behavior that, for contemporary learners, includes all manner of meaning-making in all manner of modalities from the pencil and paper to the purely electronic (and potentially wordless, at times) video- or audio-based. Chapter 15 Incorporating Students’ Digital Identities in Analog Spaces: The Educator’s Conundrum................ 257 William J. Fassbender, The University of Georgia, USA Multiliteracies has gained significant favor in the past two decades due to the increased popularity of technology. Educators are not only finding new and exciting ways to make content relatable to students by including their digital lives in the classroom, but now the digital experience of teens is the topic of classroom conversations. The inclusion of students’ online identities has certain advantages, as many students may find the bridge between academic work and their out-of-school lives advantageous to their learning. However, educators need to give careful consideration of how to safely include students’ digital identities into the classroom, as these online lives are often carefully crafted for their networking platforms and are not necessarily intended for analog, classroom spaces. Throughout this article, the author explores the ways in which teachers incorporate teens’ online identities and troubles the notion that teachers can safely include these identities without co-opting their out-of-school online practices. Chapter 16 Living the YOLO Lifestyle: The Rhetorical Power of Memes in the Classroom................................ 269 Crystal L. Beach, The University of Georgia, USA & Buford High School, USA Katie S. Dredger, James Madison University, USA In this chapter, the authors discuss what it means for students to create, remix, and disseminate memes today—especially considering the connectivity and participatory nature of youth culture. The authors then discuss the importance of a critical media literacy pedagogy. Next, the authors investigate and rhetorically analyze some current memes. The authors also analyze the digital affordances of tools, the ways that messages are privileged and silenced, visual rhetoric, and remix. Finally, the authors explore further implications for educators to consider when using memes in the classroom.



Chapter 17 Making Sense of Authors and Texts in a Remixed, Participatory Culture.......................................... 287 Crystal L. Beach, The University of Georgia, USA Mikhail Bakhtin’s and Jacques Rancière’s theories can help educators understand students’ texts in today’s remixed, participatory culture. Specifically, this chapter will focus on two key terms: Bakhtin’s heteroglossia and Rancière’s emancipated spectator. First, the aforementioned terms will be defined in relation to the authors’ ideas and applied to literacy education. Then, these ideas will be connected to how authors and texts are shaped by remixing within a participatory culture. Next, Bakhtin’s and Rancière’s works will be discussed to understand how they speak to each other concerning remixing in a participatory culture, pulling from examples from the research literature. Finally, it will be important to consider the implications of their work for literacy educators and researchers. Compilation of References................................................................................................................ 303 About the Contributors..................................................................................................................... 346 Index.................................................................................................................................................... 352

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Foreword

Deconstructing the Education-Industrial Complex in the Digital Age requires us to think seriously about the technologies we use to make sense of our educational institutions, our students, and even ourselves. Thinking in what the authors call the “digital age” means to me that we must consider not only how new conduits of knowledge alter relations in education, but also how the new technologies are constitutive of knowledge. Let me go further: We can no longer know without these technologies. Manuel Castells argued that informational technologies are reshaping the material bases of society because they have led to a new communication system that uses a universal digital language, which integrates globally the production and distribution of the words, sounds, images of our culture, while also customizing them to the particular concerns of individuals. This communication system converts all inputs—no matter the kind—into information, and it processes that information at increasing speed, with increasing power, at decreasing cost, in ubiquitous retrieval and distribution networks, which grow exponentially and create new forms and channels of communication, shaping life and being shaped by life at the same time (Castells, 1996). Of course, the creation of new technologies has always allowed societies to understand themselves in different ways. What seems to be the case today, however, according to Castells, is that productivity lies primarily in the technology of knowledge generation, information processing, and symbol communication. What we are facing now is a virtuous circle of interaction between the knowledge sources of technology and the application of technology to improve knowledge generation and information processing. The new information technologies, I would add, convert knowledge into information, which then feeds back on the technologies to generate more technologies for the creation, storage, and distribution of information. If all I just said is even remotely possible, how are we to think of knowledge? What of power? According to Daniel Bell (1976), “knowledge” conventionally has been thought of as sets of organized statements of facts or ideas presenting reasoned judgments transmitted via some communication medium in some systematic form; “information” simply constituted data that have been organized and communicated in some way. Knowledge always needed information but was not itself information. But we do not need to worry about this distinction anymore, for knowledge today seems inseparable from its mode of communication. Jean-François Lyotard (1984) seemed correct when he argued that knowledge is being transformed into “quantities of information,” which then transforms relations between and among myriad institutions and individuals, all of which are being converted into “data.” If Michel Foucault (1980) was also correct that knowledge and power can only be thought of as in relation to each other, then our understanding of power today requires that we attend in a very explicit way to the transformation of knowledge in the “digital age,” for power cannot be understood without understanding its relation to knowledge.  

Foreword

As we read Deconstructing the Education-Industrial Complex in the Digital Age, let us ask ourselves: How are we to think of the relation between knowledge and power in the “digital age?” I think the new technologies require that we convert institutions, individuals, education, teaching, learning, diversity, the state, the world—everything and anything—into information that we will now call “data.” Thus, we might say, counter-intuitively, not that knowledge entails using data but that knowledge = data. The privileged data today is that which made all phenomena numerical, calculable, and reproducible. From this, we can develop new statistical laws that will justify new modes of social administration. That is, social phenomena are now objectified, so that the inner workings of people, of institutions, of anything, could be known as data and used for change. The social world—perhaps the “physical” one too—has been converted into “data” that could be ordered systematically and taxonomically within a functional system that is administrable. The overriding themes of Deconstructing the Education-Industrial Complex in the Digital Age enable us to understand new forms of power, but also how we can make use of technologies to create new forms of justice. But that is not the main point of such a book for me. I would ask readers to think of how the new technologies shaping our lives in education become important stakes in political struggles, for the “digital age” is characterized by specific social organizations in which information generation, processing, and transmission become the fundamental sources of productivity and power. I think we need to see in the proliferation of these new technologies, or new uses for existing ones, new claims to, and struggles for, political power. I hope readers are intrigued enough to consider new technologies in education as more than simply conduits for the uses of information couched as knowledge. New technologies might be central to all kinds of political imperatives in advanced liberal societies, for such societies may not be able to generate new meaning—or even to have real meaning—outside of these technologies, which produce information we call knowledge, which then is turned back on them to spark conversions of new things into information. If this is so, we might attend to our creation and proliferation of these technologies, to our attempts to restrict their creation or their contents, to our attempts to control their uses, to our defenses and critiques of them, to all this as much more than battles over particular uses of technologies. These are political struggles in a larger battle over legitimacy and power in the “digital age.” For to gain control over these technologies—and I mean much more than a physical control, but also a control over the discourses about them—might be, in a sense, to gain power today. Benjamin Baez Florida International University, USA

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Foreword

REFERENCES Bell, D. (1976). The coming of the post-industrial society: A venture in social forecasting. New York: Basic Books. Castells, M. (1996). The rise of the network society. Oxford, UK: Blackwell Publishers. Foucault, M. (1980). Power/knowledge: Selected interviews and other writings 1972-1977 (C. Gordon (C. Gordon, L. Marshall, J. Mepham, & K. Soper Trans. & Eds.). New York: Pantheon Books. Lyotard, J.-F. (1984). The postmodern condition: A report on knowledge (G. Bennington & B. Massumi, Trans.). Minneapolis, MN: University of Minnesota Press.

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Preface

WHY THIS BOOK, AND WHY NOW? The title of this book is no accident, and we feel that it couldn’t come at a more crucial time in the history of democratic societies and the systems of compulsory public education within them. The industrial complex construct, introduced by Dwight D. Eisenhower as he left the presidency of the United States of America in January 1961, grew out of his concerns about the further subversion of America’s incomplete democratic experiment through the solidification of the corporate state. Having witnessed first-hand the American build-up to World War II and having led Allied Forces in Europe against Nazism and Fascism, both predicated on a strong corporate state, Eisenhower’s farewell address should have served as a wake-up call to the American people that the same anti-democratic forces were taking root in the U.S. as well. The military-industrial complex relies on what political scientists call an “iron triangle” that consists of the military (itself a special interest group), private defense contractors, and the U.S. Congress, which facilitates the transfer of public funds into private hands. As that triangle formed, Eisenhower became alarmed as he saw his constitutional authority to conduct American foreign policy increasingly constrained by the nebulous, unelected, and politically unaccountable forces that were calling the shots in foreign and defense policy. Those forces, obscured from the voting public, restructured the economy and the government to serve their financial interests through the formation of a national security state that enveloped every social institution, including, importantly, education. Since the 1970s, the emergence of neoliberal capitalist hegemony has facilitated the reconfiguration of the American state to support the concentration of corporate power through the upward redistribution of wealth. The solidification of what Giroux (2014) has called a market society has repositioned citizenship as consumption, the public good as the maximization of private gain, and everyone and everything as a commodity from which its “surplus value” must be extracted. The model of the military-industrial complex—concentration of unaccountable institutional power, setting public policy according to corporate interests, and outsourcing American foreign and military policy—has become the model for de-politicizing our public and political spaces through the lexicon of markets über alles. None of this is new, of course. Reading the record of the debates that occurred during the writing of the Constitution of the United States of America, James Madison, the Constitution’s principal architect, urged his fellow framers to create a document that would “protect the minority of the opulent”—White men who owned property—from the majority. Madison and the other framers set the young nation on a course in which the fundamental purpose and structure of the government codified what Adam Smith (2007/1776) criticized in the Wealth of Nations as “the vile maxim of the masters of mankind,” which Smith articulated as “all for ourselves and nothing for other people” (p. 321). 

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The history of America is, in fact, a history of tension between the vile maxim and building a more just demos. Yet as scholars such as David Harvey, Henry Giroux, and Noam Chomsky have demonstrated, the rapid institutionalization of neoliberalism since the 1970s has resulted in configurations of corporatestate power so overwhelming that it is becoming increasingly difficult to challenge and subvert them, particularly through a political system that has grown comfortably dependent on corporate largesse. Our political apparatus has become simultaneously financially wealthy and ethically bankrupt as it has succumbed to the vile maxim to protect the opulent minority and increasingly slough off the majority as disposable people. That calculus of disposability has permeated every institution in the U.S.—the political system, the criminal in-justice system, our militarized police, the prison-industrial complex, and of course the subject of our study, the education-industrial complex. So what institutions form the “iron-triangle” that has produced the education-industrial complex? We argue that triangle includes the various leaders of public schooling from principals to state officials, those who make educational policy and funding decisions at the federal level, and the private corporations that are financially invested in certain market-based educational paradigms. Take for example Bill Gates and his endorsement of the Common Core movement in the United States. Gates provided much of the funding to develop the Common Core and legislate its implementation; meanwhile his company Microsoft teamed up with Pearson (the world’s largest educational publisher) to provide hardware and software to schools to facilitate that implementation (Strauss, 2015). Consider the amount of money made in these educational transactions: Pearson profited more than 1 billion U.S. dollars in 2013 alone (Simon, 2015). Much of this money comes from testing, with states spending between 50 to 100 U.S. dollars for each test that each student takes. A fifth grade student in Texas took three tests (Math, Reading, and Science) in 2011. If a student failed, they could take the test three more times. And Texas has almost four million elementary students being tested in multiple subjects at multiple grades. That’s a lot of students who take a lot of tests, and Pearson cannot help but see the dollar signs. So the lobbyists and government entities manufacture and manipulate crisis (see Berliner and Biddle, 1996), and the money continues to flow into efforts to manage it. We propose in this book that nothing occurs in a vacuum. The fundamental philosophies and purposes of education have always existed in highly contested historical, social, cultural, ideological, and economic contexts, with policy emerging from dominant configurations of institutional power. Public education has seen many movements come and go, and woven through that history is the question of power, of who benefits from the structures of education and why. We pause in disbelief and dismay when we hear in-service teachers, who work in corporate charter schools and wear uniforms emblazoned with company logos talk about “the company I work for” rather than “the school in which I teach.” We feel a sense of tremendous foreboding when we contemplate our own teacher education programs structuring themselves to meet the data collection demands of accreditors rather than the needs of the children and communities we supposedly serve. The first chapter of this book by Brian Charles Charest entitled The Way It’s Going: Neoliberal Reforms and the Colonization of the American School describes a public school in Seattle, Washington that presents the kind of education we wish would permeate the educational landscape. We wonder at the increasingly corporatized structures of education, from early childhood through higher education, which have been hypnotized by “big data” and audit culture and have repositioned public school teachers and university faculty as “contingent academic labor.” We look askance at our own administrators and colleagues, who as Peter Taubman (2009) suggests, have allowed themselves to become locked into an abusive relationship and race to prove their worth on the terms of the abuser, in this case anti-intellectual governors, state legislatures, the American congress, the Secretary of Eduxx

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cation, and what Diane Ravitch (2010) calls a “billionaire boys club” of “venture philanthropists” led by the likes of Gates, Broad, Walton, and others. Those philanthrocapitalists represent the nebulous, politically unaccountable power behind the education-industrial complex. Particularly in K-12 schools, many classroom teachers feel this tension between what is and what should be. Some may not recognize the impending corporate takeover for what it is, and others may not recognize that teachers, as the oppressed, and as Friere (2003) suggests, have “internalized the image of the oppressor and adopted his guidelines” (p. 45). Instead, they leave the profession in droves or note the lack of autonomy to be a professional instead of a technician in their pedagogical choices. They no longer can be considered what so many ideally could be, an artist who supports students in their becoming of themselves. Section three of this book presents practical implications in K-12 schooling related to these issues. Freire claims that “The teacher is of course an artist, but being an artist does not mean that he or she can make the profile, can shape the students. What the educator does in teaching is to make it possible for the students to become themselves.” (Horton & Freire, 1990, p. 181). This is not true in the school model that has been slowly morphing since the end of the school houses of the industrial age, and in our current digital age, we must recognize technologies that perpetuate the image of the teacher as technician instead or professional, or even as artist. Unfortunately, dreams of resurgent democratization in cyberspace have been usurped by “a reality of many, many ways to buy things and many, many ways to select among what is offered” (Lessig, 2002, p. 7). In this economic paradigm, digital technologies “empower the strong and disempower the weak” (Morozov, 2011, p. xvii). Thus, digital technologies that could transform knowledge construction and schooling instead are co-opted to reinforce standardization movements with rote lines of curriculum that equate 21st century skills to the labor needs of corporations. Given that context, the chapters in this book demonstrate the tensions between the instrumental questions of “how” that have enthralled teacher education and education more broadly, and the much more uncomfortable “why” questions. Why do we continue to accept the descent of education into algorithmic instrumentality? Why do we perpetuate that reductive thinking in teacher education? Most importantly, why do many who know better remain silent and thus complicit in perpetuating a Foucauldian regime of disciplinary power? We argue that grappling first with those complex “why” questions is imperative in moving toward the “how” of praxis. Chomsky (2016) has noted that no institution or system is self-justifying, and where, upon asking the critical “why” questions, institutions cannot justify themselves, they should be dismantled. Perhaps this book might be one place of generative dialogue through which to interrogate the “commonsense” that structures our individual and institutional thinking and practices, and where necessary provoke action to, as Jefferson wrote in the Declaration of Independence, alter or abolish them. Jim Burns Florida International University, USA Douglas J. Loveless University of Auckland, New Zealand Katie Dredger James Madison University, USA Pamela Sullivan James Madison University, USA xxi

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REFERENCES Berliner, D. C., & Biddle, B. J. (1996). The manufactured crisis: Myths, fraud, and the attack on America’s public schools. New York, NY: Perseus Books. Chomsky, N. (2016). Who rules the world? New York, NY: Metropolitan Books. Friere, P. (2003). Pedagogy of the oppressed (30th ann. ed.). New York, NY: Continuum. Giroux, H. (2014). The violence of organized forgetting: Thinking beyond America’s disimagination machine. San Francisco, CA: City Lights Books. Horton, M., & Freire, P. (1990). We make the road by walking: Conversations on education and social change. Philadelphia, PA: Temple University Press. Lessig, L. (2002). The future of ideas: The fate of the commons in a connected world. New York, NY: Vintage Books. Morozov, E. (2011). The net delusion: The dark side of internet freedom. New York, NY: Public Affairs. Ravitch, D. (2010). The death and life of the great American school system: How testing and choice are undermining education. New York, NY: Basic Books. Simon, S. (2015, February 10). No profit left behind. Politico. Retrieved from http://www.politico.com/ story/2015/02/pearson-education-115026_Page2.html Smith, A. (2007). An inquiry into the nature and causes of the wealth of nations. New York, NY: MetaLibri. Retrieved from https://www.ibiblio.org/ml/libri/s/SmithA_WealthNations_p.pdf Strauss, V. (2015, September 23). Common Core: The gift that Pearson counts on to keep giving. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2015/09/23/ common-core-the-gift-that-pearson-counts-on-to-keep-giving/ Taubman, P. (2009). Teaching by numbers: Deconstructing the discourse of standards and accountability in education. New York, NY: Routledge.

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Acknowledgment

We wish to thank all those without whose contributions this book would not have been possible. We deeply appreciate the reflective insights contributed by Benjamin Baez to the foreword. Thanks also to those who served on the editorial advisory board. We also extend our gratitude to the chapter authors, without whose thoughtful contributions this book would not exist. We also express our appreciation to Yuejia Chen of Florida International University for her editorial assistance. Finally, we wish to thank Courtney Tychinski at IGI Global for her support and commitment throughout this project.

Douglas J. Loveless University of Auckland, New Zealand Pamela Sullivan James Madison University, USA Katie S. Dredger James Madison University, USA Jim Burns Florida International University, USA



Section 1

Curriculum and Instruction in a Neoliberal, Digital Age

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Chapter 1

The Way It’s Going:

Neoliberal Reforms and the Colonization of the American School Brian Charles Charest The Nova Project, USA

ABSTRACT In this chapter the author argues that those concerned with the “the way it’s going” in public education can learn much from post-colonial theory about the relationship between education research and assessment technologies and education reform policy, curriculum development, and knowledge formation. The author argues that current neoliberal education reform in the US can best be understood through the frame of neocolonialism, where schools and communities take the shape of internal colonies, where teachers, students, and parents have little or no say about the technologies, curricula, and standardized examinations foisted upon them. Education research that supports the current policy paradigm largely benefits researchers, corporations, and policy makers, while ignoring the effects of such policies on students, teachers, and local communities. Such practices, the author suggests, are rooted in a type of colonial thinking and acting that have been rearticulated through the prevailing logic of neoliberalism.

INTRODUCTION The title of this chapter comes from a talk given in Dakar some years ago by the Beninese philosopher and politician, Paulin Hountondji (1992). In his talk, later reprinted under the title, Recapturing, Hountondji (1992) challenged the scientific community by asking the assembled researchers, educators, and economists the deceptively simple question: “Are we satisfied or not with the way it is going?” (p. 238). This chapter explores what might happen if this same question were posed today to public educators, university researchers, and other advocates for public education across the country. Are educators currently satisfied or not with the way it’s going in public schools today? Hountondji (1992) followed up his question by saying, “As long as we look upon the problems of scientific research only from the angle of the individual performance and career, we have almost nothing to criticize” (p. 238). As his talk continued, however, it became clear that Hountondji (1992) had someDOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch001

Copyright © 2017, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.

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thing besides individual accomplishments and careers in mind: he wanted his audience to look beyond individual performance and examine the value and purpose of their work for the greater good; he wanted his colleagues to look closely at the relationship between what they did and the effects of their work on local communities; finally, he wanted his fellow scientists, researchers, and educators to examine their connections to the industries, corporations, and economies in wealthy Northern countries—particularly those of former colonial powers. Hountondji (1992) then invited his audience to carefully consider the ways in which their research and the development of individual careers had been used to advance only certain economic, political, and educational goals. Who had benefited (and who had not), both economically and politically, from the results of this work? What changes are needed, he asked, when we consider the social and political context, the consequences of our work for local communities, and the destination and uses of the results of our research and the development of new technology? These questions led Hountondji (1992) to further explore how research and economic development had helped redefine the value of certain types of knowledge in society. Hountondji (1992) wanted to know how the results of these activities could embed themselves in the society that had produced them, while at the same time ignoring or devaluing local ways of knowing and doing. How did society manage to appropriate the results of research and the development of new technologies and to what end? Each of these questions, Hountondji (1992) explained, “would require researchers to reassess the social and political context of scientific research, the use of technology, and the production of knowledge, in order to better understand the relationship of these things to society” (p. 238). Doing so, though, would require widening the scope of inquiry to include the collective benefits (or costs) to the larger community—costs and consequences embedded in research and technological developments. And, it would require a new understanding and acknowledgement of the way in which “disinterested” scholarship and technological development was complicit in reproducing a system of exploitation and inequality, even when certain individuals clearly seemed to benefit from this arrangement. In other words, Hountondji (1992) wanted the researchers to interrogate and critique their own work, in order to evaluate their projects and better understand the implications of such work.

BACKGROUND Knowledge in Neoliberal Times: Production and Practice There is more than a coincidental similarity between economic policy, education, and research in the postcolonial Africa of which Hountondji (1992) speaks and the way things are going in public education today here in the United States. In fact, what Hountondji (1992) critiques here—namely, that the research is done largely to benefit the researcher or company for which that the researcher works—is precisely how much education research, policymaking, and reform have been conceived of and enacted here in the United States. That is, education research and policy that affects many public schools is often no different than the kind of research Hountondji (1992) criticizes (Anyon, 2005; Lipman, 2004; Ravitch, 2013). At the center of the current reform movement looms the Common Core State Standards (CCSS)—a set of seemingly neutral standards that delineate what students should know and be able to do—and the high-stakes standardized examinations that come with them. Testing technologies that are researched and developed by for-profit companies are then exported and implemented in schools as a way to increase 2

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teacher and student accountability to the CCSS. These exams are marketed as technologically advanced and more accurate measurements of student “achievement.” The Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium (SBAC) reports the following on their website: A core feature of Smarter Balanced assessments is that they are customized for each student for a more accurate measurement for every student. To accomplish this, the computer-based test adjusts the difficulty of questions throughout the assessment based on the student’s response. If a student answers a question correctly, the next question will be harder; if a student answers incorrectly, the next question will be easier. (“Testing Technology,” 2016, n.p.) The exams, we are told, utilize “computer adaptive technology (CAT)” that, according to the consortium, can more accurately assess student learning and provide us with incontestable “scientific” data about student achievement. All of this is neatly aligned to the new and better CCSS. Nowhere on the consortium’s website, however, is there any discussion of what the exams actually measure (or what they are unable to measure). Nor is there acknowledgement on the consortium’s site about how these exams fail to help teachers or schools develop thoughtful, creative, engaged, caring, or active citizens. Additionally, while the consortium claims that their assessment is “educator created,” there is no response on the consortium website to the many scholars who have argued that the standards to which these exams are aligned were not, in fact, developed by educators (Cody, 2013; Ravitch, 2013). Finally, neither the CCSS, nor the consortium have anything to say about the hundreds of education scholars in California who have called for a moratorium on the high-stakes SBAC and PARCC exams (Ravitch, 2015, 2016). None of this is very surprising, though, particularly when one examines the origins and uses of these new standards and the computer-based examinations to which they are attached (Cody, 2013). In fact, what we see is that these standards and exams extend a way of thinking about public schooling and education policy rooted in neocolonial practice and neoliberal ideology (Giroux, 2004). According to Madina Tlostanova and Walter Mignolo (2009) there are four interconnected spheres of power and control that characterize colonialization: 1. Economic control (i.e., what Hountondji calls the “problem of dependence”). 2. Control of authority (e.g., forms of government, financial and legal systems). 3. Control of the public sphere (e.g., how society defines things like the family, gender roles, sexual normativity). 4. Control of knowledge and subjectivity (i.e., education and the interpellation of subjects). This formulation outlines how education research and teaching, as well as high stakes examinations and universalized standards, are linked to the larger projects of economic development, subject formation, control, and regulation in our society. In particular, Tlostanova and Mignolo (2009) note that control of knowledge and subjectivity happens “through education and colonizing the existing knowledges, which is the key and fundamental sphere of control that makes domination possible” (p. 135). This means that outside authorities, like university researchers working on behalf of large publishing companies, tech companies, or non-governmental boards—think EdTPA, Common Core State Standards, The College Board, computer-based SBAC and PARCC exams—define, package, and disseminate only certain types of knowledge while ignoring others (Dover, Schultz, Smith, & Duggan, 2015; Simon, 2012).

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Schools and universities, university researchers, as well as new standardized computer-based assessments, play a key role in legitimizing only certain ways of being and understanding in the world that in turn benefit only certain groups. What’s more, Tlostanova and Mignolo (2009) show that these colonial practices operate in conjunction with neoliberal mandates. They note: The neoliberal agenda translated the previous mission of development and modernization, into the Washington Consensus of granting the market economy priority over social regulation. (p. 136) This is just to say that things that were once considered public goods (e.g., education and the production of knowledge) have largely been turned over to logic of the marketplace where universities no longer seek to produce subjects of universal reason, but rather set students, researchers and schools in competition with one another in a winner-takes-all race to the top (Marsh, 2011). One example of this phenomenon in education is the move to privatize public education through charter schools (Lipman, 2004; Ravitch, 2013). The neoliberal agenda that has largely structured the reform movement of the last decade has coopted the rhetoric of “experimentation,” “change,” “efficiency,” and “alternative” approaches to teaching and schooling to create more and better opportunities for private investment in the $600 billion market we once called public education. Such changes (i.e., fusing state and market concerns) are what prompted John Katzman, founder of the Princeton Review test-prep company, to suggest to would-be education investors at an investors conference that they should “look for companies developing software that can replace teachers for segments of the school day, driving down labor costs” (Simon, 2012). This radical shift in values is also what allows someone like David Coleman, president of The College Board and leading architect of the Common Core State Standards (CCSS) to say publicly at a talk he gave a few years ago that schools need to get rid of expressive and narrative writing, because as Coleman said in his now oft-quoted speech: “As you grow up in this world, you start to realize that people don’t give a shit about what you feel, or what you think.” (Weber, 2013). Additionally, in a speech to the National Conference of State Legislatures, 2009, Bill Gates had this to say: When the tests are aligned to the common standards, the curriculum will line up as well—and that will unleash powerful market forces in the service of better teaching. For the first time, there will be a large base of customers eager to buy products that can help every kid learn and every teacher get better. (Gates, 2009, n.p.) What’s left out here, of course, is what, exactly kids should learn and what it is that teachers need to know in order to “get better.” To put the problem another way, who decides what is worth knowing and doing? There’s no discussion in the current neoliberal reform movement about nurturing and supporting students or encouraging students to become citizens who understand and care about others, who appreciated and respect difference, or who understand and believe in a society organized around equity and democracy. Rather, what Gates and these other “edupreneurs” make clear is that the research, development, and production of educational products and reform policies take place within a neoliberal framework that sees more and better products as the best way to train and control subjects in so-called failing schools, while the larger socioeconomic and political concerns for communities most affected by growing inequality 4

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in the US can go entirely unmentioned. Communities most impacted by such proposals, of course, have almost no say in how and why this type of knowledge is produced or enacted in their communities. And, “edupreneurs” like Katzman and Gates often do not discuss who will pay for and who will profit from these new education solutions once they are brought to market. As educators have already seen with charter schools, what communities are told at the outset will be increased efficiency and savings for the public coupled with innovation and creativity in classrooms, ends up being something else entirely in practice (Lipman, 2002). Additionally, this move to privatize public education has been used as a rationale to dismantle unions, fire teachers, and redirect tax dollars into the hands of private companies, all in the name of raising standards and increasing accountability (Lipman, 2002; Giroux, 2004). Hountandji’s (1992) questions are a challenge for all educators and researchers to examine the value of their work—whose standards are being implementing? What policies are being enforced? What technologies are being imported and at what cost? And, for whom and for what are students being examined and assessed? —and then trace the impact of this work on students and the communities in which these students live. Teachers and researchers might begin by asking what’s working and what’s not, and then move toward what can be done to change these circumstances; answers to these questions, if thoroughly examined, can point educators, possibly, in different directions, directions that might lead toward what Jean Anyon (2005) describes as a “politically radical research paradigm” that involves movement building and organizing to change the material conditions in communities (p. 25). Similarly, Tlostanova and Mignolo (2009), argue for what they describe as the “de-colonial option” where “knowledge is no longer or necessarily produced in the academy. Living experiences generate knowledge to solve problems presented in everyday living” (p. 144). Much like the questions that Hountondji (1992) asks about the purpose and value of scientific research in postcolonial Africa, it is critical for education professionals to ask questions about the kind of work in which they engage, the knowledge produced, and the ongoing relationships to corporations and new technologies, as well as schools and communities (Giroux, 1982, 1994, 2004). Why ask these questions about the work in schools and communities? If one begins by recognizing the connections (or lack of connections) between education research and policy, economic policy and opportunity for students, and the effects (both intended and unintended) that school reforms have on local communities and teacher training, recruitment, and retention, educators and education researchers better position themselves to articulate different ways forward. Researchers, policy makers, teachers, and teacher educators interested in education reforms that help create healthy and sustainable communities would do well to begin with research that attempts to unravel the way in which colonial practices and neoliberal mandates—e.g., knowing what is best for others, extracting and exploiting human resources, importing technology and curriculum, setting up systems of dependence—have carried over into their own work. The first step in this project requires a careful examination of how research in public schools resembles a colonial practice in that it has been coopted by a neoliberal policy agenda, often with dire consequences for local populations. By taking this first step, a more honest examination of the role of education researchers, teachers, and public policies in reproducing poverty and increasing inequality becomes possible (Anyon, 2005; Lipman, 2004; Marsh, 2011). Doing so might also help educators and education researchers change current trends in urban education policy by adopting more action-oriented research and teacher preparation paradigms that acknowledge that what goes on (and what does not go on) inside our public schools is inextricably linked to what happens (and what does not happen) outside of them in surrounding communities (Anyon, 2005; Lipman, 2004; Marsh, 2011). To put the problem 5

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another way, research that tells educators how to teach Shakespeare (or any other subject) better, while undoubtedly interesting and useful in many ways, will never help communities address the problems of poverty and inequality that create the most significant barriers to learning and opportunity for most low-income students (Marsh, 2011). Echoing Hountondji’s (1992) concerns about the relationship between scientific research and the local community, education researcher Pauline Lipman (2002) notes the importance of exploring the link between education research and policy as well as the people affected by neoliberal policy mandates: There is little critical examination of the genesis of these policies, of whose interests they serve, of their social implications, or of their meanings for teachers, communities, and most of all the nearly one-half million students in Chicago Public Schools, 90 percent of whom are students of color and 84 percent of whom are classified as low income. (Lipman, 2002, p. 380) Lipman (2004) makes it clear that researchers, teachers, and administrators need to interrogate their role (or lack of a role) in developing, implementing and reshaping education and economic policies that impact urban schools. In order to do this, as Jean Anyon (2005) notes, educators and researchers will need to look carefully at the links between neoliberal economic policies and the maintenance of poverty in urban communities. In other words, educators and researchers must continue to ask who these economic policies benefit and how these policies are being used, if the goal is to determine just how unhappy (or happy) one is with “the way it’s going” in public schooling; doing so, will help researchers and educators better situate themselves to develop effective ways to challenge unjust policies that reproduce inequality in our cities. Conversely, looking only at what one does in schools (fixing teachers, students, and curriculum), while ignoring what happens outside of them (the social, political, and economic forces that influence them), is to legitimize the view that poverty and inequality are problems outside the purview of education. Or, as Jean Claude Brizard, the former CEO of the Chicago Public Schools, said during a visit to the University of Illinois at Chicago, “We can’t fix poverty. What we can fix, are people” (Brizard, 2011). Brizard’s comments crystalize the neoliberal logic and the colonial thinking that emphasizes the assumed link between individual responsibility and merit, while simultaneously legitimizing inequality in schools and society. According to education authorities like Brizard, if you happen to be a young person and you are also poor and live in an under-resourced community, our society understands this to be your own fault. The reasons that you are still living in such a neighborhood and attending a school that will not prepare you to study at Harvard, has everything to do with your own abilities, intelligence, and resourcefulness, rather than, say, the connections between your school, your community, and the larger economic and political context that has either denied or afforded you privileges and opportunities (Anyon, 2005). Viewing research, teaching, and learning, as well as the many other concerns of education (what is done in schools), as being always and already part of what goes on in our communities (what happens outside of schools), means understanding schools in ecological terms. It means seeing school and community building as reciprocal projects. This is not to say that personal responsibility does not matter; rather, it is just to say that personal responsibility can be better understood in terms of the social and political institutions that shape individuals (Trickett, 1984).

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From Public Good to Private Investment: The Rise of Neoliberal Education Reform That’s the standard technique of privatization: defund, make sure things don’t work, people get angry, you hand it over to private capital. (Chomsky, 2014) In order to better understand the challenges in urban education, however, it’s important, briefly, to examine the recent history of education reform and its effects on urban schools. For the past thirty years, education reform has shifted away from questions of equity in the public school system and moved toward a reliance on data driven systems of accountability, standards, new technologies, and scientifically “proven” curricula (Lipman, 2004; Giroux, 2004). This push to understand education reform through a neoliberal lens—one that views opportunity exclusively in terms of individual achievement and merit—has helped to eliminate broader concerns for the health and sustainability of the larger community. No longer is there a concern for the social movements of the past that coalesced around questions of equity for all and focused on things like affirmative action, social inclusion, racial justice, equal access, and equal rights for women. Instead, neoliberal reformers fixate on a mechanistic view of education tied to new and better technologies that stress a narrow understanding of individual compliance and achievement, rather than, say, a deep knowledge of self and others, and an understanding of civic learning and community engagement. This reorientation toward the state and citizenship has had a profound impact on how we have traditionally understood the rights, entitlements, and responsibilities of democratic citizenship. What used to count as basic services available to all citizens—education, social security, housing, etc.—have now been transformed (or are in the process of being transformed) into private commodities available only to those who can afford them. Neoliberalism can be understood, then, as the idea that market values and imperatives should be applied to all aspects of human life, including schools and education. Today’s neoliberal education reform environment emphasizes efficacy, freedom, skill proficiency, individual development, a fact-based curriculum, discipline, and a return to back-to-basics teaching— where teaching means that docile students receive official knowledge and teachers are there to deliver it in officially mandated ways. Such reform efforts revolve around state-administered computerized exams and the implementation of a standards-driven curriculum that ensures the same thing is taught to all students in all schools. The aims of such approaches—state-mandated tests based on state-mandated standards that reproduce a version of “cultural literacy” championed by Hirsch, Kett, and Trefil (1987)—have led to research studies and policies that seek to turn entire populations of people into objects (human capital) for scientific examination, development, and classification. These studies aim to identify and produce docile human capital without considering the relationship between individuals, their experiences, knowledges, or socioeconomic context. In other words, the few low-income students who can be cultivated into valuable resources (human capital) are extracted from their neighborhoods and encouraged to sell their labor power in order to create wealth for people elsewhere, leaving those who cannot or do not want to participate in the system to live in underdeveloped urban ghettos. Success is understood through a narrative of escape, while failure is articulated through narratives of personal failure and deficiency. The justification for the neoliberal system, one that rewards the few and disregards the many, is characterized by a meritocratic fiction that revolves in large part around a computer-based, state-mandated examination that is used to legitimize and reproduce individual social positions.

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According to education theorist Henry Giroux (1994), “we live at a time when state legislators and federal officials are increasingly calling for the testing of teachers and the implementation of standardized curriculum” (p. 38). The examination (for both students and teachers) has, in many ways, become the single most important determining factor in our public schools today. Not only does it inform and produce the need for future testing, but it also informs teacher training and licensing, provides or denies access to further education, and influences instruction and curriculum development (Dover, et.al. 2015; Giroux, 2004). There is currently a national movement underway to link teacher evaluations to student performance on these exams, raising the stakes even higher for both teachers and students. Borrowing a term from the business community, teachers in New York (and many other states) are to be measured for their “value-added” to the school (defined in large part by student test scores); these value-added ratings can comprise up to 40 percent of a teacher’s evaluation in some states and are made public in an attempt to shame teachers into raising student test scores (Strauss, 2012). What is more, these valueadded measures (VAM) have been shown by the American Statistical Association (ASA) to be neither consistently valid nor reliable (Strauss, 2014). In other words, what is wrong with these attempts to measure a teacher’s added “value,” is that fact the value-added measurement (VAM), doesn’t actually work. In their report on VAM, the American Statistical Association (ASA, 2014) found the following: Most VAM studies find that teachers account for about 1% to 14% of the variability in test scores, and that the majority of opportunities for quality improvement are found in the system-level conditions. Ranking teachers by their VAM scores can have unintended consequences that reduce quality. (p.2) The ASA report also points out: This is not saying that teachers have little effect on students, but that variation among teachers accounts for a small part of the variation in scores. The majority of the variation in test scores is attributable to factors outside of the teacher’s control such as student and family background, poverty, curriculum, and unmeasured influences. (2014, p. 7) In other words, these attempts to measure the value that teachers add are significantly flawed at best, and useless at worst. Yet, this scheme to link teacher ratings and salaries to student test scores continues to be pushed by neoliberal reformers. The seduction of these common sense reforms is undeniable, since their logic appeals to deeply held beliefs about rewarding those who work hard to raise test scores (good teachers) and punishing those who do not (bad teachers) (Kumashiro, 2015). Pauline Lipman (2002), who seeks to unmask the contradictions in the current reform rhetoric, echoes Giroux’s (2004) concerns: In a system of blatant inequalities, the agenda of standards, tests, and accountability is framed in the language of equality and justice. All students and schools are evaluated by ‘the same test’ and ‘held to the same standards. (p. 390) The dishonest rhetoric of the neoliberal reform movement emphasizes equity and access while neglecting the larger questions of racial segregation and economic and social inequality; it does so by shifting the focus of education reform to questions of curriculum content, standards, and accountability—all understood in terms of individual responsibility. At precisely the moment when justice and equity have been translated to mean access (i.e., access to curriculum, high quality teachers, job and internship op8

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portunities, etc.) we have successfully sidestepped questions about exploitation, inequality, and polices that directly impact communities. That is, access is translated to mean something that is always understood to be determined by merit, and, therefore, allows us to imagine that all opportunities are always available and accessible to those who have worked hard enough to deserve them. All of this is to say that when we suggest that the only thing that poor students need is access to new technologies, a rigorous curriculum, and a good teacher (presuming the school can provide them) then the future success or failure of that individual can only be understood in these same individualistic terms— terms that effectively deny any connection between success and socioeconomic status. Standardization in this system comes to mean fairness and equity, though, interestingly, these terms are never used in relation to community investment, school funding, or extracurricular or economic opportunities. In the latter realms, fairness, equity, and standardization are irrelevant. There is no discussion in neoliberal reform circles of surrendering privilege in the interest of justice and equity. The socioeconomic status of a student, in fact, becomes irrelevant, since what matters here is access to new technology, curriculum, a good teacher, and the individual’s self-discipline and work ethic (i.e., your grit). Teachers and students are made to understand through the logic of neoliberalism that where one is from has nothing to do with where one might go. To put this yet another way, if one is poor and not doing well in school, the reasons for this have everything to do with personal failures—failures, it’s worth noting, that have nothing to do with the problems of poverty, inequality, or state interventions on behalf of private enterprise and capital accumulation. This is to say that if our society believes that education alone is the only viable solution to the problems of poverty and inequality, and society provides you with an education, then society can really only blame you for your lack of success (society gave you access to an education, after all). This is, for all intents and purposes, just another version of blaming poor people for being poor (Marsh, 2011). Such views about education also absolve individuals with power and privilege (e.g., policy makers, students, school administrators, teachers, university educators) from having to examine the ways in which neoliberal economic policies maintain poverty, and by extension, ghetto schooling (Anyon, 2005; Giroux, 2004). Ignoring the linkages (or saying there’s nothing that can be done about them—which amounts to the same thing) between economic policies, poverty, and schools also frees policy makers to reorganize schools according to market-based mandates that valorize notions of choice and freedom (while providing very little of either in practice), exacerbating an already high stakes environment by turning the right to education funding into a race to the top with clear winners and losers (Lipman, 2002; Giroux, 2004). Neoliberal policies, and the powerful discourses they engender, have made it increasingly difficult for educators to identify and adopt new ways to address the problems of poverty and inequality—problems that have such profound effects on school performance (Anyon, 2005; Giroux, 2004). In order to find a way out of this predicament, educators from across the spectrum will need to understand how these discourses and policies function and then identify new strategies and approaches to teaching and schooling that will help us to change them.

The Age of Assessment and the Era of Accountability The call for an increase in corporate influence in schools came in the 1980s when then President Ronald Regan “spoke out strongly in favor of increased business support to education as a way to compensate for decreased public funding” (Ray & Mickelson, 1993, p. 4). With such calls came a new articulation of public school reform and a way of talking about education reform filtered through the lens of neoliberal 9

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logic. Of course, the connections between public school and business interests, as well as appeals to the cult of efficiency, go back much further than this—all the way back to the founding of our first public schools, in fact (Marsh, 2011). Horace Mann, arguing for the creation of free public schools for all—in one his twelve reports submitted between 1837-1848 to the Massachusetts Board of Education—appealed to wealthy industrialist for financial support by suggesting that a rudimentary education would produce more compliant and efficient workers as well as better citizens. But, what is most important for this discussion is how the rise of neoliberalism in the mid-1960s as the dominant set of economic policies has influenced school reform in profound ways (Anyon, 2005; Harvey, 2005; Lipman, 2004). The discourse of neoliberalism is synonymous with a discourse of common sense: it valorizes freedom, choice, efficiency, accountability, character, progress and self- improvement (development) tied to economic incentives and the rule of market forces. All of these ideas, as David Harvey (2005) argues in Neoliberalism, appeal to our instincts and intuitions, as they build on traditions of individual freedom and dignity. Additionally, these calls, wrapped in the logic and efficiency-speak of science, technology, and business, help to mask the problems and contradictions inherent in such policies—ones that decrease funding for social services in urban areas, privatize public schools, and ignore the political, economic, and social conditions that ensure the continued dependency of such schools and the surrounding communities on outside forces in order to function. With the enactment of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB), urban schools were made even more reliant on public and private funding partnerships. As a result of the new law, such funding would now largely be determined by a school’s performance on the standardized tests that were designed and controlled by those outside of local communities (Lipman, 2004, p. 106). As William Ayers and Michael Klonsky (1994) have pointed out in their discussion of Chicago Public Schools, the test—administered to all equally—does nothing to address the school funding disparities that currently exist: “Chicago schools are at the lower end of the resource-distribution curve, and they lack the most basic, essential resources needed to do the job they are asked to do” (p. 6). Yet, despite knowing this, under-resourced schools that fail these high-stakes tests are then subjected to even further control from the state or federal government and may be closed or taken over by private organizations, while questions regarding the equitable distribution of resources remain unaddressed (Hursh, 2006). Unfortunately, despite these important insights, the material conditions in many public schools remain largely unchanged (Lipman, 2004). The research cited above is important and necessary for helping us to better understand how our schools function within the larger political and economic contexts so that new research programs that acknowledge these problems will have a better chance at changing the material conditions in urban schools and communities today. The consequences of such top-down, or to use Hountondji’s (1992) term, “extroverted” policies and research programs (e.g., research using standardized test data to make decisions about schools) often play out in classrooms where students and teachers are subjected to the effects of the ongoing debates in policy circles, universities, and research centers. The data that the computer-based, high-stakes tests provide are used to target schools for additional studies, to test-drive educational programs and products, to implement new technologies, to market private test-taking programs, to test teaching methodologies, or to implement scripted curriculum plans. According to Ayers and Klonsky (1994), Chicago schools continue to fail students because of it: Despite decades of research and experience indicating the wrongheadedness of organizing learning as an essentially passive affair, that is exactly what most schools do. The central idea of this typical approach

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to teaching and learning is that there is some known body of knowledge, some key information and skills, some agreed upon, sanctified “stuff” called the curriculum that youngsters need and teachers have. (p. 7) The “stuff” that Ayers and Klonsky discuss becomes part of the official knowledge (e.g., CCSS) that schools are mandated to impart to students. This important stuff referred to above is developed, produced, and the then disseminated by outside officials—all of it in a standardized language and reproduced on computer-based exams. Such standardization reflects only certain types of knowledge and is understood through language that may be unfamiliar or irrelevant to local communities. Due in large part to the enactment of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) law in 2000 and Race to the Top (R2T) 2009, many schools were almost entirely dependent on a standardized testing system to receive additional or continued funding (Lipman, 2004). While proponents of the Every Student Succeeds Act (ESSA) 2015, suggest that computer-based, standardized testing has now been delinked from school funding, high-stakes, computer-based exams still frame teacher and student evaluations across the nation in very important ways. What is more, the curriculum programs that are created to address the perceived needs of these failing schools are most often controlled, managed, and implemented by central office employees or boards of education in spaces far removed from the everyday realities of our public schools; very little decision making power is left in the hands of the local community or the teachers in these schools. For example, in Chicago, very few of the key decision makers in the Chicago Public Schools (CPS)—current and former board members like billionaire Penny Pritzker; former professor of international affairs, Henry S. Bienen; and former general council for Sears Corporation, Andrea Zopp—have any first-hand experience with the complex contexts that shape the schools or communities most affected by their decisions. The standardized, computer-based test—the individual examination at the center of our current reforms—pays no attention to the socio-economic conditions of the local school community, but rather reduces the individual to a set of numbers in a case file; these sets of data are used as the basis of a narrative about the individual, the school, and the community, one that has severe consequences and is constructed without any direct input from (or understanding of) those whom such narratives purport to describe. The computer-based, standardized test with its irrefutable computer adaptive technology (CAT), has become a way not only to classify students, but also a tool to rate teachers, to classify entire school districts and neighborhoods, and to silence the voices of those who might dissent. As Foucault (Foucault & Rabinow, 1984) puts it, “we are entering the age of the infinite examination and of compulsory objectification” (p. 200), where all things are to be weighed and measured against an unproblematized norm. The biased language of the state-mandated exam provides the state with a self- reinforcing mechanism to justify the implementation of whatever new curriculum they decide to use, to direct funding towards test preparation classes, to close schools, to dismantle unions, or to enforce strict control over the operation of the school (Ravitch, 2015; Au & Tempel, 2012). According to researcher David Hursh (2006), the federal government then, “uses the tests to divert funding away from public education and toward for-profit and nonprofit corporations to tutor students, administer schools, or convert public schools to charter schools” (p. 51). The outside control of the computer-based testing data and the entire accountability apparatus is often used to prove the “failure” of urban public schools and justify the need for even more outside influence over what goes on inside these schools. Thus, the colonization of the urban school begins with the importation of new technology, in this case, the computer-based examination, and continues on with the importation of educational software, textbooks, teachers, administrators, and scripted curricula. 11

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To put it another way, the local culture is viewed as a “failure” according to the computer-based test data. Therefore, a culture viewed by those on the outside as containing the ingredients for success must be imported and taught to students in the form of a standardized curriculum. This is done, of course, with no mention of or regard for economic and political conditions—e.g., corporate tax avoidance and intentional disinvestment—that helped shape these schools and communities. The continued “failure” of the school and community can now only be understood to mean that the individuals (students, parents, teachers, administrators) have been unable to capitalize on the solutions (better teachers, test prep programs, scripted curricula, common standards, best practices, etc.) provided for them by outside entities. Such “failures” are used to justify the continued disinvestment from entire communities. As Giroux (1994) notes, however, the design of these high-stakes, computer-based solutions are not a simple or neutral endeavor; they are rife with challenges and potential pitfalls: The language of curriculum, like other discourses, does not merely reflect a pregiven reality; on the contrary, it selectively offers depictions of the larger world through representations that people struggle over to name what counts as knowledge, what counts as communities of learning, what social relationships matter, and what visions of the future can be represented as legitimate. (p. 35) Thus, the computer-based test that informs school curriculum cannot be viewed as a politically neutral text operating in the best interest of all students who are required to take it. Ngugi wa Thiong’o (1986), writing about the situation in Kenya, notes that colonized communities must fight to “liberate their economy, politics, and culture from the Euro- American-based stranglehold to usher a new era of true communal self-regulation and self-determination” (p. 4). In a similar way, neighborhoods that have become internal colonies in urban spaces, controlled by and dependent on outside forces, are involved “in an ever-continuing struggle to seize back their creative initiative in history through a real control of all the means of communal self-definition in time and space” (Thiong’o, 1986, p. 4). Many public schools in urban areas are locked in a similar political fight for their right to define themselves in their own words and by their own standards. Doing so, of course, means doing more than attempting to live up to market-driven mandates that demand all students perform at or above state norms on standardized examinations. The fight, of course, involves more than doing well in school; it also involves the right to control and determine how best to use the resources of the community in ways that honor the knowledge, diversity, and aspirations of community members. Schools were required by NCLB to show adequate yearly progress (AYP) in order to retain current levels of funding and avoid being labeled “failing” schools (Lipman, 2004). The schools in question, however, had little or no voice in the production of the data that determine their futures or the curriculum programs and new technologies that are brought into the schools. Urban public schools are now regulated entirely from the outside by forces they depend on for financing and curriculum development, in order to exist. Funds, of course, can be cut at any time in the name of efficiency, and schools can be taken over by for-profit companies using the now incessant call for narrowing the achievement gap as a way to justify the adoption of a corporate value system in schools. Hountondji (1992), speaking of the situation in the postcolonial spaces, puts the problem this way: This dependency is of the same nature as that of economic activity, which is to say that, put back in the context of its historical genesis, it obviously appears to be the result of the progressive integration of

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the Third World into the worldwide process of the production of knowledge, managed and controlled by the Northern countries. (p. 240) In other words, the official forms of knowledge and economic production in these spaces are always under the direct or indirect control of the colonizer, while the local economy and institutions become dependent on a system that remains in the hands of others. In a similar way, the official “facts” derived and interpreted from computer-based standardized test data—that urban schools fail to meet state standards—overshadow questions regarding the connection between the creation of the test and the system of political, economic, and social forces that determine how the data are used and for what purposes. One result of such a test is that “teachers become wed to curriculum packages and predetermined lesson plans, and are transformed from professionals with any ownership of the content and the conduct of their work into glorified clerks” (Ayers & Klonsky, 1994, p. 8). Teachers become machines delivering content to students. The content that teachers deliver, derived from curriculum, textbooks, and other teaching materials and technologies “whose origin and mode of ‘fabrication’ the local population knew nothing about and that, therefore, could only appear to them as surreal and not to be mastered, miraculously placed on top of their daily reality like a veneer” (Hountondji, 1992, p. 241). Teachers and students participate (often unwittingly) in schooling that prevents local participation in the construction of knowledge. These participants often do so without understanding why or for what purpose they are doing the things they are being asked to do; the computer-based curriculum, textbooks and state-mandated tests, and the official knowledge they contain appears “fixed” and incontestable to those who enter such schools. Teachers are instructed to impart knowledge to students that will increase student test scores, not to question the nature or construction of the computer-based test or its content. Thus, teachers and students, to use Maxine Greene’s (1988) phrase, have a “tendency to accede to the given,” as they become mired in mandated ways of doing and knowing, eventually disengaging from what they often know to be more authentic approaches to teaching or learning (p. 7). Schools become places where “messages and announcements fill the air; but there is, because of the withdrawal, a widespread speechlessness, a silence where there might be—where there ought to be—an impassioned and significant dialogue” (Greene, 1988, p. 2). In large public school districts, teachers and students are not generally consulted (not in any meaningful way) when it comes to implementing or designing school reforms or curriculum (Payne, 2008). In fact, Giroux (1994) notes, “legislators and government officials are ignoring the most important people in the reform effort, the teachers” (p. 38). When discussing standardized testing outside of progressive education circles one rarely hears questions regarding the equitable distribution of resources, control over the content of computer-based assessments, the official language of the test, what and how knowledge is distributed in schools, or the value of the official knowledge embedded in the tests. According to Giroux (1994), mainstream educational reformers in the 1980s, such as William Bennett, Chester Finn, Jr., and Diane Ravitch (before she changed her mind and started speaking out against the policies she helped set in motion), exhibited little understanding of schooling as a site that actively produces different histories, social groups, and student identities under profound conditions of inequality (Giroux, 1994; Ravitch, 2016). Yet, these same reformers set the stage for the destructive policies of the last three decades—policies that emphasize personal responsibility, grit, and achievement, while ignoring growing inequality (Marsh, 2011).

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Instead of questions about corporate tax policy, what we often hear are questions related to discipline, morals, and efficient management in schools. In fact, William Bennett, former President Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of Education, argued openly for an increase in moral education saying “moral education need not be condemned as incompatible with pluralism” (Sher & Bennett, 1982, p. 675). The argument for more discipline in schools and for a curriculum with a particular moral content continues to grow louder as more schools are seen to be “failing” under the current accountability system. In other words, by directly linking moral uprightness with individual persistence and success in school, neoliberal discourse successfully pathologizes poverty as well as any form of state dependence or assistance. According to this logic, a student who succeeds despite the many barriers to success, is a student with sufficient grit, while a student who fails to succeed in these narrow terms, is understood as lacking this key ingredient. Which means, of course, that the success or failure of a child in school can be framed in terms of personal responsibility. You either have grit, of you don’t. It is not hard to see, then, how in the current reform climate where a discourse of moral fitness (understood now as grit) continues to find its place at the education reform table, questions about fixing schools (institutions embedded in a larger social systems) can turn very quickly to questions about fixing people (individual teachers and students who just need more grit). Such discourse moves us away from discussions centered around resource redistribution, economic development, or equity in schools to whether or not certain communities (filled with failing individuals according to state-mandated metrics) deserve additional resources given their perceived inability to conform to state standards. Interestingly, given the overt inequities in many large urban school systems, the character and moral development of those setting policy, or directing the resources and curriculum, are almost never called into question. The logic of our current funding system, a system that asks us to blame poor people for their inadequate progress on computer-based, state-administered tests, is reminiscent of a similar tactic described by Michel Foucault (1961) in Madness in Civilization. While quoting from a report of the Board of Trade that sought to label the poor as the reason for poverty, Foucault notes: When the Board of Trade published its report on the poor in which it proposed the means ‘to render them useful to the public,’ it was made quite clear that the origin of poverty was neither scarcity of commodities nor unemployment, but ‘the weakening of discipline and the relaxation of morals. (p. 137) Bennett, and others who initiated the current reform movement, argues for more control over school curriculum. Such control would see a further limiting, rather than expanding, of diverse ways of knowing and doing. Bennett notes: It may appear to follow from a more general requirement that unorthodox views should receive a fair hearing. However, this would imply that we owe fair treatment to values as well as persons; and, as John Rawls has noted, such an obligation is highly unlikely. (Sher & Bennett, 1982, p. 675) According to Sher and Bennett (1982), then, there appears no reason to review (or question) the curriculum, the test, the current state standards, or the technologies imported into schools, since such views (or values) that fall outside the mainstream are not owed “fair treatment,” and, therefore, can be ignored. Failure, as defined by the test can thus be viewed as resulting from a form of moral deficiency (i.e., a lack of grit) on the part of an entire school or community; this view ignores the role of state sanctioned

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knowledge that the computer-based test attempts to measure, the lack of sufficient funding for many schools, and the biased construction of the test itself. Failure on the computer-based test becomes the legitimating mechanism necessitating the privatization of public education where schools are to be organized by market-based reforms. The test then becomes a rationale for itself by normalizing certain ways of thinking, acting, and behaving in schools. As Foucault (1982) notes, “the Normal is established as a principle of coercion in teaching with the introduction of a standardized education and the establishment of the école normales (teacher training colleges)” (p.196). The standardized test operates in Foucault’s terms as a “technology of power” that informs how one teaches and makes the production of teachers subject to the same forces of normalization; the test content provides the curriculum for both schools and teacher training colleges so that each has at its core the test as its guiding principle (Dover et al., 2015). This reproduction of colonial practice in schools—enforcing a state-mandated language through compulsory exams—not only limits opportunities, but it also ensures that only the “right” people make it through the system. According to Thiong’o (1986), in Kenya “English became the measure of intelligence and ability in the arts, the sciences, and all the other branches of learning. English became the main determinant of a child’s progress up the ladder of formal education” (12). To put it another way, success in the colonized community means giving up one’s ability for self-definition in one’s own language and culture. Hountondji (1992) notes that “between the native languages and the imported languages” there was a “relegation of native languages to substandard languages, indeed ‘dialects’ or ‘patois,’ barely good enough to express the platitudes of everyday life” (p. 248). What a colonized people needs, according to Hountondji, along with more political and economic control, is “a daring project of generalized literacy and the use of native languages as vehicles for teaching and for research at the highest level, with a real democratization of knowledge as an end” (Hountondji, 1992, p. 248). English education scholar, Jay Robinson (1998), echoing Hountondji’s (1992) call for a different view of literacy when working with diverse groups of students, notes that he “felt a deeper responsibility to listen to and learn to understand the languages these young authors brought to the tasks of becoming literate—to encourage them to use such language as they had in their attempts to make meanings for themselves and for the audiences they chose to address” (Robinson, 1998, p. 9). Both Robinson (1998) and Hountondji (1992) imagine public schools as places where the languages, knowledges, and experiences of local communities are honored, acknowledged, and encouraged. Interestingly, in well-funded schools with high percentages of students at or exceeding state standards, the test data become valuable for the opposite reason; the test affirms the rights of these schools to offer more educational experiences and design more flexible curricula (and to justify inequities in funding, since it goes without saying that successful students deserve more and better opportunities and resources). Computer-based test results can then be used as a convincing “scientifically-based” argument for privilege as well as failure and neglect. The computer-based test validates the social position and status of the over-achieving school in contrast to and at the expense of their low performing (often urban) counterparts. Foucault (1984) notes that the exam, “establishes over individuals a visibility through which one differentiates them and judges them” (p. 197). He also points out that the exam “makes it possible to qualify, to classify, and to punish” (p. 197) individuals through a narrative based entirely on positivism. In successful schools, there is almost never any real question about what the test measures or its ability to do so effectively and equitably, since it almost always produces the expected result.

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Thiong’o (1986) notes that while growing up under colonial rule in Kenya when failing to use the official language in school “the culprit was given corporal punishment—three to five strokes of the of the cane on the bare buttocks—or was made to carry a metal plate around the neck with inscriptions such as I AM STUPID or I AM A DONKEY” (p. 11). Formalized language requirements in school became an easy way to enforce colonial ideology and impose an outside culture through ridicule, punishment, or in cases of compliance, grant access to further opportunity. In a similar way, testing in Standard English currently functions as both a way to punish and evaluate students in American public schools, in order to reinforce hierarchical notions of language and culture. While students are no longer struck with canes or asked to wear metal signs that say I AM STUPID or I AM A DONKEY, they do receive scores on examinations that legitimate their social position and come wrapped in scientific validity. Their failures and deficiencies, in other words, are “scientifically” proven by computer-based assessments. As Gorski (2011) notes, this deficit ideology is used “to justify existing social conditions by identifying the problem of inequality as located within, rather than as pressing upon, disenfranchised communities” (p.3).

SOLUTIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS Rejecting colonial thinking and practices in schools means allowing teachers, parents, and students to make decisions about how to operate schools. Such an approach is not only smart, but it is also necessary for the survival of democratically run, publically funded schools. This is the counter-narrative that researchers and educators can promote around the country, because it suggests alternatives to the way its going in most of our public schools. But what does such a school look like in practice? Rejecting colonial thinking and practices in schools means allowing teachers, parents, and students to make decisions about how to operate schools. Such an approach is not only smart, but it is also necessary for the survival of democratically run, publically funded schools. This is the counter-narrative that researchers and educators can promote around the country, because it suggests alternatives to the way it’s going in most of our public schools. But what does such a school look like in practice? Inquiry-based, Dewey-inspired, democratic education is something that’s discussed a lot in schools and colleges of education, but rarely seen or discussed outside of these spaces. However, such schools do exist. For example, in Seattle, Washington, one such school is The Nova Project. The Nova Project embraces the idea that parents, students, and teachers can come together to create a school that reflects the needs and aspirations of a community. The school also embodies democratic ideals. And, it’s worth noting, Nova is public school (not a charter) that was founded in 1970 by a group of teachers and parents who wanted to create a space for alternative education to flourish. Nova is called a “project,” not because anyone objects to being identified as a school, but because the parents, teachers, and the students see the mission of Nova as ongoing, evolving, and open to change. At Nova department meetings there is not much talk about how to implement the CCSS; and, teachers don’t spend much time talking about standardized test scores. What one sees and hears at Nova, though, are teachers discussing how to best support students through partnerships with community-based organizations, as well as how to access opportunities for students in the larger Seattle community. For example, teachers are currently working with students to open an LGBTQ youth health center at the school. Nova currently serves a student population of whom more than 50 percent self-identify as LGBTQ.

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Additionally, at Nova one hears teachers planning courses on the films of Akira Kurosawa and Wes Anderson. Teachers discuss courses on ethics, documentary films, printmaking, ceramics, and fiction writing. There are also classes on graphic novels, Shakespearean tragedies, and Young Adult Literature (YAL). The school offers courses on African American Studies, spoken word poetry, and blog writing. This past year, Nova offered courses on the history of skateboarding and a course exploring the history of the neighborhood. What is more, Nova also offers courses on math and music, programming, robotics, digital music, animation, environmental studies, and farm ecology. There are no grades at Nova; students demonstrate competencies through things like projects, performances, artworks, portfolios, and critical reflections. Earning credit at Nova is more difficult than getting a passing grade at a traditional school, because in order to earn full credit a student must demonstrate all of the competencies in a course. In other words, there’s no way to turn in a series of worksheets and earn a “D” grade in a course, since doing such things would never be a demonstration of competency in a subject area. Some might think that a school like Nova would fall apart without the guiding hand of CCSS or a school-wide curriculum that prepares students for state exams. But actually, the opposite is true. The Nova community thrives precisely because it does not follow mandates or prescriptions for learning. Nova works because caring teachers come together with students and community members to figure out what’s worth knowing and doing. Students at Nova learn to ask questions, conduct inquiries, think critically, and engage in community issues. Additionally, every student at Nova has a Coordinator—a teacher who advises and advocates on behalf of the student. Students meet with their Coordinator each week to troubleshoot academic, social, economic, or other related issues, that may be detracting from that student’s ability to participate fully in their education. Nova also has on site counselors who work closely with students who require such services. Of course, Nova has all of the same challenges of any public institution working with young adults. However, one big difference is that at Nova, teachers don’t tell students what to do; rather, teachers invite students to be part of an inquiry process—to engage in this process of searching together. This searching looks different in every classroom, because the Nova community believes that democratic education means that different people in different situations will determine how to go about their work together. Students are encouraged by teachers to follow their passions and can even design their own independent courses. Nova students can also co-teach classes with teachers at Nova. In other words, Nova takes seriously the idea of democracy. Students sit on governing committees that help shape school policy. Students oversee the school budget and participate in hiring decisions. Decisions that affect the entire school often take a long time to make—the process is messy and difficult. But students have a real say and a stake in how the school is run. It’s important to note, though, that these ideas are not new. In fact, ideas about inquiry-based and project-based education, as well as research about experiential, democratic education have been with us for a long time (Ayers, 1993; Dewey, 1938, 1966; Freire, 1996). The question, then, for parents, educators, researchers, unions, and other education advocates, is this: Given what we know about what’s possible, why do we continue to do school in ways that fail so many of our students?

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FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS According to Giroux (1992), once teachers and researchers understand that “language always embodies particular kinds of values then you can raise questions. You can ask: What is the relationship between what is learned and the pedagogies in place? Where does the language they use come from? Whose interests does it promote? What are its value assumptions?” (p. 14). Mikhail Bahktin (1989) also reminds educators that teaching language as a static form of knowledge “operating from the heights of its own incontestable authority” ultimately does not succeed, because “authoritative unitary language fails to take into account the fact of heteroglossia and multi-languagedness” that exists in any society (p. 368). To put it another way, any state-mandated view of language enforced through examinations and licensing cannot encompass the diversity of languages that operate in a society, and, therefore, such an exam can only reproduce its own logic of domination and silence. Ayers and Klonsky (1994), in their comparison between Chicago schools and those in South Africa, note the way schooling and testing work in Chicago: If one suspends the rhetoric of democratic participation, fairness, and justice, and acknowledges (even tentatively) that our society, too, is one of privilege and oppression, inequality, and class divisions, and racial and gender stratifications, then one might view the schools as a whole as doing an adequate job both of sorting youngsters for various roles in society and convincing them that they deserve their privileges and failures. (p. 9) The school system prepares one set of individuals (those with money) for college and another (those without money) for service industry jobs; if that is its aim, the school system appears rather successful in carrying out its mandate. The current push for more standards and accountability in schools will admittedly be difficult to challenge. Who, after all, would argue for lowering standards in schools? Even Al Shanker, liberal president of the AFT for more than 30 years, promoted standards, saying “there’s an external standard that students need to meet, and the teacher is there to help the student make it” (Kahlenberg, 2007, p. 62). “Teaching to the test is something positive,” said Shanker, “when you have very good tests” (Kahlenberg, 2007, p. 62). It is this perceived scientific neutrality of measuring things by some abstract external standard that makes them so difficult to refute. Without problematizing what the test actually measures (and whether such things are actually measurable) or considering questions of identity, culture, or local knowledge and context, these arguments for state-mandated tests perpetuate a narrow, monolithic view of schooling. It is important to note, too, that the test almost never disrupts the view that White students in affluent suburban communities will almost always outperform their counterparts in urban schools that are often almost entirely nonwhite (Kozol, 1991; Lipman, 2004). Furthermore, according to Lipman (2004), there are few education policy makers who will acknowledge the way in which “high-stakes testing is intensifying curriculum differentiation between high-scoring and low-scoring schools” (p. 103) and turning urban schools into highly scripted, teach-to-the-test laboratories, while schools doing well on these tests continue to provide academically challenging courses and increased access to educational opportunities; as a result, urban public schools are currently under threat of takeover by the military and private for-profit enterprise. With such a narrow focus on the test, outside school assessors can construct a justification for school takeovers by effectively ignoring any creative or positive work done by teachers and students, since so much of this work is seen to be unrelated to the outcomes on the state-mandated examination. Chicago, 18

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for example, already has six high schools run jointly with the U.S. military where all students are required to be part of the Junior Reserve Officer Training Cadets (Lipman, 2004, p.108). Discipline, self-improvement, academic rigor, opportunity, grit, and character development are just a few of the justifications for such takeovers. All of these terms, as noted above, have a certain appeal or seduction, particularly in urban schools that have met with very limited success preparing students to compete in the global marketplace (Lipman, 2004; Payne, 2008). If one of the goals of educators and education researchers, however, is to challenge current neoliberal trends in education reform (like the militarization of schools for low-income students, for example), educators and researchers will need to find a way to acknowledge the contradictions between what education claims to do and what urban education actually does for communities most devastated by systemic inequalities produced and exacerbated by a neoliberal ideology. As John Marsh (2011) notes, “if you want to increase equality of educational opportunity for low-income children, a good place to start would be to reduce poverty” (p. 57). In other words, fixing schools, teachers, or students will not be enough. Researchers and educators will need to look outside of schools and do more to promote school and community building as reciprocal projects. In order to promote such an ambitious project, traditional organizations like teacher unions will need to push a social justice agenda that includes more local decision making and an embrace of true alternative learning environments. Unions can begin by helping create schools where teachers and students have more say in how a school functions as well as how a school relates to and interacts with the surrounding community. Additionally, the intentional and coordinated effort to underfund and then discredit public schools through use of computer-based standardized testing, can be linked directly to the unprecedented reduction in corporate taxation of the last thirty years (Mosely, 2005; Ravitch, 2013). Once funding is cut and computer-based standardized exams can be used to label public schools as “failures,” public policy makers, at the behest of corporate leaders, can begin to dismantle public education and turn it over to private interests (Ravitch, 2013). What is more, many of the corporations that are directly benefiting from the greatest corporate tax reduction in United States history, are now lining up to develop and market their education technologies as the “solution” to our so-called failing public schools. Future researcher might further explore the links between the manufactured crisis in public funding for education and the intentional effort to discredit public education and turn it over to private markets.

CONCLUSION Many public schools in the United States are locked in a political fight for their right to define themselves in their own words and by their own standards. Doing so, of course, means doing more than attempting to live up to market-driven mandates that demand all students perform at or above state norms on computer-based standardized examinations. And this fight involves more than doing well in school; it also involves the right to control and determine how best to use our shared resources to build healthy and sustainable communities for all. The late, great Joe Strummer (Temple, Temple, Campeau, & Moloney, 2008) notes the following: And so now I’d like to say – people can change anything they want to; and that means everything in the world. People are running about following their own little tracks; I am one of them. But we’ve all got to stop… just following our own little mouse trail. People can do anything; this is something that

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I’m beginning to learn. People are out there doing bad things to each other; it’s because they’ve been dehumanized. It’s time to take the humanity back into the center of the ring and follow that for a time… Without people, you’re nothing. As Strummer suggests here, “people can change anything they want to.” But, it’s important to note that these are not just inspirational words to help researchers, educators, and students make change in their schools and communities—these words are also a warning about both the way it’s going and the way it is going to go, if educators and education advocates don’t stand up and demand that schools put humanity—rather than state standards and examinations—back at the center of the curriculum.

REFERENCES American Statistical Association. (2014). ASA statement on using value-added models for educational assessment. Alexandria, VA: ASA. Anyon, J. (2005). Radical possibilities: Public policy, urban education, and a new social movement. New York, NY: Routledge. Au, W., & Tempel, M. B. (2012). Pencils down: Rethinking high-stakes testing and accountability in public schools. Milwaukee, WI: Rethinking Schools. Ayers, W. (1993). To teach: The journey of a teacher. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Ayers, W., & Klonsky, M. (1994). Navigating a Restless Sea: The Continuing Struggle to Achieve a Decent Education for African American Youngsters in Chicago. The Journal of Negro Education, 63(1), 5. doi:10.2307/2967327 Bahktin, M. (1989). The Dialogic imagination. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Brizard, J.C. (2011, November 30). The Future of Education in Chicago. Speech presented at Fred Hess Memorial Lecture in University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL. Chomsky, N. (2014). The State-corporate complex: A threat to freedom and survival. Retrieved May 30, 2016, from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UikhLJNLFK4 Cody, A. (2013, November 16). Common Core Standards: Ten colossal errors [Web log post]. Retrieved December 24, 2013, from http://blogs.edweek.org/teachers/living-in-dialogue/2013/11/common_core_ standards_ten_colo.html Dewey, J. (1938). Experience and education. New York, NY: Macmillan. Dewey, J. (1966). Democracy and education: An introduction to the philosophy of education. New York, NY: The Free Press. Dover, A. G., Schultz, B. D., Smith, K., & Duggan, T. J. (2015). Who’s preparing our candidates? edTPA, localized knowledge, and the outsourcing of teacher evaluation. Teachers College Record. Foucault, M. (1961). Madness and civilization. New York, NY: Vintage. doi:10.4324/9780203278796

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Foucault, M. (1984). Discipline and punish: The birth of the prison (A. Sheridan, Trans.). New York, NY: Pantheon. Foucault, M., & Rabinow, P. (1984). The Foucault reader. New York, NY: Pantheon Books. Freire, P. (1996). Pedagogy of the oppressed. London, UK: Penguin. Gates, B. (2009, July 21). National Conference of State Legislatures. Speech presented at National Conference of State Legislatures. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=323WQrPHslg Giroux, H. A. (1982). The Politics of Educational Theory. Social Text, 5(87). doi:10.2307/466337 Giroux, H. A. (1994). Teachers, public life, and curriculum reform. Peabody Journal of Education, 69(3), 35–47. doi:10.1080/01619569409538776 Giroux, H. A. (2004). The terror of neoliberalism. Boulder, CO: Paradigm. Gorski, P. (2011). Unlearning deficit ideology and the scornful gaze: Thoughts on authenticating the class discourse in education. In R. Ahlquist, P. Gorski, & T. Montaño (Eds.), Assault on kids: How hyper-accountability, corporatization, deficit ideology, and Ruby Payne are destroying our schools (pp. 158–176). New York, NY: Peter Lang. Greene, M. (1988). The dialectic of freedom. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Harvey, D. (2005). A brief history of neoliberalism. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Hirsch, E. D., Kett, J. F., & Trefil, J. (1987). Cultural literacy: What every American needs to know. Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin. Hountondji, P. J. (1992). Recapturing. In O. Owomoyela & V. Y. Mudimbe (Eds.), The surreptitious speech: Presence Africaine and the politics of otherness 1947-1987 (pp. 238–248). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago. Hursh, D. (2006). Carry it on: Fighting for progressive education in neoliberal times. In G. LadsonBillings & W. F. Tate (Eds.), Education research in the public interest: Social justice, action, and policy (pp. 46–63). New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Kahlenberg, R. D. (2007). The agenda that saved public education. American Educator, 4–19. Kozol, J. (1991). Savage inequalities: Children in America’s schools. New York, NY: Crown Pub. Kumashiro, K. (2015). Against common sense: Teaching and learning toward social justice. New York, NY: RoutledgeFalmer. Lipman, P. (2002). Making the global city, making inequality: The political economy and cultural politics of Chicago school policy. American Educational Research Journal, 39(2), 379–419. doi:10.3102/00028312039002379 Lipman, P. (2004). High stakes education: Inequality, globalization, and urban school reform. New York, NY: RoutledgeFalmer. doi:10.4324/9780203465509

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Marsh, J. (2011). Class dismissed: Why we cannot teach or learn our way out of inequality. New York, NY: Monthly Review Press. Mosley, J. (2005, May 21). Report: State corporate taxes down 75% since ‘70S. The Register Guard (Eugene, OR). Retrieved 2016, from http://www.highbeam.com/doc/1G1-132761049.html?refid=easy_hf Payne, C. M. (2008). So much reform, so little change: The persistence of failure in urban schools. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Education Press. Ravitch, D. (2013). Reign of error: The hoax of the privatization movement and danger to America’s public schools. New York, NY: Vintage books. Ravitch, D. (2015, April 29). The Common Core tests cannot be independently verified for validity or reliability [Web log post]. Retrieved from http://dianeravitch.net/2015/04/29/reader-the-common- coretests-cannot-be-independently-verified-for-validity- and-reliability/ Ravitch, D. (2016a, April 9). More than 100 California researchers call for moratorium on Common Core assessments reliability [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://dianeravitch.net/2016/04/09/morethan-100-california-researchers-call-for-moratorium-on-common-core-assessments/ Ravtich, D. (2016b, July 23). The Common Core costs billions and hurts students. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/24/opinion/sunday/the-common-core-costsbillions-and-hurts-students.html?_r=3&utm_campaign=linkplug&utm_source=linkplug&utm_ medium=linkplug&utm_content=linkplug&utm_term=linkplug Ray, C. A., & Mickelson, R. A. (1993). Restructuring students for restructured work: The economy, school reform, and noncollege-bound youth. Sociology of Education, 66(1), 1–23. doi:10.2307/2112782 Robinson, J. (1998). Literacy and lived lives: Reflections on the responsibilities of teachers. In C. Fleischer & D. Schaafsma (Eds.), Literacy and democracy: Teacher research and composition studies in pursuit of habitable spaces: Further conversations from the students of Jay Robinson (pp. 1–27). Urbana, IL: National Council of Teachers of English. Sher, G., & Bennett, W. J. (1982). Moral education and indoctrination. The Journal of Philosophy, 79(11), 665. doi:10.2307/2026542 Simon, S. (2012, August 2). Private Firms Eyeing Profits from U.S. Public Schools Reuters. Reuters. Retrieved August 15, 2012, from http://in.reuters.com/article/usa-education-investment-idINL2E8J15FR20120802 Strauss, V. (2012, February 12). NYC releases teachers’ value-added scores—unfortunately [Web log post]. Retrieved February 22, 2012 https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/answer-sheet/post/nycreleases-teachers-value-added-scores--unfortunately/2012/02/24/gIQAtbVXYR_blog.html Strauss, V. (2014, April 14). Statisticians slam popular teacher evaluation system [Web log post]. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/answer-sheet/wp/2014/04/13/statisticians-slampopular-teacher-evaluation-method/ Temple, J., Temple, A., Campeau, A., & Moloney, A. (2008). Joe Strummer: The future is unwritten. Sony BMG Music Entertainment.

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Testing Technology - Smarter Balanced Assessment Consortium. (n.d.). Retrieved June 30, 2016, from http://www.smarterbalanced.org/assessments/testing-technology/ Thiong’o, N. W. (1986). Decolonizing the mind: The politics of language in African literature. London, UK: J. Currey. Tlostanova, M., & Mignolo, W. (2009, September 21). Global coloniality and the decolonial option. Journal for Nordic Postcolonial Studies, 130-146. doi:10.4324/9781315868448 Trickett, E. J. (1984). Toward a distinctive community psychology: An ecological metaphor for the conduct of community research and the nature of training. American Journal of Community Psychology, 12(3), 261–279. doi:10.1007/BF00896748 Weber, M. (2013, January 13). David Coleman doesn’t give a s#@! what you think [Web log post]. Retrieved December 19, 2013, from http://jerseyjazzman.blogspot.com/2013/01/david-coleman-doesntgive-s-what-you_13.html

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Computer Adaptive Testing: A computer-based test that adapts to the ability of the test-taker. Ecological Schooling: A view of schooling that sees school and community building as inextricably linked projects. Grit: A controversial psychological term used to describe a person’s capacity for success based on their passion and perseverance. Interpellation: The process by which individual subjectivities, or identities, are called into being by social interactions and institutions. Neocolonialism: The practice of using economic power to colonize and otherwise influence a country. Neoliberalism: A set of political and economic ideas that emphasize deregulation, privatization of public goods, and the dismantling of social services. Post-Colonial Theory: A critical theory that seeks to analyze and understand the cultural and economic legacy of colonialism and imperialism.

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Gender, Process, and Praxis: Re-Politicizing Education in an Era of Neoliberalism, Instrumentalism, and “Big Data” Jim Burns Florida International University, USA Colin Green The George Washington University, USA

ABSTRACT The authors establish an analytical framework comprising the socio-historical and ideological formation(s) and re-formation(s) of hegemonic masculinities as part of a system of governmentality. They use hegemonic masculinity and heteropatriarchal settler colonialism as lenses through which to understand and critique the historically gendered, classed, racialized, and sexualized assumptions that underlie education discourses based on conservative modernization through analysis of the historic relationship between education and the military, particularly gaming technology as curricular and pedagogical tools for recruiting and transmitting military values and skills. They finally urge that the “hidden curriculum” underpinning the power and practices of the education-industrial complex be made more visible, stronger curricular counter-narratives asserted, and they seek to uncover spaces of disruption and possibility, cognizant of the constraints that arise from the totalizing nature of conservative modernization in education and schooling.

INTRODUCTION In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. (Dwight D. Eisenhower, January 17, 1961)

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch002

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Like all iconic historical figures, Dwight Eisenhower both articulated and contradicted many professed American values. In his two terms as U.S. President, he sent the 101st Airborne Division (minus its Black soldiers) to Arkansas in support of the Little Rock Nine and argued that excessive military spending stole from “those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed” (Eisenhower, 1953). Yet despite his conviction that the threat of war had “humanity hanging from a cross of iron” (Eisenhower, 1953), in the name of the Cold War and at the behest of corporate power, Eisenhower’s domino theory rationalized America’s disastrous imperial involvement in Vietnam, and he approved the overthrow of democratically-elected governments in Iran and Guatemala, the consequences of which continue to haunt us. Eisenhower’s experiences as Supreme Allied Commander in Europe during World War II and as U.S. President provided a unique perspective on the evolving relationship between civil society, the state, industry, and the military. His warning about the military-industrial complex signaled his fear that opaque, unaccountable, undemocratic power, always historically contested by democratizing forces, would coalesce in a corporate state in which, as John Dewey (1985/1931) saw during the Great Depression, “politics is the shadow cast on society by big business” (p. 163). America’s hetero-patriarchal settler colonial project (Arvin, Tuck, & Morrill, 2013), including its current imperial fantasies (Chomsky, 2016; Johnson, 2010), illustrates a historic restlessness and aggrieved entitlement to rehabilitate individual and national emasculation through restorative rationalized violence (Connell, 1995, 2000; Faludi, 2007; Kimmel, 2012). The post-World War II American Empire resulted in the permanent militarization of a society that has fully embraced its “exceptional” settler-colonial legacy, imbricated with violent frontier masculinities, by exporting institutional violence through the next iteration of colonial-capitalism: globalization. Whatever his limitations, Eisenhower’s (1961) warning about the “potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power” in the military-industrial complex, actually begun as public-private partnerships initiated by FDR, has proven tragically prescient. Corporations viewed those partnerships as opportunities to reconfigure democratic institutions to serve the interests of capital by capturing the vast resources invested in public institutions (Johnson, 2010). Since the 1970s, neoliberalism has solidified corporate-state power by reframing the public good as private interest with a concomitant upward redistribution of wealth and power (Harvey, 2005). Wolin (2008) characterizes that process as inverted totalitarianism through which corporate power expands while the state simultaneously abandons its role in protecting its citizens, the public good, and democratic life. Inverted totalitarianism produces a “managed democracy”—systems management writ large—with the U.S. a “showcase for how democracy can be managed without appearing to be suppressed” (Wolin, 2008, p. 47). So what does this have to do with education? The logic of the military-industrial complex has become a model for the de-socialization of America by marketizing, privatizing, and de-politicizing our public and political institutions, including public schools, colleges, and universities, which threatens what remains of critical intellectual life. Alexander (2010), for example, has detailed that process in the context of the criminal justice system through tracing the genealogy of the prison-industrial complex, a system of neo-slavery, in the context of the new Jim Crow. This governing-through-crime complex casts historically oppressed groups and burgeoning new groups of people, particularly youth and the poor, as disposable commodities (Giroux, 2014a). Examples of such processes in education include: •

The configuration of many, particularly urban, schools as carceral institutions through zero-tolerance policies that commodify young people as a source of profit to feed the school-to-prison pipeline (Casella, 2003; Giroux, 2014a);

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•

• •

•

The historic framing of school “failure” as dangerous to some aspect of national security: military security in the case of Sputnik, economic security in A Nation at Risk, both military and economic security in US Education Reform and National Security, and the failure of schools in their role in “the indoctrination of the young” (Pinar, 2012; Council on Foreign Relations, 2011; Ravitch 2010, 2013; Crozier, Huntington, & Watanuki, 1975, p. 162); The positioning of public schools as solely responsible for ameliorating every social issue, from crime, to poverty, to racism, and beyond (Pinar, 2012; Steudeman, 2014); The disastrous rise of misplaced power in a politically unaccountable “billionaire boys club” of “venture philanthropists” such as the Gates, Walton, and Broad Foundations and Netflix founder Reed Hastings, whose contempt for democracy is demonstrated by their influence over education policy to benefit corporate interests (Ravitch, 2010, 2013); The outsourcing of public education with false narratives of the failure of the public sector and the resulting neoliberal illusions of choice, markets, and privatization (Apple, 2013; Berliner & Glass, 2014; Pinar, 2012; Ravitch, 2013; Taubman, 2009).

The above examples illustrate the historic tension between education as a subjective, evolutionary curriculum and pedagogy of becoming and education as instrumental means to predetermined ends (Pinar, 2012; Taubman, 2000; Tyler, 1949; van Manen, 1991). In this chapter, we deconstruct the education-industrial complex in the nexus of corporate-state power, which has formed a complex of actors as nebulous, unaccountable, and undemocratic as the military-industrial complex of which Eisenhower warned. We approach this chapter as teachers, teacher educators, and scholars of curriculum and masculinities concerned about the extent to which the rationalizing market logic of neoliberalism and big data increasingly eviscerate education of the subjective struggle to understand the self in the world through academic study (Pinar, 2012, Taubman, 2009). The masculinized techno-rationalization of education through obsessive measurement, assessment, data collection, and predictive data analytics represents the latest historic configuration of heteropatriarchal governmental power concerned with the conduct of schooling, democracy, social rationalization, capitalism, and empire (Arvin et al., 2013; Connell, 1995, 2000; Foucault, 1990/1978, 2008; Johnson, 2010; Morgensen, 2012). The purpose of this chapter is fourfold. First, we establish an analytical framework comprising the socio-historical and ideological formation(s) and re-formation(s) of hegemonic masculinities as part of a system of governmentality (Connell, 1995, 2000, 2012; Foucault, 1991/1978, 2007; Kimmel, 2012, 2013; Mac an Ghaill, 1994). We employ the notion of hegemonic masculinity (Connell, 1995) and heteropatriarchal settler colonialism (Arvin et al., 2013; Morgensen, 2012), as lenses through which to understand the historically gendered, classed, racialized, and sexualized assumptions that underlie neoliberal and neoconservative education discourses. We view curriculum and pedagogy as occurring both in formal educational institutions and in other public spaces, which can include all forms of media and social group interactions. We are concerned with the perpetuation of individual and institutional violence associated with certain patterns of masculine practice inherent in market rationalization, itself a historically gendered construct deeply rooted in pre-Enlightenment and Enlightenment philosophy (Connell, 1995; Lingard & Douglas, 1999; Ross-Smith & Kornberger, 2004; Ziarek, 2001). The masculine-feminine binary is a fundamental assumption of patriarchy through which masculinity claims the power of rationality (Connell, 1995). Cartesian rationalism presents reason as achievement, which, in neoliberal logic, frames rationality as a gendered commodity (Foucault, 2008; Ross-Smith & Kornberger, 2004; Ziarek, 2001).

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Second, we situate our analysis in the context of conservative modernization, a movement comprised of neoconservatives, neoliberals, authoritarian populists, and managerial technocrats (Apple, 2006). Third, we critique the masculinized assumptions that underlie conservative modernization, which have replaced wisdom and knowledge traditions with de-politicized techno-rationalization and reconfigured education as data collection, analysis, and manipulation. We do this through analysis of the historic relationship between education and the military, specifically in the context of standardized assessment, efficiency, and the evolution of gaming technology as curricular and pedagogical tools for both recruiting and transmitting military values and skills (Mead, 2013). Fourth, we urge that the “hidden curriculum” (Jackson, 1968) underpinning the power and practices of the education-industrial complex be made more visible and stronger counter-narratives asserted. The commonsense narrative of neoliberal corporate education reform has created ahistorical “frames” (Kumashiro, 2008) that have constrained education policy to workforce development and perpetuated oppressive notions of family values, religious intolerance, heteronormativity, homophobia, patriotism, violence, capitalism, xenophobia, and “exceptionalism.” Challenges to such ‘commonsense’ approaches to curriculum and pedagogy are often summarily dismissed as lacking in clear purpose, and irrelevant to the demands students will face in college or career contexts. Through our analysis, we solicit critical generative dialogue through which to theorize curriculum and pedagogy through the lens of power in all its complexity. We seek to uncover spaces of disruption and possibility, cognizant of the constraints that arise from the totalizing nature of conservative modernization in education and schooling (McCarthy & Dimitriadis, 2000).

CONTEXT AND FRAMEWORK We contextualize our analysis historically in the proliferation of “big data” and its connection to scientific or systematic curriculum as illustrated in the “Tyler Rationale” (Tyler, 1949). We draw on Foucault’s theorization of governmentality (1991/1978, 2005, 2007, 2008) to interrogate institutional practices and power relations inherent in conservative modernization (Apple, 2006) and the historic reconfigurations of patterns of masculine practice associated with hegemonic masculinity (Connell, 1995). Governmentality provides a robust framework through which to understand the embodiment both of power inherent in institutional practices and the “counter-conduct” through which to generate “counter-politics” aimed at reconfiguring hegemonic power relations (Foucault, 2007).

Teaching by Numbers: The Long Reach of the “Tyler Rationale” One of the disturbing characteristics of the curriculum field is its lack of historical perspective. New breakthroughs are solemnly proclaimed when in fact they represent minor modifications of early proposals, and, conversely, anachronistic dogmas and doctrines maintain a currency and uncritical acceptance far beyond their present merit. (Kliebard, 1970, p. 259) It is hard to dispute that the work of teachers, teacher educators, and educators in general is often greeted with skepticism, suspicion and disdain. The bottom line, the authority of science, the exactitude of numbers seems to offer critics and criticized alike a solution to such problems. We are quite literally teaching by numbers. (Taubman, 2009, p. 7)

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The American education system has become enthralled with “big data,” which emerged from the datadriven decision making popularized during the 1980s and 1990s and has proliferated as data storage and analytics technologies and systems management have become more sophisticated (Picciano, 2012). Education institutions premise the use of big data on the assumption that data should be collected during educational processes. Data are “transacted” and can be analyzed using data mining software to create predictive models, which “convert data into actionable insight, uncover patterns, alert and respond to issues and concerns, and plan for the future” (Picciano, 2012, p. 12). Predictive educational data analytics further assumes that complex human interactions can be disaggregated into discrete measurable tasks and causally-linked with predetermined performance outcomes (Taubman, 2009). In the neoliberal era, education institutions have adopted corporatized leadership structures and performance metrics to “get students out the door more efficiently,” using software that claims to “predict how well students will do before they even set foot in the classroom” and recommending courses “Netflix-style” (Parry, 2012). As a counter-narrative to the ahistoricism and presentism that blind us to the past in the present, we engage the historical antecedents to contemporary neoliberal education “deform” (Pinar, 2012). Taubman (2009, p. 6) critiques neoliberal education reform since the 1980s through the lens of audit culture and corporate systems management, which have produced a language of accountability, market choice, strategies and best practices, and an obsession with learning science: Practices once confined to the corporate world, in particular auditing and accounting practices that reduce complicated phenomena and experience to quantifiable and thus commensurable data, now structure how we think about what happens and what should happen in classrooms. Increasingly practices that rely on mathematical calculation and the impersonality of numbers have replaced individual teachers’ often unique and context specific approaches to teaching. The rationalizing logic of audit culture in American education has a long history. The underlying principles of systematic, data-driven curriculum and teaching based on predetermined outcomes coalesced in the “Tyler Rationale” (Tyler, 1949), the origin of which lie in Tyler’s participation in the Progressive Education Association’s Eight Year Study during the 1930s (Pinar, 2011). Tyler’s (1949) rationale focused on four questions (p. 1) for schools as systems: 1. 2. 3. 4.

What educational purposes should the school seek to attain? What educational experiences can be provided that are likely to attain these purposes? How can these educational experiences be effectively organized? How can determine whether these purposes are being attained?

Tyler’s (1949) questions proffer a rational, scientific, systematic, linear model through which to set objectives, plan and sequence instruction, and assess outcomes. Importantly, Tyler (1949) presents objectives in behaviorist terms by defining objectives as “the kinds of changes in behavior that an educational institution seeks to bring about in its students” (p. 6). Pinar (2011) associates initiatives such as No Child Left Behind and Race to the Top with Tyler’s (1949) sequential linking of objectives with assessment, and he critiques the rationale for its reduction of academic study to measurable behavioral changes on standardized assessments. Tyler’s (1949) instrumentalism casts knowledge as a means to a predetermined end (Pinar, 2011) and is visible in current prepackaged and profitable curriculum design models such

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as Understanding by Design (UbD), also known as backward design (see McTighe & Wiggins, 2005), and the Partnership for 21st Century Learning (see P.21.org, 2008) The “Tyler Rationale” and its progeny illustrate a linear, instrumental curricular and pedagogical model predicated on teaching to the test, a behaviorist obsession with the replication of predetermined demonstrable behaviors. Considering the key, evolutionary, and subjective curricular question posed by Pinar (2012, p. xv): “What knowledge is of most worth?”, the historical reach of the “Tyler Rationale” into models like UbD and P21 illustrates the minor modification of an anachronistic dogma described by Kliebard (1970).

Governmentality Foucault (2007) traces the origins of the problem of governmentality to the sixteenth century. Those problems included the “government of souls and of conduct,” the government of children, and the government of entire populations associated with emerging nation states (Foucault, 2007, p. 88). The questions of governmentality relate, therefore, to “how to govern oneself, how to be governed, by whom should we accept to be governed, [and] how to be the best possible governor” (Foucault, 2007, p. 88). Foucault (1991/1978) clearly articulates governing as a “pedagogical formation,” and by implication an attendant curriculum, intent on establishing a disciplinary regime: It is the pedagogical formation of the prince, then, that will assure this upwards continuity. On the other hand, we also have a downwards continuity in the sense that, when a state is well run, the head of the family will know how to look after his family, his goods and his patrimony, which means that individuals will, in turn, behave as they should. This downwards line, which transmits to individual behavior and the running of the family the same principles as the good government of the state, is just at this time beginning to be called the police. (pp. 91-92) Governmental rationalization treats “population as a datum, as a field of intervention and as an objective of governmental techniques,” which “isolates the economy as a specific sector of reality,” and establishes “political economy as the science and the technique of intervention of the government in that field of reality” (Foucault, 1991/1978, p. 102). The pedagogical formation of governing through political economy requires the establishment of an economy over the entire state, which exercises a “form of surveillance and control” over its wealth and the behavior of its inhabitants (p. 92). We view governmental systems as curricular and pedagogical formations imbricated with institutional power, the practices of which constitute a “specific subject…whose merits are analytically identified, who is subjected in continuous networks of obedience, and who is subjectified through the compulsory extraction of truth” (Foucault, 2007, pp. 184-185). Governmental power de-politicizes, commodifies, and harnesses bodies for “productive” uses, which “dissociates the body from its political power” and renders it submissive (Ziarek, 2001, p. 24). The de-politicization and subjectivation of gendered, sexualized bodies through economic processes is essential to capitalism and neoliberal market society intent on adjusting the “population to economic processes” and inserting “bodies into the machinery of production” (Foucault, 1990/1978, p. 141). Education reform and “deform” (Pinar, 2012) must therefore symmetrically align with neoliberal economic production purposes if its full power is to be harnessed in the service of governmentality.

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Conservative Modernization Apple (2006) describes current institutional power relations in the context of “conservative modernization,” which he critiques as a narrative that positions education as the “delivery of neutral knowledge to students through neutral technologies” —Freire’s (2009) “banking method.” Accordingly, education must be delivered, efficiently and cost-effectively, with students’ measureable performance outcomes the “ultimate arbiter” of the system’s success (Apple, 2006). The conservative movement is comprised of an uneasy, unstable, yet effective coalition that includes neoliberals, neoconservatives, authoritarian populists, and technical “experts for hire” (Apple, 2004, 2006). Apple (2006) views neoliberals as the most powerful element in the conservative alliance. Neoliberalism “proposes that human well-being can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills” through “strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade” (Harvey, 2005, p. 2). Neoliberal ideology views the state’s sole legitimate purposes as securing private property rights, guaranteeing functioning markets, and creating markets where they do not already exist, by force if necessary (Harvey, 2005). Applied to education, the logic of markets and privatization frames students as “consumers” and “human capital” and espouses competition, choice, efficiency, and rationalization (Apple, 2006). Neoliberalism has also reframed democracy as an economic rather than political endeavor (Apple, 2006). Economic imperatives have subverted public schools as institutions of community, democracy, and even as sites of abundant academic study as education continues to be repurposed as workforce development with curricular decisions increasingly predicated on their economic value: Management is divorced from any viable sense of leadership, and the connection between schooling and the public good is replaced with a business model of schooling that disregards both the social and any vision not defined by the crudest forms of power, instrumental rationality, and mathematical utility. (Giroux, 2012, p. 96) Neoliberalism therefore demonstrates a “market fundamentalism” that has reconfigured the state and public discursive spaces, including schools and universities, to serve corporate power at the expense of democratic formative culture (Giroux, 2014b; Wolin, 2008). The embodiment of neoliberal practices and their underlying values illustrates governmentality’s downward pedagogical formation through techniques of institutional power, surveillance, and control (Foucault, 1991/1978). Governmental rationalization is also associated with anti-intellectualism, which privileges masculinized instrumental intelligence over “effeminate” intellectualism, the “critical, creative, and contemplative side of the mind” (Hofstadter, 1962, p. 25). The focus on technical, transactional, instrumental curriculum and pedagogy, which Apple (2013) associates with the “Wal-Marting” of America, attempts to extinguish subjectivity, political processes and agency, non-commodifiable ethics, and praxis in favor of utilitarian disciplinarian schooling and the accumulation of “marketable” skills. We view “Wal-Mart schooling” as an undertaking centered on rational, masculinized notions of development, framed primarily by “how” questions to refine and make better the technical acts of teaching and learning. Questions of “why” in teaching and learning are less commonly contemplated, their utterance considered unimportant and obstructive to proscribed outcomes. The de-politicization of education, which Taubman (2000) characterizes as the manipulation of fantasy figures, robs students and teachers alike of the “agency of subjectivity” without which “education evaporates” (Pinar, 2012, p. 43).

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Neoconservatives, concerned with “cultural decline,” articulate the need for a strong state, which traditional conservatives found a complete anathema. The neoconservative agenda advocates the use of state power to inculcate romanticized “traditional values” associated with specific views of patriotism, morality, and the revival of the “Western tradition” (Apple, 2006). The neoconservative educational vision operates through exploiting existing and manufactured fears of many Others, supports a specific conception of educational national standards, and attacks initiatives such as bilingual and multicultural education (Apple, 2006). Neoconservatives find a natural ally in authoritarian populists, who advocate public policy based on a particular interpretation of biblical authority, including “Christian” morality and “traditional” views of gender relations, sexuality, the family, and what constitutes “legitimate knowledge” in schools, with significant ramifications for curriculum, textbooks, and school finance and control (Apple, 2006). Finally, professional systems managers closely align themselves with neoliberal concerns and impulses for reform, and derive their power and cultural capital from their technical expertise in assessment, data collection and analysis, and management (Apple, 2006). We appreciate Apple’s (2006) structural analysis of the ideologies that have coalesced around conservative modernization, but we view curricular and pedagogical potential in the unstable and loosely coupled nature of this conservative alliance, thus permitting possibilities for counter-thinking and counter-conduct. We also appreciate the critique of Apple’s analysis (Pinar et al., 1995; Pinar, 2011), regarding the totalizing impact of ideology that appears to dismiss political agency and subjectivity. Our work thus draws on traditions that appear to coexist uneasily. Foucault’s theorization of governmentality and biopolitics speaks to that tension because his analysis provides insights into how individuals embody practices and values associated with institutional power and how they subjectively embody counter-conducts and counter-politics in governmental systems. As Foucault (cited in Gordon, 1991, p. 48) explained: “To work with a government implies neither subjection nor global acceptance. One can simultaneously work and be restive. I even think that the two go together.” Foucault (2005) suggests that critical engagement with the question of power situated “in the more general question of governmentality” renders unavoidable “passing through, theoretically and practically, the element of a subject defined by the relationship of self to self” (p. 252).

Hegemonic Masculinity and Heteropatriarchy Hegemonic masculinity refers to the “configuration of gender practice which embodies the currently accepted answer to the problem of the legitimacy of patriarchy, which guarantees… the dominant position of men and subordination of women” (Connell, 1995, p. 77). Hegemonic masculinity assumes the existence of multiple masculinities with the current hegemonic configuration dominating subordinated, marginalized, and complicit masculinities (Connell, 1995). Gay masculinities are the “most conspicuous” subordinated masculinities in the context of heteronormativity and homophobia, which Kimmel (2008) characterizes as the “animating fear of American guys’ masculinity,” yet other “effeminate” masculinities suffer subordination and numerous terms of abuse as well (Connell, 1995; Mac an Ghaill, 1994; Pascoe, 2007; Way, 2011). Marginalized masculinities exist in the context of complex and intersecting relationships associated with race, ethnicity, class, and other social identities (Connell, 1995). Complicit masculinities comprise a majority of men who benefit from the “patriarchal dividend” while not “rigorously practicing the hegemonic pattern” (Connell, 1995, p. 79). Considering the complex relations between numerous subjective positions and identities, complicit masculinities tend to illustrate overlapping characteristics of race, class, and sexuality and performativity (Connell, 1995; Kimmel, 31

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2012). Building on Eve Sedgwick’s (1985) groundbreaking work, Kimmel (2012) asserts that complex “homosocial” interactions have historically defined American masculinities. Those interactions can include camaraderie, fellowship, and intimacy as well as homophobia and violent peer disciplining (Kimmel, 2012; Mac an Ghaill, 1994; Way, 2011). Connell (1995) and Kimmel (2012) trace the historic development and shifts in patterns of masculine practice both globally and in the American context. While a full exploration of the that history transcends the scope of this chapter, aspects of the historic development of masculinities salient to this study include heteropatriarchy and settler colonialism, a form of colonization with significant implications for the role of education in America’s colonial and imperial past and present. Settler colonialism is “a persistent social and political formation in which newcomers/colonizers/settlers come to a place, claim it as their own, and do whatever it takes to disappear the Indigenous peoples that are there” (Arvin et al., 2013, p. 12). Heteropatriarchy refers to “social systems in which heterosexuality and patriarchy are perceived as normal and natural, and in which other configurations are perceived as abnormal, aberrant, and abhorrent” (Arvin et al., 2013, p. 13). Mythopoetic narratives of rugged individualism and frontier masculinities illustrate the heteropatriarchal settler colonial ethos, which claims to rehabilitate diminished or thwarted masculinity through violently repudiating the feminine (Connell, 1995; Kimmel, 2012). Colonization destroyed existing gender, social, political, and economic relations and positioned colonized masculinities as effeminate, sexualized, and/or childlike to separate “the men from the boys” (Connell, 2000). Western patterns of hegemonic masculinity are thus implicated in the rationalization of culture and society and the global violence that led to Western hegemony (Connell, 1995). Heteropatriarchal rationalization is also essential to the development and export of capitalism (Foucault, 1990/1978), including its neoliberal configuration, and the lingering effects of coloniality perpetuate a heteropatriarchal system of gendered and sexualized dominance predicated on enforced heterosexuality, misogyny, racism, and class relations (Connell, 2000). Despite a de-politicized “gender-neutral language of ‘markets’, ‘individuals’, and ‘choice’,” the neoliberal world is not however framed by neutral technologies, but rather is gendered with the individual constructed with the “attributes and interests of a male entrepreneur” (Connell, 2000, p. 51). Asserting that since the early nineteenth century “the idea of testing and proving one’s manhood became one of the defining experiences in American men’s lives,” Kimmel (2012, p. 1) argues that a paradox exists in understanding the history of American masculinities. Just as Kliebard (1970) noted the lack of historical perspective evident in the curriculum field, Kimmel (2012) writes that although virtually every history book ever written “is a history of men…. such works do not explore how the experience of being a man, of manhood, structured the lives of the men who are their subjects” (p. 1). This suggests that much of what men take for granted about themselves consists of partial knowledges, which are often mis-knowledge (Kumashiro, 2001). The history of American “manhood” is thus littered with narratives purporting the need to rehabilitate a sense of diminished masculinity brought about through fear of feminization. In schools and society, the masculine rehabilitation discourse in America has deep historical roots. G. Stanley Hall advocated against co-education because he feared the feminization of boys through the influence of their mothers, women teachers, and female students, while Albert Beveridge approvingly characterized young men as “rioting like a young bull” and cast those who opposed those tendencies as in a “quarrel with Nature” (cited in Kimmel, 2012, pp. 119-120). Other arguments against co-education included fears that the presence of women would dilute the curriculum and cause men to slow down so women could keep up and that the dilution of “the mysteries of heterosexual attraction” would “promote homosexuality” in young men (Kimmel, 2012, p. 120). 32

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Appreciating Complexity Responding to critiques of hegemonic masculinity as essentialist, ambiguous, focused on the reification of power, and inadequately accounting for the subject, Connell and Messerschmidt (2005) note that the theory has stood time and critique, but they also have reformulated certain aspects of it. They acknowledge, for example, the need for a more complex theorization of social relations and the nature of gender hierarchies, the geography of masculine configurations, processes of embodiment, and the dynamics of masculinities (Connell & Messerschmidt, 2005). It is important to understand that “ideal” hegemonic masculinities have changed in the context of historical, cultural, political, ideological, and economic conditions, which is consistent with Gramsci’s (1971) assertion that relations of power are continuously shifting and are always socially and politically contestable. Hammarén and Johansson (2014) underscore the complexity of homosociality and hegemonic masculinity: If we accept that the social is open for redefinitions and transitions, leading to the possibility of different subject positions, a poststructuralist approach could help us to analyze how potential hegemonic rearticulations not only lead to the reinforcement of a given gender order but also to the formation of a possibly redefined and perhaps more “desirable” order. (p. 8) Connell (2012) also cautions that although certain patterns of masculine practice have been historically associated with violence, the relationship between violence and hegemony should not be misunderstood: Indeed, where violence is central to the assertion of gendered power, we can be fairly certain that hegemony is not present, because hegemony refers to cultural centrality and authority, to the broad acceptance of power by those over whom it is exercised. (p. 13) The relationship between hegemony and violence, Connell (2012) suggests, takes on great significance in the context of institutional violence that “backs up authority, that reinforces consent by making consent prudent” (p. 14). A pattern of masculine practice that rejects personal violence might be hegemonic but may also remain open to systemic violence that celebrates “mediated violence, employing practitioners of violence, creating impunity, and supporting institutional conditions of violence” (Connell, 2012, p. 14). We propose that Connell’s (2012) assertion that the association of masculinity with systemic violence has long illustrated institutional behavior in the U.S. and elsewhere. Our inquiry suggests that systemic masculinized violence finds historic expression in “hero” narratives and the valorization of the military, the burgeoning national security/carceral state and the racialized and classed militarization of the police, violent sport culture, the continued commodification and objectification of women, the continued institutional oppression of LGBTQ communities, and corporate neoliberal masculinities predicated on “callousness” toward “poverty and social distress” and a vicious calculus of disposability (Connell, 2012; Giroux, 2014b). We see a strong connection between masculinized institutional violence and the downward pedagogical formation described by Foucault (1991/1978), yet like Foucault, Connell (2012), and Hammarén and Johansson (2014), we argue that the complexity of hegemony and homosociality render these concepts vulnerable and malleable within curricular and pedagogical discourses. Both individual and institutional gendered practices thus become open to reconfiguration through the embodiment of subjective agency, counter-conducts, and counter-politics. Similar to the unstable and contradictory forces enumerated by Apple (2006) within conservative modernization that are open to 33

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manipulation and resistance, so too can seemingly hegemonic fixed gendered practices within curriculum be rendered unstable and unmoored from their meanings.

Terror Dreams and Fantasies of Manhood In the aftermath of the September 11, 2001 attacks in the U.S., Susan Faludi (2007) contextualizes America’s response in historic gender narratives promulgated through education and myriad forms of entertainment and popular culture. Faludi (2007) notes the paradox of the national response to the September 11 attacks: The mystery here: the last remaining superpower, a nation attacked precisely because of its imperial preeminence, responded by fixating on its weakness and ineffectuality. Even more peculiar was our displacement of that fixation into the domestic realm, into a sexualized struggle between depleted masculinity and overbearing womanhood. What well of insecurity did this mystery unearth? (p. 9) In her historical analysis of the masculine angst unleashed by 9/11, in which she connects contemporary terrors and fantasies with echoes from the past articulated by the likes of Hall and Beveridge more than a century ago, Faludi (2007) concludes that 9/11 enlisted Americans in a “war to repair and restore a national myth” (p. 13). That war reached far beyond the popular culture tropes of the 1950s to a historic “fixation on restoring an invincible manhood by saving little girls…. a long-standing American pattern of response to threat, a response that we’ve been perfecting since our national wilderness experience” (p. 13). Faludi’s (2007) analysis provides an excellent trajectory into our own, imbricated with issues of historic gendered, sexualized power and fear, the continuing solidification of military-educationentertainment complex, and the implications of that construct for schools, curriculum, pedagogy, and the viability of our public institutions and American intellectual life.

A DISASTROUS RISE OF MISPLACED POWER? THE PEDAGOGICAL FORMATION OF THE MILITARY-EDUCATION-ENTERTAINMENT COMPLEX We don’t have to look far to see that the paradigms of military training—standardization, efficiency, functionality—are everywhere apparent in our schools and workplaces alike. If the historical pattern continues to apply, we can expect to see the military’s use of video games having a deep influence on our public institutions, not only in terms of methods of instruction but in regard to the skills that people will be expected to master. And yet, while the growth of virtual and game-based learning represents a potential sea change in American education, the military’s role in this potential transformation has gone almost entirely unnoticed by both the public and the media. (Mead, 2013, p. 5) In general, the nation in wartime attains a uniformity of feeling, a hierarchy of values culminating at the undisputed apex of the State’s ideal, which could not be produced through any other way but through the agency of war. (Bourne, 1918, pp. 6-7) Happily, for the busy lunatics who rule over us, we are permanently the United States of Amnesia. We learn nothing because we remember nothing. (Vidal, 2004, p. 7)

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Of all the institutions that have historically influenced American education, the role of the military might be the least widely understood by the general public or the education establishment itself. Yet, the processes through which the institutional complex comprised of the military, academy, and entertainment industry have coalesced into a governmental pedagogical formation have a long history. During the American Revolution, for example, George Washington, his troops, and the American Revolution were largely rescued by Baron Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben of Prussia, who introduced to the fledgling American Army a concept of learning that has persisted to the present (Mead, 2013). The military’s learning philosophy has historically been task-based and instrumental, predicated on a means-end calculus (Mead, 2013), an homage to America’s preference for “practical” intelligence and the anti-intellectualism documented by Hofstadter (1962). The instrumentality, functionalism, and vocationalism inherent in the military’s learning philosophy supports systems of governmentality precisely because that philosophy constitutes the pedagogical formation described by Foucault (1991/1978), of which scholars provide numerous historical examples: • •

•

•

•

The development and marketing of seemingly innocuous games of strategy, through which to teach specific military values and skills (Deterding, 2010; Mead, 2013; Nichols, 2010; Nieborg, 2010); The collusion between journalists, the entertainment and advertising industries, the military, and other corporate-state entities in militaristic propaganda, institutionalized initially in the U.S. by the Creel commission during World War I, which has become increasingly sophisticated over time (Bourne, 1918; Chomsky, 2014; Faludi, 2007; Herman & Chomsky, 1988; Zinn, 1980); The military’s innovation, refinement, and expansion of adult education and standardized testing, particularly intelligence tests, the General Educational Development (GED) assessment, and the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT), the first version of which was based on the Army’s Alpha exam created during World War I by well-known eugenicists such as American Psychological Association (APA) President Robert Yerkes and Carl Brigham (Mead, 2013); The academy’s historical and expanding role in conducting military-funded research, its collaboration with the corporate national security state, and the cooptation of intellectuals to lend credibility to social rationalization through which power has been redistributed upward to those characterized by public relations pioneer Edward Bernays (1928) as the “intelligent minorities” who “pull the wires which control the public mind” (Arkin & O’Brien, 2015, 2016; Bourne, 1918; Chomsky, 2014; Herman & Chomsky, 1988; Mead, 2013); The role of the film and television industries and other forms of popular media in propagandizing heteropatriarchal, racist, hyper-masculine violence and militarism to serve evolving corporatestate imperial ambitions (Faludi, 2007; Silverman, 1992).

The hegemonic “commonsense” nature of the pedagogical formation illustrated by the militaryeducation-entertainment complex, particularly the current enthrallment to “educational” technology such as social media and gaming among so many educators, demonstrates the disturbing lack of historical perspective described by Kliebard (1970). Like the persistent “Tyler Rationale,” one of the “anachronistic dogmas” described by Kliebard (1970), the lack of perspective on the role of the military in American education by many in the education profession borders on what Vidal (2004) might characterize as historical amnesia or even illiteracy. In deconstructing that history, we offer a brief synopsis of the history of military games and simulations as pedagogical tools to deliver a specific “curriculum.” We 35

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then focus on the game America’s Army, a first-person shooter (FPS) game developed by the U.S. Army as a recruiting and pedagogical tool, and the implications of the availability of the game and ancillary materials spawned by it for American education. Finally, we return to the implications of governmental systems in the context of the ethical questions posed by pedagogical formations of hegemony, oppression, and empire. We also offer some examples of counter-conduct and counter-politics possible within governmental systems through which relations of domination might be subverted and power relations reconfigured.

Military Games: The Past, Present, and Future? The military has long been an active participant in American education. During times of war, particularly the major global wars of the 20th century, the military’s impact on education derives from the scope of its training requirements (Mead, 2013). In America’s pursuit of imperial hegemony, the emergence of which Johnson (2004, 2007, 2010) traces to the post-World War II era, events such as the passage of the National Security Act of 1947 planted the seeds for the permanently-militarized national security state and the military-industrial complex of which Eisenhower warned. Johnson (2004) notes that most Americans, particularly in the post-9/11 era, fail to comprehend the effects of U.S. militarism and corporate imperialism on other nations, the debilitating social and economic impacts of militarism on the U.S. itself, the consequences of the military’s relationship with education, and the subversion of democracy and justice through the militarization of society. From the early 20th century onward, the military’s training needs have driven much of America’s education policy such as the passage of the 1917 Smith-Hughes Act, which significantly expanded vocational training in high schools (Mead, 2013), as well as the 1958 National Defense Education Act in the wake of Sputnik. The U.S. military pioneered standardized testing and currently administers the largest standardized testing program in the world (Mead, 2013). Military psychologists originated educational task analysis, which continues to influence civilian vocational education, and the military spearheaded computer-based training, which grew from World War II research into man-machine systems and behavioral psychologist B.F. Skinner’s influential 1958 article “Teaching Machines” (Mead, 2013). The military’s use of training simulators dates to at least the 1920s, when the first flight simulator was invented by Edwin Link (Mead, 2013; Nichols, 2010). Military video games such as Spacewar! evolved during the early 1960s to simulate nuclear war strategies. In 1980, Atari’s Battlezone, an arcade game that may have been inspired by the Army’s tank simulation Panther PLATO, produced a paradigm shift by providing a three-dimensional, first-person perspective on a battle space (Deterding, 2010; Mead, 2013; Nichols, 2010). Yet the military’s true “turn” to FPS games perhaps came in the form of the Marine Corps’ use of the popular commercial game Doom II (Mead, 2013). As part of the player feedback on which commercial game developers rely, the creators of Doom and Doom II, id Software, encouraged players to create their own scenarios and customize the game by making parts of the game modifiable, known by gamers as “mods.” In 1996, two Marine officers bought a copy of Doom II off-the-shelf for about $50.00 and created Marine Doom to train Marines in small unit tactics (Mead, 2013). Marine Doom provides just one illustration of the developing relationship between the military, military contractors, and the entertainment industry, caused by defense acquisition streamlining during the 1990s, through which military contractors spun-off technologies to the commercial game industry, which in-turn spun the technologies back to the military (Mead, 2013). 36

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The relationship between the military and the entertainment and gaming industries further solidifies the military’s influence over education by “tying education and advanced technology inextricably together…as the center of our economy” (Mead, 2013, p. 48). The enthrallment with technology-centered instruction, particularly the reframing of learning as the collection, processing, analysis, and manipulation of data, has a profound impact on education through audit culture, high-stakes standardized testing that proffers the primary metrics for all sorts of “data-driven decision making,” and a vision of curriculum as the behaviorist instrumental replication of predetermined performance outcomes. The evolution of technology-driven instruction in the era of complex, non-transparent imperial wars and increasingly sophisticated video game and simulation technologies now enables the military to teach its personnel, which logically includes potential recruits, both what to think and how to think (Mead, 2013). The commercial availability of games and their use in schools also holds the possibility to convey certain skills, values, and beliefs to a much larger audience than just military personnel. Which brings us to America’s Army.

America’s Army: Serious Game, Advergame, Edutainment, and Propaganda America’s Army is the U.S. Army’s own FPS game, created in response to significant recruiting shortfalls in the wake of the fall of the Soviet Union and reductions in military forces during the 1990s (Mead, 2013; Nichols, 2010). Army Colonel Casey Wardynski, an economist, spearheaded the development of America’s Army, and within a month of its release on July 4, 2002 the game has been downloaded over 2.5 million times (Mead, 2013). By late 2007, America’s Army initially available free to PC users, had been made further available for play on all the major home entertainment consoles and had been downloaded more than 40 million times and boasted over 8.5 million registered users (Nichols, 2010). Within one year of America’s Army’s release, 20 percent of incoming West Point Plebes had reported playing the game, and a 2008 MIT study found that 30 percent of Americans between the ages of 16 and 24 held a positive impression of the Army because of the game and that America’s Army had a greater impact on recruits’ decisions to enlist in the Army than all other forms of Army advertising combined (Mead, 2013). By any measure, America’s Army has been a huge success. As a recruiting tool and a mechanism to train players in certain skills and inculcate certain institutional ideologies, games like America’s Army, in keeping with the military’s historical task-based and functionalist learning philosophy, illustrate what gamers call “serious games” (Mead, 2013; Nichols, 2010). Serious games “move video games beyond entertainment and into the realm of training and education” and “serve as an ideal cultural commodity for the conveyance of dominant ideologies through simulation” (Nichols, 2010, p. 40). Mead (2013) further notes that serious games’ primary function lies in educating players or helping them solve problems, and that such games “are used extensively in education, health care, city planning, science, engineering, and emergency management, but their primary maker and user has always been the military” (p. 116). Nieborg (2010) characterizes America’s Army as a particularly instructive case study because the “technology possess an adaptive and interactive character that allows its game developers and military personnel to design and produce cultural artifacts that function more dynamically than more passive and traditional forms of mediated entertainment” (p. 57). In post 9/11 America, America’s Army represents a curricular and pedagogical tool, a form of soft power through which to build sympathy and support for American imperial policies. Johnson (2004) characterizes America’s Army as an institution of American militarism through which to capture “the hearts and minds of technology-savvy teenagers” (p. 97) by sanitizing the effects of war, inculcating values such as honor and personal courage, and presenting the 37

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Army as an appealing career. As a form of soft power, America’s Army functions simultaneously as an “advergame” that leverages the commercial popularity of military-themed games to market the Army; an “edugame” that virtually replicates Army life while transmitting specific values; and as propaganda that legitimates U.S. policy by limiting the individual player’s perspective to that of an American soldier (Nieborg, 2010). As an edugame, America’s Army and games like it assess and teach through game play specific skills and dispositions deemed useful to the military, specifically the ability to manage and analyze constant streams of incoming data in order to make simulated tactical decisions. As a massively multiplayer online game (MMOG), terminology similar to higher education’s flirtation with massive open online courses (MOOCs), America’s Army acculturates players how to think by requiring them to manage data, continuously communicate with other players online, and to ask questions about positions of “friendly” and “opposing” forces, the virtual situation, and many other aspects of operating in a complex, interactive, and realistic combat environment. As an advergame, America’s Army also appeals to a specific demographic, men between the ages of 18-39, which both encompasses half the gamers in the U.S. and represents the age range of eligible recruits for the Army. Some view the use of military games as a bridge between the military and civil society by affording a virtual glimpse to civilians of military life (Pearcy, 2012; Schulzke, 2013). Schulzke (2013) argues that games like America’s Army should be viewed as tools to bridge “the divide between civil and military spheres” by offering “an accessible way of learning about the military…structured in a way that makes the information easy to understand” (p. 255). Pearcy (2012) likewise sees America’s Army as possibly beneficial in social studies education as an epistemic bridge between civilians and the military by exposing students to the moral complexities of warfare, yet acknowledges that no empirical evidence exists to support its use as a critical pedagogical tool. Pearcy (2012) and Schulzke (2013) largely dismiss concerns posed by other scholars (Derby, 2014; King & Leonard, 2010; Mead, 2013; Nichols, 2010; Nieborg, 2010; Smicker, 2010) about propagandizing or the fusion of military and civil society through playing games like America’s Army. Yet the admitted aims of and singular perspective provided by America’s Army—that of a U.S. soldier indoctrinated with a specific set of beliefs, values, and assumptions—depoliticize and morally de-contextualize the data being processed by the players. There are neither counter-narratives inherent in the scenarios, nor questions raised about the purposes, goals, or morality of war. The players are provided with and act on a pretext that America fights to preserve and spread freedom, which requires the use of deadly force, a justification for war historically offered to the American public as well. In that sense, “serious games” as MMOGs form what Putnam (2000) calls bonding communities around the values of the games, which create communities “who become fans not just of the games but also of the military itself” (Nichols, 2010, p. 48). Bonding communities, as Putnam (2000) suggests, can be beneficial sites in the overall building of larger inclusive communities, but a lack of opportunities to engage in bridging communities through which to build understanding and relationships with many Others can allow one to become ensconced in a small exclusive community predicated on an us versus them ethos. America’s Army’s focus on technical skills, data processing, and the “banking” of institutionalized knowledge (Freire, 2009) illustrates the military functionalism and systems management that permeates our public and political spaces, including education. Smicker’s (2010) analysis of proleptic video games, which promise gamers “an opportunity to play a realistic version of the future before it arrives,” suggests that games such as America’s Army fit seamlessly within a neoliberal narrative of futurity known as military neoliberalism: 38

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The confluence between dominant military and economic discourse is unsurprising, since many contemporary economic theories and instruments have their roots in military planning and the development of information processing technologies within military departments. For example, rational-choice theory and game theory, two increasingly popular predictive economic techniques, have their roots in post-World War II development of computer models used to plan, simulate, and prepare for Cold War conflicts. (Smicker, 2010, p. 117) Just as neoliberal corporate systems management and “big data” seek to control, predict, create, and regulate a specific future through simulation and modeling, proleptic games represent one component of the military’s “combat against futurity” in that neoliberal economic and military discourses present the future itself as a threat that must be managed. Indeed, Harvey (2005) identifies one of the central tenets of neoliberal ideology as the management and manipulation of crises. Neoliberal prolepsis underlies the educational vision of the Partnership for 21st Century Skills (2008). The partnership, comprised primarily of corporate sponsors along with the National Education Association, promotes 21st Century Skills as an instrumental means to a specific future end in which the U.S. dominates the global economy, particularly the information and non-information service sectors, through creating partnerships between business and education. The Partnership for 21st Century Skills predicates the need for its educational model in the language of a crisis—poor scores on international assessments in STEM, the achievement gap, etc.—a crisis of future economic competitiveness, which must be managed. This language of crisis and its management is employed and embedded in commonsense narratives that such curriculum reform is also necessary to create equitable educational opportunities and life trajectories for students in schools that have, ironically but intentionally, suffered due to public disinvestment in education in favor of increased military spending and private sector corporate welfare. In suggesting the usefulness of America’s Army in formal educational contexts as part of managing the future as crisis, Chatham (cited in Schulzke, 2013, p. 256) explains that the game’s “huge following of players learn, not directly, but by absorbing the game’s back story; the cultural rules that advance one in the game are the rules that advance one in the real Army.” Indirect learning through back stories and cultural rules not directly stated but embedded in the experience of playing games like America’s Army illustrates a hidden curriculum (Jackson, 1968) through which ideological assumptions about patriotism and U.S. military, economic, and social policy form one part of the downward governmental pedagogical formation through which the state exercises surveillance and control over its inhabitants. Just as troubling, the portrayal of places like Iraq and Afghanistan in proleptic games like America’s Army as “barren wastelands devoid of civilians and infrastructure in need of saving and U.S. intervention” (King & Leonard, 2010, p. 91) feeds the historical narrative of heteropatriarchal settler colonialism (Arvin et al., 2013). Assessing that aspect of the hidden curriculum inherent in the experience of playing games like America’s Army, King and Leonard (2010) conclude: Alongside their erasure of the consequences of war, the absence of “civilization” justifies intervention, control, and mastery of unused space within both virtual and real projects of colonization….Video games play a fundamental role in solidifying the spatial mapping of the Middle East as an outpost, a marginal space, a frontier in need of saving, and without moral, legal, or political obstacles of intervention. (pp. 91-92)

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Games like America’s Army perpetuate colonizing narratives of civilization versus savagery, the seizure and development “for productive uses” of “unused” land and resources, White supremacy, heteropatriarchy, capitalism, and regeneration through violence. The narratives embedded in these games transcend training troops; they function to recruit and pre-train future soldiers as well as to build broad support for the expansion of imperial military power (King & Leonard, 2010, p. 98); they function to diminish and potentially disparage historical and geographical knowledge in K-12 social science curriculum that may aid young adolescents to develop intercultural, non-western sensibilities that do not endorse or support the colonialism of the global north. Educational audit culture and systems management, high-stakes assessment, and “big data” likewise form a back story and cultural rules, which teach children lessons similar to those in proleptic games: that success on certain reductive, behaviorist “metrics of accountability” in school represent the same rules for success in their future lives. What about those children and adolescents who do not like the future they see?

America’s Army in the Classroom Whatever the concerns expressed about the use of games like America’s Army in schools, it is vitally important to understand that the game is already in schools in the form of America’s Army “learning modules” provided free to approximately 2,000 schools in all 50 states by Project Lead the Way (Mead, 2013). Project Lead the Way (PLTW), a non-profit organization committed to providing “a transformative learning experience for K-12 students and teachers across the U.S.” in STEM education, boasts a board of directors from major corporations such as General Motors, Lockheed Martin, and Dow Chemical (PLTW). The Army partnered with PLTW to “embed a positive image of the military in the public schools” by circumventing concerns by schools, parents, students, and school boards about the presence of military recruiters in the schools (Mead, 2013, p. 155). The partnership between the Army and PLTW illustrates the fusion of the military with civil society because the mutual interest between the two organizations in STEM education addresses the Army’s need to maintain and further develop a tech-savvy fighting force, while PLTW, like the Partnership for 21st Century Skills, regards STEM education as essential to keep the American workforce, and American corporations, dominant in the world economy. Another troubling aspect of the evolving corporate-military relationship with schools lies in drastically reduced public spending on public education through the rapid proliferation of charter schools and virtual charters as competitors with public schools under the guise of “choice” and “market principles” (Apple, 2004, 2006, 2013; Mead, 2013; Ravitch, 2010, 2013). Of the relationships between schools and the Army, Mead (2013) concludes: The Pentagon has money and our public schools are starved for funds. This logic is driving the increasing corporate presence in education—the brand names that pop up regularly in textbooks, or the exclusive vending deals that schools are signing with Coke and Pepsi. But the military connection takes this process one step further: it delivers cutting-edge learning tools into the classroom, creating curricular areas where the immersion in, say, army-branded virtual worlds may define the learning experience itself. (p. 157) And Colonel Wardynsky, who spearheaded the development of America’s Army? He is now the school superintendent in Huntsville, Alabama, the home of the Army’s Redstone Arsenal, with whom he is collaborating to develop game applications for the curriculum. He is also working with the Army’s Cyber Command to “restructure the curriculum of Huntsville schools to focus on the skills required to wage 40

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and defend against cyberwarfare” (Mead, 2013, p. 156). The Huntsville schools are also collaborating with the Army on a program through which middle and high school students become “cyberwarriors or cyberdefenders,” enter the Army immediately after high school, and after completing their Army service return to work for one of the numerous defense contractors located near Redstone Arsenal (Mead, 2013). Wardynski has also broadened a social media monitoring system through which school officials can track students’ social media “when such students have a history of violence or whose conduct in school or in the community demonstrates a clear risk to student and employee safety” (Huntsville City Schools).

DANGEROUS KNOWLEDGE: COUNTER-CONDUCT, COUNTERPOLITICS, AND RECLAIMING THE AGENCY OF SUBJECTIVITY Politics is no more or less than that which is born with resistance to governmentality, the first uprising, the first confrontation. (Foucault, 2007, p. 390) In this chapter, we have, in the context of American curriculum, historicized and problematized social, cultural, ideological, gendered, and sexualized discourses that have coalesced in a system of governmentality currently predicated on conservative modernization and the neoliberal fusion between military and civil society. Our theoretical framework and analysis of the historic roles of the military in American education demonstrate that neoliberal market logic, big data, and systems management have de-politicized inherently political educational spaces, ethically de-contextualized academic study, and continue to perpetuate racist, heteropatriarchal colonizing narratives. The tyranny of big data and systems management threatens the agency of subjectivity in education and reinforces the worst historic educational dogmas associated with instrumentalism, functionalism, and anti-intellectualism. Problematizing neoliberal rationalization in education and other social spheres requires interrogating a crucial proleptic assumption associated with big data and systems management: If we collect enough of the right data, we can control, predict, and create the future by, as Smicker (2010) suggests, declaring war on the future itself and presenting it as a looming crisis in need of rational management. That war on the future-as-crisis is visible in the current war on terror. And, like the “education crisis” provoked by Sputnik in the late 1950s, the contemporary “education crisis” wrought by the neoliberal fusion of militarism and the desire to conquer the world economy purports the urgency of inculcating “21st century skills,” global thinking, and global competencies in education. In the context of big data and systems management, then, of all the members of the conservative modernization coalition identified by Apple (2004), the growing influence of systems managers, exemplified by Casey Wardynski, may be of most concern to those who desire what Jardine, Friesen, and Clifford (2006) call a curriculum in abundance not to mention the survival of American intellectual and democratic life. This morally-agnostic techno-managerial class seem driven by a blind faith in data analytics, efficiency, and the assumption that if something can’t be measured, it doesn’t exist. An avowed goal is to bring transparency and accountability to public services such as K-12 schooling, and thus frame efforts once again in a mis-appropriated language of common sense, justice, and empowerment. The intended and unintended consequences of neoliberalism and managerialism’s enthrallment with measurement and efficiency can be viewed in many marginalized and disadvantaged communities (see Apple, 2006). Its fusion has set in a motion a process whereby many elements of a “curriculum in abundance” not amenable to measurement shift from formal public schooling institutions to spheres of 41

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community and family life that cannot be so easily manipulated and controlled. Managerialism and the intrusion of corporate thinking into K-12 education predicates itself once again on a set of gendered patriarchal assumptions that result in public services such as child care and after school care, once rendered and supported by the state, now shifting to the unpaid labor of mainly women and local community organizers. Heteropatriarchical, gendered and economic relationships become yet again reified to serve the interests of the already advantaged and privileged educated class. Yet both Gramsci (1971) and Foucault (1991/1978) asserted that hegemonic power relations are continuously shifting and contested. As we conclude, we resist contributing to the very rationalizing discourse of education and society that we critique by offering a definitive model or prescription to “remedy” the complexities of governmentality’s downward pedagogical formation. Counter-conduct and counter politics can take many forms based on socio-political and historical context. We therefore offer some examples of what social, political, and educational counter-conduct might look like as a form of generating counter-politics and reclaiming the agency of subjectivity so necessary to the preservation of intellectual and democratic life. In so doing we draw upon a number of strands of what Kumashiro (2004) describes as the broad contours of anti-oppressive education whose intentional goal is the circumventing and diminishing of the totalizing effects of neoliberal and managerialist forms of governmentality in education and schooling.

Countering the Pastorate Foucault (2007) illustrates counter-conduct in governmental systems through analysis of the evolving power of the Christian pastorate in Medieval Europe. Pastoral power derived from the pastor’s assumed authority to guide individuals and whole populations to salvation, and Foucault (2007) characterizes the Christian pastorate as “a form of power that, taking the problem of salvation in its general set of themes, inserts into this global, general relationship an entire economy and technique of the circulation, transfer, and reversal of merits” (p. 183). The pastorate established an “exhaustive, total, and permanent relationship of individual obedience” and exercised a new form of power over individuals by defining a system of merits and faults through which individuals are subjectivated by a “hidden truth” (Foucault, 2007, pp. 183-184). Pastoral power was rationalized as the power to conduct individuals who would accept being conducted by the pastorate, and the pastoral system of political economy predicated on individual obedience resembles an early form of systems management. Yet, Foucault (2007) explained the subversion of pastoral power through five forms of counterconduct, which tended to redistribute, reverse, nullify, and discredit pastoral power. First, asceticism represented a sort of turning inward in the pursuit of self-understanding and self-mastery, through which its practitioners denied access to external pastoral power. Second, the development of various religious communities challenged pastoral power through, for example, the refusal by some communities to allow baptism of children because children cannot communicate their will to be baptized. Third, mysticism, a form of radical subjectivity and introspection, escapes the examination of one’s soul by another (through confession), which “short-circuits” the hierarchy of the church (Foucault, 2007, p. 212). Fourth, the act of reading Scripture by lay persons rather than relying on the banking of institutionalized dogmas by the pastorate revealed to each individual what “God wanted to reveal of Himself,” an essential component of counter-conduct to pastoral power (Foucault, 2007, p. 213). Finally, eschatological beliefs obviate the need for a pastoral shepherd because the Holy Spirit lives in each of the faithful rather than being embodied in any one person. Close reading of Foucault’s analysis reveals elements of the different counter-conducts 42

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he explained in which we as educators and citizens might engage as a form of curricular study against neoliberal “commonsense” systems of domination, which treat human beings, in schools and society, as data points to be manipulated.

Subverting War in the Virtual Battlespace: Dead-in-Iraq and Machinima Proleptic games like America’s Army, as microcosmic governmental systems, contain spaces of counterconduct in the form of user-created content through game modification. While the ability of users to modify games can help popularize and market games and provide feedback to game developers, that capability also presents a space within the game’s virtual world to generate a counter-politics to the values and beliefs embedded in the game itself by allowing players to “repurpose the game, either expanding it or critiquing it, an act sometimes referred to as ‘counter-gaming’” (Nichols, 2010, p. 48). Even in cases where games may not be modifiable, or the capability to create “mods” limited in the game, other forms of counter-conduct include in-game activism and machinima (Chan, 2010; Chien, 2010; Nichols, 2010). Artist Joseph DeLappe’s project Dead-in-Iraq described by Chan (2010) as a “ludic equivalent to an online pacifist act of civil disobedience” (p. 272), illustrates one example of in-game activism. Beginning on the third anniversary of the Iraq War in March 2006, DeLappe began to periodically log into America’s Army with his avatar named “dead-in-iraq” and use the game’s text messaging system to enter the names, ages, service branches, and dates of death of U.S. troops killed in the war (Chan, 2010; Derby, 2014). Among the critiques noted by Chan (2010) of DeLappe’s Dead-in-Iraq project is that while intended to provoke a critical dialogue on the Iraq War, warfare in general, and the use of games like America’s Army in promoting war, DeLappe’s monological display of dead American service personnel never created a direct dialogue with any of the players in the game. Concerns also include the privacy of the families of the dead service personnel, the focus on American dead rather than Iraqis victimized by the war, and the labeling of DeLappe’s project as a localized micro-protest of little overall significance (Chan, 2010). Yet Chan (2010) concludes that Dead-in-Iraq is just one of many forms of protest being undertaken through and within various evolving forms of media, and any attempt to evaluate the outcomes such actions misses the fundamental point of activism entirely. Machinima, a combination of the words “machine” and “cinema,” offers another example of counterconduct by gamers through which they record on-screen video gameplay, then edit the footage into a digital movie (Chien, 2010). Although machinima originated “in the desire of gamers to capture and share their in-game experiences,” this form of media has evolved to include challenging “the pervasive militarism of mainstream video games by unsettling them from within” (Chien, 2010, pp. 239-240). The machinima films analyzed by Chien (2010) “expose the aggressive and commanding masculine subjectplayer constructed by military video games as a vulnerable fiction” (p. 241). These films therefore seek to disrupt the narrative of anti-septic violence that dominates both gameplay and the assumptions of many Americans who view high-tech warfare as unambiguous and clean. They can also unsettle deeper historical heteropatriarchal and colonizing tropes embedded in games like America’s Army through raising questions about militaristic violence as a first resort to conflict or disagreement, the broader militarization of society, and posing, as Johnson (2010) does, forensic questions about historic, often secret, actions of the U.S. that produced the “blowback” against American imperialism. Machinima as a form of counter-conduct has been critiqued as limited to gaming cultures, but Chien (2010) argues that the rapid proliferation of the gaming industry and its crossing-over with Hollywood film productions are rapidly driving the assumptions inherent in the games as well as acts of resistance 43

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to them increasingly into the mainstream. Machinima as a form of counter-conduct “can resist the efforts of dominant war mythologies” by illustrating that the masculinized fantasy of empowerment through war sits uncomfortably aside the realization that playing the game requires one to submit to the logic of the game itself, thus the players are played by the games as much as they play the games (Chien, 2010, p. 250).

Counter-Conduct in Education: Counter Narratives and the Praxis of Refusal Just as games re-present virtual governmental systems that include spaces through which to embody counter-conduct, schools as governmental systems likewise contain abundant spaces of counter-conduct and counter-politics through curricular study. The use of games such as America’s Army has been proposed to bridge the civil/military divide (Pearcy, 2012; Schulzke, 2013) and parts of the game are in fact in use in about 2,000 classrooms in the form of PTLW modules (Mead, 2013). Any use of such games, however, must be accompanied by the posing of critical questions about the games’ underlying ideological assumptions and the political and economic roles of the games themselves. In art education, for example, Derby (2014) views analysis of violent, military-themed video games as a form of visual culture pedagogy, which “advocates creating art that is informed, critically engaged, and responsive to the underlying agendas of powerful institutions” (p. 20). In the context of disability studies, Derby (2014) argues that America’s Army and other violent games can be critically analyzed for the ways they downplay how soldiers “realistically relive traumas that disable them…just as death and disability are often downplayed when discussing war” in broader social discourses (p. 24). Derby (2014) advocates what we view as a form of as curricular counter-conduct through opening spaces in art education classrooms to critically examine military visual and material culture, particularly its effects on mainstream culture; military recruitment; the history of gaming in the military; and issues of disability in the military concluding: While I do not advocate trying to change students’ minds directly, I believe it is of paramount importance to challenge students to deeply examine and articulate their values and behaviors. Examining and responding to violent video games through art is a rich possibility toward this end. (p. 25) Derby’s (2014) conclusion provides a trajectory back to Foucault’s emphasis on negotiating an understanding of techniques of governmentalty through the relationship of self-to-self, an evolutionary subjective struggle to understand the self in the world in the context of academic study. This speaks to the development and reintroduction of subjective struggle in the affective domain to find and articulate one’s values and beliefs. That relationship of self-to-self will undoubtedly be uncomfortable as it requires interrogating mis-knowledge—incorrect assumptions, biases, prejudices, and deeply-held beliefs constructed in the context of one’s limited experiences. Learning, as Kumashiro (2001) reminds, requires considerable un-learning of many of the “commonsense” ideas, which, in Foucault’s theorization of governmentality, conduct us through many social, political, and economic spaces, including curriculum and schools. The necessity of critical self-examination holds for the education profession itself in the context of many taken-for-granted claims about education, which continue to seduce so many, including many teachers, teacher educators, and those ensconced in the increasingly corporatized education-industrial complex. One of those “commonsense” notions lies in the purported neutrality and objectivity of big 44

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data, systems management, and “educational” technologies. Our historical analysis and synthesis of existing research rejects neoliberal claims to the objectivity of audit culture, systems management, and big data. The quantification of any complex set of processes such as life in classrooms does not render analysis of those processes objective. The assumptions that underlie the selection of “metrics of accountability” and the interpretations of those data are highly subjective, and the process of data analysis is itself predicated on a clear instrumental, functionalist means-ends calculus. The banal instrumentality inherent in pre-managing a future-as-crisis finds clear expression the lexicon of 21st Century Skills and the enthrallment with standards and standardized assessment, the latest iteration of which exists as the mis-named Common Core State Standards (CCSS). All aspects of CCSS—the standards, pre-packaged curriculum and texts “aligned” with the standards, the Webinars offered to help achieve the predetermined behaviorist performance outcomes, and the assessments—are marketed as discrete, neutral, and objective. Yet CCSS is in reality an integrated system of educational political economy predicated on systems management, efficiency, instrumentality, discipline, and control, which like the Medieval pastorate, has institutionalized a system of merits and faults through which to subjectivate the population. Discourses of standards, punitive high-stakes assessment, accountability, and choice signal a doubling down on the discredited model of NCLB, characterized by Ravitch (2010, 2013) as test and punish, which has become the hegemonic, “commonsense” to which too many educators default. And in the context of globalization, the global North’s next iteration of capitalist colonization, dominating the global economy through 21st Century Skills will mean exporting that linear systems management approach to “learning.” Education publishing conglomerate Pearson, for example, seeks to do just that by providing not just educational “products,” but fully privatized educational systems to “poor countries,” which the company has already begun to do in the Philippines and Pakistan (Kamenetz, 2016). Articulating the processes through which individuals and communities subverted pastoral power, Foucault (2007) noted that words such as “dissent” and “resistance” do not adequately capture the essence of that process like the term “counter-conduct.” Thus, in the spirit of counter-conduct as a counterpolitics of reversal, nullification, and discrediting oppressive governmental power, we propose a praxis of refusal through which to: • • • •

•

Actively and intentionally re-politicize educational spaces and re-position teachers and scholars at all levels of education as public intellectuals committed creating a public not as it is, but as it might become (Robin, 2016); Reframe oppressive institutional practices and power relations as equitable, just, democratic, and culturally and environmentally sustaining/revitalizing; Actively create and hold curricular spaces for counter-narratives to oppressive precepts embedded in neoliberal market rationality, dispossession, disposability, de-politicization, and de-socialization. Constantly and continuously encourage teachers and teacher educators to view pedagogy as a performative act (Hooks, 1994) that affords us opportunities to create, alter, invent, and re-invent spaces of learning that are fluid, responsive and an impetus for personal and political engagement; and Purposefully disrupt hegemonic, impoverished, anesthetic, “commonsense” curricula, pedagogies, power relations, and institutional practices.

We offer some examples of questions that teachers in K-12 and those involved in teacher education might deploy to unsettle, disrupt and engage in curricular and pedagogical counter-conduct that neu45

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tralizes and negates anesthetic “commonsense” approaches. We offer these questions not as the way to undertake a ‘praxis of refusal’, not as a prescription of fixed or definitive strategies, but rather as one of many methods to unmoor and problematize neoliberal definitions of what constitutes ‘good’ teaching and learning. We start from an assumption that professionalism in teaching does not equate with meeting a set of sanitized metrics decided upon and implemented by technocrats divorced from the daily, lived realities and practices of teachers in schools. Rather, we see teacher professionalism as necessarily involving activism, and as necessarily involving moments of crisis and discomfort (Kumashiro, 2004) so that a fuller accounting of the social, cultural, linguistic and economic context of teachers’ and students’ lives may find expression in curricular and pedagogical experiences. Curriculum that affords opportunities for teachers and students to navigate and negotiate their way through moments of crisis and discomfort represents an attempt to find the self in curriculum content, and, as Foucault challenges us, to come to a better understanding of the values and knowledge that we embody. Cognizant of McCarthy’s (2000) admonition that we should offer suggestions of ‘possibility within constraint’, we advocate for teachers to introduce and develop as frequently as possible elements of complexity and quandary, even when teaching content that addresses pre-packaged standards such as Common Core or other similar state curriculum documents. K-12 Social Studies curriculum offers some of the most visible and viable spaces for a refusal and dissent from hegemonic knowledge, for an interrogation of the silences and elisions in historical and present-day accounting of events, and for an inclusion of perspectives too often overlooked in most K-12 US Social Studies texts. We might pose important questions when studying important milestone events (too frequently during wars and conflicts) in our country’s history such as: • • • •

What were the perspectives of different groups of people who were affected by the Constitution in 1787 but who were not part of the elite group who drew up the content of this important document such as the indentured and enslaved, those without property, or who did not own land? In what ways did the US act in contradictory ways during World War II, fighting for freedom and against the tyranny of National Socialism in Europe, yet engaging in illegal internment of its own Japanese American citizens and refusing to grant equality to its non-white citizens? In the direct aftermath of 9/11, what did it mean to be an American citizen? Which views, words, and behaviors were deemed patriotic and which ideas and actions were judged to be ‘Un-American’ and why? Again, where did contradictions appear? What do current events, embedded in racial and economic injustices within the criminal justice system and demagoguery against immigrants, convey about our national identity and about whom we include and exclude as valuable citizens in our democracy?

K-12 teaching and learning in Literature afford many similar opportunities to interrogate and make porous the supposedly fixed and ‘watertight’ curriculum standards that privilege certain positions over others. When reading with students in class the following questions can be posed: • •

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Why do particular texts receive the designation of being a part of the “classics”? Whose voices and positions are reflected in the classics and whose are elided? Which examples of literature denoted as ‘multicultural’ actually reflect a broader representation of who we are as a nation, and which examples intentionally and unintentionally contribute to the continued existence of cultural stereotypes?

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• •

Which cultural, social and economic representations are foregrounded in the literature we choose to read in classrooms with students, and which types and representations of characters still need further elaboration and explication? When teaching and learning foreign languages and reading literature in non-native languages, how do identity and culture get represented?

Even STEM education, long associated with the “objectivity” of the scientific method, observation, quantifiable measurement, control, and prediction, offers many opportunities for teachers and students to pose and investigate critical curricular questions related to technology and to study important social issues through the STEM disciplines. Posing the following types of questions could break the ostensive STEM binary between the objective and the subjective: • • • •

What are the social and ethical implications associated with new technologies in healthcare, biotechnology, and other fields? What should be the public role in funding research and making resultant technologies that benefit the human condition widely and equitably available? What are the moral and social implications associated with the national security state and the extraordinary resources devoted to the development and use of military technologies both globally and domestically? How can we study and understand social issues such as climate change, economic injustice, numerous forms of inequality, the plight of refugees, environmental injustices, etc., through the STEM disciplines?

We support the notion that teachers and teacher educators entertain these and similar questions to underpin their choices in curriculum content, to frame their pedagogical decisions, and to reject forms of governmentality exercised through neoliberal and heavy-handed education reforms. The education-industrial complex, like the military-industrial complex of which Eisenhower warned, has become the neoliberal systems management model for governing, which in its purported neutral, objective market logic creates a governmental pedagogical formation that attempts to erase both subjective individual agency and any sense of collective solidarity in the conduct of public, political, and intellectual life. Tocqueville (2004), in the early 19th century saw the specter of de-politicization, de-socialization, and hyper-individualism lurking in the shadows of America’s democratic experiment: Individualism is a recent expression arising out of a new idea. Our fathers knew only the word egoism…. Individualism is a reflective and tranquil sentiment that disposes each citizen to cut himself off from the mass of his fellow men and withdraw into the circle of family and friends, so that, having created a little society for his own use, he gladly leaves the larger society to take care of itself. (p. 585) We conclude and proceed from a sense of educated hope in the counter-conduct we see in formal and informal educational spaces, in the formal curriculum as well as our public curricula. Machinima and Dead-in Iraq illustrate creative counter-conduct against militarism within video games as governmental spaces. We see hope in the cracks and fissures visible in the growing opposition from both the political left and right to a perceived overreach in curriculum and testing in CCSS. We also see hope in the counter-conduct by teachers in places like Chicago as they struggle to reframe power relations to 47

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serve youth through education and in the context of state violence against communities of Color more broadly. Counter-conduct might look like a curriculum and pedagogy of counter-narrative through which teachers and teacher educators interrogate oppressive partiality and mis-knowledge (Kumashiro, 2001) and deconstruct what Ronald Takaki (2008) called the racist and heteropatriarchal Master Narrative of American History, to unearth erased histories, illuminate the hidden curriculum, find the past in the present, and perhaps re-imagine the future through new synoptic texts in curriculum studies (Pinar, 2006). As Palmer (2000) has written, authorship of one’s life requires a subjective struggle to understand what life tells about the truths and values one embodies. The relationship of self-to-self is incommensurable with a life lived as a data point conducted by the logics of systems management. Navigating the true complexities of the future, not as crises to be managed, but as life to be lived as agentive beings, requires all educators to engage in the counter-conduct of co-constructing and re-constructing curriculum as complicated conversation and generating counter-politics in governmental spaces through which to reimagine an unknowably just future rather than declare war on the future as a crisis from which few profit.

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Sedgwick, E. (1985). Between men: English literature and male homosocial desire. New York, NY: Columbia University Press. Sliverman, K. (1992). Male subjectivity at the margins. New York, NY: Routledge. Smicker, J. (2010). Future combat, combatting futures: Temporalities of war video games and the performance of proleptic histories. In N. Huntemann & M. Payne (Eds.), Joystick soldiers: The politics of play in military video games (pp. 106–121). New York, NY: Routledge. Steudeman, M. (2014). The guardian genius of democracy: The myth of the heroic teacher in Lyndon B. Johnsons education policy rhetoric, 19641966. Rhetoric & Public Affairs, 17(3), 477–510. doi:10.14321/ rhetpublaffa.17.3.0477 Takaki, R. (2008). A different mirror: A history of multicultural America (Revised Ed.). New York, NY: Back Bay Books. Taubman, P. (2000). Teaching without hope: What is really at stake in the standards movement, high stakes testing, and the drive for “practical reforms”. Journal of Curriculum Theorizing, 16(3), 19–33. Taubman, P. (2009). Teaching by numbers: Deconstructing the discourse of standards and accountability in education. New York, NY: Routledge. Tocqueville, A. (2004). Democracy in America (A. Goldhammer, Trans.). New York, NY: The Library of America. Tyler, R. (1949). Basic principles of curriculum and instruction. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. van Manen, M. (1991). The tact of teaching: The meaning of pedagogical thoughtfulness. London, Ontario, Canada: The Althouse Press. Vidal, G. (2004). Imperial America: Reflections on the United States of amnesia. New York, NY: Nation Books. Way, N. (2011). Deep secrets: Boys’ friendships and the crisis of connection. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. doi:10.4159/harvard.9780674061361 Wolin, S. (2008). Democracy incorporated: Managed democracy and the specter of inverted totalitarianism. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Ziarek, E. (2001). An ethics of dissensus: Postmodernity, feminism, and the politics of radical democracy. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press. Zinn, H. (1980). A people’s history of the United States. New York, NY: Harper Perennial Modern Classics.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Conservative Modernization: A conservative social and political movement comprised of a coalition that includes neoliberals, neoconservatives, authoritarian populists, and technical systems managers.

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Governmentality: Complex, overlapping relations of institutional power, surveillance, and punitive disciplinary regimes that have developed since the 16th Century in order to render whole populations governable through the embodiment of institutionally sanctioned practices. Hegemonic Masculinity: The configuration of gender practice that embodies the currently accepted answer to the problem of the legitimacy of patriarchy, which guarantees the dominant position of men and subordination of women. Heteropatriarchy: Social systems in which heterosexuality and patriarchy are perceived as normal and natural, and in which other configurations are perceived as abnormal, aberrant, and abhorrent. Neoliberalism: A market philosophy, which proposes that human well-being can best be advanced by liberating individual entrepreneurial freedoms and skills through strong private property rights, free markets, and free trade, with the state’s sole legitimate purposes being to secure private property rights, guarantee functioning markets, and create markets where they do not already exist, by force if necessary. Settler Colonialism: A persistent social and political formation in which newcomers/colonizers/ settlers come to a place, claim it as their own, and do whatever it takes to disappear the Indigenous peoples who are there.

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Chapter 3

Liminal Learning:

A Theoretical Framework for Reconceptualizing the Digital Space L Johnson Davis San Diego State University, USA

ABSTRACT Current educational systems have been built around the faulty metaphor of industry in which human learning is equated to machine learning or learning that is computational, linear, and void of meaning. This metaphor has been extended to how digital systems and spaces are utilized in the classroom. Recent research and conceptual frameworks built upon human learning from a metaphoric mind perspective (learning built upon meaning making and experiential connections within a social matrix), may work toward recontextualizing the use of digital technologies as methods for understanding individual experience and documenting human learning at work. A novel conceptual framework describes the digital space as a liminal learning space in which the learner enters to co-construct meaning within a social matrix, which may be evidenced by current digital artifacts. Implications for contextualizing digital technologies as liminal learning spaces are explored.

INTRODUCTION In the 1990s television space series, Star Trek: The Next Generation, Data, played by actor Brent Spiner, is a childlike artificial life form struggling with what it means to be human. Throughout the course of seven seasons, Data’s study of humanity is a meaning-making endeavor fueled by inherent curiosity. As he lives his “life” aboard the starship, he ruminates on the nuances of what it means to be flesh and blood—reflecting on human interactions, human emotions, and the human desire for connection through fellowship and love. Data, a seemingly unemotional automaton, is on a prototypical scientific quest for knowledge; embedded in a community that provides him with ample observational data to catalog and analyze “human” qualities. Through his rich dialogue, he observes and questions the actions and behaviors of those he lives with: DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch003

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Commander Riker’s easy-going manner and sense of humor is fascinating to me. I believe it to be one reason he is so popular among the crew. It may also be partly responsible for his success in matters of love…The need for more research is clearly indicated. (Apter, Moore, & Wiemer, 1991) He recognizes and yearns for human feelings with which to make more concrete decisions: I have often wished for the sense that humans call intuition, or instinct. Since Vulcans are incapable of lying, I must accept the Ambassador’s explanation as the truth. But I would still prefer a ‘gut feeling’ to back up this conclusion. (Apter, Moore, & Wiemer, 1991) And, although mystified by many human emotions, he understands completely the human desire to be loved and the need for friendship: I never knew what a friend was until I met Geordi. He spoke to me as though I were human. He treated me differently from anyone else. He accepted me for what I am. And that, I have learned, is friendship. (Apter et al., 1991) Data, is, in fact, far from the emotionless android that he believes himself to be. On the U.S.S. Enterprise bounding through space, Data participates in an ontogenetical quest, one pursued by both fictional and nonfictional characters alike, to discover the “who am I.” Data, who looks at his world with childlike wonder and seeks understanding, who practices life and adapts to new information, who seeks meaning of the self in relation to others, and who does not separate living from learning, is, at his core, inherently human. The question of what it means to be human and how we seek to gain a further understanding of our human self is framed eloquently by Gene Rodenberry’s quirky ghostly skinned creation. Data is, in essence, like us; he watches the drama of human life, love, and the pursuit of happiness like a theatergoer watching a play. He is removed but at once involved in the action unfolding on stage and, in doing so, enters a space where he is neither android nor human but something else altogether. Data’s search, our collective search for meaning, may not seem at all relevant in discussions of deconstructing the education-industrial complex’s pervading influences on how and what we learn, but it is, indeed, inexorably intertwined. For deconstruction requires that we disassemble frames, peel back layers, and challenge the very concept of what human learning is. We must do this, as Data did, to not only seek the truth about who we are as a human species but, most importantly, to begin a reconstructive process that will help us chart a course toward a future in which we use our technologies as partners in the co-construction of our meaning making rather than as dominators of our very thoughts, desires, and dreams. These two distinct futures underscore an inherent duality that has existed and has framed philosophical and psychological conversations around human thinking and, ultimately, human potential for over two millennia. At one end lies the computational theory of the mind fueled by philosophers and philosophies that have laid the foundation for linear thinking models in which the human mind is procedural, algorithmic, logical, and systemized. Cartesian concepts of a mechanized mind, Darwinian ideals of impersonal natural selection, behaviorists’ notions of uncontrollable instincts, artificially programmable models of human intelligence, and data scientists’ conquest of knowledge through “big data” provide the solid footing for defining humans as predictable and programmable machines. This mechanistic framework is woven through all of our societal systems, framing the human experience as one that can be narrowed 56

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to a series of processes. Our system of education is not exempt from these ubiquitous reductions. As educators, we continue to impersonally standardize (instead of personalize) learning methods for our young, proliferate theories and methods that classify and categorize (rather than include), ground teacher training in authoritarian behavioral management techniques (instead of exploring self-organizing and shared-cooperation models), and buy into the neoliberal mechanistic worldview that we are but consumers in a capitalistic-driven economy (rather than creators of thought and substance). Citing Bruner, Modell (2003) describes how this computational theory of mind, “under the sway of mechanistic instinct theory” as promulgated by psychoanalysis and behavioral psychology, replaced the notion of a meaning making mind in our intellectual history. He effectively summarizes this dichotomy by pointing out that “the construction of meaning is very different from the processing of information.” Counter to the idea that our minds are simply organic processors is the conceptualization of a mind that constructs meaning. This meaning-making model views human beings, not as a collective of fleshencased circuits and nodes that follow specific processing paths that can be manipulated and, better yet, quantified, but as individuals with the personal and societal ability to transform, change, adapt, construct, deconstruct, imagine, and create meaning that, not only can be individually contextualized throughout ontogeny, but passed on to future generations (Bruner, 1996; Lakoff & Johnson, 1980; Modell, 2003; Rogoff, 1980; Tomasello, 2009; Turner, 1988). This is an important concept that may distinguish the two theories of mind. In the mechanistic view of man, society acts on man. In the meaning-making view, man acts on society. It is a powerful shift in thought – one from transactional and reactionary to one that is proactive and transformational. When society acts on a human being, it provides the script to live a life. When a human being acts on society, she writes her own script. The mechanistic viewpoint has served us in the past because it is certain and can be standardized (e.g., 1 + 1 = 2). The meaning-making theory of mind is messier and is open to interpretation based on context (e.g., what does the symbol + mean?). This shift from a theory of mind that marginalizes men as individual workers, consumers, and data points, to one that envisions human beings as a myriad of intertwined and overlapping contextualized experiences is crucial to an understanding of why we, as educators, must work quickly to disrupt the education industrial complex and its grip on technological methods for teaching. At no time in the history of our planet have we needed to harness the potential of every single human child. Placing artificial limits on this potentiality based on flawed assumptions of our “machine minds” may be contradictory to our own species adaptation and our future place in a changing world. A shift in perspective, preceded by a thoughtful personal deconstruction of our individual pedagogies, is necessary to begin transforming our larger educational systems and to loosen the grip that the “complex” has on our teaching practices. A cogent example of this type of perspective shift can be evidenced in American psychologist Jerome Bruner’s own personal change in focus from the process of education (Bruner, 1977) in which he elaborated on “intrapsychic processes of knowing and how these might be assisted by appropriate pedagogies” to the culture of education (Bruner, 1996, p. xi) in which he describes culturally-situated intentional learning and thinking. Psychiatrist Viktor Frankl also presents a window into the uniquely human ability to recontextualize and change through his powerful exploration of his transformed beliefs from Freudian ideals of internally-motivated human drives to his understanding that man’s ultimate drive is in the pursuit for meaning (Frankl, 2006). It is important to ground this chapter by showcasing the duality of these two competing orientations of the human mind early on in order to help the reader work toward disrupting mechanistic notions that drive technological applications within the education industrial complex. A large body of historical and present day intellectual work, forged in the foundry of computation and processes, has served to inform 57

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and anchor many of the suppositions on learning, thinking, and teaching we use today. Readers are encouraged to approach the text with a willingness to see through the shadows to the forms beneath, even if they initially represent flawed reflections. As Plato’s prisoner discovered, stepping out from the cave was the first step on the path to recognizing that he had been observing the shadow of beings rather than their true forms. In a mechanistic theory of mind, humans are but one-dimensional, linear shadows of their true selves. In a meaning-making theory of mind, humans may be fully represented in all of their glorious and flawed forms. It is uncovering these forms and searching for the truth of human learning that we will begin to unravel in this chapter. We will step out of Plato’s cave and continue a forward journey, first toward the ancient Paleolithic cave and then onto a digital cave in the present day. In all likelihood, the text may leave with you with more questions than answers. Although much of the premises discussed in this chapter are grounded in the inquiries and passions of a variety of individuals outside the field of education, the connections and links made by the author, based on research, are novel concepts. It is important to have a forum for grand ideas, particularly as one starts to question the very constructs that we have come to know quite intimately. It is the author’s hope that other researchers will dive into some of the ideas postulated in this chapter and, through careful study, determine if they have merit. It is vitally important, however, to come to this work with an open mind and a sense that what has been written may or may not be the truth. It may be framed and oriented to the theory of a mechanistic mind, believing that human beings cannot think for themselves but must be dominated and controlled, instead of the more culturallyinclusive metaphoric theory that allows for creativity and individual/group intent. Deconstructing the influence of existing systems on human learning is a complex process and must be thoughtfully presented. This chapter will continue the discussion of the dueling theories of mind by describing how existing frames and metaphors have worked to shape our way of thinking about learning, particularly with regard to our educational systems, and how the commercialization of digital technologies for use in the classroom is just one artifact of their degrading influence of the mechanistic theory of mind. It will then lead the reader to challenge these existing frames by providing an alternative evolution for human learning that is grounded in what Turner (1969) calls communitas. It is in this section that ideas related to the metaphoric mind are explored more fully and our current notions of human development may be challenged by first reviewing theory on the origins of consciousness and the mind in the cave (Lewis-Williams, 2002), discussing new evidence that may suggest caves were places of communal learning through potentially groundbreaking research that describes women, not young men, as the Paleolithic cave artists (Snow, 2006) and reflecting on how the cave itself and the drawings placed on its walls may be expressions of an emerging mind. The chapter will then discuss theoretical perspectives and research that root the evolution of the human mind in a social context (Tomasello, 2014), orients it as one that is centrally meaning making (Modell, 2003), and defines how the ambiguous liminal space, as originally conceptualized by Van Gennep (1960/1909) and later expanded upon by Turner (1969), may be what Briggs and Peat (1999) defined as the chaotic space where “our psychological perspective shifts—through moments of amplification and bifurcation—our degrees of freedom expand and we experience being and truth. We are then creative. And our true self lies there” (p. 29). Lastly, the author will reconceptualize Turner’s (1969) ambiguous, chaotic liminal space as an inherent learning interface mechanism and theorize that this “betwixt and between” space is an integral part of the feedback loop of our human learning system and of our metaphoric minds. An overview of this new liminal learning framework and its applications to the digital space will be presented, drawing con58

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nections from the ancestral mind leaving artifacts on a cave wall to current users of technology leaving artifacts of self and community on the Internet. The framework synthesizes research and proposes a new direction for reinventing the digital space as one free from the neoliberal economic agenda that orients the human mind as a machine to one that honors the human mind as inherently metaphoric. Drawing from research in the areas described previously, tools will be provided for assisting educators to determine the value of any given technology, and suggestions will be provided for using technology in novel ways that support our ancestral minds and, perhaps, emerging ones whose features we cannot yet discern.

DISRUPTING NEOLIBERAL STRUCTURES Never more in the history of civilization have we been at such a crucial junction, the proverbial fork in the road. Do we embrace our humanity and all that it entails, or are we “machine men with machine minds and machine hearts” (Chaplin & Chaplin, 1941), choosing to let technology and its myopic crusaders take the helm and warp-speed us into unexplored territory? Humanity’s crossroad is on the minds of many of our most brilliant scientists and technologists of the 21st century. Noted theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, fearing the rise of machine intelligence, has stated, “I think the development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race” (Cellan-Jones, 2014). In response to the Redditor comment during an “Ask Me Anything” session (“. . . whomever controls [technology] will control what information people make their own. Even today, we see the daily consequences of people who live in an environment that essentially tunnel-visions their knowledge”), Microsoft founder Bill Gates responded about its dangers, “I am in the camp that is concerned about super intelligence. First the machines will do a lot of jobs for us and not be super intelligent. That should be positive if we manage it well. A few decades after that though the intelligence is strong enough to be a concern. I agree with Elon Musk and some others on this and don’t understand why some people are not concerned” (Reddit, 2015). Gates was underscoring comments made by the Tesla chief executive during a speech at the MIT Aeronautics and Astronautics Department’s Centennial Symposium in October 2014 where he stated that artificial intelligence was our “biggest existential threat” (McFarland, 2014). This threat is personified in futurist and Google’s Director of Engineering Ray Kurzweil’s theory in which he postulates that the singularity will be a time when humans overcome their biological limitations and amplify their creativity (Kurzweil, 2005). Kurzweil’s (2005) hypothesis belies the question, in view of the Singularity’s occurrence by 2045, will we even know what creativity is three decades from now? Will human beings shaped by the influences of a technological world that, as the Redditor astutely commented, “live in an environment that essentially tunnel-visions their knowledge” be creative? If the institution of school, as the current primary form of learning across the United States, has essentially switched out play and other alternative forms of learning, particularly in kindergarten, for an increased focus on content and standards (Bassok, Latham, & Rorem, 2014), how are we working actively to cultivate creative individuals? And, if creativity is defined as processes leading to “new or novel” ideas that have value to the creator (Catterall, 2015), whether that creator is a 50-year-old man or an 11-year-old girl, how are our educational institutions and the way we use technology providing opportunities for a wide variety of experiences that will encourage our young people to ideate and innovate? These essential questions are playing out every day in schools across America and in the board rooms and offices of talented people who have become obsessed with creating technology that provides shareholder returns rather than harnessing its digital power to solve human problems. Our current use of 59

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technology in the classroom can serve as a magnifying glass to examine a larger problem: educational institutions, as we know them, are not currently structured to help our young experience the world and, in doing so, make meaning. Whether the intention was there or not, our public institutions of learning provided an alternative factory for working-class children in the post-Industrial Age, complete with bells to acknowledge shifts in the day and rows of desks to emulate a factory floor. The distinct sequential processes describe a manufacturing principle of linearity which Robinson (2011) states has defined educational operations and puts “schools under pressure to prioritize those subjects that seem most relevant to the economy” (p. 59). In agreement, Wirt (as cited in Cohen & Mohl, 1979) stated that our learning system could “promote American capitalism and individualism, within the framework of the corporate-technological society” (p. 22). Bowles and Gintis (2002) also argued that American schools prepare children for the eventuality of adult work by promoting compliance and submission to authority within a hierarchal structure similar to that of the modern corporation, thereby modeling an environment potentially rich for learning and socio-emotional-cognitive development after the environment of the workplace, which inherently promotes the interests of Capitalism and, inherently, the consumer market. Adding to its parallels with the workplace, during the time of its massive expansion, theories related to intelligence and intelligence quotient (IQ) encouraged the process of ability grouping and sorting to identify those who would be college bound or tracked toward work (Robinson, 2011). Therefore, the world of work and the training of individuals to take their place in the labor market, either directly after graduation from high school or following a college-level curriculum, have been inextricably intertwined with the underlying function of education in the United States since its founding. Our young are not groomed to be creators in this system but rather developed to be automatons that do not question authority, to fit snugly into the 8:00-5:00, Monday-Friday with weekends off structure of work, and to consume, consume, consume. This imperative toward consumerism, reinforced by our educational system and its values and beliefs, creates a vicious cycle into which young people are immediately indoctrinated and kept tame through financial, economic, and social systems that provide incentives (e.g., income tax deductions and credits, home ownership, etc.) that ensures compliance to the system. Defining the educational experience solely as a method for contextualizing one’s future self in the marketplace and as a necessary pathway to a future career is endemic of the larger problem that lies in the symbiotic relationship between our public educational system and industry. This concept is vitally important to recognize in terms of our deconstructive process. By using the skeleton of industry to build our concepts of education and learning, we have supported the powerful metaphor of man as a cog in a machine. Thus, our concepts of human learning have become narrowly focused through the restrictive mechanistic aperture, with practitioners and researchers alike driven by what Lakoff and Johnson (1980) call “metaphors we live by,” the title of their book, which outlines a different framework for human thinking. In much the same way that the researchers outlined how the metaphor of “war” structures our understanding and language of an argument (e.g., your claims are indefensible, his criticisms were right on target), the seemingly impenetrable metaphor of industry structures our current understanding of human learning within our educational systems. Our young people are no more than future workers that are tracked via career pathways or to college. In our current system, we are not learners working collaboratively to bring out our human best, but individuals in classrooms to be managed. As educators, we have been led to believe that facilitating the process of an individual’s search for meaning—helping them navigate and develop an understanding of the “I” within the collective that is the “we”—is beyond our purview. Unfortunately, we are—and industry, business, corporations, individual communities, our nation, and the world are included in this “we”—missing out on the untapped but vast reservoirs 60

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of potential in each individual, mainly due, in part, because the factory, by its very nature, is meant to produce benefits for a few and, therefore, cultivates the best and brightest to fill roles in “management.” Within this machine framework, tools for learning, whether they are the latest and greatest method for literacy development or online programs to help with math, are simply utilized as tools of the trade, assisting in the “job” of student. By continuing to ground our thinking of human learning in the metaphor of “man as a cog in the machine,” we may, in fact, be embarking upon an unchangeable, self-fulfilling prophecy to a final destination. The fork in the road is upon us. Down one path, a path where we have reframed what learning means to humanity in the 21st century and beyond, we may find that technology’s benefits are more than we could imagine, helping us co-construct the meaning of our lives by bringing us together and fostering our human talents. Down the other path, where we continue to think that we are but workers—cogs in a machine—we may, ultimately, cease to become human, as Kurzweil (2005) prophesizes, and relinquish our feelings, thoughts, desires, and dreams to technology that, like Data, will inevitably begin its own search for meaning.

METAPHOR AND MEANING If we focus our attention on the path toward a meaningful humanity, it is crucial to more fully develop a new framework for learning and cognition grounded in a meaning-making theory of mind that seeks to capture all the intricacies of who we are, free from the mechanistic theory of mind that has worked to dichotomize, categorize, and classify us. Could there be a unifying theory of human learning that, if carefully excavated and extracted from our evolutionary beginnings, serves in our efforts to reconstruct and influence how we educate our young in this increasingly digital age? Most of us feel in our gut that we were not born to simply be workers in profit-making enterprises. Should we take Data’s advice and trust our intuition? If so, what is it telling us about who we really are? Ironically, this new framework or metaphor for learning is grounded in just that: metaphor. More specifically, in contrast to our previous framework which focused on a dehumanizing linear model of human thinking to groom a future workforce, a new framework should seek to rehumanize and transform the misguided notion that human emotions, thoughts, and feelings can somehow be reduced to a series of machine-type processes. In fact, Modell (2003), in agreement with Lakoff and Johnson (1980), states that what makes us uniquely human is an unconscious metaphoric process that allows us to consistently and constantly recontextualize our experiences. Distinct from the literary device, this cognitive ability, our robust metaphoric brain, allows us to make connections between our lives and the lives of others. Modell (2003) postulates that our metaphoric brain serves as the interpreter of unconscious memory, which it must access in order to make the comparisons vital to understanding and learning. He specifically defines metaphor as “a mapping or transfer of meaning between dissimilar domains . . . metaphor not only transfers meaning between different domains, but by means of novel recombinations metaphor can transform meaning and generate new perceptions” (Modell, 2003, p. 27). One example drawn from the author’s recent research on the “experience of internship” may help to clarify this metaphoric process. Having been immersed in a personalized, project-based learning curriculum since 9th grade, students are embedded in a workplace for four weeks during the second semester of their junior year with seemingly no lifelines. Having had a myriad of experiences in which they communicated and collaborated in groups in order to solve problems with their peers, incredibly, by the end of the first week, students 61

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recontextualize their experiences working and collaborating in groups at school, connect these experiences with what is going on in the workplace, generate similarities through observation, and recombine their experience in school with their current experience as an intern to redefine their identities and “attach” to the new environment. Their metaphoric brains must access a variety of unconscious experiences and make connections in order to navigate within a new social structure. This process is a uniquely human ability which allows us to live a life, create meaning from the experiences of our life, and then learn from these experiences; thus we “live and learn.” If a divergence from a linear mode of thinking to a metaphoric way of learning is to be supported, it is necessary to root this new framework firmly to the ground and look for possible reasons why we might have this uniquely human ability. Questions remain: How were these metaphoric devices developed anthropologically? What evidence do we have for this unique learning process in the past that can inform our present understanding? Although we can see the evolutionary output of who we are today as a species, how we got here is still a mystery. The roots of our metaphoric brains are missing. But there are clues. Donald (1991) has theorized that metaphoric gesture may have been a precursor to language. Modell (2003) states that the formation of metaphor is “intrinsically multimodel,” engaging all inputs, including auditory, visual, and kinesthetic. Lewis-Williams (2002), referencing 17th-century Italian philosopher Vico, states that humanity created itself during the task of forming the world. How could humanity have created itself? How did all inputs to our human system become engaged in a process that birthed the metaphoric mind? To answer this question, we must journey back in time to our ancestral home and briefly explore the lives of the ancients. The researcher will endeavor to synthesize two primary strands of evidence, seemingly unrelated, to make a case for why the birth of our metaphoric mind may have been initiated within the cold stone walls of a simple cave and why this environment may, in fact, be the birthplace of human learning. This is a heady statement and, as previously mentioned, the author encourages dialogue and conversation around this topic. As you read further, you are encouraged to be mindful of the historical and anthropological framing that has occurred regarding the subjects that we are about to discuss and work through your own deconstruction process by asking questions and harnessing memories of your own learning processes. The missing link to the primordial incubator of our learning may lie in a recent revelation regarding our ancestors and their lives spent in caves. Snow (2006) created an algorithm for determining the gender of the sources of handprints found throughout caves in Europe during the Upper Paleolithic period. He concluded that 75% of the handprints in these European caves were made by women—a startling discovery in light of the fact that for decades, young adolescent boys were thought to have been the cave painters. His research presents additional questions: If women were in the cave, who else might have been in the cave? If women were the primary artists, why did they paint on the cave walls? The caves that hold human art are different from the ones used for dwellings. Many of them, particularly the most famous European caves such as Lascaux, Altamira, Volp, Niaux, and Chauvet, are elaborate, labyrinthlike, multichambered structures, which are, to this day, difficult to navigate with modern lighting. Despite the dangers that these caves posed for our ancestors, they were drawn to these voids—why, no one will ever know for certain. Anthropologists have speculated that caves were a place where sympathetic magic rituals took place, led by shamans who were probably males. They point to the numerous depictions of animals on the cave walls as hallmarks of totemism or expressions of “spiritual” connections with these creatures. As mentioned previously, many have interpreted the drawings of bison as depicting strength, lines as depicting spears, and groupings of animals as depicting scenes of the hunted—art metaphorically situated around the concept of the hunt (Lewis-Williams, 2002). 62

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Drawing from a variety of scholarly work across disciplines, Lewis-Williams (2002) postulates that these expressions may be reexamined not as “art for art’s sake” but as artifacts of something much more: as evidence of an emerging mind and human consciousness. The exceptional artistic representations that adorn the various curves and expanses of its walls may be glimpses of our conscious and cognitive development; however, a specific story behind how this may have happened has not been forthcoming. Returning to Snow’s finding describing women as the primary cave artists, this narrative may be unraveled further and, in doing so, we might find the origins of learning. This chapter started in space, the final frontier on the starship Enterprise. The author would like to juxtapose this vision of our future with the vision of the past. This space is now the cave. When we enter the cave, we see women painting pictures, but what might we also see: children, elders, community? It is proposed that these ancient cave painters were not solo in the work, but that they were in the cave with others, that the act of expression was a communal affair, and, perhaps, there was a great bit of storytelling that centered on the art, from its crudest forms to its most refined. As babies crawled on the cave floor and elders reclined with their backs against its walls, a developing understanding of the world in which our ancestors lived unfolded before them. The researcher hypothesizes that the reason they may have initially ended up in the cave in the first place was because of some type of conflict; perhaps they were escaping from the other that threatened their particular community, but these details are less important. The crucial piece to this story is that, based on a faulty prior frame of reference that posited young adolescent boys as the cave painters, we have dismissed a setting that could have been the site of an explosion of the metaphoric mind, in essence, the first one-room schoolhouse. There are two crucial points to take away from this thought experiment. First, placing women in the caves as the primary artists may reference the cave as a communal center, where it is possible that individuals took part in social learning processes around the narratives told on the cave walls. Eisler (1988) postulates that prior to the Bronze Age, humans lived communally in “partnership” societies and traces artifacts left by Minoans to showcase how their art did not depict representations of conflict or violence, but communal living, not only between humans, but with their natural environment and fellow animals. Tomasello (2014) has defined this idea of collaborative social learning as his hypothesis of shared intentionality: “when individuals participate with others in collaborative activities, together they form joint goals and joint attention, which then create individual roles and individual perspectives” (p. 3). In his work observing both great apes and young children, Tomasello (2009) has theorized that the cognitive difference between humans and their ancestors—in essence, what makes us human—is that we have a unique form of social cognition that allows for the understanding of “conspecifics as beings like themselves who have intentional and mental lives like their own” (p. 5). The second point that will be unraveled more in the next section is that the cave itself was a special space, what Turner (1969) defines as a liminal space or state. It is within this profound incubator of the liminal space that the voids of our emerging minds and the dark, wet, and dangerous voids of the cave may have clashed to create our metaphoric minds.

THE LIMINAL SPACE As we enter the great void that is the liminal space, it is best to pause and reframe our conversation. The author has asserted that in deconstructing the education-industrial complex and its current influence on learning in the digital age, we must take a careful look at the roots of learning. A description of how 63

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our learning has been deftly framed to orient us as cogs in a machine, future workers in an industry that has, as its ultimate aim, profits for a few, has been explained. A bold claim has been made that we are at the proverbial fork in the road, throwing down the gauntlet that we have a choice to continue toward an ominous super-intelligence that assimilates us, or that we can take pause and rediscover who and what we really are. And, finally, the author has put forth a thought experiment, grounded in evidence and the interdisciplinary work of others, that who we are is more than linear and instead metaphoric. Before we steer toward the complexity of the liminal space, it is important to consider why we should orient our inquiry in the past. We like to believe that we are very different from those who used stone tools and lived in tribes. Most of us have been brought up on early Homo sapiens and Neanderthals as depicted in cartoons and showcased in museums. We have created a space between what was and what is, but we are more similar than we think. This chapter proposes that evidence for the metaphoric brain and the quest for meaning making that may have begun when our Paleolithic ancestors began drawing on cave walls are no different than our quest for meaning in the 21st century. Our new cave wall is the Internet. Instead of handprints, bison, and elk, our symbols are icons (i.e., Twitter’s bird, Snapchat’s ghost, Instagram’s camera). Instead of pottery, talismans, and conch shells, our symbols of clan and tribe are Facebook and LinkedIn. Despite everything that works to keep us apart, we have gone back to the great cave, to an even greater global community. The Internet may be the greatest of liminal spaces and, like the cave of our ancestors, combining its void with the void of our metaphoric minds may be actually leading us toward new frontiers. The liminal state is a term with anthropological origins. Its Latin root word, “limen,” meaning threshold, was first used by the early 20th-century German folklorist Arnold Van Gennep (1873-1957). In his highly influential book, Les rites de passage, Van Gennep (1960/1909) explored the intricacies of rites of passage, specifically mentioning that there was a dearth of description on how rites were performed in sequential order. For Van Gennep, rites of passage were defined as times when an individual or social group separates from one world and enters another. As a threshold for a door is “the boundary between the foreign and domestic worlds in the case of an ordinary dwelling . . . to cross the threshold is to unite oneself with a new world” (Van Gennep, 1960/1909, p. 20). Following several years of observations, he theorized that there were three phases of passage rituals: preliminal (rites of separation), liminal (rites of transition or threshold rites), and postliminal (rites of incorporation). Van Gennep (1960/1909) was the originator of the anthropologically oriented term liminal. The word, however, was relatively obscure outside these circles until anthropologist Victor Turner (1920-1983) brushed it off for use in his lifelong study of the Ndembu tribe of Zambia. Turner (1969) strengthened Van Gennep’s definition of liminal by defining it as a state in development that is betwixt and between: “Liminal entities are neither here nor there; they are betwixt and between the positions assigned and arrayed by law, custom, convention, and ceremonial” (p. 95). Individuals in the liminal state are at once in and out of time and structure. Additionally, emerging during the liminal period is a sense of what Turner (1969) defined as communitas—recognition of an essential common human bond “without which there would be no society” (p. 97). In addition to redefining and broadening the depth of the term liminal and adding the term communitas, in his later work, he began to explore how the liminal state is deeply tied to man’s use of symbols and metaphors, particularly in their usage in philosophy, science, art, and religion. Turner (1974) clarified the liminal state as “any condition outside or on the peripheries of everyday life”. In subsequent works, Turner focused on liminality in social drama, developing a postmodern dramaturgy that allowed exploration of chaotic situations (Boje, 2003). Turner (1988) saw theater as “a cultural mirroring of the 64

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meaning-seeking process at the public, generalizing level” (p. 37). Within the art form, as in society, there are inherent tensions of schism and peace, of resistance and submission, of “aharmonic or disharmonic social processes” (Turner, 1974, p. 37). This was the human experience. Yet it is in within the liminal spaces of these tensions that Turner felt the foundry for developing meaning was provided. Turner recognized that the liminal state provides a place for unique structures of experience. Through the process of making sense of these experiences, of striving to crystallize what we know about our past with our feelings and thoughts about our present lives, we create meaning that is difficult to measure. One way of making meaning and connection is through expressions of our experience, but this is a difficult process to discern: The critical distinction here is between reality (what is really out there, whatever that may be), experience (how that reality presents itself to consciousness), and expressions (how individual experience is framed and articulated). In a life history, as I have indicated elsewhere (Bruner 1984:7), the distinction is between life as lived (reality), life as experienced (experience), and life as told (expression). Only a naïve positivist would believe that expressions are equivalent to reality; and we recognize in everyday life the gap between experience and its symbolic manifestation in expression. Some expressions are inchoate, in that we simply do not understand what we are experiencing, either because the experiences are not storyable, or because we lack the performative and narrative resources, or because the vocabulary is lacking. As we ourselves are telling others about an experience, we sometimes realize, even as we speak, that our account does not fully encompass all that we thought and felt during that experience…there are inevitable gaps between reality, experience, and expressions, and the tension among them constitutes a key problematic in the anthropology of experience. (Turner & Bruner, 1986, p. 7) It is within the discussion set forth in The Anthropology of Experience that Turner and Bruner connect what they have observed regarding transitional stages in individuals and community groups in the field (Turner in Zambia and Bruner in Sumatra) with philosophical discourse on man’s search for meaning through symbolic expressions.

A LIMINAL SOURCE OF LEARNING To develop further understanding, Turner’s conceptualization of liminal spaces involved looking at states that were “betwixt and between.” These were states in transition—they were ambiguous, androgynous, ageless, and immeasurable. Because of the natural tensions on the human system that were indicative of these states of transition, being in the liminal space (in transition) gave meaning to the experience. In fact, understanding rites-of-passage experiences was what Van Gennep originally set out to do (Van Gennep, 1960/1909). These experiences structured overt symbolic expressions. In tribal settings, these visual expressions took the form of art work on a cave wall or body paint on an initiate. These expressions, in turn, were symbols for the individual learning that had occurred, which was then shared with the tribe. Therefore, the liminal space may equal, develop, and possibly be a transitional state or precursor of learning. It may be a state of learning that has been extremely difficult to assess in current educational terminology. Turner (1974) was aware of this complexity, stating that “because [these states] are outside the arenas of direct industrial production . . . their very outsiderhood disengages them from direct functional action on the minds and behavior of a society’s members” (p. 16). Interestingly, without directly 65

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alluding to cognition, Turner may have described the very conflict that plagues a full understanding of human learning processes: How do we make the unseen seen? How do we see learning taking place in the human self? The process of learning itself is “betwixt and between” with authentic human cognition (learning of the self by the self that is “outside the arenas”) in a constant state of flux. The human as a system is well adapted to constant feedback, which informs the process of the system. The feedback/ input may be a human’s experience, which is drawn into the system and from which meaning is derived. When the processing is complete, expressions are the output and describe the processing (learning) that has taken place, albeit from the perspective of the individual experiencer. Interestingly, when Turner was writing in the mid-1970s, he accurately observed the roots of an evolutionary biological concept, first philosophized by Johann Pestalozzi and then later by John Dewey, that humans may be programmed to learn through experiences: Evolving species are adaptive and labile; they escape the constraints of that form of genetic programming which dooms a species to extinction under conditions of radical environmental change. In the evolution of man’s symbolic ‘cultural’ action, we must seek those processes which correspond to open-endedness in biological evolution. I think we have found them in those liminal, or “liminoid” (postindustrialrevolution), forms of symbolic action, those genres of free-time activity, in which all previous standards and models are subjected to criticism, and fresh new ways of describing and interpreting sociocultural experience are formulated. (Turner, 1974, p. 15) Writing in the 1970s, Turner could have never anticipated the widespread collective that we now call the Internet. He would have never anticipated the evolution of man’s symbolic “cultural” action as laid out broadly in the programmed infrastructure of this ethereal cloud that serves as the new Paleolithic cave wall. Through their respective studies of rites of passages, Van Gennep and Turner gave name to something unseen—the liminal space. From their original studies in the field they both expanded upon the concept of liminality to include other instances where these spaces became seen to them, such as those expressed through the arts. Turner recognized that the liminal space was seen through the sociocultural expressions of humans, and its understanding would be necessary for open-ended biological evolution. What is unclear is whether or not Turner, writing prolifically in the 1970s, had reached a full comprehension of the implications of recognizing the liminal state. For, in fact, this chapter proposes that this “betwixt and between” state, this space of tension and chaos, this space on the threshold between something that was and something that will be, may be a human’s learning interface mechanism, a complex “throughput” for change to a living system. Within the liminal space, processes of amplification and bifurcation guide the organic system. It is a continuous process that is charged by experience. Within the chaos and tensions of the void, experiences are given meaning through metaphoric processes. This meaning can be amplified and, consequently, turned into expressions that show learning. These expressions can work to inform subsequent experiences, which again charge the liminal space. The cycle continues until the combined effect of the experiences results in a bifurcation that allows for powerful changes in the system that are primarily unconscious but could be recognized upon reflection or review of expressions. Two primary anchors of this framework are the concepts of the metaphoric brain and shared intentionality. The researcher proposes that it is this critical mass—the ambiguous space of the cave, the shared experiences of the cave wall painters and their community, and the shared intention of the visual 66

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expressions—that may have served as a foundry for the developing mind. Recontextualizing experiences communally over time may have been human learning in motion. Educators often use the phrase, “make the learning visual.” The cave wall may be the visual data that showcases our metamorphosis from the primal brain to the metaphoric brain (experience = liminal/transition = meaning = visual expressions = learning). This transition may have been a direct result of being incubated in a liminal space, which allowed for experiences to drive meaning. Deriving meaning resulted over time in a developed sense of shared intention between our own communal groups and with others (shared intentions through experiences), which allowed us to draw comparisons between the similar and the dissimilar—the perfect recipe for development of a complex, liminally primed metaphoric brain. This perfect recipe may be in the process of refinement. If we look at how we have embraced the digital age and our expressions of our learning, perhaps we can think optimistically that we might be primed for another leap in human development. In looking at the artifacts that we leave, the online communities we develop, and the stories we tell, perhaps we are seeing the rise of a liminal brain that is comfortable with the void, the tension spaces, the blackness, the betwixt and between. This new period of the liminal brain can be attributed to the plethora of micro-liminalities that reside in the ephemeral space we call the Internet. The two ingredients for metaphoric brain development that existed in the cave, shared intentionality and metaphoric comparison/storytelling, are quite visible in the expressions on this new cave wall. Vint Cerf himself, one of the creators of the communications protocol TCP/IP that helped give rise to the modern Internet, recognized the first ingredient: shared intentionality, “When Bob [Kahn] and I did this design, we thought we were building a system to connect computers together, but what we very quickly discovered is that this is a system for connecting people together” (Reiss, Gabriel, Gershenfeld & Cerf, 2013). In fact, we are witnessing the birth of something that far surpasses our regionally specific incubated brain development. The Internet is the incubator of a universal “we.” As Tomasello (2014) describes: When individuals participate with others in collaborative activities, together they form joint goals and joint attention, which then create individual roles and individual perspectives that must be coordinated within them (Moll and Tomasello, 2007). Moreover, there is a deep continuity between such concrete manifestations of joint action and attention and more abstract cultural practices and products such as cultural institutions, which are structured—indeed, created—by agreed-upon social conventions and norms (Tomasello, 2009). In general, humans are able to coordinate with others, in a way that other primates seemingly are not, to form a “we” that acts as a kind of plural agent to create everything from a collaborative hunting party to a cultural institution. (p. 3) Like our ancestors, in order to make sense of the changes that we can feel deeply but cannot fully describe, we have begun to record our similarities and differences through comparative visual storytelling. Individuals from around the world are uploading, posting, Instagramming, Snapchatting, and Tweeting visual representations of the self and of the self’s identity. These images are profound, for they showcase an I, built up through classification and standardization over several thousands of years, in search for the we. This collective we is challenging the linearity of current structures and, by embracing the liminal space, is coordinating with others to develop new cultural norms. Brooks’s (2014) Huffington Post report on agender individuals is one of many examples of young people embracing the tensional void of the Internet to challenge dichotomous classifications. Acting as “plural agents,” young people are seeking, and possibly creating, liminal spaces for others—acts of disturbance that push thinking in new 67

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ways. Reiterating Tomasello’s (2009) thoughts that “[p]rocesses of cultural learning . . . are especially powerful forms of social-collaborative creativeness and inventiveness, that is, processes of sociogenesis in which multiple individuals create something together that no one individual could have created on its own” (p. 6), we can definitely see the process of sociogenesis as the I and the we seek to collaboratively create on the Internet. The Internet allows for a level of ubiquity never before experienced in the history of civilization, and the vehicle of delivery is the digitally visual. From our earliest times in caves where we changed and evolved through development of our metaphoric brain, to centuries of concentrated linear brain development through classification and standardization, perhaps the Internet is the incubator for a great shift in human cognition. Based on these expressions, a new question to be posed is are we in the process of developing the liminal brain? If so, are we fostering the right experiences through our structures of learning to create meaning that will, in turn, create learning?

LIMINALITY FOR EDUCATORS The expressions and experiences, particularly of our young people, may, in fact, be “making the learning visual,” revealing how we have transformed a perfunctory resource into an amazing tool for shared intention. Use of the Internet and digital technologies has the potential to be much more than tools in a tool belt. The digital space is a powerful facilitator for meaning making, metaphor, and community. Recontextualizing the digital space as a liminal learning space is crucial because, in doing so, we recognize its importance. By institutionalizing human learning and framing it within the context of industry and consumerism, we commoditize not only our expressions, but also our experiences, marginalizing digital technologies and their true potential for transformation, particularly in learning environments. In order for the transformation process to be successful, however, this disruption must first begin within our own educational systems. Starting with institutions of higher education, schools of education and learning must deconstruct how they are supporting the mechanistic theory of mind and understand their own complicity in the education industrial complex. Questions to ponder include: Are departments interdisciplinary, comprised not only of educators and learning scientists but anthropologists, cognitive and systems scientists, and developmental psychologists? Does the curriculum reinforce concepts of behavioral management and categorical classifications that lead to ability grouping? Are there courses on personalized learning, design-centered thinking, or the student as co-designer of his/her learning? How does the institution approach technology (i.e., does it have a “learning lab” that promotes iPads, 1:1 student/computer ratios, or the latest and greatest gadgets)? The second level of disruption must take place at the K-12 level. The structural components of K-12 schools and the districts that manage them will be much more difficult to redesign, however, there are several questions that teachers and administrators can ask when examining technology use in their schools and redesigning it for meaning and cooperation. These questions include: Is the technology being used developing transactional skills or providing a student with a new experience? Is there a communal sense of usage (i.e., Are students working together on a video project that they will work together to upload to YouTube? Are students using Skype to converse with other young people in a different country?)? If a student is using the technology on their own, does the interface allow them to “share intention” with the space? Are there representations of the other, whether that other is an animal, human, or object come to life? How are you helping contextualize the use of technology (i.e., Is it integrated as part of your total project? Are a student’s life experiences honored in the process of working digitally?)? Part 68

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of this disruptive process is demanding that designers of technology serve a student’s needs rather than their own economic ones. If districts and schools choose to opt out of large scale technology buys, shut the door to the technological sales force, and actively begin outlining specific software and technology needs instead of acquiescing to the desires of the technological industrial complex, change will happen. Human-centered design should drive future uses of technology in education. Part of this design should include elements of community (e.g., sounds, faces, music), interactive experiences and methods for helping students make connections with their own experiences and those of the other, shared intention in the space, a capacity for creative hacks by the user, and, finally, the liminal space itself (how is the technology ambiguous, chaotic, betwixt and between so that the student feels initially uncomfortable but wants to learn more?).

CONCLUSION Modell (2003) states that “the extent to which the self can enter into the other can be seen as an expression of the freedom of the imagination” (p. 117). Imagination, therefore, and creativity come from the discovery of self as it navigates through the tensions and ambiguities of the liminal space. The increasing focus on linear cognitive processes, however, may be undermining the very foundation of our potentiality. The focus on standardization, elimination of a wide variety of experiential opportunities (particularly those that are collaborative), and the underutilization of technology as a powerful transformative tool threaten our “open-ended evolution.” This evolution may be the rise of a liminal brain, one that is deeply metaphoric, concerned first with the we before the I, and one that is always in a state of creativity. Harnessing creativity, therefore, is allowing the self to be heard, to be explored, to be found by bombarding it with experiences that charge the liminal space, creating micro-tensions not felt in the moment that rush through the system over time and amplify. No one person can determine when the experiences and meaning of any one individual human being will amplify to the point of bifurcation. This type of truth is simply unknowable. It can also not be adequately assessed in a moment. Our current digital age is but a moment on our timeline. The steps we take to move forward, to disengage ourselves from frames that have limited our potential and rebuild a new sense of our capabilities, will determine who we become. The author believes the most important step is to recognize that, at its core, learning is an individual meaning-making process that takes place in the unseen spaces of a liminal mind that seeks to share intention with its world. For Data, despite seeking to share intention with his colleagues and “friends” he, like current forms of artificial intelligence, will never know what it is to be truly human because the experiences and recontextualization of a life lived are only really known to the individual. Despite his willingness to enter the liminal space in order to embrace humanity, Data’s quest will always be out of reach because, ultimately, he is simply a processor of information. But he can still try, “If being human is not simply a matter of being born flesh and blood, if it is instead a way of thinking, acting, and feeling, then I am hopeful that one day I will discover my own humanity” (Apter et al., 1991).

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REFERENCES Apter, H., & Moore, R. D. (Writers), & Wiemer, R. (Director). (1991). Data’s day. In R. Berman (Producer), Star trek: The next generation. Hollywood, CA: Paramount Pictures Corporation. Bassok, D., Latham, S., & Rorem, A. (2016). Is kindergarten the new first grade? AERA Open, 1(4), 1–31. doi:10.1177/2332858415616358 Boje, D. M. (2003). Victor Turner’s postmodern theory of social drama. Albuquerque, NM: University of New Mexico. Bowles, S., & Gintis, H. (2002). Schooling in capitalist America revisited. Sociology of Education, 75(1), 1–18. doi:10.2307/3090251 Briggs, J., & Peat, F. D. (1999). Seven life lessons of chaos: Spiritual wisdom from the science of change. New York, NY: HarperCollins Publishers. Brooks, K. (2014, June 3). Profound portraits of young agender individuals challenge the male/female identity. Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/03/chloe-aftelagender_n_5433867.html Bruner, J. (1977). The process of education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Bruner, J. (1996). The culture of education. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Catterall, J. S. (2015). The creativity playbook. Los Angeles, CA: I-Group Books. Cellan-Jones, R. (2014, December 2). Stephen Hawking warns artificial intelligence could end mankind. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30290540 Chaplin, C. (Producer), & Chaplin, C. (Director) (1941). The great dictator. Charles Chaplin Film Corporation. Cohen, R., & Mohl, R. A. (1979). The paradox of progressive education: The Gary plan and urban schooling. Port Washington, NY: National University Publications. Donald, M. (1991). Origins of the modern mind. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Eisler, R. (1988). The chalice and the blade: Our history, our future. New York, NY: HarperOne. Frankl, V. (2006). Man’s search for meaning. Boston, MA: Beacon Press. Kurzweil, R. (2005). The singularity is near: When humans transcend biology. New York, NY: The Viking Press. Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live by. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. Lewis-Williams, D. (2002). The mind in the cave. New York, NY: Thames & Hudson. McFarland, M. (2014, October 24). Elon Musk: With artificial intelligence we are summoning the demon. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2014/10/24/elon-musk-withartificial-intelligence-we-are-summoning-the-demon/

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Modell, A. H. (2003). Imagination and the meaningful brain. Boston, MA: MIT Press. Reddit. (2015, January 28). Hi reddit, i’m Bill Gates and i’m back for my third AMA. Ask me anything. Retrieved from https://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/2tzjp7/hi_reddit_im_bill_gates_and_im_ back_for_my_third/ Reiss, D., Gabriel, P., Gershenfeld, N., & Cerf, V. (2013). The interspecies internet? An idea in progress. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/the_interspecies_internet_an_idea_in_progress/ transcript?language=en Robinson, K. (2011). Out of our minds: Learning to be creative. West Sussex, UK: Capstone Publishing Ltd. Rogoff, B. (1980). Apprenticeship in thinking. New York, NY: Oxford University Press. Snow, D. (2006). Sexual dimorphism in upper Paleolithic hand stencils. Antiquity, 80(308), 390–404. doi:10.1017/S0003598X00093704 Tomasello, M. (2009). Why we cooperate. Boston, MA: MIT Press. Tomasello, M. (2014). A natural history of human thinking. Boston, MA: Harvard University Press. doi:10.4159/9780674726369 Turner, V. (1969). The ritual process: Structure and anti-structure. New Brunswick, NJ: Transaction Publishers. Turner, V. (1974). Dramas, fields, and metaphors: Symbolic action in human society. New York, NY: Cornell University Press. Turner, V. (1988). The anthropology of performance. New York, NY: PAJ Publications. Turner, V. W., & Bruner, E. M. (1986). The anthropology of experience. Chicago, IL: University of Illinois. Van Gennep, A. (1960). The rites of passage (M. B. Vizedom & G. L. Caffee, Trans.). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. (Original work published 1909)

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Complex Living System: An open, self-organizing organic system that relates to its environment. Complex System: A set of interacting parts that form a whole that includes a feedback mechanism. Deconstruction: Disassembling known structures to enable re-examination. Frame: A context for understanding that may or may not be built upon faulty assumptions. Liminal: A transitional space marked by uncertainty, confusion, and ambiguity. Metaphoric Brain: A cognitive process for recontextualizing experience (as feedback in a complex human living system). Reconstruction: Reviewing information from a new perspective in order to determine if there are gaps in a system. Simple System: A set of interacting parts that form a whole; input into the system results in outputs; specifically related to instructional systems. 71

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Where Are We If Our Batteries Die? Seeking Purpose in Educational Technology Pamela Sullivan James Madison University, USA Will P. Sullivan Virginia Commonwealth University, USA

ABSTRACT This chapter explores the role of technology in literacy from an historical perspective. Using the examples of the printing press, Engelbart’s philosophy of technology use, and the Law of Amplification, compared with the current status of technology in education, the authors argue that the technology itself is less important than the framework and pedagogy that it supports.

INTRODUCTION Miss Retzyl is old school. She likes technology, but she wants us smart if our batteries die. (Turnage, 2015) Potential effects of technology in general, and the transfer of information via computing and internet access within educational technology specifically, has been called transformational, even ‘Gutenbergian’ in the scale of impact on human potential (Loveless, 2014). According to many education experts, the underpinnings of the next ‘great age’ for civilization rely upon technology access and use (Dalton & Proctor, 2008; Dwyer, 2016). These experts posit that the ability to communicate vast amounts of information, across distance and even languages, has been made possible with very little effort on the part of an individual human being. Also, not since the invention of the printing press has there been such a widespread change in the dissemination of knowledge or information. While it is true that technological tools have changed the speed, means, and ease through which human beings communicate, reflect, DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch004

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and learn; the impact of such changes is still being debated (Kardaras, 2016). Whereas the printing transformation was seen as the key to democratizing knowledge construction, the digital age, with its accompanying advertisements, data collection, and tracking, can be seen as further corporatizing daily life and especially the processes of learning. Unfortunately, as we describe in the preface of this book: The dreams of resurgent democratization in cyberspace has been usurped by “a reality of many, many ways to buy things and many, many ways to select among what is offered” (Lessig, 2002, p. 7). In this economic paradigm, digital technologies “empower the strong and disempower the weak” (Morozov, 2011, p. xvii). Thus, digital technologies that could transform knowledge construction and schooling instead are co-opted to reinforce standardization movements with rote lines of curriculum that equate 21st century skills to the labor needs of corporations. Furthermore, the educational system as a whole, and teachers in particular, have been attempting to navigate between old school—pencil and paper and new school—technology based instruction. As with the fictional Miss Retzyl in Turnage’s book, the challenge of finding balance has largely been left to individual teachers. Within the education system, it seems as if each new technology has been lauded as “powerful” and a provider of “a once-unimaginable array of options” for enhancing learning opportunities (Herold, 2016, N.P.). Lately, others have called it a “sixty-billion dollar hoax” (Kardaras, 2016, N.P.). However, each increase in technology, beginning with the very act of writing, continuing through the printing press, to the connected of internet tools of today have not occurred in a vacuum. They have been the result of social expectations and opportunities and they have also had an effect on the society that created them. They do not simply exchange information, but change the expectations and opportunities for human beings. Anthropological studies of societies show that literate societies think differently than oral ones. In other words, a literate society is not an oral society with a writing system, but a new ecology of ideas and thinking. (Kay, 2013, p. 2) As educators, we grapple everyday with our charge of preparing students for their roles in tomorrow’s society, knowing those roles may also require a new ecology of ideas and thinking.

THE GUTENBERGIAN MYTH It is a tantalizing idea, and perhaps not surprising that educators turn to the event that is perceived as the last such transformational invention, the printing press, as they struggle to both understand the impacts of technology on the traditional classroom and to harness the power of the new tools for the benefit of their students. The invention of the printing press in the fifteenth century has been both romanticized and slightly mischaracterized. When educators refer to this event in the discussion of technology, they tend to be referring to the romanticized version of events. In this version, the printing press is seen as the tool that “brought knowledge to the people” (Clanchy, 1983, p. 7). It has been cast as an isolated event that triggered a civilization-wide change from the medieval to the Renaissance by fostering literacy and the accompanying levels of knowledge and progressive thinking. In actuality, literacy and progressive 73

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thinking were already sufficiently prized so that books had been in production for centuries via hand reproductions by craftsmen dedicated to the task, mostly monks. The invention of the printing press, then, was less a triggering event, and more of an attempt at efficiency and scale of production. Gutenberg was not a monk or an academic seeking to bring knowledge to the people for altruistic purposes, he was a goldsmith attempting to capitalize on an invention to satisfy an existing market for books (Clanchy, 1983). Similarly, the speed and scale of the transformation from medieval to Renaissance has been exaggerated in our collective memory. While hand-lettered, illustrated, crafted books by monks were affordable to only the very rich, the printing press made similar texts available to the upper and middle classes, but a certain level of prosperity was still required for ownership. It was the association of literacy with prestige and prosperity that drove the wider dissemination of books, not the books or the printing press driving the transformation to a more fully literate society (Clanchy, 1983).

ENGELBART’S PHILOSOPHY OF TECHNOLOGY Looking to the beginnings of modern digital technology, one can find a strong correlation to literacy and issues in education within the philosophy of Douglas Engelbart. Similarly to Gutenberg, Engelbart was in the business world. He was an engineer, researcher, and inventor in early computer science. He was employed at Berkeley and SRI (now SRI International) developing and patenting devices such as the computer mouse. Embodying a unique perspective on technology use and human knowledge, Engelbart was concerned that the balance of technical and non-technical skills that had co-evolved over the course of humanity’s history would be destroyed with the rapid pace of technical development. This would result in a world in which technology automated rather than augmented humankind’s skills. More specifically, Engelbart (1962) hoped technology would be a way to “boost mankind’s capability for coping with complex, urgent problems (N.P.).” He envisioned the early computer systems of the 1950s and 60s as a way to “augment human intellect”, that is, to address complex problems through gains in comprehension and problem solving. Instead of reliance on technology for specific uses, he foresaw a future where the human aspects of intellect—thoughtful guesses, insight, intuition—would co-exist with tools allowing enhanced understanding of difficult concepts or problem solving methods. He also believed that technology should be of ‘significant’ benefit to humans, but that it was the interaction between humans and technology tools that provided the most promise for making progress in solving problems. In order to accomplish this, he believed that a framework was needed to bring order and planning to the interactions between humans and the powerful new machines. That framework was built around the idea of a collective IQ, and ‘dynamic knowledge repositories’ through which humans could work together to integrate and evolve their knowledge base (Engelbart, 2004). As the repositories become more powerful, with more integrated, evolved knowledge and greater sophistication on the part of the participants, the collective IQ would also become more powerful—solving or preventing the great human problems. There appear to be many parallels between the educational technology and literacy instruction issues. Engelbart’s dynamic knowledge repositories have a correlate in traditional literacy, libraries, which did advance human knowledge and problem solving by consolidating knowledge and making it accessible. Similar to libraries, we need to look not at the tools available for dynamic knowledge repositories, but also at the use and accessibility. Just as having the tools of literacy, libraries and books, did not automatically raise literacy levels for everyone, neither will the tools of technology automatically prepare students for an online age. In terms of literacy instruction, an overall accepted importance of the ability to read 74

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was necessary as a first step. While we now consider the evolution of literacy as “the ability to read at high levels has always been considered important, permitting an essential pathway to advancement for everyone, especially the least privileged” (Huey, 1908 as cited in Leu, Forzani, Rhodes, Maykel, Kennedy, & Timbrell, 2014, p. 37). This, in fact, was not the case. For eons, literacy was measured by the capacity to sign one’s name (Clanchy, 1983). As the amount and purpose of text in societies changed, so did the definition and need for literacy skills. However, even with this recognition of the importance of literacy, a gap between the privileged within society and those with fewer resources continues to exist to this day. It is evidenced by the gap in reading skills measured yearly by standardized tests such as the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NCES, 2012). This is despite access to printed texts and the presence of libraries in most communities. Within the work of Engelbart (1962, 2004) and Kay (2013), the idea of technology integrated with education/learning becomes more centered on the learner and the problems to be solved than with the efficiency of curriculum or the need to prepare workers. As Kay (2013) described the earliest known technological advance in learning—writing: … think of new technologies as amplifiers that add or multiply to what we already have rather than replacing them – then we have the opportunity to use writing for its reach over time and space, its efficiencies, and its ability to hold forms of argument that don’t work in oral discourse…writing is not a good replacement for memories used in thinking – too inefficient – but it is a good way to cover more ground, to cover different ground, and to have more to think about and with. (p. 1) The definition of learning as collective, relational, and experiential (Cookson, 2015) fits nicely into Engelbart’s (2004) framework of the collective IQ and dynamic knowledge repositories. As libraries acted as a catalyst for literacy education and learning, rather than as a wholesale solution to the issues of illiteracy, the processing speed and interconnectedness of computers could serve as a powerful aid to create a catalyst for Engelbart’s dynamic problem solving. However, as with the printing press, the tools alone will not achieve the changes humans seek. To achieve this next evolutionary step, we must create policies to support use and learning with technology occurring within a framework of problem solving for the greater good and augmentation of human skills.

TOYAMA’S “GEEK HERESY” The power that the concept of technology wields over human thinking is tremendous. Thus far, we have seen it cast (miscast, in reality) as the driver of change for an entire civilization—saving humanity from the dark ages with the simple invention of a printing press. We’ve also seen it cast (again, most likely miscast) as the potential savior for humanity via a partnership in which technology is the enabler for unlimited human thinking and problem-solving. In our modern era, technology is often portrayed as the method to alleviate social ills. As devices and connectivity proliferate, the driving force behind continued innovation and investment relies upon the idea that technology is a force for good in the world: helping to educate the masses; lifting the poor out of poverty; bringing empowerment to those traditionally left behind. Into this environment, a researcher, scholar, and developer, Kentaro Toyama, has recently published a tome called Geek Heresy to call these ideas into question (2015a).

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Toyama is a former Microsoft researcher, tasked in 2004 with developing technological solutions to societal problems such as poverty, lack of education, and poor health. He is currently the Associate Professor at University of Michigan’s School of Information and a fellow of the Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values at MIT. In his unique position of studying both technology and social ills such as unequal education, Toyama found: Over the last four decades, America saw an explosion of new technologies – from the Internet to the iPhone, from Google to Facebook – but in that same period, the rate of poverty stagnated at a stubborn 13%, only to rise in the recent recession. So, a golden age of innovation in the world’s most advanced country did nothing for our most prominent social ill. (2015b, N.P.) Findings such as those, as well as seeing the difficulties in making the leap from developing helpful technology to appropriate use of such technology to alleviating the social problems the technology was intended to solve led Toyama to the determination that technology cannot alleviate social issues. In fact, he found that technology followed the Law of Amplification – where social issues such as education are already doing well, it helps, but where social issues are leading to mediocre outcomes, it does little to improve the situation, and in cases where the social issues are causing dysfunction, technology use can cause additional harm (2015b). Toyama’s philosophy is supported by the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report on students, computers, and learning (2015a). They reported that students in countries that had invested deeply in technology for education showed no real gains in reading, mathematics, or science skills. In fact, in the area of reading, students in schools that relied more heavily on the Internet for schoolwork showed a decline in reading skills from 2000 to 2012. Based on these findings, OECD recommended that schools focus on improving equity in education before investing further in technology. Ensuring that every child attains a baseline level of proficiency in reading and mathematics will do more to create equal opportunities in a digital world than can be achieved by expanding or subsidizing access to high-tech devices and services. (2015a, p. 16)

CURRENT STATUS This educational technology explosion is happening at the same time that education, within the United States, is reconceived as preparation for employment rather than as a transformational process or enlightenment (Cookson, 2015). Corporate practices and terms have increasingly been used to reform the policies and pedagogy that are seen as unreliable, subjective, and lacking authority (Taubman, 2009). Terms such as workforce development and corporatized credentialism describe a public education system that serves as a pipeline to corporate service (Burns, 2015). Universities are also becoming corporatized, using phrases such as knowledge economy, frontier research, and grant generation to talk about the work of teaching and learning (Berg & Seeber, 2016). Within this context, students are conceived of as both customers and product, at the same time an entity to be appeased and held to standards that demand homogeneity in educational outcomes and processes. Technology is increasingly relied upon to aid in the attainment of this homogeneity. It is seen as “directly

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applicable to the needs and priorities of the community at large as identified by the private and government sectors” (Coleman & Kamboureli, 2011, p. 53), and is therefore implemented wherever possible, with few questioning the actual value of such implementations. In this neoliberal environment, where the products take priority over the process of education, the policy and practice of technology use has proliferated wildly, with little guiding ideology to provide focus. The current reality of educational technology use in the United States public schools is that of uneven access and use, conflicting purposes, and experimentation on a grand scale.

Uneven Access and Use Although the number of connected households in the United States continues to increase, access to high quality internet connections and technological tools are by no means universal. Concerns remain about equality of opportunity in access to digital technology depending on geographical location (Livingston & Bulger, 2013), socioeconomic status (Hargittai & Hinnant, 2008), and diversity of needs (Dalton & Proctor, 2008; Dwyer, 2013). (Dwyer, 2016, p. 383) Recent surveys have also indicated differences in use by variables such as race and parent education level. These studies have shown that African-American children spend more time with media than either Hispanic or White children (Wartella, Rideout, Lauricella, & Connell, 2013). However, both AfricanAmerican and Hispanic children spend more time with media of all types than White children aged 8-18 (Rideout, Foehr, & Roberts, 2010). Parental education levels did not predict overall media co-use, but did vary by type of media with less educated parents more likely to co-use by watching television than other forms of technology (Connell, Lauricella, & Wartella, 2015). Students aged 8-18 used social media, TV/movies, or games for an average of 6 hours a day, however, they only used computers or tablets for an average of 16 minutes a day for homework. Only one-third of users aged 8-18 were likely to use the computer for homework, compared to 64% who used the computer for recreation. Heavy media users were more likely to report poor/fair grades (C’s or below) than light or moderate users across normally grade predictive factors such as family SES, parent education level, and one vs. two parent homes (Rideout er al., 2010). Despite these differences, Leu, et al. (2010). posit that requiring and assessing online research skills at a middle school level will close the achievement gap so every student meets the stated goal of the U.S. Department of Education, that is, s/he graduates from high school ‘ready to succeed in college and their future careers’. One of the most common arguments for increasing technological tools in the public schools is to combat the uneven levels of access and use in home situations. To that end, public schools in the United States spend 3 billion dollars each year on digital content (Herold, 2016). When considering the hardware and software together, the educational technology market is 8 billion dollars or more each year (Herold, 2016). Even with this level of spending, there continues to be a gap in availability and use between schools in high and low socio-economic areas. The solution, according to many experts, is to further increase the focus on technology, to the point of mandates through standards. “Until and unless online research skills are more visible in both standards and assessment, economically challenged schools may be less likely to incorporate them into their curriculum” (Leu et al., 2014, p. 55).

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Conflicting Purposes Researchers and professional organizations that historically have held negative or neutral views of technology in education have changed their thinking about media use, even for young children. For example, the American Academy of Pediatrics has changed its recommendations from limiting use of media for young children to encouraging parents to co-use media with children and adolescents (over age 2) (AAP, 2013). There are studies that show greater self-efficacy and expertise among young children whose parents co-use media with them (Connell et al., 2015), but as yet, no generalization from media use to accelerated academic learning. The National Association of State Boards of Education recommended that calendars and schedules be re-examined to find time for flexible and autonomous learning (NASBE, 2012). The rationale for changes in each case amounts to the same thing, with increased technology use in work places and throughout life, students must be prepared by the public schools to succeed by using technology effectively. “Having a portion of any society underprepared for literacy in an online age limits opportunities for both individuals and the nation” (Leu et al., 2014, p. 51). It seems very simple, on the surface, for students to be prepared or literate in an online age by using technological tools in academic settings. Leu et al. (2014) posit that online reading “typically occurs within a richly integrated and complex process of inquiry and problem solving” (p. 38). However, we also know that the use of the technology tools within educational settings can also vary greatly across those settings. Research suggests that inquiry and problem solving online occur for those with more education and a resource rich background. In fact, after basic access issues are accounted for, Hargittai and Hinnant (2008) attribute a second level digital divide to the differences in online skills – allowing those with the resource rich background or online skills to benefit from what they term capital-enhancing opportunities. For many students, especially those who struggle with basic literacy or arithmetic skills, technology in their coursework is limited to the digital equivalent of flash cards and scripted instruction (Alvermann & Rush, 2004). A meta-analysis by Higgins, Xiao, and Katsipataki (2012) examined the impact of digital technology on learning through the results of 48 studies. They found that technology-based interventions resulted in lower levels of improvement than comparable, teacher-led interventions. Similarly, a study by Heissel (2016) comparing the progress of students in an algebra course, either face-to-face or online, showed students in the online version demonstrating lower levels of knowledge at the end of the course.

Experimentation The collision between the neoliberal focus on work force development and the misguided belief among educators that the tools of teaching will bring the transformation of learning has inspired a Wild West mentality. Part of the transformational nature of technology is the speed with which it develops. This is both a strength, as Engelbart (2004) noted, the speed with which technology could be generated and commonly used “greatly accelerated the evolutionary process” (N.P.). It is also a weakness, as school systems struggle to keep up with the newest tools and software. This appears to have played out in the schools as a policy of technology first, adapt teaching later. It is best summed up as “a belief that educational improvement will follow merely by investing in technologies in schools without any real vision or clarity about the goals of doing so.” (Dwyer, 2016, p. 384). Examples of this rush to incorporate the latest technology include the Los Angeles Unified billion dollar iPad fiasco and the rush of universities to develop Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs). In 2013, LA Unified school district bought 650,000 iPads, networking, and educational software from Pearson, 78

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costing nearly 1.3 billion dollars. The experiment was short-lived, and resulted in resignations, litigation, and criminal investigations. The initiative was pitched as a way to give low-income students a chance to benefit academically through technology. The failure was blamed on poor planning, with ineffective or insufficient training for teachers and uneven internet connections across schools (Newcombe, 2015). In an effort to transform higher education, MOOCs offered the promise of more efficient, cost effective courses to be available across the globe. Companies such as Coursera and edX partnered with institutions such as Stanford and Harvard. Very few programs have become successful at revolutionizing higher education and the small-scale efforts that have been, have not been replicated (Pope, 2014).

So Where Are We if Our Batteries Die? First, remember that technology itself is not new. Humans have been adapting to new skills and tools throughout the evolutionary process and education has been a part of that from its earliest forms. From the first writing implements, to horn books, to tape recorders, to CD-ROMs with educational games; teachers have been incorporating the newest learning tools over the history of education (Glasgow, 1996; Kay, 2013, Samuels, 1979). Similarly, in education, the management pedagogies (Smyth, 2011) are nothing new; teachers have been balancing authentic learning with a top-down, dictated curriculum (Banton-Smith, 2002) since the beginning of formal education in the colonies. Technology can be seen as simply another example of that tension within education. Looking at the current guiding principles of technology integration, the focus is primarily on stepping stone goals rather than an overall purpose. For example, in the International Society for Technology in Education (ISTE)’s Standards for Digital Age Teachers, the focus is on incorporating, modeling, promoting, and engaging in the use of digital tools and resources (2008). The current fear that teachers will be ‘technology aides’ is described as: The company that developed and marked the software delivers the content from wherever their server farms are located. Students sit in front of computers and read information that is displayed on their monitors, perform simulated online activities or play educational games, and answer questions on quizzes and tests. Once students complete lessons and units, their work is sent to the publisher or the content to be graded, and the results are sent back to the teachers and students. (Thirunarayanan, 2015, N.P.) This fear is simply another example of the tension between efficient, managerial, economically focused educational policy versus a child-focused, responsive, thoughtfully situated and evolving curriculum. This tension has existed throughout education in the United States, underlying issues such as: the use of scripted literacy curriculums; existence and length of recess in the age of standardized testing; and the debates over the length of the kindergarten school day in the 1950s (Banton-Smith, 2002; Delaney & Graue, 2012; Pellegrini, 2008). Higher education settings struggle with the same types of questions, as evidenced by the experiment with MOOCs or the reliance on adjuncts as teaching faculty or the focus on education as a source of new research findings (Berg & Seeber, 2016). As with all of those curriculum or purpose issues, the answer for technology is rarely a simple ‘yes’ or ‘no’. “In the end, technology can amplify great teaching, but technology cannot replace poor teaching” (OECD, 2015). Researchers and practitioners need to have guiding principles to serve as the touchstone for discussions of use and policy. There is consensus among many researchers and policy makers that the use of technology is the most important aspect of its inclusion in educational settings. According to the joint NAEYC/Fred Rogers 79

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Center (2012) position statement on technology for young children, the professionally and developmentally appropriate way to approach technology for young children rests in, “intentionally leveraging the potential of technology and the media for the benefit of every child” (p.1). Similarly, the National Association for Media Literacy Education (NAMLE, Rogow, 2015) expresses the goal, “media literacy is about helping children develop the skills they need to become thinkers and makers in the multimedia environment that is their reality” (p. 91). However, there is little guidance for individual teachers, the Miss Retzyls in the education communities, to assess practically what that means for their students. What is needed is a student-focused framework to guide the selection and use of technological tools at both a policy and a practical level. When we consider the research and policy regarding education technology, we must look closely at the values and sources of current approaches. Taking a critical look at technology within education requires the same sort of analysis employed in any other content area. Researchers must reject the market demands for functionalist research—research divorced from ideology and focused purely on ‘what works’. They must recognize that while this type of research fits well within the agenda of the companies benefiting from the 8 billion dollar per year education technology market (Herold, 2016), it can lead to policy that reinforces the status quo, rather than transforming it (Edmondson, 2005). As Shannon (2005) questioned regarding literacy policy, “do we share the values of those who are telling us what materials to use, how to teach, and when to test…?” (p. 386). If we are truly going to realize our potential and augment human learning, we as an educational community need to approach each learning and research experience with the same level of thought and critique. The long-term learning consequences are far more important that the short term ease of use or potential for profit. This recognition is not new, and the warnings about it have reverberated through time, as Clanchy pointed out in 1983: Medieval monks took a long view of time, because they lived under God’s eternal providence and wrote their books as an act of worship and a sacred charge for posterity. Modern technology, on the other hand, of which printing was the forerunner, takes a very short view, because it responds to a mass demand in the present regardless of the consequences. (p. 10) Toyama (2015) used the story of Icarus to demonstrate the need for restraint and thought in using technology. Icarus used feathers and wax as early technology to create the wings he wanted to fly and he was successful at creating the tool he needed to accomplish the task. However, he misused the tool when he flew too close to the sun and he paid dearly for his lack of restraint and thought. The trouble with using the story of Icarus as a parable for education is that Icarus himself paid the price for his overreliance on technology. In education, as has been demonstrated throughout the ages in literacy, and is now becoming painfully apparent in our continual adoption of the latest technology, the price is not paid by those responsible for the misuse. The students we engender to serve pay that price. Our lack of thought and restraint, our failure to examine the mischaracterization of technology as savior, our focus on the short view and the demands of the masses in the form of corporatization of education – we are asking the students to pay the price. Instead, we need to use the lessons learned from literacy instruction. Recognize that, just as with literacy instruction, the tools will not be the answers. To increase literacy levels there was first a need for those skills, a societal recognition that literacy served an important purpose. Then the tools were created, first books, then libraries, then an intense focus on the methods of instruction. The parallels with educational technology are obvious, the tools have been created (printing press/digitized documents), 80

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the dynamic repositories Engelbart spoke of are in place (libraries/internet), and now we need the social focus of restraint and thought to guide our social problem solving (instruction). We need to take our cue from the Miss Retzyls of our world and find the student centered framework to guide the selection and use of educational technology so that it amplifies learning. Instead of looking to the next digital tool, we need to be able to answer the question – where are we if our batteries die?

REFERENCES Alvermann, D., & Rush, L. (2004). Literacy intervention programs at the middle and high school levels. In T. L. Jetton & J. A. Dole (Eds.), Adolescent literacy research and practice (pp. 210–227). New York, NY: Guilford Press. American Academy of Pediatrics. (2013). Policy statement on children, adolescents, and the media. Pediatrics, 132, 957–961. Banton-Smith, N. (2002). American reading instruction. Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Berg, M., & Seeber, B. (2016). The slow professor: Challenging the culture of speed in the academy. Toronto, Canada: University of Toronto Press. Burns, J. (2015). The moral bankruptcy of corporate education. Teachers College Record. Retrieved from http://www.tcrecord.org/content.asp?contentid=18091 Clanchy, M. (1983). Looking back from the invention of printing. In D. Resnick (Ed.), Literacy in historical perspective (pp. 7–22). Washington, DC: National Institute of Education. Coleman, D., & Kamboureli, S. (2011). Coda. In D. Coleman & S. Kamboureli (Eds.), Retooling the humanities: The culture of research in Canadian universities (pp. 263–267). Edmonton, Canada: University of Alberta Press. Connell, S., Lauricella, A., & Wartella, E. (2015). Parental co-use of media technology with their young children in the USA. Journal of Children and Media, 9(1), 5–21. doi:10.1080/17482798.2015.997440 Cookson, P. (2015) Read education still matters: Exposing the limits and myths of educational instrumentalism. Teachers College Record. Retrieved from: http://www.tcrecord.org/printcontent. asp?ContentID=18025 Dalton, B., & Proctor, C. P. (2008). The changing landscape of text and comprehension in the age of new literacies. In J. Coiro, M. Knobel, C. Lankshear, & D. J. Leu (Eds.), Handbook of research on new literacies (pp. 297–324). New York, NY: Routledge. Delaney, K., & Graue, E. (2012). Early childhood curriculum as palimpsest. In N, File, J. Mueller, & D. Wisneski (Eds.), Curriculum in early childhood education: Re-examined, rediscovered, renewed (pp. 188-199). New York, NY: Taylor & Francis. Dwyer, B. (2013). Struggling readers go online: Building an integrated, inquiry-based class- room curriculum. In E. Ortlieb & E. H. Cheek (Eds.), School-based interventions for struggling readers, K–8 (Vol. 3, pp. 99–120). Bingley, UK: Emerald Group. doi:10.1108/S2048-0458(2013)0000003009

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Dwyer, B. (2016). Engaging all students in internet research and inquiry. The Reading Teacher, 69(4), 383–389. doi:10.1002/trtr.1435 Edmondson, J. (2005). Asking different questions: Critical analyses and reading research. In P. Shannon & J. Edmondson (Eds.), Reading education policy: A collection of articles from the International Reading Association (pp. 284–297). Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Engelbart, D. (1962). Augmenting human intellect: A conceptual framework. SRI Summary Report AFOSR-3223. Washington, DC: Air Force Office of Scientific Research. Engelbart, D. (2004). Augmenting society’s collective IQ. Retrieved from dougengelbart.org Glasgow, J. (1996). It’s my turn! Part II: Motivating young learners using CD-ROM storybooks. Learning and Leading with Technology, 24(4), 18–22. Hargittai, E., & Hinnant, A. (2008). Digital Inequality: Differences in young adult use of the internet. Communication Research, 35(5), 602–621. doi:10.1177/0093650208321782 Heissel, J. (2016). The relative benefits of live versus online delivery: Evidence from virtual algebra I in North Carolina. Economics of Education Review, 53, 99–115. doi:10.1016/j.econedurev.2016.05.001 Herold, B. (2016). Technology in education: An overview. Education Week. Retrieved from: http://www. edweek.org/ew/issues/technology-in-education/ Higgins, S., Xiao, Z., & Katsipataki, M. (2012). The Impact of Digital Technology on Learning: A Summary for the Education Endowment Foundation. Retrieved from: https://v1.educationendowmentfoundation. org.uk/uploads/pdf/The_Impact_of_Digital_Technologies_on_Learning_(2012).pdf International Society for Technology in Education. (2008). The standards for teachers. Washington, DC: Author. Kardaras, N. (2016). Screens in schools are a $60 billion dollar hoax. Time. Retrieved from: http://time. com/4474496/screens-schools-hoax Kay, A. (2013). The future of reading depends on the future of learning difficult to learn things. In B. Junge, Z. Berzina, W. Scheiffele, W. Westerveld, & C. Zwick (Eds.), The Digital Turn, Design in the Era of Interactive Technologies. Chicago: University of Chicago Press; Retrieved from http://www.vpri. org/pdf/future_of_reading.pdf Lessig, L. (2002). The future of ideas: The fate of the commons in a connected world. New York, NY: Vintage Books. Leu, D., Forzani, E., Rhoads, C., Maykel, C., Kennedy, C., & Timbrell, N. (2014). The new literacies of online research and comprehension: Rethinking the reading achievement gap. Reading Research Quarterly, 50(1), 37–59. Livingstone, S., & Bulger, M. (2013). A global agenda for children’s rights in the digital age: Recommendations for developing UNICEF’s research strategy. Florence, Italy: UNICEF Office of Research.

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Loveless, D. (2014). Cyborgs and cyberpunks: Implications of digital literacies in schooling. In D. Loveless, B. Griffith, M. Berci, E. Ortlieb, & P. Sullivan (Eds.), Academic knowledge construction and multimodal curriculum development (pp. 1–14). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-4797-8.ch001 Morozov, E. (2011). The net delusion: The dark side of internet freedom. New York, NY: Public Affairs. National Association for the Education of Young Children & Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children’s Media at Saint Vincent College. (2012). Technology and interactive media tools in early childhood programs serving children from birth through age 8. Latrobe, PA: Fred Rogers Center for Early Learning and Children’s Media at Saint Vincent College. National Association of State Boards of Education. (2012). Born in another time: Ensuring education technology meets the needs of students today – and tomorrow. Arlington, VA: Author. National Center for Educational Statistics. (2012). National assessment of educational progress. Washington, DC: Author. Retrieved from: http://nces.ed.gov/nationsreportcard/ltt/ Newcombe, T. (2015). What went wrong with L.A. Unified’s iPad program? Retrieved from http://www. govtech.com/education Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (2015). Students, computers, and learning: Making the connection. OECD Publishing. 10.1787/9789264239555-en Pellegrini, A. (2008). The recess debate: A disjuncture between educational policy and scientific research. American Journal of Play, 1(2), 181–191. Pope, J. (2014). What are MOOCs good for? MIT Technology Review. Retrieved from http://www. technologyreview.com Rideout, V., Foehr, U., & Roberts, D. (2010). Generation M2: Media in the lives of 8 to 18 year olds. Kaiser Family Foundation Report. Rogow, F. (2015). Media literacy in early childhood education: Inquiry-based technology integration. In C. Donohue (Ed.), Technology and digital media in the early years: Tools for teaching and learning (pp. 91–103). New York: Routledge. Samuels, S. J. (1979). The method of repeated readings. The Reading Teacher, 32(4), 403–408. Shannon, P. (2005). Hog farms in Pennsylvania. In P. Shannon & J. Edmondson (Eds.), Reading education policy: A collection of articles from the International Reading Association (pp. 382–386). Newark, DE: International Reading Association. Smyth, J. (2011). Critical pedagogy for social justice. New York, NY: Continuum. Taubman, P. (2009). Teaching by the numbers: Deconstructing the discourse of standards and accountability in education. New York, NY: Routledge. Thirunarayanan, M. O. (2015). Are teachers becoming technology aides? Teachers College Press. Retrieved from: http://www.tcrecord.org/printcontent.asp?ContentID=18830

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Toyama, K. (2015a). Geek heresy: Rescuing social change from the cult of technology. New York, NY: Public Affairs. Toyama, K. (2015b). Geek heresy blog. Retrieved from: https://geekheresy.org Turnage, S. (2015). The odds of getting even. New York, NY: Kathy Dawson Books. Wartella, E., Rideout, V., Lauricella, A., & Connell, S. (2013). Parenting in the age of digital technology: A national survey. Evanston, IL: Report of the Center on Media and Human Development, School of Communication, Northwestern University.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Dynamic Knowledge Repository: An evolving storage of knowledge and methods. Engelhart: Inventor of the computer mouse and technology philosopher. Framework: A set of ideas or facts providing structure. Functionalist Research: Research supporting the creation of products. Gutenberg: Inventor of the printing press. Pedagogy: The art or science of teaching. Technology: Use of scientific tools to solve problems. Toyama: Author of Geek Heresy and technology philosopher.

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The Dying of the Light: The Cause to Illuminate in this State of Fragile Democracy Westry Whitaker The University of North Georgia, USA

ABSTRACT These are dangerous times (Giroux, 2010, 2015). In this chapter, the author illuminates and explores the founders’ complex and often contradictory perspectives on public education and democracy itself and their relevance to technologically-mediated educational discourses. This chapter demonstrates the importance of re-politicizing and historicizing public education with particular emphasis on defending public schools, public school teachers and the very concept of public education as a site of democratic solidarity. The author approaches this topic with attention to the corporatized war on education waged by wayward conservatives and centrist democrats. The author explores these battle lines while juxtaposing their stance and value for public education with that of the nation’s founders. The author expands upon this contrast by drawing critical awareness to the social, political, and cultural implications of information technology and the use of digital spaces to project our voices and faces loudly and vividly into the bedrooms of people never met.

INTRODUCTION To illuminate, as far as practicable, the minds of the people at large. (Thomas Jefferson, 1778) The whole people must take upon themselves the education of the whole people and be willing to bear the expenses of it. There should not be a district of one-mile square, without a school in it, not founded by a charitable individual, but maintained at the public expense of the people themselves. (John Adams, 1785) Bill O’Reilly is right about our founding fathers: their words are significant. This statement, however, is as far as the commentator’s revisionist perspective can travel. When it comes to the contemporary war DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch005

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on public education, the words of our early leaders, in all their complexity and contradiction, are vital in the ongoing attempt to protect and support our continually developing democracy and the very concept of public good. But, if we in the modern era are to honor their philosophy and ideology with respect to schooling, we must study their words, not distort them. We must consider their ideals, not divorce them from their meaning. We must adopt their appreciation of critical thinking while carefully focusing on the many ways we continue to confront the challenge of educating the American public. We must not conflate activism with a false sense of patriotism. In terms of the corporate media and politicians of the right wing, we must resist attempts to hijack the writings of the men responsible for the birth of our nation. We must resist attempts to use their professed values to support neoliberalism and the neoliberal agenda. Importantly, as public intellectuals in the spirit of Chomsky (1967) and as described by Robin (2016), we teachers must embody a pedagogy that takes responsibility for engaging in critical dialogues about the contested histories, philosophies, and purposes of public education in its profoundly noble and democratic mission. These are dangerous times (Giroux, 2010, 2015). The purpose of this chapter is to illuminate and further explore the founders’ complex and often contradictory perspectives on public education and democracy itself and their relevance to contemporary technologically-mediated educational discourses. This chapter therefore demonstrates the importance of re-politicizing and historicizing public education with particular emphasis on defending public schools, public school teachers and the very concept of public education as a site of democratic solidarity. I approach this topic with attention to the corporatized war on education waged by wayward conservatives and centrist democrats. I explore these battle lines while juxtaposing their stance and value for public education with that of the nation’s founders. I expand upon this contrast by drawing critical awareness to the social, political, and cultural implications of information technology and the use of digital spaces to project our voices and faces loudly and vividly into the bedrooms of people we have never met. This expansion is made with reference to a digital age where school children and adults alike are allowed to protect or pitch their ideals, values, and concerns (whether subversive or quotidian) with the click of a button. In this chapter, I voice my particular concern for this pitching in light of the fact that digital technologies are utilized by politicians, entertainers, celebrities, bullies and incendiaries, increasingly, to “empower the strong and disempower the weak” (Morozov, 2011, p. xvii). I have written this chapter as a counter-narrative seeking to draw attention to the historic conflict over the purposes and the continued importance of public schools, which are predicated on the principle of democratic solidarity and a commitment to create and sustain its vital public institutions. In light of our role as public intellectuals, teachers must embody our professional obligation to support all children through the evolving journeys upon which democracy depends. In this digital age we must remind ourselves that education is about re-imagining and/or re-creating a new and better way of life, not replicating tradition or sliding back toward what once was. The contemporary embrace of a neoliberal anti-public discourse has encouraged this backward slide and been disastrous to American public K-12 education and many other aspects of public life. In the context of emancipatory democracy (Friere, 2009), educators must cultivate in their students the critical consciousness that will, as Jefferson wrote, “illuminate, as far as practicable, the minds of the people at large” (in Labaree, 2010, p. 50). This is the purpose of education in a continually aspiring democracy.

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THE COMMON SCHOOL The Treaty of Paris ended the American Revolution and formally established our nation’s separation from the British empire. On that day—September 3rd, 1783—the American colonies became sovereign and independent. They became the United States of America. The winning of the Revolution and the formation of the United States as a nation thus inspired intense debate regarding the security, protection, and promotion of the recently formed republic. At the heart of this debate and our modern understanding of our founders’ intentions rests the definition of republic. As “A state in which power rests with the people or their representatives” (Oxford English Dictionary), a republic is, by its nature, impressionable to the will of the people. This susceptibility can be a strength in the case of the people choosing their leader or dismissing a tyrant; this susceptibility can become a vulnerability in the case of a populace that is not capable of judging right from wrong. Political leaders and revolutionaries alike were nervous and cautiously aware that our republic, born from the fire of a successful revolution, could fail and fall into the grasp of tyranny. As Labaree (2010) writes in Someone Has to Fail: The Zero Sum Game of Public Schooling, however, the early political leaders we consider our founders were wise students of history. In their attempt to establish an American Republic free from the tyrannical grasp of a colonizing power1, early leaders such as Jefferson, Adams, Franklin, Horace Mann, and Benjamin Rush looked to the past in order to best organize for the future. They recognized, in nearly all cases—from Athens to Rome, from Sparta to Venice—that the story of republics was a tale of failure. One after another, historical republican governments were crippled and broken by unchecked and limitless self-interests, exaggerated pursuits of ambition and political power, and indisputable divisions of class (Labaree, 2010). In the wake of the American Revolution, in the spirit of the brave new world that lay before them, the founding fathers of what had recently become the United States of America knew that education was the means by which they could “shore up,” protect, promote, and allow their fledgling democracy to thrive (Labaree, 2010, p. 50). By educating the people to understand and recognize tyranny, these men theorized, the people would eventually learn to protect themselves2. The newly adopted understanding that education was the means to protect, promote, and secure the American republic had three important requirements. First was the essential commitment of the people to preserve the republic and devote and dedicate their lives to its protection. This sense of civic virtue, according to Benjamin Rush (1786), required that schools instill in their students a selflessness encouraging each student to put the needs of the community, or the republic, above his or her own wants, desires, or, if necessary, his or her own life. Each student must, according to Rush (1786): … be taught that he does not belong to himself, but that he is public property. Let him be taught to love his family, but let him be taught at the same time that he must forsake and even forget them when the welfare of his country requires it. (Rush cited in Labaree, 2010, p. 50) The political leaders of the post-Revolution era were all too familiar with the brutality of battle and the act of fighting for independence. A war cannot, they knew, be won without soldiers dedicated to what is considered the collective or “public good”3. It was in this spirit of perceived selflessness, willingness, devotion, and early nationalism that the founders dedicated the first of three components—civic virtue—to the republican rationale for public education.

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The second requirement marking the important role of education within our fledgling republic was the creation of knowledgeable, literate, and skilled citizens. Such citizens, our early political leaders knew, would be able to tell right from wrong and “public good” from tyranny; they would be able to read the words of others and similarly communicate their own thoughts and opinions; they would be skilled in labor, service, or the creation of goods beneficial to the community. These educated and skilled citizens were entirely white, male and property owners. At this time in American history, “citizens” referred to white citizens and thus the responsibility of education in the early American republic ignored African Americans, Indigenous peoples, Chinese, and people of Hispanic origin. These people were confined to separate institutions—such as mission schools—or not educated at all (Labaree, 2010). Those considered “citizens” would thus be capable of carrying out their role in the successful and thriving republic. They would essentially be capable of making and allowed to make decisions—vote—based on their knowledge, skill, and understanding. These educated and responsible “citizens” would, therefore, ensure the survival of the American republic. In the preamble to his proposed “Bill for the General Diffusion of Knowledge,” Thomas Jefferson (1778) shared his historical knowledge and concern that republican governments tend to be overcome by “those entrusted with power” who “[pervert] it into tyranny” (cited in Labaree, 2010, p. 50). Jefferson continues this critique as he carefully articulates his understanding for the need of an educated citizenry: It is believed that the most effectual means of preventing [tyranny] would be, to illuminate, as far as practicable, the minds of the people at large, and more especially to give them knowledge of those facts, which history exhibiteth [sic], that… they may be enabled to know ambition under all its shapes, and prompt to exert their natural powers to defeat its purposes. (Jefferson cited in Labaree, 2010, p. 50) Unbridled ambition, according to Jefferson, is a character trait of a tyrant. An educated citizenry, he believed, would be able recognize and thereby remove this tyrant from office. Civic skill therefore combined with civic virtue to flow naturally into the third and final responsibility of education to the American republic. America’s early political leaders believed, according to Labaree (2010), that a strong and thriving republic requires a system of schools and teachers that are dedicated to bringing civic virtue and civic skill to all citizens regardless of wealth and social position” (p. 51). This third and final requirement, according to the founders, should allow the republic to construct a socially responsible community where skills, knowledge, understandings, and commitments would be shared and perceived inequalities or social stratification based on class or wealth would not prevent the equitable and efficient functioning of local communities and the republic at large. Again, in his preamble to the proposed “Bill for the General Diffusion of Knowledge,” Thomas Jefferson (1778) wrote: … it becomes expedient for promoting the public happiness that those persons, whom nature hath endowed with genius and virtue, should be rendered by liberal education worthy to receive, and able to guard the sacred deposit of the rights and liveries of their fellow citizens, and that they should be called to that charge without regard to wealth, birth or other accidental condition or circumstance. (Jefferson cited in Labaree, 2010, p. 51)

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In order to ensure that no circumstance prevents a citizen from attaining the kind of education that would allow the public to make wise decisions, our early political leaders arranged for all those who could not afford to pay for schooling to be educated at the “common” expense of all (Labaree, 2010, p. 51). The professed mission of education in the early American republic to provide civic virtue and civic skill was perhaps equally as revolutionary as the desire to be free: it was common4. Many political leaders of the post-Revolution period knew that education would provide the foundation for the responsible and effective exercise of citizenship in a free society. Similarly, many, including John Adams and, later, Horace Mann, further defined this form of education as “publicly supported, publicly controlled, and open to all” (Cremin, 1980, p. 137). In order to become “open to all,” however, public schools had to be widely distributed in order to reach the many people spread across each township or community. This distribution was expected to, according to Adams (1785), be as regular as one school for every square mile of a township (cited in Cremin, 1980, p. 137). In order to fund such a wide distribution of public schools, the people of that community, according to Adams (1785) should be taxed. The funding for this wide distribution of public schools should not, he wrote, come from a “charitable individual,” but rather from the “whole people” who must be “willing to bear the expenses of it” (Adams as cited in Cremin, 1980, p. 137). And this is important in the context of today. Adams was here articulating a sense of solidarity (despite the time period’s limited notion of citizenship). His reference to charitable individuals could have modern relevance in direct reference to “philanthro-capitalists” like Gates, Broad, Walton, and others. Adams is specifically referencing the undemocratic nature of this sort of philanthropy because the charitable individual is not politically accountable to the public, just as people like Gates are today calling the shots in education policy, but are not democratically accountable. Adams knew that the public schools were an important component to the success and survival of the new American republic. He believed they should be a willing and taxable expense for and from every citizen of that republic rather than an elite group of individuals. As designed, this model of education as an “essential function of government” (Labaree, 2010, p. 51) would be provided to everyone. The education system adopted earlier in the colonial period, one that was designed for a select few individuals, now seemed inadequate and antiquated since it did not meet these three stated functions of education in the new republic. Schooling was, the founders decided, “too important to be left to chance or to be distributed according to social position” (Labaree, 2010, p. 51). It was for this reason, throughout the first decades of the nineteenth century, that the leaders of New York and Philadelphia developed what were considered the first public schools, supported by public funding, and governed by publically elected officials (Labaree, 2010). It wasn’t long before other major East coast cities followed. The republican vision of education (however elitist it was at the time5), included an emphasis on civic virtue, civic skill, and commonality, and was considered the most important piece of a functioning, productive, and thriving American republic (Labaree, 2010). Education no longer was a privilege reserved for the wealthiest members of a community, it became a public opportunity that transcended class. America’s public school system remained dedicated to the principles of this common school into the modern era.

THE WAR ON PUBLIC EDUCATION Things have changed. Today there exists an apparent bi-partisan consensus that public education is needlessly draining the resources and funding of the federal government (Apple, 2013; Berliner & Glass, 89

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2014; Ravitch, 2013; Taubman, 2009). Democrats and Republicans, and importantly our corporatized media are in agreement over what has become a very public set of critiques creeping ever deeper into the hearts, minds, and opinions of our families, communities, students, and teachers: public education is broken and our students are not learning the “right” skills; public schools are dangerous and the worst option for parents that care about their child’s education; other nations are beating us in the area of test scores; our “abysmal” public schools threaten our economy, our national security, and our survival as a nation (Ravitch, 2013, p. 3). In order to solve these problems, leading politicians and media elites believe we must close our poorest performing public schools and fire the teachers and the principals. Anyone that disagrees with this logic must be either unaware of the true issues or completely devoted to the preservation of the status quo that represents our troubled students, schools, and nation (Ravitch, 2013). The resulting lie is a logical fallacy based on false cause, the burden of proof, and cherry picked reasoning distributed loudly, passionately, and creatively. The same politicians and media outlets that attack the public school and those that defend it are ravenous in their suggestion that public schools should be capable of solving social problems such as poverty and racism (Pinar, 2004), and, when schools fail at this absurd and impractical undertaking, these politicians and media icons turn and place blame for this “failure” squarely on the shoulders of teachers and principals. In contrast, test scores, they say, are the most practical way to objectively measure the success of a school and determine its ability to contribute the cultural capital that is capable of making such change. When the scores are low, rather than blaming those politicians and policy makers that refuse to address social injustice and acknowledge the existence of a privileged elite, Ravitch (2013) suggests, those that argue this perspective believe it is the problem and fault of those on the front lines: teachers and principals. Giving voice to these wayward pundits, Ravitch (2013) writes: [Teachers and principals] should be held accountable for this educational catastrophe. They are responsible because they have become comfortable with the status quo of low expectations and low achievement, more interested in their pensions than in the children they teach. (p. 3) When the manufactured crisis takes this fabricated approach to logic, one that blames teachers for being more interested in earning money for retirement than the students they are responsible for teaching, conservative and liberal politicians, as well as their darling media elites, begin to preach a solution that will solve all the problems of public education: the elimination of job protection and the firing of poorly performing teachers. Teachers unions, in other words, must be eliminated, teachers must be evaluated solely on their students’ performance on standardized tests, and public schools must be evaluated on a strictly “objective” basis that is dependent on its teachers’ test scores (Ravitch, 2013). What is more, students, parents, families, and communities must be given greater choice with regard to the education of children including charter schools, vouchers, private school options and scholarships, and online academies (Ravitch, 2013). This is the legacy of the Bush administration’s No Child Left Behind; this is the legacy of Obama’s Race to the Top. The conversation that springs from this understanding creates a classic black or white, good guy vs. bad guy narrative. Public schools are bad. Because charter schools, online classrooms, and school choice are considered steps toward “reform,” those that advocate for them are the good guys. Anyone that argues differently is averting “real” progress. Again, according to Ravitch (2013), this is a “compelling narrative” that “gives us easy villains and ready-made solutions. It appeals to values Americans have traditionally cherished—choice, freedom, optimism, and a latent distrust of government” (p. 4). The only problem 90

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with this narrative, Ravitch (2013) goes on to say, is that it is wrong. The reality is that public education is not broken. Rather, our society is challenged and, as a representative of our society and its strengths and weaknesses, the public school provides an opportunity for us to witness, grapple with, and attempt to understand those challenges. In order to understand them, we must confront deeply rooted seeds of poverty, segregation, social stratification, privilege, and the many communities and families that live marginalized, ignored, or forgotten. By suggesting greater emphasis on an audit system that encourages the divide between the “haves” and “have nots,” so called public school reformers contribute to that marginalization, economic disparity, and social stratification. The battles of the war on public education rage most tragically in North Carolina, Florida, Wisconsin, and Texas where school/teacher/curriculum casualties have been widely reported (Apple, 2013; Berliner & Glass, 2014; Ravitch, 2013; Taubman, 2009). This attack that threatens to close public schools, fire and demonize teachers, and uproot entire communities is, however, being waged in every public school in every state, on every school bus travelling through every neighborhood, at every dinner table where a public school student or teacher rests, and in every voting booth where our current and future leaders are chosen. Interestingly, while politicians lash out and cite the constitution and states’ rights, the war rages without regard for the mission of the public school as imagined and indeed created [however imperfectly] by Jefferson, Rush, Mann, and Adams. The battle lines are clearly drawn to determine that “traditional public schools are bad; their supporters are apologists for the unions” and, “those who advocate for charter schools, virtual schooling, and ‘school choice’ are reformers” (Ravitch, 2013, p. 4). Part of this war includes the stigma that public schools are overly focused on teaching toward a test while they have been actually forced into that very pedagogy by the legislation of the Obama and the Bush administrations. For these reasons, and a host of others (see Giroux, 2015; Berliner & Glass, 2014; Ravitch, 2013), public schools are no longer respected as institutions that insure the public education of all. Although this tension has existed for decades, ever since students were put in assigned seats and arranged in rows, contemporary public schools have begun to most clearly value conformity over critical thought. Parents trade the halls of the public school for those of private or charter schools—almost always at the expense of vouchers or public funding. The Right the public school was once tasked with providing has become a privilege that only the entitled class can access. The kind of education that was once deemed vital for the commons has become less a public good and more a private right (Giroux, 2015). We can solve this problem. We do know what works (Ravitch, 2013, p. 6). If we are to understand the mission of the public school, as defined by our founders, we must know that this system was designed to be common and, despite its original exclusivity that denied African Americans, indigenous peoples, immigrants, and the poor any opportunity to learn in favor of what amounted to a cultural genocide, we must read this early mission in a contemporary sense, regardless of race, class, culture, religion, or primary language, that is inclusive of the public domain. Our public schools were designed to promote democracy and the kind of education that is necessary for all members of the community to participate in the democratic process. While this mission has always been broken the objective has lately been absent all together. Our schools are as divided between class—if not more so—as our neighborhoods are segregated based on income and race. There does exist an “us vs. them” dichotomy with regard to schools that are accessible to different communities: there are well funded schools with stacked libraries, computer labs, arts programs, exercise programs, well qualified staff and teachers, and concerned communities. In contrast, there are rodent invested schools using ten-year-old textbooks, broken computers, twenty minutes of recess (if that), no music, no art, high teacher turn over, and apathetic community leaders. Some of these schools, including the site of my first job in the public system, are sites where 91

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used and discarded syringes can be found on the athletic fields on Monday mornings. The schools that have the resources they require to provide a “quality” education are not common. They are not accessible to all regardless of class. These schools are mostly in affluent neighborhoods where children arrive at school well fed, motivated, and well prepared for the day. Not surprisingly, these schools benefit from continued growth and prestige because they are considered the best by the surrounding communities. Importantly, contributing to further racial, social, and cultural segregation, real estate reports provide data on schools that define and therefore determine the makeup of entire communities. Those that have move in—they are welcome; those that have not move out—they are pushed away. This ability to choose your neighborhood based on the “good school” all too often turns out to be either a privilege or whiteflight code for maintaining a community’s social order. If we are to solve this problem, according to Ravitch (2013), rather than shame the more disadvantaged schools, we should look toward those advantaged schools with smaller class sizes, less teacher turnover, and greater resources and opportunity. What do they have that others do not? Why are their test scores better? Public schools are not failing; they are not broken. They are, however, indicators and symptoms of a larger cultural problem that is racial injustice and economic disparity. When one school in one community resembles a college campus with green spaces, new and updated facilities and athletic complexes while another just a few miles away resembles a prison with broken windows, crumbling infrastructure, and broken glass on the athletic fields, the problem is easily noticeable. When it is understood that each of these schools is a public school supported by public funding, the problem becomes more insidious. Eventually, it becomes tragically clear that one community is being supported while another is being forgotten or even disposed; one group of children is being groomed for greatness while another is being pushed toward the unemployment office. This is not the public school our founders imagined. This model, this design, is not for the common good. But public schools can make a difference. The common or public school imagined by our nation’s founders and re-imagined by its contemporary supporters can erode the social stratification and economic disparity that is at the heart of America’s greatest problems. But, as Michael Apple (2016) tells us, this may prove difficult because millions of people still listen to Rush Limbaugh. His blend of myth and “cherry picked” or disproven scholarship is propagandized and promoted as group logic: public schools are the enemy, their teachers are not to be trusted, unions promote laziness, and teacher education does nothing. It is important, however, to consider how and why these myths and lies become so widespread and powerful that they are attributed to “common sense” or something “we all know.” How does something once revered and appreciated by so many—the public school—become so despised? Beyond the prevalence of Limbaugh and his brand of entertainers, Apple (2016) reminds us of the teachings of the Italian political theorist, Antonio Gramsci: The struggle over common sense is crucial in exerting ideological leadership in society. And this is done by connecting the “good sense,” not the “bad sense” that individuals and groups have… That is, for dominant groups to convince people that dominant understandings of the world are correct, these groups must engage in a creative social and pedagogic project. They need to connect the often quite accurate feelings that actors have that something is decidedly wrong and employ these feelings and sensibilities to bring these actors under the leadership of the dominant groups. (Gramsci cited in Apple, 2016, p. 650) Many Americans, in other words, justifiably believe that our nation is in trouble. Many of them blame public education for this trouble as they express deep concern over their children’s future. To borrow a 92

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metaphor from Apple (2016), for many of these people “it is raining in education.” There are, however, multiple umbrellas people can stand under that will allow them to get out of the rain (p. 651). The task of the hegemonic and dominant group in control of public institutions, in this case the corporate minded and conservative leaning educational reform groups, is to engage in what has been called a process of “disarticulation and re-articulation”—the act of taking words such as freedom, liberty, faith, democracy and creating the conditions in which these ideals or dreams are threatened or connected to the “solution” offered by the dominant group (Apple, 2016, p. 651). Again, to borrow Apple’s (2016) metaphor, when freedom, liberty, faith, and democracy are threatened, people will “come out of the rain” in order to claim the umbrella occupied by the dominant group claiming to protect those values (p. 651). As such, the American public school system and its advocates are engaged in an offensive fighting back against this rhetoric that threatens the very survival of the community school and the concept of public good. According to Apple (2015) the public school is precisely placed as a training ground for those interested in joining the fight for not only the public school system but also the political and economic hearts and minds of the American people. As “mechanisms for determining what is socially valued as ‘legitimate knowledge’ and what is seen as merely ‘popular’,” schools play an important role in defining and determining the kind of information that is considered “legitimate” (Apple, 2015, p. 307). Teachers, particularly public school teachers that tend to teach more culturally diverse students, for example, have the power to promote certain forms of knowledge, ideals, and perspectives. Importantly, public schools also participate in the process that determines what people, cultures, languages, races, or groups are provided status and which remain “unrecognized or minimized” (Apple, 2015, p. 307). Here again, teachers in the public school system are well positioned to embolden, empower, and give voice to traditionally marginalized groups but specifically those of non-dominant race/ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, ability, religion, or power. Through their choices, teachers can co-create complex curricular conversations that critically interrogate what Kumashiro (2001) calls partial knowledge, which is often mis-knowledge about American and world history, literature, politics, science, arts, and mathematics. By embracing its role in such re-action, the public school thus occupies an important space for political and economic action. Again, as Apple (2015) suggests, the fact that so many economically, culturally, and religiously conservative groups are not only maintaining but turning up the volume of their attacks is significant indication of their attempt to “disarticulate and rearticulate” the hopes and fears of the American people. The fact that the loudest and most vitriolic campaigning on this front is occurring on mainstream social media should be no surprise. As bastions of the faceless, nearly anonymous, and sometimes lawless digital universe, social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube are best situated to bring this rhetoric to the masses loudly and quickly. Attempts to bring people “out of the rain” are therefore particularly powerful when played out in the blogosphere.

THE “TWITTEROCRACY” HAS SPOKEN Twitter founder Jack Dorsey “dropped” his first tweet on March 21, 2006. A little more than a year later, in April of 2007, then-Senator Barack Obama wrote his own: “Thinking we’re only one signature away from ending the war in Iraq,” he wrote (Newkirk, 2015, March 24). With this tweet, Obama launched the very first Twitter campaign for president and simultaneously demonstrated the power and value of

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social media outlets to leverage political debate and influence the way politicians reach the public. The intersection of politics and social media became an instantaneous phenomenon. In the decade since its creation, Twitter has become an important tool and ally for people and groups that have long been marginalized and silenced. It has supported grassroots organizations, turned up the volume on previously ignored conversations, and broadcast social outrage toward any event from the latest Justin Timberlake tweet to the brutal murder of forty-nine men and women in an Orlando LGBTQ nightclub. Entertainers and seemingly innocuous or unknown civilians are given the opportunity to gain status as a titan on Twitter. Importantly, the ease of use and simple format of Twitter’s required one-hundred and forty characters (or less) has allowed the platform (and other outlets such as YouTube, Facebook, and Instagram) to redefine the way Americans choose, read, and think about their “news”. Because Twitter—and others—has the ability to hit Americans with news wherever they may be (i.e. whenever they are on their smart phones—lying in bed, riding a bus, waiting in line), the format has revolutionized and certainly disrupted the nature of political leadership and communication (Newkirk, 2015, March 24). The over-arching term for this phenomenon of participation through new or digital spaces is participatory politics. The pattern of use by which most users receive, read, and share split second opinions, regardless of the interest of their many followers, has been referred to as the “Twitterocracy” (Morozov, 2011). The opportunity to bring mass amounts of information to millions of people quickly and easily is certainly a profound opportunity for the development of democratic ideals. It is, however, equally as profound an opportunity for insurgent, rogue, extremist, threatening, or anti-democratic attempts. The basic anonymity of the platform combines with the ability of a user to ignore the impact of his or her chosen words to create a potentially precarious online community where an “anything goes” mentality eventually overwhelms human morality or ethics. Where a supporter years ago had to physically attend an event hosted by the Ku Klux Klan, for example, he or she can now anonymously follow them on Twitter or “like” their posts on Facebook or YouTube. The resulting clash between ideals and uses of social media results in an overwhelming and mostly unpredictable struggle between shared respect and vitriol, understanding and intolerance, a place to gather and seemingly limitless opportunities for bullying on a community, national, and international scale. The face of communication between politicians and constituents, friends and peers, antagonists and protagonists has forever changed. The American people are, as a result, consistently bombarded by masses of information they must filter, unpack, consider, and ultimately either dismiss or soak up. Many people are understandably overwhelmed. What was once a tool used by politicians to broadcast an opinion, claim status, occupy a position, or express emotion has now become a political necessity. A candidate without Twitter, according to The Atlantic’s “The American Idea in 140 Characters” (Newkirk, 2015, March 24), is a candidate with no chance of winning. Candidates trade insults back and forth in ways that were not only impossible but also unthinkable in the past. Politicians tweet with venom and a certain tastelessness that would make thirteen-year-old boys chuckle. Candidates retweet insults exchanged by supporters that are often tasteless, insulting, and PG13 while interns take responsibility for these “mistakes”. This newly appropriated communication with the American people has bolstered campaigns (consider the current election cycle) and it has ended terms (think Anthony Wiener and his 2011 implosion). There is no question that candidates such as Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump get more attention when they attack each other with one liners, zingers, and lingo that, in some cases, only the most Twitter savvy users can fully grasp. But, when misinformation, bigotry, tastelessness, profanity, lies, and manipulations win the day and catapult a candidate toward winning a nomination or an election, we must all stop and think. We 94

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must once again consider our nation’s democracy, its future, and the role public education must play in securing its survival.

THIS FRAGILE DEMOCRACY Socrates is a well-known critic of democracy. In The Republic, Plato’s account of Socratic dialogue on the nature of justice and the organization of politics, Socrates argues that the majority of people are ignorant, inexperienced, and unskilled. The brand of knowledge possessed by these ordinary people is often based on opinion and, therefore, usually incorrect. To make matters worse, Plato writes, this mass of people is easily swayed by impressive rhetoric or deceptive passion that supports those opinions. In other words, the masses are myopic, egotistical, inconsistent in their judgement, and too easily influenced by entertainers and demagogues. In a democracy, the ignorant “mob,” however, possesses powerful control over elected officials and certain political decisions. This mob mentality that is emboldened and empowered within both a republic and a democracy thus brings about its own weakened demise through the support or election of a tyrant. The age of Internet or participatory politics seems to have more obviously pointed us in this direction. People all over the world, particularly in the United States, are under the control of a twenty-four-hour news cycle that shamelessly reinforces already well-entrenched opinions and preys on violence, extremism, and vitriolic debate. The demagogues have grown in prominence. The “mob” has taken form and social media certainly drives its growth. Modern day elected officials, policy makers, politicos and their staff are bombarded with information just as quickly and incessantly as are average citizens. Where average citizens have the opportunity and ability to hide behind their anonymity, however, the public demand within this Twitterocracy requires politicians to produce an immediate response to the latest news worthy event. Whether the United Kingdom votes to leave the European Union, for example, or the next lone gunman empties his AR-15 into a parade, politicians and civic minded people all over the world are expected to react immediately. The era when public officials could take time to craft careful responses is over. According to John Herz (1976), “where formerly more leisurely but also cooler and more thoroughly thought-out action was possible, one must now act or react immediately” (cited in Morozov, 2011, p. 266). When facts, patience, and sound judgement no longer shape a politician’s response, that politician is likely to craft the wrong response (Morozov, 2011). If voters, citizens, students and families no longer care to learn from each other or patiently study or contemplate the facts as gathered by experts, our democracy descends further toward madness. In The Net Delusion: The Dark Side of Internet Freedom, Evgeny Morozov (2011) describes the many pitfalls of what he calls the “anonymous Internet culture” (p. 256) in which people all over the world react to and learn to exploit or undermine democracy through the use of smartphones, text messages, and social media. Included in the Morozov (2011) analysis of such groups taking advantage of Internet age are Russian white supremacists—the Northern Brotherhood encourages its members to videotape their violent acts and post to YouTube, crime gangs and cartels in Central and South America—who use Facebook to investigate and target the families of wealthy citizens, Somalian insurgents—that prefer to avoid face-to-face communication due to the risk it entails, traders in exotic or extinct species—the Kaiser’s spotted newt in Iran, for example, black market organ traders—that sell a kidney in Indonesia for 350 million rupiah or exchange it for a Toyota Camry, and many racially or religiously oriented hate groups (such as the KKK, neo-Nazis, the Westboro Baptist Church, and anti-Islamic organizers). These 95

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groups and others like them turn to social media to publish photos, manifestos, and propaganda with hopes that their perspective will somehow get attention or otherwise go viral. Similarly, in the present day, radical extremist groups such as the Islamic State (ISIS) have become so adept in the use of social media that Twitter has been referred to as its most important recruitment tool. According to Berger and Morgan’s (2015) Brooking’s Institute assessment of the Islamic State on Twitter, there were no less than 20,000 “ISIS supporter” accounts on the social media platform. Most importantly and perhaps most sinister, however, any citizen of any nation in the world that carries a smartphone, regardless of age, is a mere touch away from accessing such extremist campaigns, organized violence, rampant pornography, flash mob robberies or fights, bullying, and/or knowledge of or information regarding the next opportunity or target. Perhaps most troubling and possibly detrimental to our young children that are bullied, misunderstood, angry, mentally unstable, confused, or simply curious, the same ease of access allows anyone to connect with or contact such groups and become a supporter, a participant, a mentor, a member, or the next marauding lone wolf gunman in an insurgent plot. The resulting “Twitterocracy” (Morozov, 2011) and the extreme prevalence of knowledge and mis-knowledge represented by this cursory examination of digitally dispensed politics, violence, and mis-education must, however, be juxtaposed by recent activist efforts at democratic and grassroots organization, political rebellion, and protest. Twitter has sparked and fueled political revolution in Egypt and other nations of the so-called “Arab Spring”; the Occupy movement draws attention to social and economic inequality; hashtags provide outlets and organization for the “Black Lives Matter”, “Hands-up, Don’t Shoot”, “I Can’t Breathe”, and “Oscars So White” efforts to draw attention to racial inequality in America; “Disarm Hate” represents the attempt to bring about increased firearm legislation; “Orlando” and “Love Wins” represents the fight for civil rights of the LGBTQ community; “Fight for 15” has brought prominence to the drive for a livable minimum wage; and “Opt-Out” has united teachers and parents in their resistance to testing and corporate ed-reform. Whether subversive or mainstream, regardless of political orientation or intellectual accuracy, and despite what appears to be a corporate, state and media backlash against movements such as Occupy and Black Lives Matter, information has the ability to be distributed wildly, freely, and without filter through digital technologies and participatory politics.

IN DEFENSE OF PUBLIC EDUCATION Donald Trump’s recent assertion that, “I love the poorly educated” (Dickinson, 2016, February 24) should send shockwaves through our culture. His use of digital technologies or participatory politics to not only voice his anti-democratic ideals and his bigoted opinions has caught fire in ways that few could have predicted. They should have. Social media outlets such as Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube have been carrying us in this direction for ten years. The intersection between social media and politics has, however, never been more obvious than it has in this current election cycle. Some of Trump’s success in this area has been attributed to his vulgar humor and vile language (toward women, the Latino/a culture, and Muslims specifically). Most of his success, according to The Washington Post, however, comes from the “surprising genius” of his Twitter feed (Phillips, 2015, December 10). While other candidates such as Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio spent millions on commercials, buses, and tactics, the presidential nominee utilized his Twitter campaign as his chief strategy. Trump, in other words, doesn’t spend money getting his message out. He lets social and mainstream media outlets do it for him.

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According to The Washington Post (Phillips, 2015, December 10), Trump appears to be on his way to becoming the first major American politician to use Twitter to not just amplify his message, as it has been done by many previously, but importantly to shape his identity and his campaign. Using his Twitter account to make news, attack his rivals, and taunt, pick on, or threaten those that disagree with him, Trump is able to generate excitement and create an ever-growing community of those that support him. He tweets nearly ten times a day, almost every day, and as of December of 2015, his tweets had been retweeted 3.5 million times (Phillips, 2015, December 10). The inner workings of the Trump brand of self-obsessed publicity seems to work best, however, at creating a community for his followers. Perhaps the most important piece of his success being the fact that, when he tweets, his supporters feel as if he is speaking directly to them (Phillips, 2015, December 10). Donald Trump has clearly been successful in his use of participatory politics and social media, particularly Twitter. This in and of itself is not necessarily alarming. What is alarming is the nature of this participation. While his rivals post policy statements and viable political, social, economic, and strategic opinions that are not only defensible against criticism but more importantly topics of political debate, Trump ignores such would be requirements in a presidential election in favor of more outlandish self-obsession, finger pointing, and frat-house humor or bullying. He speaks about “making America great again” through forcing Mexico to build a wall on its border, referring to the Mexican people as criminals and rapists, banning all Muslims from entering the United States, and by encouraging violence anytime someone speaks out at his rallies or argues against his ideas. He does each of these things while promising to make the American dream “bigger and better”. His supporters are loud and they are angry. He speaks to them almost personally as they rally around him, pledge their support, and even fight for him. Yet, Trump is not some phenomenon; he is a direct reflection of where we stand and who we are in this moment in history. We have, in other words, created Donald Trump by reinforcing and preying upon the fears of the uneducated. As I write, Donald Trump has won the Republican nomination for President of the United States and, although his campaign is imploding in the face of misogyny, sexual assault, “hot mics”, and “rigged” elections, the corporate media’s fascination with crisis continues to promote and prop an unrealistic candidate. There is a general sense that abounds in our corporate media that what is most beautiful, most shocking, most aggressive or explosive, and most ridiculous will be most entertaining. Donald Trump benefits from this phenomenon. He is not the only one. With a similar nod toward mob mentality ignorance and the spread of mis-knowledge via social media, B.o.B., a well-known rapper, recently garnered attention and created a public outcry over his analysis that we have been lied to for generations: the world, he claimed repeatedly in nearly 50 tweets to 2.31 million followers, is actually flat (Wagner, 2016). It is alarming how much attention, support, and seemingly honest debate amongst B.o.B.’s followers this conversation actually sparked. Thankfully, Neil deGrasse Tyson intervened, also on Twitter, and shut down the rapper’s foolishness. Additionally, in a student generated video series called “Politically Challenged,” students at Texas Tech University were interviewed and asked questions such as “Who won the Civil War?” and “Who is our Vice President?” (Self-Warbrick, 2014). Unable to answer the first two questions, students were then asked, “What show is Snookie on?” Every student responded correctly: The Jersey Shore. Critical literacy can be understood as an ability to adopt a critical perspective of text (Apple, 2004; Friere & Macedo, 1987; Giroux, 1988; hooks, 2010; Kincheloe, 2008; Ladson-Billings, 1995; McLaren, 2005; Zinn, 2003). When we allow contemporary understandings of new and digital literacies to inform our perspective and definition of “text”, we understand that critical literacy includes the ability to ask questions and, to borrow from Freire and Macedo (1987), learn to read the word and the world. We 97

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must, in other words, adopt a critical lens that is capable of critiquing all that is read, all that is seen, all that is told and all that is believed. This includes the critical analysis of all forms of text—all things that can be comprehended. Traditional texts are certainly included but, importantly, so are the internet sites we visit, the Facebook posts we scroll through, the media we observe, the Twitter users we follow, the commercials we see and the politicians or celebrities we choose to respect or represent us. We cannot trust B.o.B. when he tells us the Earth is flat, for example—we must think in this moment. We cannot place more emphasis on reality television than reality—we must critique these stories. We cannot allow the media to prey on our fears through manufactured crisis—we must remain calm. We cannot let Donald Trump get the better of us—we must remain vigilant. Public schools occupy an important place in this narrative; public school teachers are the first line of defense against this form of tyranny. When allowed to inspire and not merely supervise an assembly line in a “skill-and-knowledge-factory” (Pinar, 2004, p. 3), public school teachers are capable of igniting fires, asking questions, encouraging critical analysis and developing independent, individual thought. Public schools are the sites and public school teachers are the facilitators. These are the places—these are the people best able to open spaces and develop the dispositions necessary for critical literacy. In this ever complicated world we live in, our citizens require the ability to read, to see and to think about (to challenge, problematize, examine, consider) what is observed.

CONCLUSION Giroux (2015) refers to the fact that our democracy is in a “fragile state” (p. 11). Our schools are therefore the first line of defense against tyranny of the mind. Because public schools have been tasked by our founding fathers with providing a common education to public citizens, they must be considered vital pieces of our democracy. Given the reform minded attempt to create a more corporate, commodity driven public school system modeled after Microsoft or Apple, however, perhaps we should consider the public school model envisioned by our founders as un-common. Perhaps, we should re-imagine these public spaces more effectively and more intrinsically align them with that mission to “illuminate as far as possible” the minds of all our people rather than the property owning or more contemporary enculturated elite. By re-imagining this design, we may be reminded that public schools are supposed to be bastions of a common education. As such, they should be well positioned on the front lines of the war for our minds. They should be the first place we turn in order to engage and one day eradicate systemic educational inequality, racism, repression and violence. Following the model provided by our founding fathers, we must recommit to a more constant devotion to maintain, rise up, and fight against those that work to limit our role as public intellectuals. Doing so will empower our teachers to provide our students with the tools that are needed to navigate this ever-complicated world. These are troubled times (Giroux, 2010, 2015). We look into an abyss that stares back at us; we teachers are being dared to react. Speaking toward the death of his father, Dylan Thomas (1952) wrote, “Do not go gentle into that good night”. In terms of the war on education and the newly un-common mission of the public school to illuminate the minds of all people regardless of wealth or circumstance, I ask us to reimagine this poem as a response to our role as public intellectuals: we teachers must, “Rage, rage against the dying of the light”. We must, in other words, resist pedagogies of numbness and re-commit ourselves to the historic, philosophical and political foundation, the focus and the objective of America’s public schools. In an era dominated by a constant barrage of digital information predicated by Trump twitter feeds, so 98

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called flat-Earthers, and a war on public education, we teachers must commit ourselves to brightening the darkness. The survival of our democracy depends on it.

REFERENCES Adams, J. (1785). Letters: John Adams to John Jebb. University of Virginia: Founders early access. Retrieved from http://rotunda.upress.virginia.edu/founders/FOEA-03-01-02-0254 Apple, M. (2004). Ideology and curriculum. New York, NY: Routledge. Apple, M. (2013). Can education change society? New York, NY: Routledge Falmer. Apple, M. (2015). Reframing the question of whether education can change society. Educational Theory, 65(3), 299–315. doi:10.1111/edth.12114 Apple, M. (2016). Countering myths about public schools: An essay review of David Berliner, Gene Glass, and associates, 50 myths & lies that threaten Americas public schools: The real crisis in education. Educational Policy, 30(4), 649–656. doi:10.1177/0895904814550079 Berger, J. M., & Morgan, J. (2015, March). The ISIS twitter census: Defining and describing the population of ISIS supporters on Twitter. The Brookings Project on US Relations with the Islamic World (no. 20): The Center for Middle East Policy at Brookings. Retrieved from http://www.brookings.edu/~/media/ research/files/papers/2015/03/isis-twitter-census-berger-morgan/isis_twitter_census_berger_morgan.pdf Berliner, D., & Glass, G. (2014). 50 myths & lies that threaten America’s public schools: The real crisis in education. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Chomsky, N. (1967). The responsibility of intellectuals. New York Review of Books. Retrieved from https://chomsky.info/19670223/ Cremmin, L. A. (1980). American education: The national experience, 1783-1876. New York, NY: Harper Collins. Dickinson, T. (2016, February 24). WTF happened in the Nevada GOP caucuses, explained. Rolling Stone Magazine. Retrieved from www.rollingstone.com/politics Freire, P. (2009). Pedagogy of the oppressed (30th Anniversary Ed.). New York, NY: Continuum. Friere, P., & Macedo, D. (1987). Literacy: Reading the word and the world. Westport, CT: Bergin and Garvey. Giroux, H. (1988). Teachers as intellectuals: Toward a critical pedagogy of learning. Westport, CT: Bergin and Garvey. Giroux, H. (2010, April 14). In defense of public school teachers in a time of crisis. Truthout. Retrieved from http://www.truth-out.org/in-defense-public-school-teachers-a-time-crisis58567 Giroux, H. (2015).Education and the crisis of public values: Challenging the assault on teachers, students, and public education. New York, NY: Peter Lang.

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Hooks, B. (2010). Teaching critical thinking: Practical wisdom. New York, NY: Routledge. Kincheloe, J. (2008). Critical pedagogy primer. New York, NY: Peter Lang. doi:10.1007/978-1-40208224-5 Kumashiro, K. (2001). Posts perspectives on anti-oppressive education in social studies, English, mathematics, and science classrooms. Educational Researcher, 30(3), 3–12. doi:10.3102/0013189X030003003 Labaree, D. (2010). Someone has to fail: The zero-sum game of public schooling. Boston, MA: Harvard University Press. Ladson-Billings, G. (1995). Toward a theory of culturally relevant pedagogy. American Educational Research Journal, 32(3), 465–491. doi:10.3102/00028312032003465 Madison, J. (1787). Notes of the secret debates of the federal convention of 1787. Yale Law School, Lillian Goldman Law Library. Retrieved from http://avalon.law.yale.edu/18th_century/yates.asp McLaren, P. (2005). Red seminars: Radical excursions into educational theory, cultural politics, and pedagogy. New York, NY: Hampton. Morozov, E. (2011). The net illusion: The dark side of internet freedom. Philadelphia, PA: Public Affairs. Newkirk, V. (2016, March 24). The American idea in 140 characters. The Atlantic. Retrieved from http:// www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/03/twitter-politics-last-decade/475131/ Philips, A. (2015, December 10). The surprising genius of Donald Trump’s twitter account. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2015/12/10/reading6000-of-his-tweets-has-convinced-us-donald-trump-is-a-social-media-master/ Pinar, W. (2004). What is curriculum theory? Mahwah, NJ: L. Erlbaum Associates. Plato. (2003). The Republic (D. Lee, Trans.). New York, NY: Penguin. Ravitch, D. (2013). Reign of error: The hoax of the privatization movement and the danger to America’s public schools. New York, NY: Knopf. Republic. (n.d.). Oxford English Dictionary. Retrieved June 16, 2016, from http://www.oed.com.libproxy. ung.edu/view/Entry/163158?redirectedFrom=republic#eid Robin, C. (2016, January22). How intellectuals create a public. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Self-Walbrick, S. (2014, October 29). Poli-tech presents “politically challenged”. The HUB @TTU. Retrieved from http://www.ttuhub.net/2014/10/politech-presents-politically-challenged/ Taubman, P. (2009). Teaching by numbers: Deconstructing the discourse of standards and accountability in education. New York, NY: Routledge. Thomas, D. (2003). Do not go gentle into that good night. In D. Jones (Ed.), The poems of Dylan Thomas. New York, NY: New Directions. (Original work published 1952)

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Wagner, L. (2016, January 25). Neil DeGrasse Tyson gets into a rap battle with B.o.B. over flat earth theory. National Public Radio. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/01/26/464474518/ neil-degrasse-tyson-gets-into-a-rap-battle-with-b-o-b-over-flat-earth-theory Zinn, H. (2003). A people’s history of the united states: 1492-present. New York, NY: Harper Collins.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Critical Literacy: An instructional approach with influence in Marxist philosophy that encourages the development or adoption of an inquiry based approach or perspective toward all things learned or encountered whether traditional or radical in nature. Democratic: Of, relating to, supporting, favoring or enhancing a democracy and its values as dependent upon the choices or decisions of a nation’s people. Digital Literacy (see New Literacy): An evolving understanding of literacy that includes specifically electronic and/or internet based forms of communication, contact or delivery of information and a person’s ability to comprehend, participate in, analyze or critique that communication or the information it delivers. Illuminate: The act of providing or brightening with light (metaphorically or physically) in an attempt to make an object, idea, concept or perspective more clearly visible or understandable. Synonyms for the physical use of this term may include brighten or shine. Synonyms for the metaphorical use of this term may include enlighten, clarify or explain. Neoliberal: The contemporary market driven, political and economic theory that acts in favor of corporatization, free trade, free markets, privatization and minimal federal government intervention within matters of the state, business, education, public and social services, etc. New Literacy (also Known as 21st Century Literacies): A contemporary and culturally broadened understanding of literacy that includes the phenomenon of a socially and technologically evolving society and its many forms of communication allowing for increasingly complicated forms of contact and/or delivery of information that must be comprehended. Republic: Any country governed by or dependent upon the decisions and choices of democratically elected representatives including an elected leader. Republican: An individual, nation or organized collective that acts in favor of or supports the actions, decisions and choices of the democratically elected representatives or leaders of a Republic.

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And in one of the great paradoxes of American history, these founders then embarked on the internal colonization of America – settler colonialism – which devastated the Plains tribes. Here as well, the founders – particularly Madison, Washington, and Hamilton – were really talking about protecting property and, as Madison (1787) himself wrote, the “opulent minority” against the majority. Indeed, the protection of the “public good” was conflated with the protection of private interests – property.

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Although it was clearly intended to provide a common and instrumental education that would perpetuate the ideas and ideals of the dominant political class. Those who were deemed capable of being educated were a small group. For others, the common school could be viewed as a form of assimilation through education.

Section 2

Implications for Higher Education

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Chapter 6

The Use of ePortfolios in Teacher Education Programs to Support Reflective Practitioners in a Digital World Valerie J. Robnolt Virginia Commonwealth University, USA

Sheri Vasinda Oklahoma State University, USA

Joan A. Rhodes Virginia Commonwealth University, USA

Leslie Haas Johns Hopkins University, USA

ABSTRACT The use of ePortfolios to document and assess preservice teacher learning continues to be a prevalent method for encouraging student reflection. This chapter outlines the definition and prevailing uses of ePortfolios and describes the variety of ways that ePortfolios are implemented in teacher education programs. The authors describe the issues that faculty and preservice teachers face when implementing ePortfolios, particularly when writing for different audiences, such as accreditation agencies and to meet program requirements. The importance of technology knowledge and skills for successful creation of ePortfolios is outlined. Through the presentation of two cases, this chapter focuses on the development of ePortfolio implementation projects. The chapter concludes with suggestions for faculty to support preservice teachers as they implement ePortfolios in their teacher education programs.

INTRODUCTION The electronic portfolio, known as the ePortfolio, has increased in use for students at colleges and universities across the United States. According to the 2012 ECAR study of undergraduates’ use of instructional technology, the percentage of students using ePortfolios increased from 7% in 2010 to 52% in 2012 with about the same percentage of use in 2013 (Brown & Chen, 2014). Interestingly, in the 2014 ECAR study, the percentage of undergraduates reporting the use of ePortfolios dropped to 25% (Dahlstrom & Bichsel, 2014). In spite of this decline, educators must be prepared to utilize ePortfolios DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch006

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as part of the assessment program. As educators, we need to know what ePortfolios are before we can use them effectively in our education programs. According to Jenson and Treuer (2014): … educators do not agree on a common definition of it [ePortfolio] because its nature and uses vary widely. Some see it as a gigantic electronic file cabinet. Some regard it as a tool for authentic assessment; for others, it is a digital, multimedia resumé. Certain teachers might define the e-portfolio as a course management tool or a learning platform, while still others view it primarily as a space for creating a virtual identity. (p. 51) In this chapter, we will define what an ePortfolio is, share a variety of ways that ePortfolios are implemented and the issues that faculty and students face when implementing them in teacher education programs. As Strudler and Wetzel (2011) explain, ePortfolios have been used “…to support teacher candidates’ reflection and learning, enhance their job searches, and provide data for program assessment and accreditation” (p. 161). This chapter will focus on the use of ePortfolios as related to reflection and learning. Yancey (2009) explains that reflection is a skill that students need to learn to do effectively and one they can develop through scaffolding and feedback from faculty. The ability to reflect leads to continual learning, which is the ultimate goal of lifelong learners.

BACKGROUND Throughout the literature on ePortfolios, there is consistency in the definition of what ePortfolios are. At the basic level, ePortfolios are evidence collected in an electronic format assembled and managed by a user, usually on the Internet (Meyer & Latham, 2008; Miller & Morgaine, 2009). They are a way to house artifacts that provide evidence of achievement. Additionally, they allow students the opportunity to reflect on their learning, leading to enhanced levels of metacognition. Jenson and Treuer (2014) created the following definition of ePortfolios through research conducted at their university: “The eportfolio is a tool for documenting and managing one’s own learning over a lifetime in ways that foster deep and continuous learning” (p. 55). In a longitudinal study of preservice teachers that followed them as they entered their first year of teaching, Boulton (2014) described the ePortfolio as a “…space to build authentic, multi-modal evidence of professional identity where tacit, authentic knowledge can be exemplified, critical reflection can be developed and linked to assessment and developing evidence can be shared with others” (p. 377).

Prevalence of ePortfolios Many teacher preparation programs in the United States have implemented ePortfolio systems to assess preservice teachers (Meyer & Latham, 2008). A significant increase between 2010 and 2012 is evident (Brown & Chen, 2014), with a decline reported in 2014 (Dahlstrom & Bichsel, 2014). Successful implementation of ePortfolios requires support and commitment from university administration, faculty, and compliance stakeholders. The significant effort required on the part of all participants in ePortfolios implementation may be negatively impacting their recent use in teacher education programs. Professors, in particular, may feel like one of the medical educators quoted by Jenson and Treuer (2014) who privately

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said, “Much as I know e-portfolio is the future of medical education, we just don’t have the time or the means to teach our first and second year medical students critical reflection” (p. 53). Regardless of this decline, the use of ePortfolios in interviews for teaching positions and as part of teacher performance assessments like the Performance Assessment for California Teachers (PACT; Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning and Equity (SCALE), 2014) provides further impetus for programs to consider the implementation of an ePortfolio approach for preservice teacher evaluation. Additionally, accreditation requirements encourage the use of ePortfolios by making them a manageable and paperless alternative to documentation materials of the past (Meyer & Latham, 2008). ePortfolios provide an organized and accessible way to collect student artifacts, evidence of mastery, and assessment data.

Types of ePortfolios According to the Regis University Electronic Portfolio Project (2003) there are three major types of ePortfolios. These types are developmental, assessment, and showcase. Developmental ePortfolios are process-oriented and focus on student growth. They provide students a means to observe, reflect, and self-assess over time. Assessment ePortfolios are product-oriented and focus on the successful completion of a set of criteria and provide faculty a means to assess student competency. Showcase ePortfolios are product-oriented and focus on quality student work. They provide future employers a means to review and assess future teachers’ skills. Most ePortfolios are combinations of two or three of the types reviewed and are designed based on the needs and desires of both faculty and students. Assessment ePortfolios. The edTPA is a performance-based assessment for preservice teachers developed by Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning, and Equity (SCALE) in collaboration with the American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education as an outgrowth of their work with National Board Certification (Sato, 2014; SCALE, 2014). It is a portfolio-based assessment of preservice teachers’ ability to develop and evaluate student learning in a three-part teaching cycle: planning, instruction, and assessment (Sato, 2014). Artifacts for the portfolio include videos of classroom teaching analysis of student work samples, reflections and self-analyses of teaching. The portfolios are scored by highlyqualified subject-area and grade-level matched teachers and teacher educators hired by Pearson’s Evaluation System who partnered with SCALE for this purpose (Sato, 2014; SCALE, 2014). Sixteen states have portfolio-type performance-assessment policies in place, of which edTPA is approved for this purpose. Twenty-one states are considering such policies with at least one institution already participating (edTPA, n.d.). Some teacher education programs also implement ePortfolios to meet state departments of education (SDOE) accreditation requirements. In one study that compared the implementation of ePortfolios at two institutions that varied in size (Fiedler, Mullen, & Finnegan, 2009), tensions were described between the rigidity of accreditation requirements and how that, “... in turn, shapes the student portfolio experience and portfolio content” (p. 114), including the artifacts they chose to include in their ePortfolios and having “...to use the language from an accrediting agency’s document to express themselves” (p. 115) when writing reflections. Strudler and Wetzel (2014) support the idea that when preservice teachers work to meet the requirements for accreditation, the factors to be successful may not align with studentcentered learning.

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ePortfolios and Reflection There are ePortfolios that align more closely with student-centered learning, are product-oriented and showcase the student’s quality of work. These are created on a continuum from more objective, for which outcomes are clearly stated and skills-based oriented, to subjective, which is more constructivist and encourages more reflection (Strudler & Wetzel, 2011). Preservice teachers can grow in their ability to self-reflect while creating their ePortfolios, as well as negotiate their teacher identity (Hallman, 2007); students use reflection as an important tool to self-assess what they have learned (Lin, 2008). Pelliccione and Raison (2009) added that when teacher education students develop ePortfolios, they are not only engaged in reflection but also “...in the scholarship of teaching” (p. 273). Furthermore, when preservice teachers engage in deep reflection, this leads to greater learning; however, “...students found portfolio reflections to be more meaningful if faculty provided more in-depth and timely feedback on their work. Furthermore, faculty reported that student learning increased if students used a theory of reflection and reflected at a deeper level” (Strudler & Wetzel, 2014, p. 166). Research has shown that preservice teachers can be taught to use a reflective framework when writing reflections for their ePortfolios (Pelliccione & Raison, 2009). Over three years, preservice teachers were able to increase their reflections related to outcomes that were chosen. They were also able to write responses that indicated higher order thinking. Overall, “the reflective framework provided a useful structure for students to follow” (p. 276).

Student Benefits ePortfolios benefit students by developing their understanding through the integration of learning into a comprehensive summation of collections, reflections, and improvements (Meyer & Latham, 2008; Miller & Morgaine, 2009). They allow for both the facilitation and documentation of understandings. Furthermore, ePortfolios provide students with the opportunity to build academic capacity through authentic assessments which allow them to proactively plan for future growth opportunities. Boulton (2014) followed preservice teachers into their first year of teaching who were continuing the use of their ePortfolio and found that they made links between theory and practice and had more ownership because of the decrease in its use for assessment purposes. According to Northeastern University’s College of Professional Studies (2016) and the Regis University Electronic Portfolio Project (2003), academic ePortfolios are essential in providing students with highly regarded workplace tools. Academic ePortfolios develop experience in collaboration, communication, development, presentation and project management. Additionally, they provide students with valuable experiences with digital literacy in a variety of forms. The literature on ePortfolios highlights students’ increase in technology knowledge and skills while completing ePortfolios (Herner-Patnode & Lee, 2009; Lin, 2008; Strudler & Wetzel, 2014), as well as increased confidence in the use of technology in the classroom (Boulton, 2014).

Skills Needed for Implementing ePortfolios In their study of first year writing students, Jenson and Treuer (2014) reported five skills were essential for the successful implementation of ePortfolios: collection, self-regulation, reflection, integration, and collaboration. They noted that students in an initial implementation of the ePortfolio approach in a writ107

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ing course did not utilize ePortfolios as Jenson originally intended. Providing a three-pronged treatment centered around developing self-regulation, Jenson was able to see marked improvement in students’ ability to meet the ePortfolio goals with 30 - 90% of students in any given class showing improvement in self-regulation, identifying their ability to meet their learning goals and ability to integrate the learning from the writing course with that acquired in other settings. Jenson and Treuer (2014) further suggest that the five fundamental learning skills listed above are essential for students to successfully use ePortfolios as intended. The skills require increasing levels of thinking and independence beginning with collection where students gather relevant artifacts and selfregulation where they exercise behaviors that lead to learning. When students are able to critically reflect on their work they contextualize their learning according to established value systems and goals. The higher level skills of integration and collaboration, require students to synthesize and transfer experiences to new situations and build on their knowledge by applying it in a community, respectively. The researchers note that the five fundamental skills are not mastered in one first-year course, but must be considered across the entire undergraduate program. In addition to the fundamental skills outlined above, the successful implementation of ePortfolios does require students to have a certain level of expertise with technology tools. The 2014 ECAR study indicated that with the increased use of technology in the day-to-day lives of undergraduate students we might expect them to feel more prepared to utilize technology in the educational environment (Dahlstrom & Bichsel, 2014). However, ECAR found that undergraduates felt no more prepared to use technology than students in past surveys. In 2014, only 67% of students agreed or strongly agreed that they possessed adequate technology skills as they began college. Students indicated they wished they were better prepared to use basic software and institutionally specific technology like learning management systems (LMS). Specific examples that preservice teachers shared in a study by Fiedler, Mullen, and Finnegan (2009) regarding their limited technology skills were creating a movie or concept map with pop-up menus. They expressed concern about whether or not they should take the time to get more training to learn a new skill to use while creating their ePortfolio. When they did not take the time to learn the new technology skill, they were not able to implement their ideas in their ePortfolios.

Issues in Implementation The use of ePortfolios in teacher education programs can present challenges. One significant issue in implementing ePortfolios is the necessity of having multiple audiences for the ePortfolio. Preservice teachers have to negotiate the expectations of future employers and faculty (Fiedler, Mullen, & Finnegan, 2009; Hallman, 2007). This may indicate that preservice teachers may be uncertain who their audience is (Lin, 2008), will need to change their ePortfolios for different audiences (Strudler & Wetzel, 2011), and make choices as they present their identity as beginning teachers (Hallman, 2007). Due to issues that surfaced from research involving implementation of ePortfolios, suggestions were shared for implementation. Faculty need to have a clear vision or purpose when implementing ePortfolios with their preservice teachers (Strudler & Wetzel, 2011). It is also important that faculty communicate expectations to the preservice teachers at the beginning of the program so that they know the assignments that they will need to use as artifacts in their ePortfolios (Fiedler, Mullen, & Finnegan, 2009). Preservice teachers in Lin’s research (2008) described the limited choice in artifacts to include in ePortfolios; Strudler and Wetzel (2014) found in their review of the literature that preservice teachers had increased engagement when they were able to choose their artifacts to document their learning and 108

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accomplishments, so they suggest having required artifacts and allowing preservice teachers to choose some artifacts. Lin (2008) found that “…they had to review their artifacts again and again to decide how to put them together in a meaningful way so that their final products would show what they had learned throughout this program and how they could use this knowledge in their teaching careers” (p. 197). General concerns about experiencing issues with technology (Herner-Patnode & Lee, 2009) were expressed throughout the literature. Students must contend with how rapidly technology changes and having access to their ePortfolio after graduation (Ledoux & McHenry, 2006). There were also issues of access to, reliability of, and frustrations with technology discussed (Lin, 2008; Strudler & Wetzel, 2011).

IMPLEMENTATION CASES Outlined below are two cases that highlight recent ePortfolio implementation projects. The first case highlights the benefits of transitioning from paper-based portfolios to more responsive ePortfolios to support the hiring process and as a means to utilize technology to enhance students’ presentation of their experiences. The second case focuses on the important steps that need to be considered as a faculty begins the portfolio implementation process. Following the cases, a discussion of the affordances and challenges of portfolio implementation are shared in light of the research from Lin (2008) who made suggestions for implementing ePortfolios with students in higher education settings.

Case 1: Transitioning to More Authentic and Responsive Practices In fall 2010, as I (third author) transitioned back into my position in higher education after returning to teach and complete ethnographic research in an elementary school, I took an interim position teaching the same courses I had as a graduate teaching assistant ten years earlier. Two of my courses included serving as a liaison to one of our full-year student teaching internship professional development centers. As the center coordinator reviewed the syllabus and expectations for weekly reflection, she explained how the students would turn in hard copies of their weekly reflections when we met face-to-face each week after their field-based experiences. When we took a short break, I asked, “Wouldn’t you prefer them to turn them in electronically so we can respond to their reflections while they are still fresh on their mind?” She assured me that the hard copy system was best and, as the newest faculty member, I deferred although I silently disagreed. It was challenging to return to a place I’d been 10 years earlier and find it unchanged when I had explored affordances of technology in many ways in the same time period as a third and fourth grade teacher. I remembered my student teachers’ reflections being full of questions as they began to view classrooms through emerging teacher lenses. I wanted to provide more timely responses. Although that state was not one that required a portfolio as part of the certification process, our students created portfolios using the state proficiency domains in 3-ring binders. Students organized their observations, reflections, and work samples around four domains: • • • •

Designing Instruction and Assessment to Promote Student Learning, Creating a Positive, Productive Classroom Environment, Implementing Effective, Responsive Instruction and Assessment, Fulfilling Professional Roles and Responsibilities. 109

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Students collected artifacts from assignments, lesson plans, observations, student work samples, examples of communications to parents and reflect on how these artifacts demonstrated their understanding of each domain. Since I had just returned from P-12 teaching, I knew those binders would never be accessed again after graduation or possibly until a job was secured. We were also in the midst of a state budget crisis and districts were not hiring. It was challenging to face our students each week wondering if there would be jobs for them upon graduation. As I brainstormed ways we might support our students in getting a job during this hiring freeze, our center coordinator was assigned to a major project and I was named center coordinator before the end of the semester. We used part of our seminar time to transition our 3-ring binder portfolios into an ePortfolio to showcase both our students’ thinking and work samples from successful lessons with the corresponding reflection. We utilized free website hosts to develop skills in website development and blogging. We used Weebly creating a tab for each of the five teaching and learning domains around which to organize learning artifacts, reflections, and student work samples. Some students already had their own blogs and used Tumblr or WordPress to house their documentation. One of the great advantages of the professional development center is the partnership with a P12 district and the resources available to teachers. Our center had innovative mentor teachers, and we scheduled them for technology integration sessions as well as to share their expertise around various aspects of teaching and learning. Our partner district also held an annual technology fair, similar to a science fair, in which students could enter a project. Our preservice teachers who worked with students in developing their projects were able to post them as part of their ePortfolios. The ePortfolio afforded displaying fully functional animations that would not have the same effect as photographs in a 3-ring binder. Learning to use blogs and websites to develop ePortfolios for collecting, displaying, and reflecting opened the door to other technology integration opportunities. One of our preservice teachers created a YouTube channel using her original videos to introduce a unit in engaging ways. Introducing the preservice students to simple website development software seemed to develop their confidence in exploring technology without fear of failure. They put links to their ePortfolio on their resumes and created business cards with QR codes that linked back to their ePortfolios. Ultimately, our students voiced a sense of amazement in their digital curation of their work and its professional nature and presentation. In April of 2011, they proudly and eagerly sent out their hyperlinked resumes as introductions to campus principals and distributed their QR code embellished business cards. By the time school started every one of them who wanted to start work in the fall had a job. Several of them attributed their ePortfolios as the entry point and deal maker in supporting their job search. They also attributed it to organizing their thinking supporting their success on their certification exams. Our quick entry into ePortfolios with less than a year to completing their degree was hasty, but exciting. The success of the project lead to starting the ePortfolio process in their Introduction to Teaching course when they enter the teacher certification program the first semester of their junior year. That course was already organized around the four Professional Development Domains and setting up the ePortfolio early in their program provided more opportunities for reflection and opportunities to include pertinent entries over a two year period.

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Case 2: Decision-Making for ePortfolio Implementation in an Elementary Education Program The preservice elementary program at our (first and second authors) university is a 5-year undergraduate to graduate program. The students enroll in a liberal studies undergraduate major with a focus on elementary education that includes their first 40-hour practicum in the public schools as part of the Teacher Preparation portion of the major. In the spring semester of their junior year or fall of their senior year, they apply to the graduate portion of the program. The elementary faculty in the School of Education work closely with the faculty in the College of Humanities and Sciences to make the transition between the programs as seamless as possible. In the initial stages of implementing the ePortfolio in the preservice program, the graduate-level elementary program faculty conceptualized the ePortfolios as a means of capturing what the preservice teachers do in the courses they take in the School of Education. There were two overarching reasons for choosing to use ePortfolios: 1) the faculty were concerned that the pre-service teachers were not making connections across their coursework. There was a sense that they were taking the courses to get them done and not reflecting on how their knowledge was being built upon from one course to another; and 2) it was becoming increasingly clear that principals were using ePortfolios as one strong piece of evidence in the hiring process for preservice teachers at their schools. We knew other teacher preparation programs in our state were already requiring ePortfolios, so we wanted our preservice teachers to be competitive in the job market. The first major decision we had to make was selecting the web-based platform we would have the preservice teachers use for their ePortfolios. Several were discussed including Weebly and two commercially-available portfolio platforms. We finally settled on our university’s version of WordPress, known as Rampages. Our special education program had already piloted the implementation of ePortfolios in their program using Rampages, so the elementary program chair consulted with the special education program chair to learn about how they rolled out the ePortfolios with their students. The special education chair gave the elementary program permission revise their directions for creating the ePortfolio in Rampages to meet the needs of our program. The next key decision in the ePortfolio implementation process was to decide how we would have our preservice teachers organize their ePortfolio. We initially considered having students organize their work around the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI) standards and the school’s conceptual framework. However, after much discussion and debate, we decided to organize the ePortfolio around the various content areas students would teach and the related required elementary program classes including: Math, Science, Language Arts, Social Studies, Fine Arts, and Movement. We also included sections for Management and Career Development (which was specifically designed to include students’ resume and copies of their certificates and test scores needed for licensure). An important part of this decision was based on our collaborative work with the faculty in the College of Humanities and Sciences to ensure that assignments in the undergraduate classes for elementary preservice teachers could be captured by the content organization. For example, the students take two undergraduate math classes that are created specifically for elementary preservice teachers where they gain experience instructing an elementary-aged student. The students could include their reflection of the math concept teaching experience from their undergraduate course in the Math section of their ePortfolio. We initially rolled out the ePortfolio implementation in the semester that the pre-service teachers were enrolled in teacher preparation and taking their first practicum. In their general methods course, the 111

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students set up their ePortfolio and were required by the end of the semester to include specific artifacts with reflections from assignments from each of the courses they took with their first practicum. Once they entered graduate school the following semester, they were expected to continue adding artifacts (which they were given in a list in the initial directions) related to these courses. The preservice teachers were expected to submit their ePortfolio during their final semester when they complete their student teaching internship. The ePortfolio was graded as part of their participation in the seminar related to their internship. As with any new initiative, implementation of the ePortfolio did not go perfectly, but now, about 3 years later, the faculty and preservice teachers have established a routine and know the expectations. After the initial implementation, the College of Humanities and Sciences faculty wanted to have the preservice teachers start an ePortfolio as part of the undergraduate liberal studies program. Through ongoing discussion and negotiation, the faculty determined it would be most beneficial to have one ePortfolio that would begin as part of the undergraduate degree and carry through to graduation from the Master’s in Teaching graduate program. We are in the process of starting the ePortfolio earlier in the undergraduate program. Since implementing the ePortfolio, the preservice teachers are able to see the growth they have made in the program as they complete the final product; however, they have commented that they need to revise artifacts from earlier in the program before they show it to a principal who is considering hiring them in their first teaching position.

IMPLEMENTATION AFFORDANCES AND CHALLENGES As these case studies demonstrate, there are many issues that faculty should consider when implementing ePortfolios in teacher education programs. Lin (2008) made suggestions for this implementation. First, it benefits the preservice teachers to be in a learning community to support each other. Lin suggests that faculty set up an online forum in which preservice teachers can communicate about the ePortfolios. They can share issues they are having and make suggestions to each other. Building on this idea of support, preservice teachers need advanced technology courses to be more successful in creating their ePortfolios (Lin, 2008). Faculty can also work to integrate technology and the skills that preservice teachers need to learn into their education courses. In both of the cases, faculty have worked to explore software available for housing portfolios and ways to use technology to assist students in demonstrating their learning through coursework and clinical experiences. These efforts have been largely undertaken because of individual faculty commitment to the ePortfolio implementation projects. As described previously in this chapter, reflection is a critical aspect of the ePortfolio process. When preservice teachers engage in reflection, “...the e-portfolio not only provides more information and insight on the learner’s performance, but also helps learners to make connections with prior learning, and to transform previous learning into active and authentic knowledge” (Lin, 2008, p. 199). In the first case, students were able to demonstrate critical reflection and one can argue that they did so effectively since all students found employment in a tight job market. Students in the second case are beginning to see how courses relate to one another since portfolio assignments build from one course to the next. For instance, items required in the foundational reading course are reviewed and expanded upon in artifacts required in the diagnosis and remediation of reading program course. Lin (2008) asserts that preservice teachers benefit from having some flexibility in creating their ePortfolios so that they can express their individuality instead of being required to use a specific template 112

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that all students have to use. The presented cases offer a contrast in this regard. The faculty in the second case determined the specific ways in which students were to establish their portfolio whereas the first case allowed more flexibility for students in their choice for housing their materials. Both cases allow students to add additional materials to their portfolio and for students to revise their portfolio contents to meet the needs of the audience during the job-seeking process. Lin also notes that faculty should have a rubric that the preservice teachers can use as a guide for creating their portfolio. The faculty in the second case made this a goal from the outset of the portfolio implementation project, benefitting significantly from collaborative efforts with colleagues from the special education program.

CONCLUSION The overall benefits of completing ePortfolios in teacher education programs far outweigh the issues. In both cases, students are able to leave the institution with a valuable resource for documenting their learning. Outcomes from both the research and case studies support the idea that preservice teachers gain more from creating an ePortfolio when they focus on the process, over the final product. Although there may be the end goal of obtaining a teaching position, thoughtfully going through the process of ePortfolio development allows for deeper, more meaningful reflection about the growth students have made as future educators.

REFERENCES Boulton, H. (2014). ePortfolios beyond pre-service teacher education: A new dawn? European Journal of Teacher Education, 37(3), 374–389. doi:10.1080/02619768.2013.870994 Brown, G. R., & Chen, H. L. (2014). Understanding the evolution of e-portfolio practice: Where do we go from here? Educause Learning Initiative Webinar. Retrieved from http://www.educause.edu/library/ resources/understanding-evolution-e-portfolio-practice-where-do-we-go-here Dahlstrom, E., & Bichsel, J. (2014). ECAR Study of Undergraduate Students and Information Technology, 2014. Research report. Louisville, CO: ECAR. Retrieved from http://www.educause.edu/ecar edTPA. (n.d.). Participation map. American Association of Colleges for Teacher Education (AACTE). Retrieved from http://edtpa.aacte.org/state-policy Fiedler, R. L., Mullen, L., & Finnegan, M. (2009). Portfolios in context: A comparative study in two preservice teacher education programs. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 42(2), 99–122. doi:10.1080/15391523.2009.10782543 Hallman, H. L. (2007). Negotiating teacher identity: Exploring the use of electronic teaching portfolios with preservice English teachers. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 50(6), 474–485. doi:10.1598/ JAAL.50.6.5

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Herner-Patnode, L., & Lee, H. (2009). A capstone experience for preservice teachers: Building a webbased portfolio. Journal of Educational Technology & Society, 12(2), 101–110. Retrieved from http:// proxy.library.vcu.edu/login?url=http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&AuthType=ip,ur l,cookie,uid&db=a9h&AN=38422398&site=ehost-live&scope=site Jenson, J. D., & Treuer, P. (2014). Defining the e-portfolio: What it is and why it matters. Change, 46(2), 50–57. doi:10.1080/00091383.2014.897192 Ledoux, M. W., & McHenry, N. (2006). Electronic portfolio adoption for teacher education candidates. Early Childhood Education Journal, 34(2), 103–116. doi:10.1007/s10643-006-0111-1 Lin, Q. (2008). Preservice teachers learning experiences of constructing e-portfolios online. The Internet and Higher Education, 11(3), 194–200. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2008.07.002 Meyer, B. B., & Latham, N. (2008). Implementing electronic portfolios: Benefits, challenges, and suggestions. Educause. Retrieved from http://er.educause.edu/articles/2008/2/implementing-electronicportfolios-benefits-challenges-and-suggestions Miller, R., & Morgaine, W. (2009). The benefits of e-portfolios for students and faculty in their own words. Peer Review. Retrieved from https://www.aacu.org/publications-research/periodicals/benefits-eportfolios-students-and-faculty-their-own-words Northeastern University College of Professional Studies. (2016). 3 ways academic e-portfolios benefit you in the workplace. Retrieved from http://www.cps.neu.edu/prospective-students/tips-for-success/ ways-academic-e-portfolios-benefit-you-in-the-workplace.php Pelliccione, L., & Raison, G. (2009). Promoting the scholarship of teaching through reflective e-portfolios in teacher education. Journal of Education for Teaching, 35(3), 271–281. doi:10.1080/02607470903092813 Regis University Electronic Portfolio Project. (2003). Learners becoming leaders. Retrieved from: http:// academic.regis.edu/laap/eportfolio/index.html Sato, M. (2014). What is the Underlying Conception of Teaching of the edTPA? Journal of Teacher Education, 65(5), 421–434. doi:10.1177/0022487114542518 Stanford Center for Assessment, Learning, and Equity (SCALE). (2014). Performance Assessment for California Teachers (PACT). Retrieved from https://scale.stanford.edu/teaching/pact Strudler, N., & Wetzel, K. (2011). Electronic portfolios in teacher education: Forging a middle ground. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 44(2), 161–173. doi:10.1080/15391523.2011.10782584 Yancey, K. B. (2011). Electronic portfolios a decade into the Twenty-first Century: What we know, what we need to know. Peer Review, 11(1), 28-32. Retrieved from http://www.aacu.org/sites/default/files/files/ peerreview/Peer_Review_Winter_2009.pdf

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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS ePortfolio: Evidence collected in an electronic format assembled and managed by a user, usually on the Internet. Preservice Teacher: A college student pursuing a career in education who experiences life in a school, gradually increasing classroom management and instructional responsibilities under the supervision of a teacher. Reflection: The process of critically considering one’s valued experiences. Teacher Education: The process of attaining the professional knowledge and skills necessary to become a general or specialized teacher. Technology: 1) The knowledge that involves producing and using technical means informed by fields like industrial arts and science interrelated with life, society, and the environment. 2) The practical application of this knowledge for a specific purpose.

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Adapting Problem-Based Learning to Database Courses in the Digital Age Samuel B. Fee Washington and Jefferson College, USA Thomas E. Lombardi Washington and Jefferson College, USA

ABSTRACT Over the course of the last two decades, the United States government has pursued a program of democratizing data. Public services have been transformed into data-driven enterprises. This enthusiasm for data collection, analysis and public reporting has important consequences for computing education. This chapter outlines a pedagogical strategy for educating citizens in the competent and responsible use of the data currently defining our national agenda. Specifically the authors argue that problem-based learning (PBL) provides a strong framework for introducing database concepts to a broad range of students. The design of databases constitutes complex problems with multiple solutions. Database problems are necessarily interdisciplinary involving both problem domain and technical expertise. Moreover, since databases support some real-world objective, problems in database design are inherently authentic and contextualized. These properties hold consistently across a range of problem types. Thus, common problems in the database domain are aligned with PBL definitions of good problems.

INTRODUCTION My Administration is committed to creating an unprecedented level of openness in Government. We will work together to ensure the public trust and establish a system of transparency, public participation, and collaboration. Openness will strengthen our democracy and promote efficiency and effectiveness in Government. (Obama, 2009)

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch007

Copyright © 2017, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.

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In recent years, many public institutions have embraced open data as a vehicle for promoting citizenship in the digital age. President Obama’s memorandum to leaders in his administration quoted above placed open government at the top of the national list of priorities. Although the word ‘data’ does not appear in the short memorandum, the transparency, public participation and collaboration at the heart of President Obama’s message have frequently been translated into the data-driven technologies so familiar to U.S. citizens in the 21st Century. For example, the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 (American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, 2009) supports investment in the data collection, information exchange and reporting capabilities of educational and health institutions. U.S. state and local government agencies have mirrored President Obama’s leadership by collecting and publishing large volumes of data in the domains of crime statistics, emergency planning, and housing services among many others (Kalin, 2014). By no means is this phenomenon unique to the United States: The United Kingdom (“Government Digital Service,” n.d.), the European Union (“European legislation on reuse of public sector information,” n.d.) and the G8 (“G8 Open Data Charter and Technical Annex,” 2013) have all established comparable commitments to open data and its associated technologies. Given the new civic context for data, this chapter suggests that educators shift the focus of database courses from their current professional orientation to more civic-oriented goals. By promoting open data, governments have juxtaposed data and citizenship in a new way that exposes some challenges and opportunities for educators in the computing disciplines. In particular, open data offers educators an opportunity to revisit the common approaches to the teaching of data-oriented courses and database courses specifically. Databases have traditionally been taught from the perspective of professional development, rather than in a civic context. If citizens around the world are expected to use open data effectively (Gurstein, 2011), the educational system will need to make major adjustments to accommodate this new demand. Database courses often focus on technical or engineering problems, rather than the important civic problems associated with data. For example, issues such as accounting for gender pay equity and recording racial and ethnic identity require a deep understanding of data collection and analysis. Moreover, since databases are always developed for and deployed in some real-world context, the teaching of databases can incorporate these real-world problems in a natural way. Some database educators have adopted constructivist approaches to their teaching as a way to enhance student comprehension of the material (Connolly & Begg, 2006). These approaches, particularly problem-based learning, provide a useful vehicle for introducing database concepts from a civic perspective. The recent trends in open data invite a reconfiguration of database education from the ground up as a branch of civic education for the digital age.

BACKGROUND For the purposes of this chapter, the term “databases” refers to a set of concepts and technologies for organizing data efficiently and effectively in a computer. Conceptually speaking, normalization is the process of reorganizing data in a computer to reduce the redundancies that compromise the accuracy and efficient storage of the data. Database design and data modeling involve designing database structures to capture the salient features of real-world entities with data. Databases are often stored in commercial database systems referred to as database managements systems (DBMS). Oracle and Microsoft produce popular database management systems. Structured query language (SQL) is one of the most common programming languages for manipulating data in a 117

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database. Queries refer to SQL programs written to extract meaningful information from a database. Database tuning and query optimization are processes for improving the speed with which SQL programs can deliver information to users. For better or worse, much of the world’s information resides in database systems which relatively few people currently understand. Any effort to democratize data must account for this discrepancy. Rather than thoughtfully preparing citizens for our data-driven society, educators have focused on technical training for professionals intending to work with data. Given the prevalence of these technologies in modern commerce, computing students often aspire to professions based on data. For example, database administrators and database programmers are professionals who specialize in the practical aspects of managing a modern database system. In addition to managing the database system and writing programs to extract information, database professionals are also responsible for database security. As more and more information is made available in digital formats, data becomes ever more difficult to secure due to a problem known as database inference. Database inference occurs when a clever user can deduce information to which they do not have valid access by carefully analyzing data to which they do have valid access. A famous example of this problem involves predicting a person’s social security number based on publicly available data (Acquisti and Gross, 2009). Despite the many important civic consequences of database technologies, the current approaches to database education at the college level focus primarily on career preparation for professionals. At the time of writing, database education in the K-12 context is virtually non-existent except for pre-professional programs sponsored by corporate database vendors like Oracle and Microsoft. This chapter reviews current approaches to the teaching of databases to identify the opportunities and challenges of educating citizens as responsible producers and consumers of data in the digital age. Section I reviews several current approaches to database instruction for professional and academic audiences. Current pedagogies address largely specialist audiences pursuing professions in software engineering, computer science, management information systems and accounting. While training professionals is important, the organization of such courses is often mismatched for the needs of a more general audience. Moreover, the typical approach to database instruction does not address data in its civic context or does so only incidentally. Section II explores the problem-based learning (PBL) approach and its application to instruction within database courses. In general, PBL has largely been adopted to support the teaching of databases in their professional context (Connolly & Begg, 2006). Section III outlines the current crisis in civic education in general and presents database curricula as a meaningful way to contribute to civic education. STEM education has eclipsed civics as a national priority for many reasons, chief among them is the emphasis on career preparation and job training. The computing disciplines are well-positioned to connect technical and civics education because technology mediates more and more of civic life. From this perspective, database education belongs in the discussions of computing for everyone currently taking place in computing education research (Guzdial, 2016). The conclusion presents a model for teaching database concepts in a civic context to a general audience based on problem-based learning. Problem-based learning provides an effective framework for integrating the technical and civic material for students across the curriculum. The complex, ill-structured nature of database design problems allows for students to construct solutions to the proposed problem in myriad ways. The range of solutions developed by students then serves as a starting point for discussion about the civic consequences of their designs. The chapter ends with a reflection on the challenges and opportunities for teaching database content to citizens in the digital age.

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TEACHING DATABASE CONCEPTS TO ASPIRING PROFESSIONALS Database Education Curricula The study of databases is a core part of the computing curricula in our time (Connolly & Begg, 2006). Researchers have spent much time outlining meaningful curricula and adapting pedagogical techniques to the teaching of database concepts and technologies (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013; “IS 2010,” 2010). This study examined recent updates to the CS and IS model curricula, a sampling of syllabi of database courses, and scholarly literature discussing the pedagogical approaches to teaching databases. Several themes emerge from the literature for database courses. First, database courses are most often presented to an audience in a professional context. The professional orientation of these courses is explicit and deliberate at many levels of curricular design. On the one hand, this is entirely appropriate for aspiring professionals and academics. On the other hand, the courses as currently taught cannot address the needs of everyone with a stake in database concepts and technologies. Second, the current thinking on database courses constructs barriers of access to a general audience. For example, many database courses are upper-level courses with prerequisites in programming or data structures. Third, the current model curricula tend to address citizenship as an adjunct to technical knowledge rather than an inherent part of that knowledge. In other words, the curricula tend to address social context separately from technical knowledge. These trends in the teaching of databases pose challenges to the goal of educating data-aware citizens. The Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) guidelines for undergraduate degree programs in computer science (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013) establish the professional context of the database curriculum. In its high-level discussion of the guidelines, the authors recognize the need for breadth in computer science education: “The education that undergraduates in computer science receive must adequately prepare them for the workforce in a more holistic way than simply conveying technical facts” (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, p. 15). The discussion lists a number of soft skills recognized as crucial to success such as communication, time management, sense of social responsibility, and appreciation for diversity. The authors conclude their discussion of the importance of breadth in these terms: “These overarching considerations are important for promoting successful professional practice in a variety of career paths” (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, p. 15). The message of the corresponding guidelines for Information Systems programs is consistent with that expressed in the computer science guidelines (“IS 2010,” 2010, pp. 7-8). In the ninety-seven page treatment, the word ‘professional’ appears on almost every page while ‘citizen’ does not appear once. The reasoning for these decisions is well documented in the ACM guidelines. For example, the computer science department at Colorado State characterized the rationale for its Database Systems course in a particularly explicit way: “This course is an elective and students do consider it to be challenging but incredibly beneficial to their job prospects. Many students discuss their knowledge in database administration, database design, database tuning, query optimization, and knowledge of commercial DBMS and the projects developed in this course with potential employers” (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, p. 299). Of course, this approach is neither inappropriate nor surprising given the enormous commercial influence of database technologies, but it does make it difficult to draw a line from the current conception of database courses to the open data environment currently promoted by governments around the world. Several implicit barriers to the study of databases derive from the explicit professional orientation of database courses. Database courses in the ACM guidelines are often conceived as upper-level courses 119

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with prerequisites. For example, Colorado State’s Database Systems course was designed for undergraduate seniors and first year graduate students (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, p. 298). Moreover, as of the time of writing, the course has prerequisites, a third-year course in Software Development Methods. This prerequisite has its own prerequisites as well including data structures. These barriers to non-CS students enrolling in database courses are common; many other such examples could be cited. For instance, the ACM guidelines also include Stanford University’s Introduction to Database course which requires two prerequisites, Mathematical Foundations of Computing and Computer Organization and Systems (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, p. 501). Although there are some examples of dataoriented courses designed for the general student (Sullivan, 2013), these are less common than those typically offered. As a whole, computing education tends to view database concepts as a course for the professional development of mature students ready to enter the workforce.

Pedagogical Approaches to Database Education The pedagogical research in the field of databases supports and strengthens the curricular approach to teaching data-oriented subjects. This research provides yet more evidence of the strict focus on careeroriented, technical approaches to the subject. Broadly speaking, educators agree that database concepts are essential yet challenging parts of a modern computing curriculum. Moreover, many have recognized that database design in particular poses serious pedagogical challenges. In recent years, the community of database teachers have responded to these challenges with an impressive array of novel approaches to the teaching of SQL programming, normalization, database design, database courseware, database systems and internals, database security and database administration. Furthermore, many educational researchers have identified constructivist approaches as an effective technique for preparing aspiring database professionals (Connolly & Begg, 2006; Musti, 2015). Connolly and Begg (2006) offer the following description of their expectations for their students: “Our modules have a vocational orientation and we expect our graduates to become professional database practitioners typically in a multi-disciplinary environment”(p. 44). In other words, the curricular guidelines and pedagogical approaches share a consistent pre-professional philosophy regarding this crucially important topic. Many educational researchers in computer science, information systems and business have recognized the centrality and challenge of teaching database technology to aspiring professionals. Connolly and Begg (2006) succinctly capture this sentiment in their critical study: “The database is now the underlying framework of the information system and has fundamentally changed the way many companies and individuals work. This is reflected within tertiary education where databases form a core area of study in undergraduate and postgraduate courses related to computer science and information systems, and typically at least an elective in other data-intensive courses” (p. 43). Chen and Ray (2004) and Wang, Du and Lehmann (2010) offer two useful studies regarding such other data-intensive courses in business and accounting respectively. Researchers in each of these disciplines also recognize the persistent problems of teaching database concepts. Chen and Ray (2004) observe, for example, that “Students who learn Access by systematic, tutorial-type instruction alone were not able to solve business problems using a database as the source of information” (p. 18). Database design and normalization are frequently cited as one of the most problematic aspects of teaching database concepts. Wang, Du and Lehmann (2010) developed a specialized technique for teaching normalization to accounting students. Students in STEM disciplines also struggle with database design. In a recent survey, Czenky (2014) reports that over 80% of engineering students cited the topic of normalization as difficult or very difficult. Database design, 120

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therefore, is both unavoidable and extremely challenging for students and teachers alike. This is but one of the many challenges inherent in teaching and learning database concepts (Musti, 2015). In response to these challenges, researchers and teachers have developed an impressive range of approaches to the teaching of database concepts. Somewhat predictably, educators have focused on the most problematic database design topics like normalization and data modeling. Czenky has studied different approaches to teaching normalization to students pursuing mechanical and environmental engineering (Czenky, 2015; Czenky, 2014). Kung and Tung (2007) compared the effectiveness of teaching two different bottom-up database design approaches to junior Information Systems and Information Technology students in a systems analysis and design course. Kung et al. (2012) compared top-down and bottom-up approaches to the teaching of data modeling. Douglas and Barker (2004) evaluated an e-learning tool designed to help postgraduate students learn dependency theory, a critical aspect of normalization. The pedagogical innovation was by no means restricted to normalization and data modeling. Many researchers developed techniques for teaching database internals (Sotomayor & Shaw, 2016; Sciore, 2007), network database security (Sabareesan & Gobinathan, 2013) and database administration (Mason, 2013). Educators frequently discuss better ways to teach SQL and database programming (Silva et al., 2016; Ahadi et al., 2016). Many researchers have also studied the role visualization, simulation gaming, and e-learning can play in database education (Allenstein et al., 2008; Murray & Guimaraes, 2009; Taofiki & Tale, 2012; Connolly et al., 2006). Despite these many worthwhile innovations, the educational community has not yet adopted an approach to teaching database concepts to the citizens who will need to understand the rapidly developing data-driven society.

PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING FOR DATABASES Problem-Based Learning The community of computing teachers focused on database education has developed some of the essential elements required to address this growing audience and its civic needs. Problem-based learning (PBL) provides a strong framework for introducing database concepts to a broad range of students in a civic context. PBL encourages students to solve ill-defined problems with minimal instructor guidelines and project constraints (Savery, 2015). When implementing a PBL approach, solving the problem is paramount to the process. Several authors in the field have recently invited researchers to explore the application of PBL approaches to new fields. For example, Jonassen and Hung (2015) argue that “As PBL continues to migrate to other academic disciplines, research needs to consider the nature of the problems being solved and how efficacious PBL methodologies are for those kinds of problems” (pp. 18 -19). Although studies have addressed constructivist pedagogical approaches in the computer science domain generally (Ben-Ari, 2001) and database courses specifically (Connolly & Begg, 2006), few studies have explored the application of PBL to problems in the database domain despite the fact that such problems have many of the properties desirable from the PBL perspective (Duch, 2001). Moreover, no study to the authors’ knowledge addresses the use of PBL for teaching database concepts in their civic context. The problems associated with database technology are decently aligned with the characteristics of a good problem in the PBL sense. PBL researchers have produced a fairly consistent set of characteristics defining good problems. First, good problems incorporate a real-world context to motivate students and capture their interest (Duch, 2001, p. 48). Since databases almost always support some real-world objec121

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tive, problems in the database domain are inherently authentic and contextualized for students. Second, good problems are ill-structured or messy (Savory, 2015, p. 8). The design of even small databases, for example, constitutes ill-structured, complex problems with multiple solutions. Third, good problems are complex enough to sustain student motivation (Duch, 2001, p. 48). Since authentic problems of database technology can be found in almost any domain, database courses do not need to rely on uninspired toy problems. Fourth, good problems are interdisciplinary, drawing on the knowledge from a range of disciplines (Savory, 2015, p. 8; Fee & Belland, 2012). Database problems are necessarily interdisciplinary involving at least both domain and technical experience. Even the development of queries can draw on considerations far beyond the SQL used to produce a solution. This is a particularly useful characteristic for addressing the needs of students in many fields. The database domain focuses on a broad range of problem types recognized as well suited to PBL approaches. Jonassen and Hung (2015) have recently outlined a helpful selection of problem types amenable to PBL including diagnosis-solution, decision-making, situated cases/policy, troubleshooting and design problems (pp. 26-30). In the database context, diagnosis-solution problems require students to identify the causes of problems in a database system and propose remedies for those problems. Decisionmaking problems ask students to make and justify decisions from a list of potential options. According to Jonassen and Hung (2015), situated cases and policy problems are vague, context-driven and similar to the problems encountered in professional life (p. 28). In particular, these are challenging for students because much work is required to identify and define the problem clearly. Troubleshooting problems require students to correct a fault in the system to restore it to a good state. Design problems ask students to construct a solution responding to a broad set of interests, concerns and constraints. Jonassen and Hung (2015) identify these types of problems as the most complex and ill-structured (p. 29-30). In fact, software design problems are so notoriously complex, they have been identified as wicked problems (Armarego, 2002). Wicked problems have a number of special properties that make them a special case of design problems. For example, the solutions to wicked problems are expressed in terms of good versus bad, rather than true versus false (Armarego, 2002). In a sense wicked problems combine the most challenging aspects of each problem type into a single complex design problem.

PBL for Database Education Database courses provide a vehicle for problems in each of these categories. For example, database design issues often involve decision-making requiring designers to balance a complex set of goals and constraints. The case of representing demographic information such as racial or ethnic identities in a database provides a well-documented example (Vega, 2014). When students design databases to store information about race and ethnicity, they are forced to balance efficiency against accuracy in a variety of challenging ways. The range of solutions offered by students, not to mention U.S. Government agencies, reflects a complex balance of technical and social constraints at the center of the democratic process. After committing to a set of decisions resolving the problems’ constraints, students are asked to explain and reflect upon their decisions. Since access to public services like education and health care is now dependent on the responsible definition and analysis of such demographic data, database problems that engage students in the technical and civic aspects of such questions are crucial to supporting the democratic project in the digital age. Many database problems fall into the category of design problems as defined in PBL literature (Jonassen and Hung, 2015). This category of problem has been recognized as particularly challenging for the 122

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application of PBL pedagogies. Jonassen and Hung (2015) summarize the literature addressing these challenges in cautionary terms: “Although their moderate to highly complex nature will not exclude design problems from being used in PBL, the extremely high level of ill-structuredness may present challenges or even negative effects on students’ learning in PBL environments” (p. 30). Scaffolding and context-driven examples facilitate PBL approaches to teaching design problems related to database concepts at an introductory level. In fact, the means of scaffolding such as feedback and questioning permit the instructor to elevate problem complexity because these techniques if employed correctly reduce student frustration and confusion (Belland, 2012, p. 89). Moreover, the instructor learns through regular interaction with each student their state of knowledge making it possible to serve students with varied educational needs. In some cases, students will struggle with design issues while others struggle with technique. The authors find that with sufficient scaffolding the civic aspects of the design problems motivate students without much interest in the technical aspects of such problems. In this pedagogical context, the ill-structured, complex aspects of database design problems promote student engagement by offering several potential motivations and approaches to such problems. In other words, by introducing database problems as civic problems, teachers can increase problem complexity and ambiguity without demotivating students. Since teachers already cite complexity and ambiguity as serious problems in the technical domain, it is counter-intuitive and surprising that adding complexity and ambiguity from the civic domain would improve student motivation. For example, Connolly et al. (2006) describe their pedagogical context in precisely these terms: “Students often have considerable difficulty comprehending implementationindependent issues and analyzing problems where there is no single, simple, well-known or correct solution. They have difficulty handling the ambiguity and vagueness that can arise during database analysis” (p. 104). On the other hand, other researchers have noted positive responses to ambiguity as well. For example, Chen and Ray (2004) argue that “Moving away from systematic instruction to an unstructured activity after presenting basics should strengthen learners’ understanding of database capabilities and procedures. By allowing students to decide which database procedures to use to organize data into relevant information, the unstructured activity provides an opportunity for students to learn the process of using computers to extract valuable information for problem solving and decision making” (p. 20). In the case presented here, adding new kinds of complexity works because it responds to the specific interests of many different kinds of students. In the past, PBL has been employed to help students grapple with design complexity in several contexts. In a pedagogical context, Fee and Holland-Minkley (2010) discuss the importance of helping students come to terms with the complexity of problem decomposition. In a professional context, Armarego (2002) reflected on her experiences with PBL in a compelling way: “From the teacher’s perspective, exposure to the uncertainties, inconsistencies and idiosyncrasies associated with real problems helps ensure[s] students exit[s] the educational environment with the potential to deal in their own turn with wicked problems, and hence become competent software engineers within an organisational context.” In this review, we observe that additional complexity given the appropriate scaffolding not only helps motivate students with varied backgrounds and interests, but also introduces them to the complexity involved in many civic problems. It would seem that real-world database design problems with their ambiguity and complexity can enhance the potential of citizens to understand the growing number of wicked problems in civic life. In other words, computing educators have the necessary tools to address databases as civic artefacts with social consequences.

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CIVIC EDUCATION IN THE AGE OF OPEN DATA Civics and Technology Education: The Missing Link Current educational policies complicate and obstruct opportunities to educate citizens broadly in database concepts. The process of disconnecting civics and technical education begins well before students attend college. In her article, The Challenges Facing Civic Education in the 21st Century, Kathleen Hall Jamieson (2013) documents the long tradition of civic education in the United States as well as its recent challenges. In particular, she cites recent educational reforms as evidence of the diminishing role civics plays in contemporary curricula: In the past decade, a number of major initiatives have concentrated on enhancing educational quality at the elementary and secondary levels. Signed into law in January 2002, the No Child Left Behind Act (NCLB) focused on increased student proficiency in language arts and mathematics. In 2007, NCLB added student proficiency in science to its goals. In light of the long-lived perception that education should increase civic knowledge and enhance the capacities of citizenship, it is surprising that Title I of NCLB did not list civic education as a priority. (Jamieson, 2013, pp. 68-69) In the 15 years since the original drafting of No Child Left Behind, little has changed regarding civic education. For example, the Every Student Succeeds Act of 2015 maintains the educational focus on mathematics, language arts and science established by NCLB (Every Student Succeeds Act, 2015). Strange to tell, both civic and technical education receive little attention in federal educational legislation. What makes this oversight so odd is the fact that the legal requirements specified in these acts suggest a strong and necessary connection between civics and technology. According to the Every Student Succeeds Act, academic assessments must “enable results to be disaggregated within each State, local educational agency, and school by each major racial and ethnic group; economically disadvantaged students as compared to students who are not economically disadvantaged; children with disabilities as compared to children without disabilities; English proficiency status; gender; and migrant status, except that such disaggregation shall not be required in the case of a State, local educational agency, or a school in which the number of students in a subgroup is insufficient to yield statistically reliable information or the results would reveal personally identifiable information about an individual student” (Every Student Succeeds Act, 2015). This passage requires a good knowledge of data and database systems to interpret properly. First, data must be aggregated and disaggregated in several overlapping ways to meet the federal reporting requirements. Second, groups must be handled effectively in order to preserve the reliability of the data and the privacy of specific individuals. This database inference problem, as it is often called, reflects a major challenge in the design of modern data-driven systems. In essence, this clause encapsulates the well-known tension between information as a public utility and information as a private resource. It is not clear that language arts, mathematics or science education, regardless of its rigor, addresses such issues. What in the current educational legislation prepares future citizens for understanding data in this way? The current disconnect between civic education and technology in the United States is all the more surprising given the long association between civics and technology in U.S. history. The technical aspects of democracy were established in the constitution itself. For example, the US Constitution provides for

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an “Enumeration” of the people for the purposes of representation and taxation in Article I, Section 2. Despite its modest beginnings in what was originally a small nation, the 1880 census, consisting of more than 21,000 pages in reports, took over seven years to process with the manual tally system common at the time (Campbell-Kelly, Aspray, Ensmenger, & Yost, 2014, p. 14). For the 1890 census, the U.S. Government deployed Herman Hollerith’s tabulating machines which completed the required operations in two and half years (Campbell-Kelly, Aspray, Ensmenger, & Yost, 2014, pp. 14-17). Data processing played a similarly important role in the U.S. war efforts in the 1940s. The ENIAC, for example, was designed to help decrease the required time for calculating trajectories for firing tables (Campbell-Kelly, Aspray, Ensmenger, & Yost, 2014, pp. 68-71). In other words, the United States has a long and successful tradition of adapting new technologies for data processing to civic and military purposes. Despite the long history of technology serving civic goals, the association between civic education and data has had little effective representation in the classroom. This phenomenon has been observed for some time in the community of mathematics teachers. Nearly two decades ago, the Quantitative Literacy Design Team, for example, characterized the issue in these terms: “Unfortunately, despite years of study and life experience in an environment immersed in data, many educated adults remain functionally innumerate. Most U.S. students leave high school with quantitative skills far below what they need to live well in today’s society” (Quantitative Literacy Design Team, 2001, p. 1). Since that time, data-oriented products and services have been adopted in almost every venue of public and private life with no commensurate adjustment to mathematics education (Hacker, 2016). If mathematics education is stuck with respect to data-oriented skills and topics, then computer science education is moving backwards. Margolis, Goode and Bernier (2011) document a decrease in the percentage of high schools with computer science courses in the years from 2005 to 2009 (p. 68). Many of the computing courses on offer teach students rudimentary computer skills like word processing, rather than the problem solving, logical thinking and creativity at the heart of computer science (Margolis, Goode & Bernier, 2011, p. 68). Although more recent initiatives are somewhat more promising (Guzdial, 2016, p. 1), overall, this state of affairs leaves the interested observer with the impression that neither civics, nor data-oriented topics are considered with any depth independently. Therefore, we should not be surprised that, by the time students reach college, they often cannot recognize the vital connections between civics and technology.

Database Education: Reconnecting Technical and Civic Education The recent developments in big data offer a decent opportunity and considerable motivation to reconsider this state of affairs. First, many have recognized the threats new technology poses to proper democratic function. For example, Grabowski (2011) argues that U.S. Supreme Court Justices lack sufficient technical knowledge to rule effectively on many of the most important developments in modern communications and technology. Second, big data is already positioned to challenge many legal concepts and cultural practices. Richards and King (2013) describe three paradoxes of big data related to privacy, identity and power (p. 42). These are precisely the issues involved with large database projects like those of the U.S. census and the reporting requirements of federal educational programs. Database inference problems are potential threats to privacy because the more linked information available, the easier it is to reconstruct someone’s identity. Aggregated group reporting poses threats to identity because it limits our ability to control how we identify ourselves. Bromley (1998) documents this problem particularly well in his description of the affirmative action forms he encountered during a job search.

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In response to the imperative to count the members of various categories and abstract the entire applicant pool into a single set of numbers, this university (like many others) formalized racial identity in a manner that excluded many possibilities and rendered the exclusions invisible to users of their data…. But what’s worse, in this case an initiative specifically intended to welcome a broader range of people into an institution effectively tells many of them they don’t even exist. (Bromley, 1998, p. 20) As bad as this can be in a private setting like a job search, the problem can be much worse in a civic context because the decisions made based on those counts speak directly to issues of power via funding for services like education. Third, the notion of open data for citizens suggests that ordinary people can and should participate in the new data-driven civic processes promoted by the U.S. government and many others. Some argue that open data policies improve democracy (Kalin, 2014), while others question the effectiveness of such policies in practice (Gurstein, 2011). In any case, the widespread adoption of open data policies will have many consequences for the societies embracing these policies. Judges, legislators and citizens will be forced to grapple with the almost certain collision between big data and civic life. How should we educate students to be good citizens in the age of big open data? By combining technical and civic education, database courses and other data-oriented courses can contribute a great deal to students’ civic development. Despite the fairly narrow focus of database courses, the computing curricula do include some of the raw materials required for a more broadly-defined approach to teaching databases. For example, the ACM guideline defines knowledge units related to Social Context, Intellectual Property, Professional Ethics, and Privacy and Civil Liberties in its Social Context and Professional Practice recommendations (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, pp. 192-194). Grinnell College’s course for non-majors, the Digital Age, borrows heavily from these requirements with modules for electronic voting and sustainability (“Computer Science Curricula,” 2013, p. 442). Moreover, scholars are starting to recognize the need for a framework for teaching students about data. In the absence of any other meaningful model, Philip, Schuler-Brown and Way (2013), for example, developed a framework for teaching big data to public high school students. Overall, the tendency in database education has been to separate data processing from the social and ethical discussions of data. An essential part of understanding data is the recognition that data cannot be separated from the process that created it. The database course is a natural venue for facilitating this appreciation.

CONCLUSION: TEACHING DATABASE CONCEPTS FOR CIVIC EDUCATION WITH PROBLEM-BASED LEARNING In this data-driven digital age, the primary purpose of database and data-oriented courses is not technical, but rather civic education. At the time of writing, the national dialog focuses mostly on preparing a professional class of programmers with the skills to maintain the infrastructure required for initiatives like the educational and health care programs recently implemented in the United States (Seidman, 2014). Just as democratic participation in the U.S. in the 19th Century required literacy for its success, democratic participation in the 21st Century requires citizens to possess a thorough knowledge of data and how it informs or misinforms the democratic process. The mathematicians and educators working on the Quantitative Literacy Design Team observed this over a decade ago: “Virtually every major public issue – from health care to social security, from international economics to welfare reform – depends on data, projections, inferences, and the kind of systematic thinking that is at the heart of quantitative 126

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literacy” (Quantitative Literacy Design Team, 2001, p. 10). The pressing problem of education in our time is that while we have focused on technical infrastructure in education, we have done surprisingly little to promote understanding of the shifting rights and responsibilities of citizens in the digital age. This chapter puts forth a pedagogy supporting a form of technical education worthy of the great democratic traditions of the United States. Although early results with the approach are encouraging, our study recognizes some challenges and limitations to its application. The pedagogical approach absolutely requires the teacher to redefine her or his role from that of content disseminator to that of facilitator. Initially, students may resist the approach in a number of ways. Like many technical problems, database design tasks require a great deal of problem decomposition that many students find troublesome (Fee & Holland-Minkley, 2010). Even with appropriate scaffolding and flexibility in coaching, some students experience high degrees of stress or reduced motivation. At the other end of the spectrum, more technically-inclined students reject the context as a crucial factor in the problem. Since the database course serves both majors and non-majors at the authors’ institution, some mismatch between problem selection and student preference is expected and perhaps unavoidable. Given the demographic blend of students in the course, PBL has served the great majority of students well by encouraging them to connect technical topics like normalization and data types to the social, political and economic contexts in which these techniques are applied. Many educators have already started to reconsider the role of database courses in the curriculum. For example, The Special Interest Group on Computer Science Education of the Association for Computing Machinery (SIGCSE) has recently organized birds of a feather sessions to discuss database curricula. The abstract of the session proposed the following rationale for the meeting: Compared to their fundamental part of computer science curricula the small number of papers on database system education comes as a surprise. The apparent draught in new ideas in database system education is even more surprising given the fact that this area of computer science has arguably undergone its most significant changes for more than 30 years within the last 5 to 10 years. Many new database system paradigms (most of them appearing under the NoSQL label) have been introduced for various reasons. Some of these massively distributed database systems facilitate unprecedented data processing capabilities often labeled as BigData. In order to offer a sustainable and practical CS education, at least some of those new paradigms and methodologies should be included into database education. (Kleiner, 2015) This chapter argues that the civic context of database technology should also be included into database education. Moreover, other researchers are also starting to contemplate what it means to educate students in the era of big data. In their critique of big data, boyd and Crawford explore what it means to educate social scientists in our time: “There are complex questions about what kinds of research skills are valued in the future and how those skills are taught. How can students be educated so that they are equally comfortable with algorithms and data analysis as well as with social analysis and theory?” (boyd & Crawford, 2012, p. 674). We believe that it is crucial for educators to ask those questions for all current students and citizens. Just as PBL encourages students to engage with authentic problem-solving in professional contexts, PBL can also be used to engage students with the authentic wicked problems at the heart of many of our most severe public debates. Based on our experience with PBL in the civic context, we recommend the following steps for educators interested in exploring this approach. First, create database and data-oriented courses for everyone. In order to address the broadest audience, such courses can be designed with no prerequisites. To date, 127

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the computing for everyone movement has focused primarily on programming (Guzdial, 2016). From our perspective, this is not an obvious choice given the data-oriented focus of many new civic programs. We argue that understanding data is at least as important if not more so for advancing civic goals with technology. Second, database courses can address more than the professional needs of future employees. Database courses for everyone will include database content addressing civic concerns like the problems with gender pay equity and the problems inherent in aggregating and disaggregating data. Third, database courses can ask students to make decisions regarding data organization and presentation, and reflect on those decisions. This is the essence of responsible participation in a democracy and we see no reason why it cannot be incorporated into the classroom. Finally, we recommend that instructors integrate social, political and economic examples into database classes. For example, the gender gap in computing and technical education is extraordinarily severe (Guzdial, 2016, pp. 8-10). Teaching students about database inference with a gender pay equity report problem is remarkably effective in classes with such skewed gender imbalances. Overall, we recommend that educators reunite civics and technical education to serve the needs of citizens in the 21st Century. Owen et al. (2016) have made similar arguments for teaching digital media in secondary schools: Americans increasingly use digital media to engage in political life. Citizens communicate with officials, participate in election campaigns, take part in community affairs, share information and opinions, and engage in protest activities via digital platforms. Still, many citizens, including young people who are open to innovation, do not make the connection between digital media use and politics. They lack the requisite competencies required for effective and responsible digital political engagement. (p. 2) In their estimation, students should be introduced to digital technologies in civics classes to provide high school students with the skills necessary to engage and participate in the political process. Williams et al. (2014) document City Digits: Local Lotto as an example of how digital media can help young people develop data skills in a civic context. The project helped high school students to evaluate the consequences of the lottery by collecting and analyzing quantitative and qualitative data (Williams et al., 2014). Despite successes like these, we recognize that the gap is large between what our students need and what they currently have in this domain (D’Ignazio and Barghava, 2015). For our part, we believe that technical classes, such as database courses, can also contribute to this cause. Since many of the issues at the center of our political debates are based on data, we believe that database courses and dataoriented subjects in general have a bigger part to play in making civics intelligible to citizens in our time.

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Jonassen, D. H., & Hung, W. (2015). All Problems Are Not Equal: Implications for Problem-Based Learning. In A. Walker, H. Leary, C. E. Hmelo-Silver, & P. A. Ertmer (Eds.), Essential Readings in Problem-Based Learning. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press. Kalin, I. (2014). Open Data Policy Improves Democracy. SAIS Review, XXXIV(1), 59–70. Kleiner, C. (2015). New Concepts in Database System Education: Experiences and Ideas. In Proceedings of the 46th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (pp. 698–698). New York, NY: ACM. http://doi.org/ doi:10.1145/2676723.2691835 Kung, H.-J., Kung, L., & Gardiner, A. (2012). Comparing Top-Down and Bottom-Up Approaches: Teaching Data Modeling. 2012 Proceedings of the Information Systems Educators Conference. Retrieved from http://proc.isecon.org/2012/pdf/1910.pdf Kung, H.-J., & Tung, H.-L. (2007). Comparing Two Bottom-Up Database Design Methods.Proceedings of the 2007 Southern Association for Information Systems Conference, 87–92. Margolis, J., Goode, J., & Bernier, D. (2011). The Need for Computer Science. Educational Leadership, 68(5), 68–72. Mason, R. T. (2013). A Database Practicum for Teaching Database Administration and Software Development at Regis University. Journal of Information Technology Education, 12, 159–168. Murray, M., & Guimaraes, M. (2009). Animated Courseware Support for Teaching Database Design. Issues in Informing Science and Information Technology, 6, 201–211. Musti, K. S. S. (2015). An Effective Approach for Teaching Database Course. International Journal of Learning. Teaching and Education Research, 12(1), 53–63. Obama, B. (2009, January 21). Memorandum on Transparency and Open Government. The White House. Retrieved from https://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/TransparencyandOpenGovernment Owen, D., Doom, J. K., & Riddle, G. I. W. (2016). Educating Digital Citizens: The Influence of High School Civics Instruction. Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Southern Political Science Association, San Juan, Puerto Rico. Retrieved from http://www.civiced.org/images/stories/PDFs/EducatingDigitalCitizens_DianaOwen_2016.pdf Philip, T. M., Schuler-Brown, S., & Way, W. (2013). A Framework for Learning About Big Data with Mobile Technologies for Democratic Participation: Possibilities, Limitations, and Unanticipated Obstacles. Technology. Knowledge and Learning, 18(3), 103–120. doi:10.1007/s10758-013-9202-4 Richards, N. M., & King, J. H. (2013). Three Paradoxes of Big Data. Stanford Law Review Online, 66(41). Sabareesan, M., & Gobinathan, N. (2013). Network Database Security Issues and Defense. International Journal of Engineering Research and Applications, 3(1), 1748–1752. Savery, J. R. (2015). Overview of Problem-Based Learning: Definitions and Distinctions. In A. Walker, H. Leary, C. E. Hmelo-Silver, & P. A. Ertmer (Eds.), Essential Readings in Problem-Based Learning. West Lafayette, IN: Purdue University Press.

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Sciore, E. (2007). SimpleDB: A Simple Java-Based Multiuser System for Teaching Database Internals.Proceedings of the 38th SIGCSE technical symposium on Computer science education, 561–565. doi:10.1145/1227310.1227498 Seidman, S. (2014). Is Computing an Emerging Profession? ACM Inroads, 5(4), 6–11. doi:10.1145/2644826 Silva, Y. N., Almeida, I., & Queiroz, M. (2016). SQL: From Traditional Databases to Big Data. Proceedings of the 47th ACM Technical Symposium on Computing Science Education, 413–418. doi:10.1145/2839509.2844560 Sotomayor, B., & Shaw, A. (2016). chidb: Building a Simple Relational Database System from Scratch. Proceedings of the 47th ACM Technical Symposium on Computing Science Education, 407–412. doi:10.1145/2839509.2844638 Sullivan, D. G. (2013). A Data-centric Introduction to Computer Science for Non-majors. In Proceedings of the 44th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (pp. 71–76). New York, NY: ACM. http://doi.org/ doi:10.1145/2445196.2445222 Taofiki, A. A., & Tale, A. O. (2012). A Visualization Tool for Teaching and Learning Database Decomposition System. Journal of Information and Computing Science, 7(1), 3–10. The Quantitative Literacy Design Team. (2001). The Case for Quantitative Literacy. In L. A. Steen (Ed.), Mathematics and Democracy: The Case for Quantitative Literacy (pp. 1–22). The National Council on Education and the Disciplines. Vega, T. (2014, July 1). Census Considers How to Measure a More Diverse America. New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/02/us/census-bureau-arabs-hispanics-diversity.html?_r=0 Wang, T. J., Du, H., & Lehmann, C. M. (2010). Accounting for the Benefits of Database Normalization. American Journal of Business Education, 3(1), 41–52. Williams, S., Deahl, E., Rubel, L., & Lim, V. (2014). City Digits: Local Lotto: Developing Youth Data Literacy by Investigating the Lottery. Journal of Digital and Media Literacy.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Constructivism: An epistemology that encourages learners to build knowledge based upon their own understandings of the world as well as the content provided by any educational treatment. Database: A set of concepts and technologies for organizing data efficiently and effectively in a computer. Database Managements Systems: Commercial database systems created for the storage of databases. Normalization: The process of reorganizing data in a computer to reduce the redundancies that compromise the accuracy and efficient storage of the data. Problem-Based Learning (PBL): A pedagogical approach that presents ill-structured problems for students to solve. Solving the problem is paramount to the educational experience or the individual task at hand.

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Queries: SQL programs written to extract meaningful information from a database. Structured Query Language (SQL): SQL is one of the most common programming languages for manipulating data in a database.

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Strategies for Implementing Digital Assignments Paige Normand James Madison University, USA Alexa Senio James Madison University, USA Marlena Luciano James Madison University, USA

ABSTRACT In chapter, the authors draw from their in-class experiences, one-on-one tutoring sessions, focus-group interviews with students, and discussions with all of the course-embedded peer tutors about their experiences working in digital communication across campus, to discuss some of the “behind the scenes” issues that students face that might be invisible to faculty. The authors’ observations and reflections over the past two years have led them to identify common hurdles on their campus and identify solutions for faculty interested in incorporating digital assignments into their curriculum. The chapter addresses the following obstacles faculty might face and offers solutions: (1) students do not understand the value of the digital assignment, (2) students are not confident the faculty will accurately evaluate their digital production, (3) students’ skill development is hampered by their anxiety about their aptitude and confusion about their process for digital production, and (4) students do not feel comfortable sharing honest concerns and anxieties about digital composition with their instructor.

INTRODUCTION In this chapter, the authors define “digital assignments” as any class assignment that asks students to create content that is publicly available or sharable online, typically through websites, digital stories, and professional portfolios. Faculty and institutions’ push for these assignments reflects changes in higher education to prepare students for the key demands of the knowledge economy: solving complex problems, adapting to new technology, and communicating effectively online. Digital assignments offer an DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch008

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opportunity for students to take greater ownership of their learning (Ng 2015), improve their autonomy as learners (Ting 2015), increase their confidence with digital tools (Smith and Chipley, 2015), engage in active learning (Simatele, 2015), and connect their learning across disciplines (Eyon, Gambino, and Török, 2014). When faculty develop digital assignments in their courses, they offer their students an opportunity to produce content that not only furthers their disciplinary knowledge, but also helps them share their work more publicly and reflect on their development as learners. Academic digital projects have the ability to be more transferable, both because digital assignments are often created for audiences outside the class dynamic and because students can more easily collect and showcase digital work in an online portfolio, which offers a comprehensive overview of their academic accomplishments. However, digital assignments often require significant changes to traditional assignments. To produce digital work, students need to develop new skills that might not necessarily connect to the course material, such as digital literacy skills, understanding and consideration of copyright, accessibility, and privacy, as well as potentially communicating to a large audience of readers. Through their public availability, these assignments can decentralize the typical work of the classroom. When their assignments are reframed as projects for an external audience or work that can be showcased on a digital portfolio, the instructor is no longer the sole or perhaps most important reader of the students’ work. Eyon, Gambino, and Török (2014) in their assessment of over 24 campuses’ implementation of online portfolios found that external audiences can “raise the stakes for production” and that when students gather their work in a digital portfolio, it helps them “engage more deeply with content and concepts, integrate their understandings, and develop a more purposeful approach to learning” (p. 102).

BACKGROUND While students might think of professional portfolios as a practical tool for the job market, faculty should consider how assigning digital projects and discussing the value of a digital portfolio can help students more accurately reflect and describe their role as learners, work through complex problems, identify areas they want to develop, and hold themselves to standards external to their course grades. Eyon, Gambino, and Török (2014) report “ePortfolio practices correlate with substantially higher levels of student success, as measured by widely recognized indicators, including: course pass rates, GPA, credit accumulation, retention across semesters, and graduation” (p. 96). As more faculty integrate digital assignments into their courses, more students are given the opportunity to synthesize and demonstrate their intellectual development through a digital portfolio that showcases their growth, skills, and academic experience.

Digital Native Myth Due to college students’ increasing use of social communication online, both faculty and students often miscalculate students’ ability to adapt to new communication tools. Social media companies, such as SnapChat, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, design their products to be incredibly userfriendly and gratifying through the constant reward of notifications, communication, and validation. However, professional digital communication tools require much more thought and consideration to use the tools effectively and share meaningful messages. Academic tools, such as StoryMap JS 135

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and Timeline JS produced by Knight Lab at Northwestern University, and professional storytelling platforms, such as Atavist, require significantly more practice, skill development, and troubleshooting than social media. Even user-friendly commercial platforms for creating free websites, such as Wix and Weebly, still require assessment of purpose and audience, knowledge of copyright, revision, and usability testing. In short, digital communication for academic purposes will inevitably require much more planning, research, rhetorical analysis, troubleshooting, and revision than the communication typical college students create through social platforms that cater toward concise writing and image-based communication. Throughout this chapter, we refer to this overestimation of students’ digital proficiencies as the “digital native myth.” Samara Smith and Laura Chipley (2015) point out that “digital natives should not be assumed to be universally digitally literate. The digital native theory fails to account for both the varied quality of digital technology use and for the participation gap, brought about by unequal opportunities for participation in the digital world” (p. 231-232). The authors cite Hague & Williamson (2009) that a definition of digital literacy should include “not only consuming and analyzing digital information but also fully engaging in a participatory digital culture through creation and sharing” (p. 231). While digital communication is an increasingly valuable skill for students to learn, faculty will need to take a concerted approach to developing digital assignments to ensure that students learn necessary skills for synthesizing or presenting their content knowledge. In fact, rather than considering digital skill development peripheral to the course, learning a new tool for an academic purpose will be an increasingly valuable skill for students. By developing digital literacies, resource-seeking strategies, and confidence to work with professional communication tools, students will be better prepared to adapt to new technologies for professional and civic communication that will often be more complex and less intuitive than commercially-produced social media tools. Research highlights the need for faculty to assume that a majority of students, even those proficient with technology, should not be considered savvy in the new realm of academic digital production (Smith & Chipley, 2015 p. 237). Therefore, these students require individuals to showcase these tools and demonstrate their purpose in learning, critical thinking, and communication.

Our Program Our Media Fellows program, a part of Digital Communication Consulting in our university’s Learning Centers, trains undergraduate students to become peer tutors who partner with faculty to support their students in courses with intensive digital assignments. Media Fellows serve as a middle ground between faculty and students to coach students with a range of experiences and motivation about the process of digital communication. With this support, faculty have been encouraged to integrate innovative digital assignments in their courses (Smith & Chipley, 2015, p. 237). Vygotsky’s model of the ‘Zone of Proximal Development’ (ZPD, Vygotsky, 1978) also proposes that a learner’s cognitive growth relies on “social interaction and collaboration between a learner and a more knowledgeable expert.” Our program aims to provide student-focused peer support for digital assignments across campus, and the Media Fellows’ roles in the classroom have offered unique insights into the common struggles faculty and student face with digital production. Between 2014 and 2016, our team of nine tutors partnered with 21 faculty to support 42 classes to increase the implementation and sophistication of digital assignments at our university. Media Fellows partnered with faculty across the curriculum, from capstone Engineering courses to introductory 136



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Communication Studies courses, from helping Education students create professional online portfolios about their work to assisting Justice Studies students create digital stories about interpersonal and social justice. Our program offers a model for how trained peer tutors can relieve faculty members’ anxiety and students’ frustration with academic digital assignments. Media Fellows often support faculty during the pilot stage of new assignments by being digital experts who can troubleshoot issues, advise processes, and help set meaningful benchmarks. Our program understands that faculty aren’t often able to keep up to date on new digital tools that are constantly evolving and agree with Smith and Chipley (2015) that “online and individualized support for faculty and students are needed to encourage faculty to incorporate innovative digital assignments in their courses across the curriculum” (p. 237). The Media Fellows were partnered with the faculty member and the course for the full semester and served as the expert on the digital platform to assist the students—and sometimes the professor—in the process of learning digital literacy skills. Boylan, Bliss, and Bonham (1997) found that tutor training is the best indicator for a tutor’s successful impact on student learning. Thus, Media Fellows were trained in a semester-long three-credit course that is cross-listed among our university’s communication, design, and writing programs. Our recruitment of students did not focus on top producers of digital content. Instead, we focused on recruiting students who have strong metacognitive skills: they are aware of their learning process, can articulate their steps in a project, and identify ways to iterate and improve. They also demonstrated a deep interest in helping other students and ambition towards creating a meaningful impact on campus. The course focused on training these students on a wide range of digital tools and peer tutoring theory and practice. After assessing the needs on our campus, our Media Fellows developed skills working with free web builders (such as Wix and Weebly), digital storytelling platforms (such as Storify and Atavist), and course WordPress sites hosted and maintained by our Center for Instructional Technology. The tutors developed both their digital creation and tutoring skills through reading peer tutoring pedagogy, writing center practice, and texts on designing effective digital portfolios in addition to extensive hands-on production with a range of digital tools, writing documentation, creating resources, and participating in a tutoring apprenticeship. Once trained and hired, the Media Fellows were paired with faculty members to support a course with intensive digital production through numerous levels of tailored services, including: delivering presentations and workshops on the digital platforms and effective digital communication, holding one-on-one tutoring sessions, and maintaining a course website with curated resources, examples, and tools to support the students’ production. In addition, the Media Fellow provided a valuable feedback loop to the professor. Our tutors often gained unique insight into the students’ process and struggles with the assignment during workshops, one-on-one consultations, and emailed questions. The Media Fellow brought any important concerns back to the faculty to collaborate on potential solutions, extra resources, or additional presentations.

CHAPTER OVERVIEW In this chapter the authors draw from our in-class experiences, one-on-one tutoring sessions, focusgroup interviews with students, and discussions with all of the Media Fellows about their experiences working in digital communication across campus, to discuss some of the “behind the scenes” issues that students face that might be invisible to faculty. Our observations and reflections over the past 137

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two years have led us to recognize common hurdles on our campus and identify solutions for faculty interested in incorporating digital assignments into their curriculum. The following sections explore these obstacles faculty might face: • • • •

Students do not understand the value of the digital assignment. Students are not confident the faculty will accurately evaluate their digital production. Students’ skill development is hampered by their anxiety about their aptitude and confusion about their process for digital production. Students do not feel comfortable sharing honest concerns and anxieties about digital composition with their instructor.

All of our faculty partners were tackling projects and digital tools that were new and foreign to them. We know many faculty on our campus have integrated small-stakes digital assignments in a well-intentioned effort to help integrate 21st literacies into their students’ coursework. However, we have found that the most successful assignments—when students have devoted time and energy to produce content they are proud to showcase—are when faculty have set a high bar, invested time understanding the tools and process of their assignment, and have been able to effectively communicate to their students the purpose and value of the digital production. When faculty are able to address the common hurdles their students face, we’ve found students are more likely take more ownership, investment, and pride in their work.

VALUE OF DIGITAL COMPOSITION Hurdle: Students do not understand the value of the digital assignment. We have seen students’ motivation and production decrease when faculty assign digital production that students do not see as relevant to the course, supported in the classroom, or valuable to their skill development. Some faculty solicited our program’s help because they thought a digital assignment, such as creating a video, would be a fun way to get students engaged with their course material. However, faculty often inaccurately assessed their students’ ability to create content or did not provide them with the necessary resources so students could succeed with the assignment. Sometimes they did not set specific expectations for the work they wanted students to produce. Alternatively, some faculty opted to have students post assignments to online platforms, making them publically available, but did not correspondingly adapt the assignment to accommodate best practices for digital publishing. We found students often questioned the value of their digital assignments when the digital platform didn’t significantly add value to the assignment, course objectives, or their field of study. Student engagement and motivation increases when faculty regularly communicate to their students the value of the digital assignment. Wan Nag (2015) asserts that students are more motivated to learn digital literacy skills when they understand how the assignments will help them progress toward academic achievements. However, there are many reasons why students may be hesitant to tackle digital assignments: they are unfamiliar with the platform, their field of study does not connect to digital literacy, they have not completed a digital assignment before, they have a low sense 138



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of self-efficacy for digital production, or they do not understand why digital assignments are a part of their coursework. Students who struggle with these challenges that come with digital production often have lower engagement and motivation with their work. Digital production requires exploration, trial-and-error, troubleshooting, and a level of tenacity that demand significant motivation in order for the students to produce valuable and meaningful work. Students can learn to value these assignments and what they have to offer beyond the classroom when faculty emphasize the growing necessity of developing these digital communication and critical problem solving skills, contextualize the work within the class curriculum, and regularly address the value of digital products as potential work samples. An unexpected facet of the Media Fellows’ position was to contextualize and champion the value of the digital assignment. Media Fellows often helped students see their work as more than just an assignment within the class but rather a portfolio piece or an important artifact that showcased their development as learners. These digital assignments served as opportunities for students to expand their digital skills and develop valuable work samples for their portfolios. One of our Media Fellows, Kendall Gilman, assisted students in an introductory Biology class to create WordPress posts to synthesize and re-conceptualize the course content. She told us in an interview: The Biology students that I worked with did research, formulated ideas, and displayed concepts in a way that allowed anyone to engage with their content, regardless of their biology experience or knowledge. As our world becomes increasingly focused on communicating through digital platforms, this experience equipped the students with valuable skills that they will be able to use in all disciplines of study and areas of life. According to Bennett & Maton (2010) “if digital literacy is understood as a complex process of consuming, analyzing, creating, and sharing digital information, the frequency of completing some technology-based activities as opposed to others (e.g. communicating vs. creating) creates a variance of fluency” (p. 232). Digital assignments require students to not only learn a new tool, but they also put students in a position where they can develop their problem solving and communication skills in a new setting. Thus, these assignments facilitated students’ metacognitive process for learning new tools, critical thinking, and more robust digital competencies. Disciplinary differences also impact how students perceive the value of digital assignments. While students whose disciplines have a background in design, communication, and digital production often understood the importance of showcasing their work to external audiences, students in disciplines such as Engineering focused more on the creation of research or prototypes rather than how they would capture or share that work with others. Holly Warfield, one of our Media Fellows who worked with Engineering capstone students commented on this different perspective and concluded that her Media Fellowship was particularly valuable because their work is “not only impressive, it’s important. Their project could improve a whole environment. So it’s so important for them to be able to present that to not only their professors, but also to the community stakeholders.” These digital projects gave students an opportunity to practice communicating to audiences outside their discipline and externalizing the work of the classroom to connect to community projects and civic engagement. Solution: Capitalize on the public nature of online projects by designing them for an external audience.

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Our most successful faculty partners developed authentic, external audiences for the digital assignments, such as future employers, community organizations, faculty or classes in other disciplines, or relevant stakeholders. Some professors focused their assignments around projects with community members, a specific cause, or real-world partner. Many students find these assignments more meaningful because they felt like they were making a valuable contribution for a specific audience. Students’ work was then held to an external and professional bar rather than exclusively the grading of the instructor. Unlike traditional assignments, which may not seem relevant to a student after the semester is over, digital assignments for legitimate audiences can become a valuable opportunity for students to become more invested in civic engagement, hold themselves to professional standards, and get hands-on experience with how their disciplinary knowledge can impact local communities. We’ve seen a range of audiences from across disciplines: • • •

Engineering students showcased their wastewater proposal to a significant watershed community. Hospitality seniors synthesized the work of their discipline to showcase them in professional portfolios for the job market. A Writing faculty member who worked with community members and organizations so the students are producing content (prototypes, permanent exhibits, websites, pamphlets, etc) for stakeholders.

When faculty capitalize on the visibility and circulation of digital communication, they can hold their students to the professional bar of public consumption. The more faculty can design assignments that mirror or create real-world projects in their classrooms—ideally projects that require collaboration, outside stakeholders, and effective digital production—the more likely students will be to invest the time and energy necessary for learning new digital skills, communication strategies, and deeper content knowledge.

A Caution about Public Content Students should understand that producing online content requires they maintain a professional online persona. However, higher education is a place for students to interrogate new ideas, test new perspectives, and evaluate their conclusions. If students know such content will be publically available, they are more likely to sanitize their thoughts or avoid controversial topics. Thus, we recommend that any digital publishing of intellectual explorations (such as blogging) not be publically connected to students’ names in a way that might negatively impact them later in life. Faculty should allow students to use pseudonyms, ensure the content is not search engine optimized (SEO) for their name, or have the option to take down content after it has been graded. We also strongly encourage faculty to discuss the line between students’ professional online persona and their social online persona. Rather than attempt to censor their social voice, we encourage students to be proactive about privacy settings, educate themselves on the laws surrounding employers or school officials requesting access to social media accounts, and decide for themselves their own balance between the risks and rewards of sharing social content online.

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PERCEPTIONS OF LEARNING AND MOTIVATION Hurdle : Students are not confident the faculty will accurately evaluate their digital production. We noticed students’ motivation plummet when they saw evidence that their instructor would not be able to accurately assess their work or understand the constraints or abilities of a particular digital composition tool. With digital assignments, faculty often had difficulty perceiving which aspects of the final product represented time, energy, and creativity, and which elements were simply the student’s adaption of a template or plugin. In addition, faculty sometimes gave feedback on elements that are beyond the scope of a particular digital tool. We saw students’ engagement with the digital assignment decrease when faculty were unfamiliar with the platform being used. Students often lacked confidence that the faculty member would be able to accurately grade their work so they redirected their focus to areas of the course that they are more confident the professor would grade accurately. Engagement and motivation play integral roles in the successful integration of digital assignments throughout higher education. Since some students were hesitant about new technologies—especially ones for academic production—their understanding of the purpose, support, and stages of production were key to their overall success. Media Fellows entered the class as experts in both peer learning and digital communication and offered the essential instruction on the stages, hurtles, troubleshooting, and review stages of digital production. They also modeled what Carol Dweck (2007) terms a “growth mindset” by regularly discussing the ways they developed their skill with digital production—from their initial anxieties, false-starts, resources, tutorials, and strategies for improvement. Lastly, the Media Fellow often championed the value of the digital assignment. Their excitement about the project, their determination to help students develop their work, and their celebration of the students’ successes were a positive impact on the students’ varied perceptions about the purpose and value of the digital assignment. Media Fellows encouraged students to overcome their initial anxiety toward a digital assignment by presenting it as an opportunity for growth. As peer tutors, they could be honest about their own struggles and share a relatable perspective on both the challenges and value of digital assignments. Media Fellows also reduced anxiety with those they tutor by sharing experiences on how they had been in their position once, too. Marlena Luciano, a Media Fellow for Education students explains her experience: The Media Fellow is a relatable peer expert: we’ve all been in their shoes at one point. Students come in not knowing any of the platforms and the fellows showing them they can get there eventually if they put the time and effort into it. We have that knowledge as experts to guide them through that process so in terms of helping [students] understanding it, it’s like taking a step back and realizing they don’t know it the way you know it. Having taken a similar journey, the Media Fellows created an environment that embraced mistakes throughout the learning process. They remembered those initial feelings of anxiety and recognized the various hurdles students encounter with new digital tools. The Media Fellows’ extensive peer tutor training and experience using the digital platforms allowed them to view the issue from the students’ perspective and offer step-by-step guidance to tackle common issues. 141

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Faculty can take on a similar role by getting to know the platforms on their own. In one of the seminars we assisted, the professor created a short digital story using Atavist in about an hour, showed the class, and said “look what I did in an hour. Imagine what we can do in a semester.” Seeing faculty and peer involvement with a particular platform provided students with new attitudes on the project. One of the key components for successful digital production was the professor’s investment with the assignment and familiarity with the digital tools. Our tutors saw how professors’ motivation impacts students’ work: when the professor showed enthusiasm for the assignment and regularly communicated the value of the work as it related to the course content, the students approached the assignment with more enthusiasm and persistence. Our successful faculty communicated that the digital platform was a means of exporting their knowledge: by translating and synthesizing their course content into digital stories and interactive maps, students were able to display their learning beyond the classroom. According to Marcelo, Mayor, and Yot (2015) “the successful integration of technologies in the teaching-learning process arises when teachers focus their attention less on the technological resources, and more on the actual learning experience they design using acceptable technology” (p. 118). The more class time faculty are able to devote to the digital assignment, the more students are likely to respond to the value and support for their work with increased motivation and creativity. Solution : Faculty should produce the digital assignment. By producing the assignment themselves, faculty can more accurately assess their students’ work, create more meaningful benchmarks and resources, and model a growth mindset toward developing digital skills. Since faculty are most often in the role of evaluating the end-product, they tend to write assignment prompts and discuss students’ work with a final product in mind. When a faculty member undertakes their own digital assignment, they will be able to have more honest and helpful conversations with their students about the importance of mistakes and iteration and ultimately how their experience informs their assessment of the assignment. Faculty will have a more thorough understanding of what can be easily accomplished within the platform and what work demonstrates the time, effort, creativity, and determination of their students. One faculty partner who produced her own digital storytelling project in preparation for assigning it to the class, shared the various stages of her work to illustrate common pitfalls academics make when transitioning to a more public platform: she wrote far too much text, she used disciplinespecific language rather than writing to a general audience, and she realized how difficult it was to find meaningful images to supplement her work. When faculty demonstrate that they don’t have a particular talent or innate ability to create online content, they are modeling their growth mindset to learn a new skill through time, effort, feedback, and assistance. All of these strategies will be helpful for students to internalize so they will be better prepared to not only succeed with this particular assignment, but have problem solving strategies and a motivated mindset when approaching new projects and digital tools in the future. While the faculty member doesn’t need to be completely versed with the digital platform they are using in the classroom, they should be open to learning with the students. We encourage faculty to: • 142

Create their own version of the digital assignment on the platform.



• • • • • • •

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Showcase their work to the class, discuss their process, and ask their students for feedback. Lead a discussion about other projects that previous students have completed that will facilitate current students’ evaluation of digital projects and create their own criteria for assessment. Collect resources for students (most can be found on the platform’s resource center) to utilize when working on the assignment. Create an online discussion group for students to find, assess, and curate their own resources. Offer time in class for students to work on the digital assignment and troubleshoot issues together. Give students who are experienced with the platform the opportunity to lead workshops on specific topics or serve as a mentor for their peers. Encourage student participation when showing examples of how to use the platform for the class (ex. have the students come to the front and navigate the platform while the professor talks them through a certain task).

PROCESS Hurdle: students’ anxiety about their aptitude and confusion about their process for digital production obstructs their skill development. Faculty’s perception of students as “digital natives” often led them to indicate that digital assignments would be easy for students. When students faced the inevitable hurdles and complications that come with academic digital composition, they often became frustrated. A Media Fellow’s most important impact for students was their ability to communicate and facilitate the processof digital communication. Like most semester-long projects, the digital assignments demanded many stages of production: drafting, troubleshooting, collecting data and content, building layouts, crafting narrative flow and purpose, revising, and usability testing. The Media Fellows guided students through the complex and often circular process of digital composition and, as peers, they created a comfortable environment where students could honestly discuss their mistakes, frustrations, and confusion about these stages. Their position as peer educators also allowed them to be more intimately aware of the class’ perspective and knowledge of digital media. As a result, Media Fellows capitalized on those insights in order to redirect students to intrinsic learning objectives by encouraging the student to view the goal of the assignment not as just submission, but an opportunity to communicate important information publically. Media Fellows often facilitated this perception through workshops that focus on highlighting students’ individuality and talents they can capitalize on with their digital assignments. For example, Media Fellow Alexa Senio’s “Personal Branding for Portfolios” workshops for senior Writing majors encouraged the students to focus on their values and skill and then translate that message into an online persona including a color scheme, descriptive words or phrases, and a logo. Senio created handouts with questions that prompt students to think about their goals, values, and qualities both within and beyond the classroom that they wanted to showcase. Senio also encouraged students to professionally integrate their passions, such as photography, music, traveling, and volunteering, into their digital portfolio. Senio helped the students reflect on their skill development across their

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college career, contextualize their passions and hobbies within their coursework, and envision their potential future impact as a citizen with a unique combination of abilities and values. Students require instruction and observation when learning new platforms (Smith & Chipley, 2015, p. 232). Media Fellows often modeled their own experiences with the platform by showing previous examples of their work or walking the students through the construction process step-bystep. Rather than have the students learn a platform through trial and error, Media Fellows acted as guides in each phase of the assignment: they explained their own process and invited students to share their own. Having other classmates demonstrate their solutions to common hurdles also made students feel more comfortable with their skill acquisition. Media Fellows often invited students to model their troubleshooting techniques to their classmates or share examples from the students they worked with. One Media Fellow, Sarah Lundberg, utilized this technique with a student who was usually quite reserved. During the workshop, the student discovered how to transfer links on Storify, a feature Lundberg was not familiar with. Lundberg suggested that the student present this finding in front of the class. This experience made the student more aware of her ability to contribute to the learning in the class and more confident approaching Lundberg with questions throughout the semester. Research supports this aspect of peer-to-peer learning, since the student represented someone who was undergoing the same process as her classmates (Hall et al. 2013). The Media Fellows contextualized their advice as both someone who has recent experience with the process of digital production as well as invited the insights and experiences from the students in the class. Kendall Gilman emphasizes her position in the process each time she entered the classroom of Biology students creating WordPress posts: “I set a standard for whatever they are working on that day based on what they are creating. My role was to come in, be excited about the project so they’re excited about it, but most importantly, walk alongside them in the process and reassure them that ‘okay, you can do this.’” Her assistance was professional, yet more personable, than students had with their professors. Gilman sensed the comfort many had with disclosing honest concerns about the assignment. From there, they had the opportunity to sit down and figure out the specific hurdles a student was confronting and collaborate on solutions. While it is not necessarily possible for faculty to assume a similar position to the Media Fellow, we have two main recommendations for faculty implementing digital assignments: Solution : Design specific rubrics and benchmarks based on learning objectives and identify priorities for creation. Digital composition often allows for great variety for how content (graphics, interactive content, images, text, links, etc). Given this level of flexibility, we’ve seen the most success when faculty to set regular benchmarks to allow students to share their work and receive feedback. Students are then better able to calibrate the instructor’s expectations and evaluation. Compared to traditional papers, digital assignments inevitably add a level of complexity, creativity, and new skill development in addition to demonstrating content mastery. Faculty should be very clear about how much they value the elements of digital composition in relation to their course content. To acknowledge the complex skills necessary for digital composition, we strongly encourage faculty to devote a substantial portion of a project’s grade to elements of production. As faculty develop their grading rubrics, we encourage them to consider if they want to foster students’ creativity with the assignment or foster consistency. The two objectives are often mutu144



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ally exclusive, so determining the value for the particular assignment and communicating it clearly to the students will be valuable to setting clear expectations and promoting students’ motivation toward the task.

Example: Rubrics for Professional Portfolios Our Media Fellows worked with many faculty who assigned their students to create professional portfolios. We have seen several strategies produce very different outcomes for the students’ work and motivation.

Strategies and Outcomes for Fostering Creativity Emphasize Personality One faculty partner regularly emphasized the importance of personal branding to stand out on the job market. He encouraged his students to make their professional content—resumes, cover letters, business cards, and portfolios—consistently reinforce the message of who the students are and their unique contributions to their field. The students’ first benchmark for the portfolio assignment was submitting their personal brand, which included their chosen colors, fonts, and a personal logo. Outcome: Emphasizing personal brand and adapting the assignment toward the students’ interests and future careers help create a wide range of unique and tailored portfolios. We saw students envision their future selves in the workforce and demonstrated more sophisticated presentations of their projects, passions, and disciplinary knowledge.

Emphasize Options Another faculty member held 20-minute one-on-one meetings with his students to create tailored rubrics for their professional portfolios. He set expectations for what pages were required on the portfolios and allowed each student to defend what percentage of their grade should be designated for each page. This allowed students to choose where they would direct their energy in their portfolio and gave them the freedom to make their portfolios different than their classmates’. Outcome: Students came up with creative ways to utilize the platform and showcase their information. While all students were required to create an “About Me” page, the students that weighed it more heavily invested more time and thought to create unique content: one student replicated a filled out personality quiz from an activity book and other created a short video introducing herself and her work.

Strategies and Outcomes for Fostering Consistency Emphasize Skill Acquisition When faculty were working with students who were particularly anxious about their digital skills or resistant to the value of a digital assignment, a more hands-on approach was effective. Faculty in one of our partnered departments created rubrics that resembled a checklist for the students to 145

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follow, including dictating the title and content of each page of the students’ portfolios. The rubric did not value students’ personal brand, unique traits, or creative risks. By the end of the semester, the students’ portfolios across the class had a very similar format and layout. Outcome: the students often did not try to make their portfolios their own. While some students expressed frustration that their portfolios all looked very similar, the project was successful in improving students’ confidence with learning a new digital tool. At the beginning of the semester, only 21% of students rating themselves as “confident” or “very confident” about producing a digital portfolio. At the end of the semester, that number had quadrupled: 88% of students rated themselves as “confident” or “very confident.”

PEER-TO-PEER LEARNING Hurdle: Students do not feel comfortable honestly sharing concerns about a digital assignment with faculty members. Since peer tutors served solely a supportive role and were not be responsible for evaluating the students’ work, they heard questions and concerns students often wouldn’t share with an instructor. Peer-mediated learning offers numerous opportunity for tutors to give students a new perspective on the purpose of digital assignments. Our Media Fellows discussed with their students how they have integrated digital coursework into their professional portfolios, showcased digital storytelling projects in job interviews, approached faculty to propose transforming traditional paper assignments into multimedia projects, or created content they were excited to share with their family and friends. The digital native myth can often push faculty to think that students will be eager and self-motivated to create digital assignments; however, we have found that students needed to be regularly reminded of how these assignments can be valuable to them academically, personally, and professionally. Therefore, Media Fellows shared a unique perspective that allowed them to talk about their own process of understanding the tools (Scott et al., 2014) as well as the advantages they had reaped from the experience. Muriel Harris (1995) describes that when working with a tutor, students: begin to talk more freely and more honestly because they are not in the confines of a teacher/student relationship where there are penalties for asking what they perceive as ‘dumb’ questions (the penalty being that the teacher will find out how little they know or how inept they are in formulating their questions (p. 28) Marlena Luciano, a Media Fellow for Education majors, explained the environment she aims to create during their initial meeting: “I try to be very energetic with the assignment from the first day,” she shares, “because I want to establish that early on. As a student you have that opportunity, not to be their friend in that kind of way, but make the atmosphere more laid back and comfortable. The students feel like they can ask me questions and we get along really well.” Both the Media Fellows’ perspectives as students and their enthusiasm toward the assignment benefited the students involved in peer-to-peer learning. The benefits of peer-to-peer learning has evolved over time, beginning with Piaget and his views on co-operation. Interaction between individuals sparks genuine thought and conversation, something he believed significantly impacts the development of a “critical attitude of mind, objectivity 146



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and discursive reflection” (Falchikov, 2001, p. 87). Initially, students value the perceived control of their learning and the decisions they share in its process. However, research has also demonstrated the importance of observing the learning of peers. One particular study illustrated the way peers teach in the manner that they learned the material (Vickery citing Thomas & Brown, 2011). Watching others around them perform the same tasks creates a more informal and comfortable environment. This atmosphere offers a place for those learning to make mistakes, ask questions, and share new discoveries. Students, especially after working with the easy and instant gratification of social media, are often frustrated with the more time-consuming and nebulous experience learning to use academic digital technologies. Therefore, peers demonstrated the importance of working through these mistakes on their own and discussing this knowledge with those in similar situations (Vickery citing Thomas & Brown, 2011). To further this assumption, Harris (1995) explains that students view peer tutors as “someone to help them surmount the hurdles others have set up for them” (p. 28). In this situation, peer tutors were neither responsible for creating nor grading assignments. Their priority was to help another student work through these frustrations and leave feeling more confident with the communication tools. This interaction differs from a student-professor relationship because it encouraged honest conversation about the assignment or platform being used. The peer tutor placed the students in control of their learning by asking “How can I help you?” or “What would you like to work on today?” Students then felt more open to ask questions and share concerns with someone who was there to help work through these challenges rather than evaluate their production or effort. Many students fear rejection or disappointment from a professor, something a peer aimed to avoid in the learning process. Instead, tutors utilized “exploratory talk” to guide students in conversation and encouraged them to bring out their ideas. Through this engagement, students had the opportunity to understand their frustrations and the ways to overcome them. Kenneth Bruffee explains, “Knowledge is an artifact created by a community of knowledgeable peers,” and Harris (1995) elaborates, “learning is a social process not an individual one” (p. 32). Therefore, faculty can encourage this sense of collaboration among peers within the classroom. By supplying the necessary resources, students can take control of their learning and share their findings with their classmates. Each time a Media Fellow entered the classroom, his or her individual views toward the assignment often translated to the attitudes the students had as well. Gilman shared how her positivity contributed to this transition, especially in terms of the various opportunities that come with content creation. In her Biology class, Gilman encouraged her students to take a step further and challenge their capabilities on these new platforms. While some students were disposed to approach their WordPress posts as just another assignment, Gilman emphasized that her excitement encouraged them to view it an opportunity to create content similar to what students regularly consumed online, such as BuzzFeed articles, PSA videos, and infographics. Several Media Fellows emphasized the value of having students envision the possibilities of creating work they would be proud to share and showcase online. While many students may feel overwhelmed with new technologies, examples of previous work demonstrated their potential capabilities. Students who saw their peers’ work set higher expectations for their own work. When a student saw a classmate overcome an obstacle, they gained a stronger understanding of what was possible for them to accomplish. Research supports this sense of motivation toward new technologies that evolves from social interaction. Beyond personal expression 147

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and creativity, it generates a sense of community engagement by “acknowledging the importance of one’s individual contribution within a larger dynamic” (Smith & Chipley, 2015, p. 231). Therefore, learning these technologies in the classroom encourages peer-to-peer learning alongside academic and professional development. Solution: Give students time in class to collaborate and discuss their process and drafts. We encourage faculty to offer regular opportunities in class for students to showcase drafts of their work, get feedback from their peers, and describe their own process and share resources. Students who are unfamiliar with working on a digital platform or who have never tackled a digital assignment before often don’t know where to start. Faculty can show them ofther students examples to jumpstart this brainstorming process and to give them an idea of the instructor’s expectations. According to Kendall Gilman, “Showing them examples of student work helps increase student motivation. I pulled up examples to show them how other students have approached this prompt, and they said, ‘Whoa, someone from this class made that? Wow, that’s really cool.’ And it automatically sets their bar higher for what they can expect of themselves.” Other strategies exist for faculty to create their own resources that will help guide students throughout this process. For example, Alexa Senio, Media Fellow for a presentational speaking course, created a “bucket list” for their digital storytelling assignment using the platform Atavist. The checklist offered strategies for the students to stay on track with the project by following suggested deadlines, attending a workshop on campus for designing infographics, and booking two consultations by the middle of the semester. For faculty, these benchmarks could involve speaking with the professor oneon-one about the assignment or have two group meetings by the sixth week of classes. Faculty can utilize checklists to demystify the creation process and decrease any overwhelming feelings toward tackling a digital assignment. In turn, this approach will encourage faculty to more on the learning process for students rather than the final product. Faculty should also direct students to the platforms and tools that will best serve their students to create effective digital content in their discipline. Here are some of our favorites (currently free) tools for digital production: • • • • •

Video: Powtoon, Adobe Spark, WeVideo, iMovie Graphics: PiktoChart, Canva, Graphiq Digital Storytelling: Atavist, Storify, Adobe Spark Portfolios or Websites: Wix, Weebly Interactive Content: Timeline JS, StoryMap JS, Silk.Co

CONCLUSION There are many hurdles to integrating digital production into the college classroom. To do so effectively, faculty need to develop new digital skills, create new assignments, devote class time to workshops and feedback, and foster students’ motivation and engagement with complex production. We applaud the faculty who have undertaken such a difficult task. When implemented effectively, we have seen amazing transformations: students who had self-identified as “bad with technology” learned 148



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that they are capable of producing professional online content; students creating portfolios became invested in their professional image, synthesized and articulated the skills they have developed in higher education, and envisioned their future contributions as professionals; students worked long hours outside the classroom to create professional content for community partners. Digital production offers a powerful opportunity for students to become content creators, but in order to support such gains, faculty should have institutional support. We’ve seen first-hand the complexities, failures, and successes with digital assignments in the classroom. Our program exists solely to maintain expertise in digital communication and support our campus in the production of sophisticated and meaningful digital content. Institutions that promote digital literacy across campus should similarly invest in support systems for faculty and students alike.

REFERENCES Boylan, H., Bliss, L., & Bonham, B. (1997). Program components and their relationship to student performance. Journal of Developmental Education, 20(3), 2–9. Dweck, C. S. (2006). Mindset: The new psychology of success. New York: Random House. Eyon, B. Gambino, L. M., & Török, J. (2014) What Difference Can ePortfolio Make? A field report from the Connect to Learning Project. International Journal of ePortfolio, 4(1) 95-114. Falchikov, N. (2001). Learning together: Peer tutoring in higher education. Routledge. doi:10.4324/9780203451496 Hague, C., & Williamson, B. (2009). Digital Participation, Digital Literacy, and School Subjects: A Review of the Policies, Literature and Evidence. Bristol: Futurelab. Hall, S., Lewis, M., Border, S., & Powell, M. (2013). Near-peer teaching in clinical neuroanatomy. The Clinical Teacher, 10(4), 230–235. doi:10.1111/tct.12001 PMID:23834568 Harris, M. (1995). Talking in the middle: Why writers need writing tutors. College English, 57(1), 27–42. doi:10.2307/378348 Hicks, T., & Turner, K. H. (2013). No longer a luxury: Digital literacy can’t wait. English Journal, 102(6), 58–65. Marcelo, C., Yot, C., & Mayor, C. (2015). University teaching with digital technologies. Comunicar, 23(45), 117–124. doi:10.3916/C45-2015-12 Margaryan, A., Littlejohn, A., & Vojt, G. (2010). Are digital natives a myth or reality? University students use of digital technologies. Computers & Education, 56(2), 429–440. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2010.09.004 Ng, W. (2015). Affordances of new digital technologies in education. In New Digital Technology in Education (pp. 95–123). Springer International Publishing. Scott, J. L., Moxham, B. J., & Rutherford, S. M. (2014). Building an open academic environment: A new approach to empowering students in their learning of anatomy through ‘ Shadow Modules. Journal of Anatomy, 224(3), 286–295. doi:10.1111/joa.12112 PMID:24117249

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Simatele, M. (2015). Enhancing the portability of employability skills using e-portfolios. Journal of Further and Higher Education, 39(6), 862–874. doi:10.1080/0309877X.2014.953461 Smith, S., & Chipley, L. (2015). Building confidence as digital learners with digital support across the curriculum. Journal of Educational Technology, 44(2), 230–239. Thomas, J., & Brown, D. (2011). A New Culture of Learning: Cultivating the imagination for a world of constant change. Lexington, KY: CreateSpace. Vickery, J. (2014). Youths teaching youths. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 57(5), 361–365. doi:10.1002/jaal.263 Vygotsky, L. S., & Cole, M. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Academic Digital Communication: Complex communication tools that require planning, research, rhetorical analysis, troubleshooting, and revision. In our chapter, this includes digital storytelling platforms, such as Atavist, web building platforms, such as Wix and Weebly, and interactive narrative tools such as Timeline JS and StoryMap JS. Digital Assignment: Any class assignment that asks students to create content that is publically available or sharable online; our chapter focuses on assignments for websites, digital stories, and professional portfolios. Digital Portfolio: An online collection of students’ work that showcases their skill sets, work experience, and academic production. Our discussion often includes portfolios that include personal branding, multimedia, and embedded or linked work samples. Digital Native Myth: The miscalculation of students’ digital proficiencies by faculty or the students themselves due to college students’ prolific use of social media. Media Fellows Program: Trained undergraduate tutors who partner with faculty to support their students in courses with intensive digital assignments. Media Fellows serve as a middle ground between faculty and students to coach students with a range of experiences and motivation about the process of digital communication in a low-stakes, peer exchange.

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Digital Storytelling and Digital Literacy:

Advanced Issues and Prospects Kijpokin Kasemsap Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University, Thailand

ABSTRACT This chapter reveals the overview of digital technologies; the overview of digital storytelling in education; and the overview of digital literacy in education. Digital storytelling and digital literacy are very important in modern education. Digital storytelling is used to improve student’s learning through multimedia in the modern classrooms. Digital storytelling is the expressive medium that can explain even the most intricate topics in depth, integrating it with the rest of the curriculum. Digital literacy is the ability to use Information and Communication Technology (ICT) to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information, requiring both cognitive and technical skills. Digital literacy leads to the great increases in information that can be conveniently accessed. The chapter argues that developing digital storytelling and digital literacy skills has the potential to improve both teaching and learning performance in modern education.

INTRODUCTION The impact of technology is one of the most critical issues in education (Sincar, 2013). Digital technologies become the essential parts of students’ learning experiences in the classrooms (Kissel, 2014). The advent of digital technologies brings substantial shifts both at the material levels and at the global literacy levels in this digital world (Limbu, 2014). Storytelling on electronic platforms can become powerful if adopted and delivered with appeals known as digital storytelling (Hassan, 2016). With digital storytelling, technologies allow individuals to organize their educational messages through sophisticated multimedia and to participate in the cross-cultural communication (Kozdras, Joseph, & Kozdras, 2015). Digital storytelling brings the time-honored teaching and learning achievements of storytelling with the modern student’s affinity for technology (Bhattacharyya, 2012). DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch009

Copyright © 2017, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.

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Digital storytelling represents an interesting method to establish a methodology that takes advantage of multimedia technologies to develop learning mechanisms (Carrozzino, Evangelista, Neri, & Bergamasco, 2012). The inherent interactivity of the Internet and the emotional engagement of digital story can lead to transformative learning experiences in the media-rich environments (Kalogeras, 2013). Educational leaders (e.g., school district managers and administrators who are implementing mobile learning devices) need deeper comprehension of the value of such technology initiatives and the types of technological support needed to bring about the meaningful learning projects toward effective digital programs (Ostashewski & Reid, 2013). The growing digital experiences have radically transformed the traditional approach, and have traced the route for a new communication paradigm in education (Ganzerla, Colapinto, & Rocco, 2015). The 21st century literacy skills increasingly reflect the ability to use technology (Pilgrim & Bledsoe, 2013). Digital literacy for students and learners has developed into an important dimension of information and communication technology (ICT)-related educational policies worldwide (Karagiorgi & Gravani, 2012). The balanced literacy approach to teaching, reading, and writing derives from the philosophy that students learn best through opportunities for authentic reading and writing experiences (McGinnis, 2013). It becomes imperative for technology to be embedded in the digital literacy methods courses to prepare the future teachers of writing (Werderich & Manderino, 2014). In the educational process, teaching with technology is as challenging as it is necessary as the 21st century has facilitated learners ever more vigorously into the digital age, offering multimedia for interpreting the world (Chen, 2016). Regarding digital literacy, the utilization of computers and video games, combined with more traditional storytelling, serves as the useful tools for motivating and engaging students as well as promoting learning in education (Jin, DaCosta, & Seok, 2016). Thus, teachers should consider how best to teach and apply their digital literacy skills in their classrooms so as to support the students’ digital literacy development toward gaining better educational performance (Wake, 2013). This chapter aims to bridge the gap in the literature on the thorough literature consolidation of digital storytelling and digital literacy. The extensive literature of digital storytelling and digital literacy provides a contribution to practitioners and researchers by revealing the advanced issues and prospects of digital storytelling and digital literacy in order to maximize the impact of digital storytelling and digital literacy in modern education.

BACKGROUND Nowadays, many teachers are under pressure to provide the evidence of the impact that coursework has on student learning, and student-generated digital stories provide the valuable artifacts of learning (Matthews-DeNatale, 2013). In recent years, digital stories have been used for both teaching and learning purposes as a result of the advancements of technology and overspread use of technological devices by students and teachers (Soleymani, 2015). A constructive teaching approach is adopted to allow students to create their own digital stories based on an authentic experience and express their thoughts (Tay, Lim, & Lim, 2011). Unlike the traditional stories, digital stories have multimedia format and are made with different types of technological tools (Soleymani, 2015). The advent of digital storytelling in educational environments is based on theories by which learning is a result of knowledge building (Psomos & Kordaki, 2012). Digital storytelling is a concept that

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is growing in popularity and one which offers versatility as an instructional tool (Wright, 2008) and aims at generating the compelling stories based on the user’s input (Smed, 2014). Digital storytelling approach provides students with several opportunities that enable them to utilize technology as the active participant designers in the process of putting forward their creativity and that allow them to create their own original and creative languages (Eristi, 2014). The integration of both traditional and new literacy practices is evident throughout the process of creating a digital story (Shelby-Caffey, Úbéda, & Jenkins, 2014). Digital literacy is the set of skills, knowledge, and attitudes required to effectively access the digital information (Julien, 2015) and is one of the core competencies for the 21st century (Voogt, Erstad, Dede, & Mishra, 2013). In order to adequately characterize literacy, the definition of digital literacy has to capture the relationship between literacy and new technologies (Bodomo, 2010). Davis, Palmer, and Etienne (2016) defined digital literacy as the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, and produce messages and information across a range of ICT in a variety of social settings. Martinovic, Freiman, Lekule, and Yang (2015) viewed digital literacy as the ability to effectively use digital technologies for learning, working, and functioning in a modern society. Digital literacy needs, including general computing skills, computerized communications, distance education, and Web 2.0 tools can make navigating coursework an additional challenge (Hsu, Wang, & Hamilton, 2013). Technologies used in teaching can be delivered through many mechanisms, such as slide projectors, overhead machines, filmstrip projectors, TV, interactive whiteboards, and computer projectors (Streeter, 2011). The changing nature of online engagement privileges interaction over information (Merchant, 2009a). Many online classes make use of discussion boards, on which students can interact with their peers, the content, and the instructor (Wegmann, 2010). With the rapid development of information technology (IT), the trend in education and learning has changed from traditional in-class teaching to teaching through digital media. In order for technology knowledge to be transferred to the classroom, teachers need to find both knowledge and digital literacy skills being taught relevant to their future classrooms (Ottenbreit-Leftwich, 2012). The increase in the popularity of mobile and social media practices, from texting and sharing multimedia to social networking and online gaming, has aroused the discussion around the affordances of technologies for the creative learning (Ranieri & Bruni, 2016). While access to technology is rapidly growing, educators need to be aware that students’ technological knowledge and skills are diverse (McAdams & Gentry, 2014). Regarding digital literacy enhancement in education, teachers and schools need to predict and prepare students for their future, the scope of which covers teaching students how to effectively apply digital technologies and information, how to think, and how to communicate (Tsai, Shen, & Lin, 2015). Technology education continues to rapidly develop as the basic channel for preparing students and learners concerning digital literacy (Thomas, 2016).

IMPORTANT PERSPECTIVES ON DIGITAL STORYTELLING AND DIGITAL LITERACY This section emphasizes the overview of digital technologies; the overview of digital storytelling in education; and the overview of digital literacy in education.

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Overview of Digital Technologies The rapid development in digital technologies during the digital era confronts individuals with situations that require the utilization of an ever-growing assortment of technical, cognitive, and sociological skills that are necessary in order to perform and solve problems in the digital environments (Eshet, 2005). Modern digital technologies provide users with opportunities to create visual art and written works by reproducing and manipulating texts, visuals, and audio pieces (Eshet-Alkalai, 2009). Students need to be aware about the growing technologies and media so that they can effectively access, evaluate, and create the media messages of all kinds (Mahajan, Rather, Shafiq, & Qadri, 2016). As digital technologies and social media have become the integral parts of individual’s everyday life, there is a global trend for effectively integrating them in education (Marav & Espinoza, 2015). Technology utilization has been found to have the greatest effect on learning (Gibson, 2006). Universities and colleges are required to incorporate digital technologies into teaching and learning (Haneef, 2015). Using digital technologies to make both learning and teaching educationally productive must be cultivated over time (Arnseth & Hatlevik, 2010). An increasing reliance on digital technology necessitates the development of digital literacy skills to enable individual’s continued participation in the digital age (Antonio & Tuffley, 2015). Digital technologies refer to a subset of electronic technologies that include hardware and software utilized by both children and adolescents for educational, social, and recreational purposes (Ng, 2013a). The digital environment provides the abundance of multimedia and offers the new potential for using resources in the multiple modes of representation for teaching and learning (Matusiak, 2013). For example, learning with mobile devices is the need to develop the associated digital literacy in students (Ng, 2013b). Augmented by recent developments in user interfaces, the use of mobile devices is likely to broaden both user receptiveness and acceptance of video learning content in modern education (Abdous, Facer, & Yen, 2015). Over the past three decades, new digital technologies have rapidly proliferated and transformed the character of both public and interpersonal communications (Underwood & Parker, 2011). Among the technological developments in educational environments are technology applications that allow individuals to express themselves better, to recognize their own potential, and to develop themselves (Eristi, 2014). The expectation for responsive change to the changing student learning needs significantly comes in the form of educators’ attempts to transform K-12 classrooms with digital technology (Leneway, 2014). Digital curation appears to be an approach that helps frame an inquiry-based pedagogy geared toward student engagement and digital literacy comprehension (Mills, 2013). Digital technologies are mainly used to communicate in social networks or to play music and movies (Cartelli & Di Nuzzo, 2013). Technology mediates the way in which students around the world communicate, consume content, and create meaning (Botha, Vosloo, Kuner, & van den Berg, 2009). The close relationship between modern technology and humanity affects the way of learning and teaching (Incikabi, 2015). Digital reading and writing are affecting not only how K-12 students think about literacy, but also how teachers teach and how educators and researchers define and investigate literacy (Foley, Guzzetti, Agnello, & Lesley, 2014). Beyond developing reading and writing skills, it is necessary to emerge in the digital culture and master the different codes of different languages (Fantin, 2012). Community-based digital storytelling must take seriously the realities of the digital divide, and must consider the social, political, economic, and cultural contexts of communities and their specific relationship to digital technologies to ensure that educational communities have the effective access to 154

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the digital medium (Tharp & Hills, 2004). Preservice English teachers reflect the positive perceptions toward the use of digital storytelling (Aşık, 2016). Their reflections are significant in terms of the tools to be used for digital storytelling, the viewpoints regarding young learners, and the improvement in their technological pedagogical content knowledge (TPACK) (Aşık, 2016). TPACK is one of the technology integration models that focuses on the effective technology integration regarding the teacher’s technology integration competencies (Yurdakul, Odabasi, Sahin, & Coklar, 2013).

Overview of Digital Storytelling in Education Digital storytelling refers to the use of digital media to produce and disseminate stories (Davis & Foley, 2016). Digital storytelling is an innovative tool and serves as a promising activity facilitating learning and development in the post modern society (Nilsson, 2008). Digital storytelling includes a special emphasis on the group process and the experience of individuals sharing stories with each other. Digital storytelling combines the functions of visualizing and verbalizing, which are essential for language comprehension and thinking from the perspective of cognitive neuroscience (Kimura, 2012). Digital storytelling provides the interactive approach for establishing learner communities, engaging learners in digital literacy, and creating educational opportunities for the global audience interaction (Alameen, 2011). In recent years, digital storytelling models have helped teachers achieve the improved outcomes (Smeda, Dakich, & Sharda, 2014). Acquiring new literacies and learning how to integrate them into the classroom will take considerable time and resources. School must be prepared to invest both. Rather than focusing primarily on skills in technology and the development of high-quality media products, facilitators take care to build and further community connections through a process of reflecting on the stories in the classroom. Encouraging preservice teachers to reflect on their digital literacy stories provides them with the opportunity to connect their past experiences as literacy students with their present and future goal of becoming the digital literacy teachers (Hughes & Robertson, 2013). Preservice teachers can facilitate both mathematical problem-solving competences and pedagogical competences for applying digital storytelling in solving mathematical problems (Starčič, Cotic, Solomonides, & Volk, 2016). Digital storytelling has the potential to contribute to the formation of new knowledge, expand dialog, and promote the exchange of ideas. Digital storytelling is the important approach for the transformative learning (Christopher, 2011) and is effective in both early child education and in all areas of higher education (Wang & Zhan, 2012). Digital storytelling projects can be beneficial in the development of student media production skill sets (Spicer & Miller, 2014). To optimize opportunities for this development, teachers are encouraged to consider the required media components with relevant production tasks and skill sets while designing a digital storytelling assignment toward digital programs (Spicer & Miller, 2014). The process of digital storytelling requires that students explore the relationship between narrative, audio, and visual text, offering both storyteller and audience the multiple layers of meaning-making within each story. Research in online reading comprehension is informed by theoretical work in new literacies (Leu, Kinzer, Coiro, & Cammack, 2004). Additional reading comprehension skills are required to be a successful online reader (Coiro & Dobler, 2007). Little instruction in the new demands of online reading comprehension takes place in schools (Leu, 2006). Teachers will benefit from an understanding of new instructional models that take full advantage of the Internet, such as Internet Workshop (Leu, 2002), Internet Project (Leu, Leu, & Coiro, 2004), and inquiry models (Eagleton, Guinnee, & Langlais, 2003).

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In game-based learning (GBL) and in teaching using virtual worlds, educational designers creating the learning products and teachers providing them to students are both faced with a dualism between instruction and construction (Martens & Maciuszek, 2013). Educational computer games can motivate students to develop the basic competencies and encourage challenging themselves to be better and learn the additional knowledge related to the important tasks (Kasemsap, 2017). Most of the literature supports the notion that the experience of creating digital stories can have a positive impact on the students’ acquisition of literacy skills and their motivation to engage with the text (Tobin & Blanton, 2014). Howto manuals, project descriptions, and anecdotal comments are available on digital storytelling (Love, Cushing, Sullivan, & Brexa, 2011). This section is dealing with the overview of digital storytelling in education and the next section is dealing with the overview of digital literacy in education. Digital storytelling is the process of using story and digital media for personal expression. This includes expressive outlets, such as blogs, podcasts, and social media. Performing digital stories encourages youth to move beyond the role of consumer and into the role of producer of media, and thus of culture. This process helps build cultural capital among young people. At its core, digital storytelling invites youth to combine technology, performance, and personal experience to contribute to the educational world. Effective digital storytelling relies on creative, group facilitation skills, and an ability to structure a safe space for young people to share, listen to, and reflect on educational experiences toward improving digital literacy in education. Digital storytelling is utilized in the K-12 classroom to build community through personal exchange and reflection; support creativity, communication, and collaboration; foster connections between curriculum content (inside the classroom) and students’ lived experiences (outside the classroom); engage youth in research, writing, and reflection; support peer-to-peer teaching and learning; and to promote language skills, as well as visual and media literacy.

Overview of Digital Literacy in Education Literacy is a basic principle of any educational system (Heredero, 2012). Digital literacy refers to the ability to use digital technology to locate, evaluate, and create the information (Manzoor, 2016). Digital literacy represents the changes in the traditional views of literacy due to the impact of the Internet and technology tools (Pilgrim & Bledsoe, 2015). The 21st century literacy perspective can support the inclusive literacy practices that create the community of learners, utilize the digital tools to make the curriculum accessible, and link the academic goals with the real-world platforms (Price-Dennis, Holmes, & Smith, 2015). Blogs are recognized as the media-rich platforms in which learners operate with plural modes of literacy to construct educational meaning (O’Byrne & Murrell, 2014). Digital literacy has gone from a virtually non-existent entity to an essential skill set (Weisberg, 2016). Introducing digital literacy into classroom settings is an important task and is encouraged by both policymakers and educators (Merchant, 2009b). The digital literacy practices of many educational communities provide the new ways of technological and digital culture (Tan, Abdullah, & Saw, 2012). Regarding cultural transition, global society moves from a literary society to digital one, adopting the widespread use of advanced technologies, such as the Internet and mobile devices (Rivoltella, 2008). Digital literacy education requires each learner to grasp unfamiliar terminology, learn skills for unfamiliar tools, and apply complex ideas to digital interactions (Donohue & Kelly, 2016). With technology infused throughout the standards, teacher preparation programs are confronted with the challenge of priming preservice teachers to be the technologically literate educators ready to cultivate 156

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the educational curriculum for 21st century learners (Robinson, 2014). As technology becomes more and more accessible outside of the classroom, educators are challenged to reconsider the digital literacy skills required to be successfully literate (Wells & Lyons, 2016). Becoming literate in the 21st century means that one must decode and comprehend multimodal digital texts and be able to purposefully engage with these texts with others (Mills, 2014). A digitally literate person must possess a wide range of abilities necessary to collaborate and present information through multimedia (Pilgrim & Bledsoe, 2013). Digital literacy incorporates an ability to critically evaluate information, communicate concepts, and express ideas in a wide variety of media, all mediated by computers (Kennedy, 2008). Education institutions need to prepare their students and their own organizational processes to thrive in the age of digital knowledge practices (Littlejohn, Beetham, & McGill, 2012). The lack of knowledge of how to operate and utilize digital tools is a critical barrier to the enhancement of digital literacy (Lee, 2014). Teachers are confronted with not only developing curricula that focus on the important learning components, but also with incorporating curricula that highlight the technological skill sets students need to be the successful learners (Mallon & Gilstrap, 2014). The development of digital learning skills in school curricula challenges the designers of educational software (Utsi & Lowyck, 2009). Regarding digital literacy, many students gain transformative benefits from knowing how to perform various tasks on the Internet and computers (Lee, 2015). ICT training can motivate students to develop digital literacy, numeracy, and language skills (Jimoyiannis & Gravani, 2012). By using digital literacy skills, students are able to utilize the forms of literacy for non-text based instructional material increasing the options available for them to learn (Brown, 2016). In addition to incidental learning taking place in virtual environments, learning style and digital literacy seem to predict the incidental learning in some instances (Thomas & Boechler, 2016). The emergence of digital literacy skills to better fit the networked information economy presses higher education institutions (HEIs) to invest in the digitally rich environments that allow learning to be personalized, taking place in multiple locations and at time that suits both students and learners (Coutinho, 2016). In the higher education sector, technological resources have been devoted to the development of the virtual and game-based environments (Kennedy-Clark & Wheeler, 2014). Game technology can be successfully utilized to aid in the development of social skills among those with special needs (Kinsell, DaCosta, & Nasah, 2015). The digital society is characterized by an extensive utilization of digital technologies (Rodríguez-deDios & Igartua, 2016). Facing digital society means to accept the need of a digital literacy (Vasilescu, Epure, & Florea, 2013). It is important to provide the cognitive and emotional support for the risk-taking cycles of experimentation and trial-and-error process that is essential for learning to utilize the digital tools (Hobbs & Coiro, 2016). Teachers and students use many digital tools including computers, iPads, and videos, and demonstrate practices that characterize the 21st century skills, such as collaborative learning, technology literacy, and information literacy (Lawrence, 2016). Pedagogical decisions associated with the use of digital tools are an important part of the new literacies for 21st century learning. The utilization of digital tools requires educational leaders to consider what digital literacy means in the 21st century (Brown, 2014). Many digital tools offer the innovative approaches for writing instruction in K-12 settings (Brown, 2014). Handheld computers have the potential to have a tremendous impact on teaching and learning in the K-12 classroom (van ‘t Hooft, 2006). Laptops, personal digital assistants (PDAs), and cellular phones are the major components of digital literacy (Garland, 2006). The iPad-based curriculum can promote the critical digital literacy skills for students (Hilton & Canciello, 2013). 157

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Modern technology continues to revolutionize the teaching and learning landscape establishing the new possibilities to utilize the new digital media to digitally enhance the multiple literacies (Levitt & Piro, 2016). Enhanced user engagement and collaboration are recognized in terms of rich media experience, semantic interaction services, intelligent content processing, and management automation over the interoperable multiplatform environments (Matsiola, Dimoulas, Kalliris, & Veglis, 2015). The pedagogical value of technological video projects creates the opportunities for learners to interact with authentic materials in the real world by searching for relevant information, thus developing their own interpretation and producing the multimedia video (Huang, 2015). Preservice teachers indicate the transformative practices in two ways: firstly, through designing lessons that indicate that they will teach differently than the way that they were taught; and secondly, through utilizing digital literacy as a method of reflecting on their own social identities and working for the educational changes in both culture and society toward transforming the status quo (Hughes & Robertson, 2013). Concerning technology-rich teacher education programs, teacher educators engage preservice teachers in the world of diversity using technology (Thomas, 2016). Both the use of digital technology and the digital literacy pedagogy can help preservice teachers reflect on personal experiences to digitally develop both literacy teaching and learning practices that have the transformative elements (Robertson & Hughes, 2010).

FUTURE RESEARCH DIRECTIONS The classification of the extensive literature in the domains of digital storytelling and digital literacy will provide the potential opportunities for future research. A virtual classroom is a teaching and learning environment where participants can interact, communicate, discuss presentations, and engage with the learning resources while working in groups, all in an online setting. A course management system (CMS) is a set of tools that enables the teachers to create the online course content and post it on the Web 2.0 without having to handle hypertext markup language (HTML) or other programming languages. An examination of linkages among digital storytelling, digital literacy, virtual classroom, and CMS in education would seem to be viable for future research efforts.

CONCLUSION This chapter highlighted the overview of digital technologies; the overview of digital storytelling in education; and the overview of digital literacy in education. Digital storytelling and digital literacy are very important in modern education. With the advancement of digital tools, the practice of digital storytelling has become prevalent. Digital storytelling is used to improve student’s learning through multimedia in the modern classrooms. Digital storytelling is the expressive medium that can explain even the most intricate topics in depth, integrating it with the rest of the curriculum. Digital storytelling can be shared on each student’s device through the Internet and can make the classroom learning much more practical and easy in the modern learning environments. Digital literacy is the ability to use ICT to find, evaluate, create, and communicate information, requiring both cognitive and technical skills. Digital literacy leads to the great increases in information that can be conveniently accessed. Teachers must be cognizant of promoting digital literacy, putting the 158

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proper utilization of digital tools and technology right on par with reading and writing. Teachers and students must determine which tools are essential to their digital literacy tool kit. Embedding digital literacy lessons and social media across the curriculum can open up a wide variety of educational tools for teachers and students. Commitment to providing digital tools must come with a commitment to providing fidelity in instructional practice toward effective digital storytelling and digital literacy for teachers and students. Allowing students to find their own learning resources creates a true personalized learning environment. The developed digital literacy skills through learning and development programs provided by universities and colleges can afford students the ability to seek out and utilize knowledge resources that help them create a personal learning connection in the digital age. Developing digital storytelling and digital literacy has the potential to improve both teaching and learning performance in modern education.

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Martinovic, D., Freiman, V., Lekule, C., & Yang, Y. (2015). Social aspects of digital literacy. In M. Khosrow-Pour (Ed.), Encyclopedia of information science and technology (3rd ed., pp. 2158–2166). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-5888-2.ch209 Matsiola, M., Dimoulas, C. A., Kalliris, G., & Veglis, A. A. (2015). Augmenting user interaction experience through embedded multimodal media agents in social networks. In J. Sahlin (Ed.), Social media and the transformation of interaction in society (pp. 188–209). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/9781-4666-8556-7.ch010 Matthews-DeNatale, G. (2013). Digital story-making in support of student meaning-making. In E. Smyth & J. Volker (Eds.), Enhancing instruction with visual media: Utilizing video and lecture capture (pp. 192–203). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-3962-1.ch014 Matusiak, K. K. (2013). Image and multimedia resources in an academic environment: A qualitative study of students’ experiences and literacy practices. Journal of the American Society for Information Science and Technology, 64(8), 1577–1589. doi:10.1002/asi.22870 McAdams, L., & Gentry, J. (2014). The use of digital story expressions with adolescents to promote content area literacy. In D. Loveless, B. Griffith, M. Bérci, E. Ortlieb, & P. Sullivan (Eds.), Academic knowledge construction and multimodal curriculum development (pp. 243–255). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-4797-8.ch015 McGinnis, T. (2013). Creating a balanced literacy curriculum in the 21st century: Authentic integration of literacy 1.0 with literacy 2.0. In J. Whittingham, S. Huffman, W. Rickman, & C. Wiedmaier (Eds.), Technological tools for the literacy classroom (pp. 64–81). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/9781-4666-3974-4.ch005 Merchant, G. (2009a). Learning for the future: Emerging technologies and social participation. In L. Tan Wee Hin & R. Subramaniam (Eds.), Handbook of research on new media literacy at the K-12 level: Issues and challenges (pp. 1–13). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-60566-120-9.ch001 Merchant, G. (2009b). Literacy in virtual worlds. Journal of Research in Reading, 32(1), 38–56. doi:10.1111/j.1467-9817.2008.01380.x Mills, M. S. (2013). Facilitating multimodal literacy instruction through digital curation. In J. Whittingham, S. Huffman, W. Rickman, & C. Wiedmaier (Eds.), Technological tools for the literacy classroom (pp. 46–63). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-3974-4.ch004 Mills, M. S. (2014). Fostering collaboration and digital literacy with mobile technology. In Z. Yang, H. Yang, D. Wu, & S. Liu (Eds.), Transforming K-12 classrooms with digital technology (pp. 43–57). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-4538-7.ch003 Ng, W. (2013a). Empowering students to be scientifically literate through digital literacy. In Digital literacy: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications (pp. 1219–1239). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-1852-7.ch063 Ng, W. (2013b). Conceptualising mLearning literacy. International Journal of Mobile and Blended Learning, 5(1), 1–20. doi:10.4018/jmbl.2013010101

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Nilsson, M. E. (2008). Digital storytelling as a tool in education. In T. Hansson (Ed.), Handbook of research on digital information technologies: Innovations, methods, and ethical issues (pp. 131–145). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-59904-970-0.ch010 O’Byrne, B., & Murrell, S. (2014). Evaluating multimodal literacies in student blogs. British Journal of Educational Technology, 45(5), 926–940. doi:10.1111/bjet.12093 Ostashewski, N., & Reid, D. (2013). The iPad in the classroom: Three implementation cases highlighting pedagogical activities, integration issues, and teacher professional development strategies. In J. Keengwe (Ed.), Pedagogical applications and social effects of mobile technology integration (pp. 25–41). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-2985-1.ch002 Ottenbreit-Leftwich, A. T. (2012). The importance of using subject-specific technology uses to teach TPACK: A case study. In D. Polly, C. Mims, & K. Persichitte (Eds.), Developing technology-rich teacher education programs: Key issues (pp. 152–169). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-46660014-0.ch011 Pilgrim, J., & Bledsoe, C. (2013). The application of Web 2.0 tools for literacy education. In J. Whittingham, S. Huffman, W. Rickman, & C. Wiedmaier (Eds.), Technological tools for the literacy classroom (pp. 27–45). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-3974-4.ch003 Pilgrim, J., & Bledsoe, C. (2015). The role of technology in the transformation of twenty-first century literacy skills. In M. Khosrow-Pour (Ed.), Encyclopedia of information science and technology (3rd ed., pp. 4805–4813). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-5888-2.ch472 Price-Dennis, D., Holmes, K. A., & Smith, E. (2015). Exploring digital literacy practices in an inclusive classroom. The Reading Teacher, 69(2), 195–205. doi:10.1002/trtr.1398 Psomos, P., & Kordaki, M. (2012). Analysis of educational digital storytelling software using the “dimension star” model. International Journal of Knowledge Society Research, 3(4), 22–32. doi:10.4018/ jksr.2012100103 Ranieri, M., & Bruni, I. (2016). Create, transform, and share: Empowering creativity and self-expression through mobile learning. In D. Parsons (Ed.), Mobile and blended learning innovations for improved learning outcomes (pp. 159–179). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-5225-0359-0.ch009 Rivoltella, P. (2008). Digital literacy: Tools and methodologies for information society (pp. 1–368). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-59904-798-0.ch001 Robertson, L., & Hughes, J. (2010). The teachers they are becoming: Multiple literacies in teacher preservice. International Journal of Knowledge Society Research, 1(2), 38–49. doi:10.4018/jksr.2010040104 Robinson, H. M. (2014). Emergent digital literacy and mobile technology: Preparing technologically literate preservice teachers through a multisensory approach. In D. Loveless, B. Griffith, M. Bérci, E. Ortlieb, & P. Sullivan (Eds.), Academic knowledge construction and multimodal curriculum development (pp. 203–217). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-4797-8.ch012 Rodríguez-de-Dios, I., & Igartua, J. (2016). Skills of digital literacy to address the risks of interactive communication. Journal of Information Technology Research, 9(1), 54–64. doi:10.4018/JITR.2016010104

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Shelby-Caffey, C., Úbéda, E., & Jenkins, B. (2014). Digital storytelling revisited: An educator’s use of an innovative literacy practice. The Reading Teacher, 68(3), 191–199. doi:10.1002/trtr.1273 Sincar, M. (2013). An analysis of prospective teachers’ digital citizenship behaviour norms. In Digital literacy: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications (pp. 757–771). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-1852-7.ch039 Smed, J. (2014). Interactive storytelling: Approaches, applications, and aspirations. International Journal of Virtual Communities and Social Networking, 6(1), 22–34. doi:10.4018/ijvcsn.2014010102 Smeda, N., Dakich, E., & Sharda, N. (2014). Digital storytelling with Web 2.0 tools for collaborative learning. In Cyber behavior: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications (pp. 1089–1107). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-5942-1.ch056 Soleymani, E. (2015). Digital storytelling in an EFL class: A digital immigrant’s reflection and digital natives’ perceptions. In M. Rahimi (Ed.), Handbook of research on individual differences in computerassisted language learning (pp. 120–143). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-8519-2.ch006 Spicer, S., & Miller, C. (2014). An exploration of digital storytelling creation and media production skill sets in first year college students. International Journal of Cyber Behavior, Psychology and Learning, 4(1), 46–58. doi:10.4018/ijcbpl.2014010104 Starčič, A. I., Cotic, M., Solomonides, I., & Volk, M. (2016). Engaging preservice primary and preprimary school teachers in digital storytelling for the teaching and learning of mathematics. British Journal of Educational Technology, 47(1), 29–50. doi:10.1111/bjet.12253 Streeter, D. H. (2011). Using digital stories effectively to engage students. In C. Wankel & J. Law (Eds.), Streaming media delivery in higher education: Methods and outcomes (pp. 175–198). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-60960-800-2.ch010 Tan, K. E., Abdullah, M. N. L. Y., & Saw, K. G. (2012). Online activities of urban Malaysian adolescents: Report of a pilot study. Literacy, 46(1), 33–39. doi:10.1111/j.1741-4369.2009.00536.x Tay, L. Y., Lim, S. K., & Lim, C. P. (2011). Exploring alternative assessments to support digital storytelling for creative thinking in primary school classrooms. In A. Mesquita (Ed.), Technology for creativity and innovation: Tools, techniques and applications (pp. 268–284). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-60960-519-3.ch013 Tharp, K. W., & Hills, L. (2004). Digital storytelling: Culture, media and community. In S. Marshall, W. Taylor, & X. Yu (Eds.), Using community informatics to transform regions (pp. 37–51). Hershey, PA: Idea Group Publishing. doi:10.4018/978-1-59140-132-2.ch003 Thomas, U. (2016). iPad: Integrating positive, active, digital tools and behaviors in preservice teacher education courses. In Teacher education: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications (pp. 1230– 1254). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-5225-0164-0.ch059

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Thomas, W. W., & Boechler, P. M. (2016). Incidental learning in 3D virtual environments: Relationships to learning style, digital literacy and information display. In Mobile computing and wireless networks: Concepts, methodologies, tools, and applications (pp. 1500–1515). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-8751-6.ch066 Tobin, M. T., & Blanton, W. E. (2014). Reading-to-learn from subject matter texts: A digital storytelling circle approach. In R. Anderson & C. Mims (Eds.), Handbook of research on digital tools for writing instruction in K-12 settings (pp. 219–242). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-5982-7. ch011 Tsai, C., Shen, P., & Lin, R. (2015). Exploring the effects of student-centered project-based learning with initiation on students’ computing skills: A quasi-experimental study of digital storytelling. International Journal of Information and Communication Technology Education, 11(1), 27–43. doi:10.4018/ ijicte.2015010102 Underwood, C., & Parker, L. (2011). The tools at hand: Agency, industry and technological innovation in a distributed learning community. In M. Bowdon & R. Carpenter (Eds.), Higher education, emerging technologies, and community partnerships: Concepts, models and practices (pp. 300–313). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-60960-623-7.ch027 Utsi, S., & Lowyck, J. (2009). Digital literacy and the position of the end-user. In M. Khosrow-Pour (Ed.), Encyclopedia of information science and technology (2nd ed., pp. 1142–1146). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-60566-026-4.ch181 van ‘t Hooft, M. (2006). Tapping into digital literacy: Handheld computers in the K-12 classroom. In L. Tan Wee Hin & R. Subramaniam (Eds.), Handbook of research on literacy in technology at the K-12 level (pp. 287–307). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-59140-494-1.ch016 Vasilescu, R., Epure, M., & Florea, N. (2013). Digital literacy for effective communication in the new academic environment: The educational blogs. In B. Pătruţ, M. Pătruţ, & C. Cmeciu (Eds.), Social media and the new academic environment: Pedagogical challenges (pp. 368–390). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-2851-9.ch018 Voogt, J., Erstad, O., Dede, C., & Mishra, P. (2013). Challenges to learning and schooling in the digital networked world of the 21st century. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 29(5), 403–413. doi:10.1111/jcal.12029 Wake, D. G. (2013). Teacher candidates’ perceptions of technology used to support literacy practices. In J. Whittingham, S. Huffman, W. Rickman, & C. Wiedmaier (Eds.), Technological tools for the literacy classroom (pp. 220–242). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-3974-4.ch013 Wang, S., & Zhan, H. (2012). Enhancing teaching and learning with digital storytelling. In L. Tomei (Ed.), Advancing education with information communication technologies: Facilitating new trends (pp. 179–191). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-61350-468-0.ch015

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Wegmann, S. J. (2010). “Cross talk”: The connected stance of one successful student’s online interactions. In B. Olaniran (Ed.), Cases on successful e-learning practices in the developed and developing world: Methods for the global information economy (pp. 209–225). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/9781-60566-942-7.ch015 Weisberg, D. J. (2016). Methods and strategies in using digital literacy in media and the arts. In M. Yildiz & J. Keengwe (Eds.), Handbook of research on media literacy in the digital age (pp. 456–471). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-9667-9.ch022 Wells, M., & Lyons, D. (2016). Navigating 21st century multimodal textual environments: A case study of digital literacy. In J. Keengwe, J. Mbae, & G. Onchwari (Eds.), Handbook of research on global issues in next-generation teacher education (pp. 43–61). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-46669948-9.ch003 Werderich, D. E., & Manderino, M. (2014). The multimedia memoir: Leveraging multimodality to facilitate the teaching of narrative writing for preservice teachers. In R. Ferdig & K. Pytash (Eds.), Exploring multimodal composition and digital writing (pp. 316–330). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/9781-4666-4345-1.ch019 Wright, V. H. (2008). Digital storytelling in teacher education. In L. Tomei (Ed.), Encyclopedia of information technology curriculum integration (pp. 235–237). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/9781-59904-881-9.ch038 Yurdakul, I. K., Odabasi, H. F., Sahin, Y. L., & Coklar, A. N. (2013). A TPACK course for developing pre-service teachers’ technology integration competencies: From design and application to evaluation. In J. Keengwe (Ed.), Research perspectives and best practices in educational technology integration (pp. 242–269). Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-2988-2.ch013

ADDITIONAL READING Apperley, T., & Walsh, C. (2012). What digital games and literacy have in common: A heuristic for understanding pupils’ gaming literacy. Literacy, 46(3), 115–122. doi:10.1111/j.1741-4369.2012.00668.x Arrow, A. W., & Finch, B. T. (2013). Multimedia literacy practices in beginning classrooms and at home: The differences in practices and beliefs. Literacy, 47(3), 131–141. doi:10.1111/lit.12006 Boechler, P., Dragon, K., & Wasniewski, E. (2014). Digital literacy concepts and definitions: Implications for educational assessment and practice. International Journal of Digital Literacy and Digital Competence, 5(4), 1–18. doi:10.4018/ijdldc.2014100101 Bosman, J. P., & Strydom, S. (2016). Mobile technologies for learning: Exploring critical mobile learning literacies as enabler of graduateness in a South African research-led University. British Journal of Educational Technology, 47(3), 510–519. doi:10.1111/bjet.12441 Chisholm, J. S., & Trent, B. (2013). Digital storytelling in a place-based composition course. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 57(4), 307–318. doi:10.1002/jaal.244

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Ferro, E., Helbig, N. C., & Gil-Garcia, J. R. (2011). The role of IT literacy in defining digital divide policy needs. Government Information Quarterly, 28(1), 3–10. doi:10.1016/j.giq.2010.05.007 Gainer, J. (2012). Critical thinking: Foundational for digital literacies and democracy. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 56(1), 14–17. doi:10.1002/JAAL.00096 Gil-Flores, J., Torres-Gordillo, J. J., & Perera-Rodríguez, V. H. (2012). The role of online reader experience in explaining students’ performance in digital reading. Computers & Education, 59(2), 653–660. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2012.03.014 Greene, J. A., Yu, S. B., & Copeland, D. Z. (2014). Measuring critical components of digital literacy and their relationships with learning. Computers & Education, 76, 55–69. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2014.03.008 Hafner, C. A., Chik, A., & Jones, R. H. (2013). Engaging with digital literacies in TESOL. TESOL Quarterly, 47(4), 812–815. doi:10.1002/tesq.136 Hatlevik, O. E., Ottestad, G., & Throndsen, I. (2015). Predictors of digital competence in 7th grade: A multilevel analysis. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 31(3), 220–231. doi:10.1111/jcal.12065 Hess, M. E. (2014). A new culture of learning: Digital storytelling and faith formation. Dialog, 53(1), 12–22. doi:10.1111/dial.12084 Jones, R. H. (2013). Research methods in TESOL and digital literacies. TESOL Quarterly, 47(4), 843–848. doi:10.1002/tesq.137 Larson, L. C. (2012). It’s time to turn the digital page: Preservice teachers explore e-book reading. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 56(4), 280–290. doi:10.1002/JAAL.00141 Liu, C. C., Wu, L. Y., Chen, Z. M., Tsai, C. C., & Lin, H. M. (2014). The effect of story grammars on creative self-efficacy and digital storytelling. Journal of Computer Assisted Learning, 30(5), 450–464. doi:10.1111/jcal.12059 Madureira, A., Baken, N., & Bouwman, H. (2011). Value of digital information networks: A holonic framework. NETNOMICS: Economic Research and Electronic Networking, 12(1), 1–30. doi:10.1007/ s11066-011-9057-6 Marsh, J. (2011). Young children’s literacy practices in a virtual world: Establishing an online interaction order. Reading Research Quarterly, 46(2), 101–118. doi:10.1598/RRQ.46.2.1 McDonald, S., & Howell, J. (2012). Watching, creating and achieving: Creative technologies as a conduit for learning in the early years. British Journal of Educational Technology, 43(4), 641–651. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2011.01231.x McPake, J., Plowman, L., & Stephen, C. (2013). Pre-school children creating and communicating with digital technologies in the home. British Journal of Educational Technology, 44(3), 421–431. doi:10.1111/j.1467-8535.2012.01323.x Oliver, G., Chawner, B., & Liu, H. P. (2011). Implementing digital archives: Issues of trust. Archival Science, 11(3), 311–327. doi:10.1007/s10502-011-9167-9

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Park, E. Y., & Nam, S. J. (2014). An analysis of the digital literacy of people with disabilities in Korea: Verification of a moderating effect of gender, education and age. International Journal of Consumer Studies, 38(4), 404–411. doi:10.1111/ijcs.12107 Petrucco, C. (2013). Fostering digital literacy between schools and the local community: Using service learning and project-based learning as a conceptual framework. International Journal of Digital Literacy and Digital Competence, 4(3), 10–18. doi:10.4018/ijdldc.2013070102 Potter, W. J. (2013). Review of literature on media literacy. Social Compass, 7(6), 417–435. doi:10.1111/ soc4.12041 Scuotto, V., & Morellato, M. (2013). Entrepreneurial knowledge and digital competence: Keys for a success of student entrepreneurship. Journal of the Knowledge Economy, 4(3), 293–303. doi:10.1007/ s13132-013-0155-6 Stewart, K., & Gachago, D. (2016). Being human today: A digital storytelling pedagogy for transcontinental border crossing. British Journal of Educational Technology, 47(3), 528–542. doi:10.1111/bjet.12450 van Tryon, P. J. S. (2013). The instructional designer’s role in forming university-community partnerships in digital literacy. TechTrends, 57(1), 52–58. doi:10.1007/s11528-012-0631-z Worcester, L. (2012). Reframing digital storytelling as co-creative. IDS Bulletin, 43(5), 91–97. doi:10.1111/j.1759-5436.2012.00368.x

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Digital Literacy: The ability to find, evaluate, utilize, share, and create the content using information technology and the Internet. Digital Storytelling: The practice of using computer-based tools to tell the stories. Information Technology: The set of tools, processes, and associated equipment employed to collect, process, and present the information. Knowledge: The state of knowing about or being ​familiar with something. Learning: The activity of obtaining knowledge. Literacy: The knowledge of the particular subject. Storytelling: The art of telling stories. Technology: The utilization of scientific knowledge to solve the practical problems, especially in industry and commerce.

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Chapter 10

Lessons Learned Building an Online Degree Program Ottilie F. Austin University of Virginia, USA Gail M. Hunger University of Virginia, USA Julie J. Gray University of Virginia, USA

ABSTRACT Many universities and colleges are moving courses and master’s programs to online formats. The Masters of Reading program at the University of Virginia has a history of providing professional development to teachers in the Commonwealth through course work and the online Reading Degree program. This chapter will outline the growth of a state outreach master’s degree program as it developed courses online beginning in 1999 and moved to a fully online degree program. The authors will discuss the importance of using a sound instructional design model and taking a close look at course evaluations to examine the design of the course and the quality of instruction. This chapter will discuss the success of our design, lessons learned and some of the challenges faced.

INTRODUCTION We live in a time when working adults who want to pursue advanced degrees or more professional training are looking to online options. Professional schools and higher education institutions find that economic changes have a positive impact on overall enrollments and resonate closely with increasing demand for online courses (Allen & Seaman, 2008). There is widespread agreement that demands on time and need for flexibility will lead to more students selecting online courses. Many universities recognize this area of growth for professionals who work full time and are adult learners. The reading outreach program at the University of Virginia has observed these needs and the growth potential for over a decade. One way for the University of Virginia to expand its geographic reach and increase enrollment is through DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch010

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online education. The reading program area is experiencing an increase in enrollments and the need for multiple sections of online courses as a growing number of teachers apply for the reading degree or certificate programs and take courses for professional development. The reading program area at the University of Virginia has long recognized the importance of professional development courses for teachers in the field and the needs of these adult learners. Adults are characterized by maturity, self-confidence, autonomy, solid decision-making, and are generally more practical, multi-tasking, purposeful, self-directed, experienced, and less open-minded and receptive to change. All these traits affect motivation, as well as the ability to learn. (Pappas, 2013, n.p.) The majority of online students in the reading program area courses are teachers who hold full time jobs and take classes part time to earn a reading specialist certificate or a master’s degree. In addition to teaching full time, many of the teachers enrolled in courses have families and other life responsibilities. The availability of online courses makes it convenient for teachers to pursue professional development and further their educational aspirations. The teachers in these courses have high expectations to learn meaningful content and strategies that will help them better meet the needs of the students they teach. They tend to be self-directed learners who are good at establishing a schedule and goals for completing their weekly assignments. These adult learners are results-oriented and have high expectations to learn practical information to improve their classroom instruction. They appreciate the assignments that can be immediately implemented into daily classroom practice. Research shows that adult learners draw on their own experiences and have opinions that are often already formed by their experiences. Adult learners need to see tangible evidence that supports the principles and content that is presented in their courses. This is true of the teachers enrolled in our online courses. As adult learners who are full time teachers, our students appreciate the handson practice with material that they have success with in classroom use. According to Pappas (2013), it may take older adults more time to learn new content but they are better at integrating new information because of past experiences and more world knowledge. Because of this, in-service teachers often learn with much greater depth than do pre-service teachers. Consistent with the research on adult learners, the teachers in our online courses are motivated learners. They pursue course work and professional development because they want to, not because they have to. This is especially true in degree and certificate programs where an application for the program is required. The University of Virginia’s Reading Program has a history of state outreach that began in 1984. From 1984-2000, the state outreach program relied on adjuncts traveling to the university’s regional centers and to course sites at school divisions, and on satellite broadcasts of lectures from the university faculty to course sites. With the advent of online learning platforms in the late 1990’s, the reading education program moved into web-based course-design and offered the first online reading course in the spring of 2000. Driscoll (1994) states that instructional design is the deliberate arrangement of learning conditions to promote the attainment of some intended goal. Faculty in the reading outreach program have consistently worked with an instructional designer and a videographer to produce high quality face-to-face courses that were designed in a format that instructors could easily pick up and use. All teachers taking UVA reading courses whether for professional development or as part of a master’s degree should get the same type of high quality instruction that is offered on-Grounds at the university. The Dick and Carey (1978, 2000) instructional design model has been used with some modifications to support the practica173

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based assignments in courses. The Dick and Carey Model (1978, 2000) is based on a five step process for designing courses. The steps include: (1) Identify instructional goals, (2) Conduct an instructional analysis of course materials to match the goals, (3) Write performance objectives for each class topic, (4) Design instructional strategies/activities that will help the learners meet the objectives, and (5) Evaluate learning and how the goals are met. This design model was used in developing our face to face classes delivered throughout the Commonwealth of Virginia. When the face-to-face courses were transferred into the online format, many of the same types of interactions were modified for the online setting. Although the platforms used over the years changed from Jones Knowledge (1999-2004), to Blackboard (20042009), and finally to UVACollab (Sakai) Platform (2009-2016), the format and design of the courses has remained relatively constant. Students have experienced a consistently high quality experience in all of their reading education courses because of the consistent and systematic design of the courses.

INSTRUCTIONAL DESIGN MODEL AND DEVELOPMENT OF COURSES IN A PROGRAM The format of the online courses using the Dick and Carey model (1978, 2000) includes an overview page with class objectives, weekly readings, and weekly exercises that include video case studies and examples, video lectures and/or podcasts, all of which are discussed in the forums. The instructional design team worked to establish the desired outcomes from each class session and then selected the readings and designed exercises that would support student learning to meet those outcomes. The online classes that include video recorded lectures use a “flipped classroom” approach (Milman, 2012). This approach allows the instructor to create a video lecture that teaches the students key concepts, and then frees up valuable class time for more engaging (and often collaborative) activities facilitated by the instructor. In the online class, the activities are part of the weekly exercises in which students apply the concepts presented via lecture and the readings. Each week, students are expected to complete all of the weekly exercises although they have options for which discussion threads they participate in each week. Instructors create asynchronous conversations in the forum by calling on different students to lead discussions and set a schedule with deadlines for weekly interactions.

Assignments The weekly readings include articles and texts that reflect current theory and good instructional practices. Reading guides are provided to help students think through the content and make sure they don’t miss important points. The weekly exercises include case studies and activities that allow participants to apply what they are learning to real-life student and classroom examples. Students are encouraged to reflect on their own classrooms and teaching experiences and include these reflections in the weekly forum discussions. The design of the course along with instructor interactions seeks to nurture the reflective practitioner in each of the students. Good pedagogy includes valuable content in theory and practice, and an opportunity for teachers to make connections to their own classrooms. For students, the online environment is less intimidating, less prone to be dominated by a single participant and less bounded by convention (Redmon & Burger, 2004). It provides students the flexibility of time and place to reflect on the previous postings to the discussion thread (Anderson & Kanuka, 1997) and thus actively engage in a meaningful and intellectual experience. 174

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The online format allows for active learning since students must be prepared to participate in the forums. Active learning engages students in the learning process as they apply new information to case studies and engage in written discussions on topics (Prince, 2004). Our online students often comment on how much they learn from posting their written responses each week. Herrington, Reeves and Oliver (2000) state that although students may never meet face-to-face, these highly motivated learners will form strong bonds that encompass productive teamwork, in-depth collaboration, and even lasting friendships. Through intensive engagement in the collaborative solution of authentic problems, the learning outcomes accomplished by these learners will be of the highest order, including improved problem-solving abilities, enhanced communications skills, continuing intellectual curiosity, and robust mental models of complex processes inherent to the performance contexts in which their new learning will be applied. In our program writing is a learning tool; it is the place where we assimilate, analyze and synthesize what we know and think. The forums allow asynchronous small group discussions around a particular topic or case study. Throughout the course, students build on their understanding of the content. The reading courses center around the development of literacy and the components related to that development. Courses have a cycle of learning: (1) build foundational understandings, (2) apply new understandings, (3) evaluative feedback from peers and instructor, and (4) assimilate new understandings. The ultimate goal is to have students make connections between what they are learning in the courses and their own teaching practices.

Challenges of Clinical Courses Each year from 2000-2008 the reading outreach program distributed the online course design, putting a few courses each year into the online format. By 2013, all of the required reading courses were fully available online as well as a number of electives. In total, twelve courses for the reading program area are available online. The last two classes to be moved into the online format were the clinical practica courses. These courses include testing and tutoring components that were more challenging to move into an online format. Initially, two models were explored for these two high-touch courses. 1. A hybrid course (approximately 30 percent of course is online) with a practicum component that utilized video uploading and sharing; and 2. An asynchronous online class that used video-based case studies for assessment and companion sample lessons. Currently, the hybrid course is still being used, as well as a completely face-to-face model of supervised tutoring after school, and a completely online model that utilizes independent tutoring with some video uploading and sharing for peer coaching and instructor feedback. The reading program are faculty are currently experimenting and learning to improve the online format of the clinical practica courses. Leveraging technology to enhance the teaching of administering assessments and teaching intervention techniques has met with limited success. We began using video demonstrations with our first completely online practicum course in fall of 2012. Teachers would view videos of an instructor administering various assessments. The graduate students would then have the opportunity to score along with the instructor as they administered assessments with different students, and compared their results with that of the instructor. Finally, the graduate students would then view and score assessments from the video cases independently and would be graded on their ability to score and interpret the results. Lessons were then planned based on different student profiles as shown on video 175

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and written descriptions. No real-time assessments were administered nor was any tutoring taking place. Instruction was based on video case analysis. In theory, this may sound acceptable. However, compared with another group of graduate students who were actually assessing students and providing intervention weekly for several weeks, the scores from a common final exam of these two matched groups told a different story. The completely online group of teachers did not do as well on the final exam when having to describe how to administer assessments and in analyzing data. Their experiences had been limited to video analysis, and perhaps this is what negatively impacted their overall ability to explain the administration of various assessments and to analyze more critically the assessment results and plan effective instruction. The following year, the assignments for our online students were modified to include not only the video cases, but also application to their own students to assess and tutor, videotaping their interactions and lessons for peer and instructor feedback. This seems to be a better way to teach assessment and intervention, although it is much more time-intensive for both the graduate students and the instructors. There have also been technical issues with video-taping and uploading segments to our secure site. Those issues continue to persist every semester. One affordance of leveraging technology for the benefit of assessment and intervention by having students video themselves and uploading the video to a common secure site is the ability to provide opportunities for virtual peer observations and peer coaching. This has been a huge success in our program development, related to motivation and sharing of ideas and practicing coaching. It creates an authentic purpose for video-taping; students enjoy watching each other, sharing ideas, and learning how to give written feedback after observations of each other. The asynchronous nature of watching videos as opposed to observing in real time is that it provides the opportunity to view many others at work, as well as promoting self-reflection. This aspect has been beneficial to the overall practicum experiences, not only for our online students, but for our face-to-face students as well. They are able to watch each other apart from the common tutoring time, and are also now video-taping their lessons for self-reflection and sharing.

Quality Instruction The quality of the courses is managed through several measures: consistent design of the course (discussed above), student orientation, faculty training and check-in, exit slips and periodic anonymous feedback, and post-course surveys. Each class includes a student orientation module that was designed by one of the reading faculty members who works with the online courses. The module includes an overview of the course site demonstrated in a video recording and documents that explain the course design and course expectations. The same orientation module is included in all of the reading courses. Students have access to the orientation module and the course site one to two weeks before the class officially begins. All faculty who teach for the reading program have access to an online instructor training site. The training site was created by the same faculty member who designed the student orientation. The training site includes written documents and short video demonstrations that will help new faculty members get up to speed with the Sakai platform (UVACollab), the course structure, and learn how to manage an online course. The training site includes guidelines for communicating with students, how to establish an online community and how to create a learning community with students in the class. Instructor checklists are provided to give instructors a timeline for items that need to be tended to before the course starts (i.e., 176

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updating course dates, assignments, gradebook, etc.); throughout the semester (weekly announcements, responding to students, grading, etc.); and after the semester is over (i.e., course evaluations and posting final grades). New faculty members have the opportunity to shadow another instructor teaching the same course so that they can learn how to manage the course site and student interactions, communicate with students, and create a sense of community. Additionally, full time reading faculty members are in the course sites of the adjunct instructors. These faculty members are able to watch new instructors and offer support as needed. We recommend that our instructors use the anonymous feedback tool for weekly exit slips or for mid-semester checks to find out what is working well for students and what they are struggling with. These comments may be content or format related but they let instructors know how students are doing and if any adjustments need to be made to better support student learning.

Assessment Immediate, ongoing, and detail-oriented feedback assists the learner in better understanding the material and more effectively applying what they have learned. As a result, assessment methods are aligned clearly with the learning outcomes, skills required of the learner, and the academic field of study (Wittkopf, 2003). In order to monitor the quality of students’ learning experiences in the online classes, a two-part survey was designed to monitor the quality of the course content/design and instructor interactions with students. See Appendix 1 for the survey. Results are collected in Survey Monkey and can be accessed by faculty responsible for instructor training. The survey results are also useful for regional and professional accreditation procedures. The survey has been used in online courses for eight years. Results have revealed that students have been overwhelmingly satisfied with the design and content of the courses. They found the online course experience to be equal to or better than other face-to-face graduate level courses they had taken. Some of the common comments we have received from students include (See Appendix 2 for additional comments): Thank you again for such a wonderful course! I have learned so much about word study during this course with you and intend to take all that I have learned about it forward with me in my teaching career to help me continue to develop as a teacher and to help my future students develop! (Spring 2016) I have enjoyed this class more than any I have taken in such a long time. I have actually missed the discussions.) I learned so much. What a pleasure to take an online class that has been developed and is taught using sound pedagogical practices for online learning! (Spring 2016) The evaluation of instructors reveal which instructors needed more support and which ones were most involved with their classes. Over the years we find that the instructors who respond to students quickly, send out timely messages, show a regular presence in the forums and provide timely feedback on assignments are the ones who consistently have the strongest evaluations. Instructors who do not get high marks for the availability and participation in the class can easily improve with some coaching on responsive management, connecting with students and building community. According to a meta-analysis of online instruction (Bernard, Abrami, Lou, Borokhovski, 2004), well-designed online courses have been found to have equal outcomes and to be as effective as face-to-face courses. Instructors who provide regular and consistent communication with students and facilitate class discussions provide better class experiences for students. Students report having a strong sense of community in those classes. These 177

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instructors earn better evaluations than those who do not provide consistent communication and interactions with students. It is the combination of a strong class design and an effective instructor that make for the best online class experiences for students (Means, Toyama, Murphy, Bakia, and Jones, 2010).

Growth and Trends From 2000-2016, the reading program has observed steady growth of enrollments in the online courses. When the online courses were first offered, the intent was providing quality graduate level professional development courses to teachers throughout the state of Virginia, in rural and metropolitan areas. As a flagship state university, the University of Virginia has been committed to continuing education programs that serve the far reaches of the state, geographical sites such as Southwest Virginia, Southside Virginia, Northern Neck, and the Eastern Shore as well as greater metropolitan areas. Teachers in the most rural regions of the state would be able to access courses that would not have been available to them otherwise. Although the online courses provided access, in the early years, the reality was that many teachers and even many schools only had dial-up options. Teachers in remote parts of the state had to complete their online forum postings from school rather than at home. But by 2010, most areas in the state had strong connectivity to the internet. The online programs also serve teachers from more urban areas including Northern Virginia, Hampton Roads and Richmond. Teachers in those locales cite the convenience of being able to take classes from the comfort of their own home without having to battle traffic to get to one of the University operated regional centers as a main reason for electing to study online. Working teachers who have families and busy lives appreciate the convenience of and adaptability of the online format.

CONCLUSION: MOVING FORWARD/LOOKING AHEAD Challenges of an Online Program The move to the online format was done in an entrepreneurial fashion by one program area. The School of Continuing and Professional Studies supported the reading program area by providing release time for the faculty members to develop courses and supporting an instructional designer and videographermedia specialist to assist with the development of online courses. The development of online courses at the University of Virginia is more of a niche area rather than a primary focus of the university. Because of that, some of the changes in platforms and the move to the open source Sakai platform created a number of challenges for the faculty to overcome in their design work. Additionally, there are a number of platform tools that the faculty would like to be able to use to better support a clinical and practicum based model of instruction but the current platform does not support that type of work. The faculty would like to implement the use of e-portfolios and video-annotation for these clinical courses. Historically, the reading degree program is heavily weighted toward practicum-based courses, comprising 30 percent of the degree competencies. Moving toward an online degree brings the challenge of maintaining a commitment to this approach. Faculty are now evaluating Chalk and Wire to facilitate practicum learning and continue the forward advance of the online degree and coursework but there is still much to figure out in order to use the tool effectively for the clinical courses. Providing the faculty time to oversee the online courses and to keep these courses up-to-date requires a commitment from the department and the school. Faculty often feel they have to make a case for the release time necessary in order to manage multiple online courses, support adjunct instructors, and update

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content. Now that other program areas are beginning to move existing master’s degrees into the online format the department and the school is starting to recognize the concerns that the reading department has long stated. As others voice the same concerns our observations and needs are being validated. Our team sees the need for a person at the school level to oversee online programs, offer leadership, support and guidance for all of those who are working in the online format and for those who wish to move existing degrees and certificates into that format. At this point, each program area works on its own. Our faculty, often have conversations and share the work we have done with those who are interested. In the past year, the school has had more conversation about the need for online growth and support in faculty meetings and subgroup interest meetings. In the near future, we expect to see the establishment of an online/off-Grounds administrator and hopefully a support team to build and maintain online programs.

REFERENCES Allen, I. E., & Seaman, J. (2008). Staying the course: Online education in the United States, 2008. Sloan Consortium. Anderson, T., & Kanuka, H. (1997). On-line forums: New platforms for professional development and group collaboration. Journal of Computer-Mediated Communication, 3(3). Bernard, R. M., Abrami, P. C., Lou, Y., Borokhovski, E., Wade, A., Wozney, L., & Huang, B. et al. (2004). How does distance education compare with classroom instruction? A meta-analysis. Review of Educational Research, 74(3), 379–439. doi:10.3102/00346543074003379 Dick, W., & Carey, L. (2000). The Systematic Design of Instruction. Glenview, IL: Scott Foresman and Company. Driscoll, M. P. (1994). Psychology of learning for instruction. Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum. Herrington, J., Reeves, T. C., & Oliver, R. (2005). Online learning as information delivery: Digital myopia. Journal of Interactive Learning Research, 16(4), 353. Means, B., Toyama, Y., Murphy, R., Bakia, M., & Jones, K. (2010). Evaluation of evidence-based practices in online learning: A meta-analysis and review of learning studies. U.S. Department of Education, Office of Planning, Evaluation, and Policy Development. Milman, N. B. (2012). The flipped classroom strategy: What is it and how can it best be used? Distance Learning, 9(3), 85. Pappas, N. (2013) Eight important characteristics of adult learners. ELearning Industry. Retrieved from https://elearningindustry.com/8-important-characteristics-of-adult-learners Prince, M. (2004). Does active learning work? A review of the research. The Journal of Engineering Education, 93(3), 223–231. doi:10.1002/j.2168-9830.2004.tb00809.x Redmon, R., & Burger, M. (2004). Web CT discussion forums: Asynchronous group reflection of the student teaching experience’. Curriculum and Teaching Dialogue, 6(2), 157–166. Wittkopf, B. (2003). Recreating the credit course in an online environment. Reference and User Services Quarterly, 43(1), 18. 179

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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Asynchronous: Online activities that are completed at different times during the week as independent contributions to a collective class discussion. Flipped Classroom: Students watch a video lecture or podcast on their own, outside of class time, and then complete extension activities as a part of the class. Hybrid Courses: Courses which are taught partially face-to-face and partially online. In-Service Teachers: Teachers who currently work full time as educators and have their own classrooms. Instructional Design: A systematic method for designing courses to meet specific learning and performance objectives. Practica Assignments: Course assignments that require practical application of an assessment or instructional activity to be piloted with real students in the teacher’s classroom. Pre-Service Teachers: Teachers in training who have not yet entered the field. Sakai Platform: The Learning Management System used by the University of Virginia. It is an open source platform built by a consortium of universities.

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APPENDIX 1: ONLINE ASSESSMENT In order to evaluate the quality of our web courses we would appreciate your candid responses to the following survey. This evaluation will not take long and it will help us ensure the best on-line learning experience for future classes. Thank you for your assistance!

Evaluation: Course Content 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7.

Were the course objectives presented clearly in the course? Were the objectives met? Was the course format easy to follow? Were the weekly directions easy to follow? Were the weekly lectures helpful and did they fit with the course objectives? Did the course content meet your expectations and was it relevant to your professional needs? Was a sense of professional community established for this class or at least within groups in the class? 8. How did the quality of instruction in this course compare to other graduate level courses you have taken? 9. How did the workload in this course compare to other graduate level courses you have taken? 10. Do you have any additional comments about the course content?

Evaluation: Instructor 1. 2. 3. 4. 5.

Did the instructor introduce him/herself and provide the information you needed to get started? Did the announcements provide the directions and guidance you needed each week? Did the instructor effectively monitor and facilitate the discussions online each week? Did the instructor respond to your questions and concerns in a timely manner? Did the instructor provide feedback on your graded assignments in a timely fashion? (Responded within 7 days of assignment due date.) 6. Do you have any suggestions for the instructor? 7. What did you see as the overall strengths and weaknesses of the course?

APPENDIX 2: ADDITIONAL STUDENT COMMENTS Thank you again for such a wonderful course! I have learned so much about word study during this course with you and intend to take all that I have learned about it forward with me in my teaching career to help me continue to develop as a teacher and to help my future students develop! I have enjoyed this class more than any I have taken in such a long time. I have actually missed the discussions.:) I learned so much. What a pleasure to take an online class that has been developed and is taught using sound pedagogical practices for online learning!

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This being said, by the end of each online course I find myself much more comfortable putting my thoughts coherently on an empty forum page. I have really appreciated this specific course due to the way in which you ask us to post on forums, it seems very natural and much less contrived compared to other classes. I feel like I’m getting the most out of the forums from this class. There are specific goals each week, but the conversations occur very naturally. I appreciate being able to take the time to gather my thoughts and edit as needed without the pressure of speaking in front of a whole class. I also like the fact that I can read everyone’s responses and gather ideas and strategies to implement in my classroom. The forum allows everyone a chance to contribute in a way that might not happen in a regular classroom. To be honest, I was very nervous about starting the class and having all my peers read my thoughts. In a classroom setting, when people orally respond, it may not stick in everybody’s minds. I feel like if you misspeak or make a mistake, it is not written down for all to see over and over. I have really appreciated this online course environment because I now feel more comfortable sharing my honest thoughts on the readings, videos, and lectures. I know that I am, myself, a learner and everything that I say is not going to be correct. I also love reading others’ responses and opinions I think this class has helped me become a better writer, especially with backing up my opinion on a topic. I am looking forward to taking other online classes through Curry and seeing how else I will grow as a student. I am usually a very quiet person in my classes. I have to go through the process of sense making while listening to intellectual discourse. I very much appreciate writing my responses versus participating orally in class. First, it makes me stop to think about what I truly want to say. Also, if I need a minute to think, it is fine, because everyone isn’t looking at me to finish generating my thought. Second, it helps me be succinct in my point...I can’t go on and on in a written response, which is nice. Finally, by writing down my responses, I am able to go back to see everyone’s responses including my own so I don’t have to remember what was said. I would much rather participate in writing than orally. p.s. I think online classes are at least 10 x more work than face-to-face classes, but I learn so much!

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Creating Connected Educators with Online Portfolios Katie S. Dredger James Madison University, USA

Pamela Sullivan James Madison University, USA

Joy Myers James Madison University, USA

Douglas J. Loveless University of Auckland, New Zealand

ABSTRACT The authors explore ethical considerations, as well as logistical concerns of online portfolio creation by teacher candidates by examining how the Reading Faculty in one university instituted a cross-course online portfolio that followed students as they progressed through their Master’s degree in Teaching (MAT) program. This grassroots online portfolio initiative, while collegial, became a microcosm of technology use in education today where faculty attempted to provide students with a job-seeking tool while also encouraging reflection on their growth in the teaching profession. This tenuous line in an environment of hyper-standardization and accountability left unanswered questions. Faculty worked to transparently examine costs and benefits to stake-holders. This chapter describes how the online portfolio project developed, and offers vignettes that illustrate some of these issues faced by the teacher educators who implemented the project across their courses.

INTRODUCTION As teacher-training programs grapple with balancing goals of pragmatically producing a hireable workforce as well as creating reflective professionals who weave philosophy and theory into their practice, faculties of education are often turning to digital technologies to facilitate flexible and deep learning experiences. Peter O’Connor (2016) recently told a group of graduating teachers: you have not only learned to work in the world as it is, but also learned how to consider the world that could be so that you may reshape it into one that is more just and humane. Following this line of thinking, teacher-training programs should endeavor to train educators to teach in schools as they currently are, while also working to bring about a better education system through praxis. DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch011

Copyright © 2017, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.

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Unfortunately, the idealized goal of creating professionals that embody Dewey’s (1895)notion of a teacher1 and the pragmatic aim to provide teachers that school districts want to hire are at odds in the current era of neoliberal education. What do we do when our theoretical underpinnings lead us to teach in ways that are subversive and not endorsed by the Education Industrial Complex? Furthermore, the increasing demands for demonstrable learning outcomes in higher education lead even the teachers of teachers to internalize the increasingly hegemonic forces shaped by the Education Industrial Complex— forces that are so ingrained in public education that they become to be perceived as inherent to the system. Can online portfolios can offer a way to encourage critical reflection and nuanced evidence of learning, as well as meet the needs of providing teachers-in-training with a document that can later facilitate the job-finding process? As we consider this question, we must continue to remind ourselves as teacher educators that to narrowly define teacher training as merely a process in which untrained individuals gain the skills to teach situates teaching and teacher training as neoliberal tasks aimed at meeting market needs. Yes, teacher training is about getting a job upon completion, but it is also about becoming the kind of Deweyan teacher that can problematize, question, and critique the system. This teacher also encourages students to do the same. A public school teacher is a public servant; and in a democratic society, a teacher is employed by the democracy to defend democracy through engaging students and their families in the construction of knowledges that will enable democracy to continue and thrive. Though contrary to popular discourse around education, our mandate as teachers is not to train a compliant and efficient workforce, one that can be easily manipulated by demagogues out for their own interests. In this discussion of online portfolios, we attempt to avoid the pitfalls of efficiency and instrumental rationality that reinforce an industrial form of education. Instead we aim to embody the spirit of teaching espoused by Freire (1970) in which teachers and students “deal critically and creatively with reality and discover how to participate in the transformation of their world” (p. 34). If instead, education works to conform and systemize students, with teachers operating in the banking model, we can envision the day when Mitra’s (2010) worries of teachers being replaced by computers becomes realized. Of course, the Education Industrial Complex fosters just that. Robotic teachers are easier to control and program, they are cheaper, and they don’t subversively act to educate a population of creative, critical thinkers that will undermine the financial interests of those benefitting from the status quo. We believe online portfolios can offer students with a hypertextual document, much like Borges’ (1962) labyrinth, that allows them to explore their perceptions, interpretations, and embodiments of teaching. Such a self-exploration of teaching empowers teachers to creatively link their practice to theory rather than relying on systemized banks of curriculum and pedagogy. Online portfolios can make such epistemologies visible to others as theoretical writings are linked to practical plans and curriculum, both standardized and hidden. So we must take care not to turn online portfolios into a form of panopticon in a Foucaultian sense that links visibility to punishment (in terms of lower grades or some other mechanism). If unchecked, this relationship between visibility through digital technologies and punishment can ferret out subversive acts and co-opt the technologies that once promised a reshaping of the ways we teach and learn to reinforce the status quo. Thus, online portfolios that provide avenues for philosophical, theoretical, and practical reflections are fraught with ethical considerations, as well as logistical concerns. In this chapter, we will explore these considerations by examining how the Reading Faculty in one university instituted a cross-course online portfolio that followed students as they progressed through their teacher-training program. This grassroots online portfolio initiative, while collegial, became a microcosm of technology use in education today where faculty attempted to provide students with a job-seeking 184

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tool while also reflecting on their growth in the teaching profession in ways that complicate assumptions about that profession. This is a tenuous line to walk in an environment of hyper-standardization and distorted notions of accountability. So faculty had to continually ask who is benefitting from this project, what are the costs and even symbolic payments to all involved, and what ethics are at play? In this chapter, we describe how the online portfolio project developed, then provide a number of vignettes that illustrate some of these issues faced by the teacher educators who implemented the project across their courses. These issues include: • • • • • •

Negotiating purpose, Relating to an audience, Assessing in the students’ interests, Reflecting transparently on learning, Bridging the digital divide, Rewriting the “techie” identity.

As we explore these issues, we are confronted with the hegemony of current forms of education, and the influence of the Education Industrial Complex.

BACKGROUND A number of years ago, faculty in the reading program of a mid-sized, regional university responded to the call from professional organizations like the International Literacy Association (ILA) to integrate digital technologies into literacy courses for preservice teachers (Alvermann, 2013; Beach, 2012; Beach & Baker, 2011; Cervetti, Damico, & Pearson, 2006; Chai, Koh, & Tsai, 2010; Luke, 2000; Watson, 2012). A caveat: we recognize that unfortunately ILA and similar professional organizations for educators often legitimize actions of the Education Industrial Complex by endorsing, advertising, and selling merchandise that promotes the interests of the Education Industrial Complex. For example the Executive Director of ILA, Marcie Post (2013) called for teachers to “suspend their political or philosophical beliefs” and “implement what has been put in place [by federal and state legislatures]” (p. 4). And of course, her organization could sell teachers the materials to help do just that. We must be careful that calls for digital technologies are not also necessarily tied to large financial transactions, nor exploit the free labor of individuals contributing their knowledge to corporations who stand to gain. The goal of the faculty in organizing online portfolios was to address new literacies and model for students a sustainable way of adapting to the changing tools within the field of literacy (Coiro, Knoebel, Lankshear, & Leu, 2014) with an eye to avoiding the issues we mentioned above. The purpose of the student-maintained, online portfolio was thus threefold: 1. To have students connect their learning across three literacy courses. 2. To provide a place for professional reflection that empowered students as they refined their philosophical stances. 3. To model the infusion of new literacies instruction in an integrative framework that students could use within their own classrooms when they entered the teaching profession. (Coiro et al., 2014; Granberg, 2010; Kivunja, 2013; Koehler, & Mishra, 2009; Loveless, et al., 2014; Oakley et al., 2014; Parkes, Dredger, & Hicks, 2013).

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The students were the authors, and yet the conflicting audience and use encouraged the faculty to begin an earnest discussion about the forces at play in education today. The reading faculty partnered with the university’s Digital Communication Center to rework course syllabi in order to weave the online portfolio into the reading program in a holistic manner. Ironically, given the nature of this book, but reflective of the current state of education, the rubrics ultimately and pragmatically aligned with Interstate Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (InTASC) standards and focuses on professional language; copyright/privacy issues; navigation; readability or design; literacy components; and consistency. Lessig (2008) among others addresses the problems (in particular copyright) associated with these issues. As we moved forward with the initiative, we found ourselves considering the possibility that these standards in themselves fed the Education Industrial Complex and how to mitigate that influence in the adoption of emerging technological tools. It is intriguing to reflect on online portfolio issues that can emerge in light of fictionalized vignettes. In each section of this chapter, we present a story that is crafted from the conflation of one or more real experiences, shortened for impact, to shed light on situations that affect online portfolio adoption by a group of teacher educators. These discussions developed from program meetings, presentations at local, state, and national conferences, and in the literature on ways that a group can have meaningful examination of what matters when those outside of classroom teaching spaces may be excited by the bells, whistles, and ease of access of a tool without fully examining some of the implications of situations that can emerge. In this section, we examine audience, purpose, student privacy, transparent reflective growth, public relations, the digital divide, assessment, and the cost of public mistakes. These topics each begin with a question and a vignette from our practice. We conclude each section with an analytical reflection on these vignettes. From these vignettes and reflections, readers of this chapter can consider how portfolio initiatives such as this one can be co-opted for purposes beyond initial examination, and move with intention.

NEGOTIATING PURPOSE: WHY WOULD A STUDENT WANT TO CREATE AN ONLINE PORTFOLIO? Vignette At a faculty meeting, one professor in our program expressed that online portfolio creation is essential to building the skills to engage others when in the field. A classroom website can be a place of connection to parents, to other educators, and to students. We ask preservice teachers to create an online presence so then, when they are teachers, they are more comfortable in this communication space than they might have been had they not created an online portfolio. Another faculty member suggested that online portfolios are important places for students to have many ways to document artifacts of learning that show their growth and reflection in her courses. As such, when standards are mediated and agreed upon, it is the student’s responsibility to show that they have met them. Others see online portfolios as a way to show the scope and sequence of a program of study, so after meeting the requirements of the introductory course curriculum, students then can show how they have they mastered the curriculum of subsequent courses (Strudler & Wetzel, 2011; Trent & Shroff, 2013). The online portfolio serves as a way for the instructor and the student to document continued growth over multiple instructors and over time.

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Discussion In this vignette that describes a discussion in a faculty meeting, one group of stake-holders determined the purpose without meditating with students or outside entities in portfolio creation. As faculty, we may create online portfolios, in part, to create and leave a digital footprint, a record of where we have been, and as proof of academic engagement. When we mandate their creation, we can ask students to state the purpose of each online portfolio. To future employers, to parents, and to colleagues, a preservice teacher can show a record of learning. Just as preservice teachers have been asked to present portfolios in ringed binders as a record of individualized learning, the online portfolio amplifies this as it affords a place for teachers to link videos of teaching, wordles, social media feeds, blog links, and other realtime evidence of engagement. A key difference between the two types of portfolios is protection from intended audiences. When implementing online portfolio use, we have discussed agency when students own their portfolio’s url. In this case, students may choose to protect and even un-publish their work after completion of a course. Public online portfolios can demonstrate a scope and sequence of learning. Artifacts can be used by institutions to demonstrate work to accrediting bodies, especially in teacher education. Institutions with links to students’ online work can contact former students for feedback in order to improve educational experiences. There can be transparency in this process. This issue, in particular, is one that scholars of emerging literacies have grappled with, and is one that we can broach with our students (Kajder, 2010; Kress, 2007). Online portfolio creation requires a close look at audience and the ways that any student’s creation can be used to benefit others while actually having a cost in the risk that the student could make a public mistake in the presentation of their student work. These issues manifest themselves in discussions of student privacy, growth, identity, and assessment.

RELATING TO AN AUDIENCE: WHAT DO AUDIENCES AND AUTHORS GAIN FROM ONLINE PORTFOLIOS? Vignette A preservice teacher asked her instructor, “Should I call myself Ms. Jones, or Tess Jones? And I know we have to share our website address with you, but do we have to make it public?” The instructor encouraged Tess to situate herself as a future teacher in her portfolio by calling herself Ms. Jones and taking her first name off of the url and the online portfolio title. The question of sharing becomes one that the student has to grapple with. Portfolios hosted on public sites can be public, private, or semi-private, findable by link but not by search engine. Most choose to publish their site publicly but only with the exact link instead of by search engine.

Discussion When considering audience and the private lives of teachers, this is a question that has to be answered by each student. The reality becomes, however, that preservice teachers remain in a place between. They are students, looking to earn grades that place them on distinctive deans’ lists and scholarship applications. At the same time, they are future employees. Whether they have a full understanding of what it means to 187

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create an online presence is difficult to measure. While some online media users intuitively understand the nature of branding and presenting oneself online, it is important that we guide these understandings when requiring public scholarship. Early adulthood is the time when an online presence, i.e. branding, can begin for students. This comes with difficult questions of identity and socio-cultural norms and acceptability (Heath, 1986). New teachers must ask, “Who is the public me (as a teacher) as opposed to the social networking me (connected to family and friends)?” When is the online presence one that is acceptable to a possible audience, and when do we push rules of acceptability? As faculty members, do we advise students to include a picture of families or hobbies? Do we ask that pictures that privilege one demographic be excluded for fairness? Does the title “Mrs.” benefit a future teacher in job prospects? Would sharing a passionate video of a gaming hobby detract? In guiding young adults in the creation of an online professional presence, we want them to get a job and be employed but we are balancing the realities of a generally conservative profession. This is the crux of the issue. If we are to deconstruct the neoliberal agenda, how can we use our theoretical ideas and practice to both get a job, but also transform the status quo? Hobbes (1651) suggests that any empowered system will inherently protect the system and that it is that system’s responsibility to protect itself. We would like to position educators as change agents while also being employable in a system that works to avoid change. With this in mind, ideally we work to show how while questioning why and examining possible implications of technological innovations. Technological literacy goes beyond showing students where to point and click and the technicalities of reading and creating. It is often about being even hyper-aware of possible audiences, now and in the future (Alvermann, 2004; Kist, 2013; Lapp, Fisher, Frey, & Gonzalez, 2014). While we as teacher educators have much to gain in generally stable academic positions, our students, preservice teachers, have much to possibly lose in underestimating the possible effects of unintended audience in the development of online portfolios. Ultimately (and conversely) we admit that teacher educators have much to gain when endorsing the status quo. Giroux (2011) suggests that the academy is becoming: … corporatized and militarized, their governing structures are becoming more authoritarian, faculty are being devalued as public intellectuals, students are viewed as clients, academic fields are treated as economic domains for providing credentials, and work place skills, and academic freedom is under assault. (n.p) Faculty need to see the system as it is and protect students and the profession even in small ways. This may mean awareness of unintended audiences and looking for ways that a breach in student privacy could potentially harm a student as well.

STUDENT PRIVACY: WHAT SHOULD BE MADE PUBLIC? Vignette Taking a big breath, Rachel shared one day in class saying, “I am constantly sharing pictures online and updating my friends and family on everything I am doing, from weekend plans to a meal I just ate. Still I am freaked out about what to include on my online resume.” She went on to add, “You hear stories of crazy people using personal information in all sorts of bad ways but I want prospective employers to be able to reach me.”

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Discussion Privacy is one of the topics covered each semester in all of our courses in order to support students’ decision making regarding what to include in their online portfolios. However, even after well-meaning suggestions from the instructor, which included saying things such as, “Put your email on the resume and make sure it is an email you check regularly but do not include your phone number or address,” Rachel was left feeling unsure about the intersectionality of sharing, privacy and her future profession. The topic of privacy is a difficult one for students and their instructors to navigate at all levels of education. In higher education specifically, the desire to showcase one’s work online as evidence of teaching effectiveness is appealing to students as well as future employers because it saves paper, time, and makes shared access quick for both parties. Questions arise related to this process, such as will the documents always be private? If students upload their work to a particular platform such as Weebly, who owns the content? After teacher candidates graduate and begin teaching in schools, they will face similar dilemmas in terms of online privacy since many K-12 schools are moving to digital portfolios as a way to store and share student work. The decisions teachers make about how to assign, collect and assess student work has shifted as have the conversations they need to have with their students about privacy (McMeans, 2015; Roswell & Harwood, 2015; Simplicio, 2015). Today’s classroom teachers are hosting blogs, written by or about students, public calendars, and photo diaries - all written or maintained with the idea of sharing learning and events with those important to the children. However, the potential for mistakes in privacy settings, in descriptions of a child’s behavior or learning, or in the assessment of learning is tremendous and is largely relegated to an individual teacher’s judgement. Furthermore, privacy may be more important to those with introverted personalities, those with lifestyles outside of the socio-cultural norm, and those with a social justice bent toward supporting these communities. In reality, some individuals are risking a lot less when putting their lives in a public space.

AUTHORING ALTERNATE IDENTIES: HOW DO PROFESSIONALS CREATE A “BRANDED” SELF ONLINE? Vignette One early career teacher started following a teaching blog by “Cool Cat Teacher.” She didn’t know who or where Cool Cat Teacher taught, but she loved the classroom stories and the ways that she integrated innovative technology thoughtfully. Modeling Cool Cat Teacher, this preservice teacher asked the faculty instructor whether she could create a handle in her online portfolio, guarding her personal identity while engaging in rich online professional spaces.

DISCUSSION Technology can allow users to explore the fluidity of identity. Online personas can be simultaneously liberating and oppressive as our projection of these selves has local and global consequences. Recognizing that even a handle can’t fully protect privacy, this group started to encourage the use of handles because of the ways that they lend a layer of security in online spaces. This becomes effective modeling 189

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for teacher candidates as they move into the classroom as well. While most teacher candidates are young adults, the students will want to emulate them are even younger.

ASSESSING IN THE STUDENTS’ INTERESTS: HAVE WE PROBLEMATIZED THE HEGEMONY OF STANDARDS AND THEIR INFLUENCE ON ASSESSMENT? Vignette One of our faculty members only grades reflective practice, looking for instances of students’ statements that indicate possible changes that will be implemented in their future practice. Other faculty members use rubrics to grade online portfolios. These rubrics require students, for example, to have evidence of branding and a certain number of work samples uploaded (Appendix). We individually choose how to assess the online portfolios which allows us to determine if we want our assessments to be guided by standards or by what we personally or as a group value. The benefit of these various assessment techniques is as the students move through a scope and sequence of classes they experience different assessment systems. The drawback is a lack of continuity across the program often causing some confusion from students as they try to acclimate to one way of grading when the previous semester their portfolios were graded a different way.

Discussion The difference between standards determined by a governing agency or professional organization and our own either mandated or mediated standards has become a pivotal discussion in our implementation of the online portfolio initiative. Some faculty members at our institution and others feel strongly that standards from the Interstate Teacher Assessment and Support Consortium (InTASC) and the International Literacy Association (ILA) should be used as a guide to support and for students to reflect on in their online portfolios (Parkes et al., 2013). One standard, offered here as an example, from ILA is “Candidates create and engage their students in literacy practices that develop awareness, understanding, respect, and a valuing of differences in our society” (ILA, 2010). In an online portfolio, students might be asked to offer support and evidence that they have met this standard by uploading work samples and reflecting on them. This option of assessment offers places for different responses, reflective practice, and autonomy. In addition, it encourages students to take ownership and responsibility for the learning process as they choose work that they feel represents their achievement of a particular standard. We can recognize the current reality of accrediting institutions like CAEP, we should also aim to explore how these types of organizations further entrench the Education Industrial Complex. Rubrics can also value reflective practice, help determine the quality of artifacts included in the online portfolio and even be linked to standards. Rubrics certainly assist in grading a lot of portfolios in a much quicker fashion than looking rather subjectively at individual statements for evidence of reflective practice. However, at what cost? Is requiring students to jump through the hoops we set with our online portfolio rubrics really helping them develop into thoughtful users of technology? If, as Leu, et al (2014) posit, online reading or learning “typically occurs within a richly integrated and complex process of inquiry and problem solving” (p. 38), can this be amply demonstrated with a pre-set, teacher generated rubric? These issues are not new to portfolios, or to learning in general, and as with most answers in 190

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education, the solution most likely resides in a compromise of standards and reflection, with parts of the rubric originating from the teacher, and parts being generated by the students. Perhaps one day we will be able to find common ground that allows us to join the benefits of rubrics, standards and reflective practice. Regardless of what way faculty choose to assess online portfolios, it holds us accountable and assists the students’ understanding of whatever objectives and/or standards that we set.

PUBLIC NATURE OF DOCUMENTING GROWTH ONLINE: WHAT IS THE UNIVERSITY INSTRUCTOR’S ROLE IN PROTECTING STUDENT TEACHERS? Vignette A future teacher, a university student was critical of the cooperating teacher in her practicum placement. She was bored in an observation and perceived that the students were too. She put this critique in her online portfolio, one that she shared with human resources when on the job market. While she did not identify names, a future employer, a school principal bluntly explained that her critical response cost her a teaching position.

Discussion Many instructional faculty are painfully aware of the mistakes that young adults often make since we work with college students on a daily basis. Our patience with these mistakes may vary, but we must question the role we play when letting the students live and learn? In this vignette, the student felt strongly that what she saw while in practicum should be represented and choosing to do otherwise made her uncomfortable. Yet, she failed to see the bigger picture of how her choice might play out in the job search. Just as students struggle between the roles of future teacher/student, faculty also struggle between that of a parent figure and future colleague. While we applaud the student for her transparent reflective practice and the decistion to retain such documents prior to looking for a job, we also have the wisdom and the experience to recognize the realities of compromise. However, when is the right time to step in? Do we wait until we are asked for guidance or if we see something that we anticipate as going sideways do we speak up? In what ways do we conform to the neoliberal agenda or confront in ways that is seen as being subversive? When we risk our students’ possible job prospects in fighting the machine, we recognize that we do this from a safe place of employment.

REFLECTING TRANSPARENTLY ON LEARNING: HOW DO ONLINE PORTFOLIO INCREASE THE VULNERABILITY OF LEARNERS? Vignette As students worked on their online portfolios in class, Eric was overheard talking to another classmate about the work she did in a introductory education course compared to what she is now doing at the post-requisite course. “Ugh, I can’t believe I thought that was a good lesson,” she lamented. “It was the first one we did,” responded Sarah, “cut yourself some slack.” “Maybe,” said Erin, “but I can’t leave it my portfolio now that I know how to really write a lesson plan.”

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Discussion Although the idea of a portfolio showing growth and allowing students an opportunity to reflect on that growth, Erin is not alone in feeling vulnerable in a display of work that she now feels is less than stellar. Many students we work with do not seem to value the process the portfolio represents. Rather, they are focused on the final product. We ask ourselves what we need to do as educators to shift this thinking. It is certainly not something that begins at the university level. Students as young as first grade are developing writing portfolios, and yet, the conversations we have with our college students are very similar to ones we might have with school aged children. So if the conversations are the same, why has their thinking not changed over time? One has to wonder if the emphasis on the grade of the portfolio has anything to do with it. Although we are telling students to value the process, if we aren’t transparently privileging and assessing the process over the product, we are complicit in this status quo. Growth suggests a previous area of weakness. However, the students in our classes must learn that although documenting growth may indeed leave learners vulnerable to judgment that is something they will continue to grapple with the rest of their lives. As university educators, we must give students the opportunity to be vulnerable in a safe space. When we do this, students can honestly share big concerns with us such as fears related to whether or not they are ready to be teachers or smaller struggles such as dropping a prized assignment from their portfolio that may indicate growth in order to make room for a more comprehensive project that better reflects their skills as a future educator. We are the first of many mentors in these young people’s educational profession and it is necessary for us to share the value of transparent reflective growth not only for the portfolio, one of many assignments in their college career, but beyond that for their future success (Bokser, et al., 2016; Lewis, 2016; Lim, Lee, & Jia, 2016; McPherson, Wang, Hsu, & Tsuei, 2007). What we know is that what we share and what we privately reflect upon are often different things.

BRIDGING THE DIGITAL DIVIDE: HOW DO WE RECONCILE THE FACT THAT THERE ARE THOSE WHO HAVE RESOURCES FOR EMERGING TECHNOLOGIES AND THOSE WHO DO NOT? Vignette Joseph worked at the Verizon store, and when the cohort wanted to stage a group selfie, used his new Apple watch to click the shutter on the iPhone6S on a selfie stick. “I have to have the newest technology,” he explained to his peers. “How can you afford it?” asked another student. “I just can” he responded, and “I guess it matters to me. I’ve always had this stuff.”

Discussion One of the workshop days that were embedded into the course included Speed Tech Time, a spin on Speed Dating. Each student spent three minutes with another student, showing off ideas and helping with tech glitches. Joseph was the most popular Tech Time Date, guiding his peers through suggestions to make their online portfolios look more like his. On portfolio presentation day, his visuals were sleek and his links were embedded into each photograph. While his artifacts and reflective responses were no 192

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better than others, his presentation set him apart, showing the privilege that comes with a lifetime of the newest tech tools and the time he’d invested in tinkering with them. The gap between the haves and the have nots is perhaps more stark than it has been in the past and is magnified when technology implementation is the topic. Public schools in affluent areas may have engaged Parent Teacher Organizations that have raised thousands of dollars at bake sales to provide prekindergarten students with iPads. In other areas of the country, fundraisers, when they don’t fall flat, are used for bandages, paper for copiers, and healthy food. While it is an assumption that a tech savvy student is affluent, that is not always the case. The myth of the digital native is laden with assumptions about wealth and privilege, but at times the technological thinker has time to tinker, something that many traditionally privileged students with overscheduled calendars may not have had growing up. What teachers can consider is time in class for the tinkering, experimenting, and play in a low-stakes environment where they can explore while collaborating. What this means for an instructional designer is planning time for this with the tools available in the classroom. Strategies such as “speed sharing” and teachers serving as guides instead of centralized experts fall under the dispositions of New Literacies in the sense that with exponential knowledge currently available and constant new tools and innovations being developed, no one person can be the expert. Instead, groups learn and share together, narrowing the gap in classrooms today between those who call themselves tech savvy and those who do not (Beach, 2012; Dredger, Woods, Beach, & Sagstetter, 2013; O’Brien, Beach, & Scharber, 2007; Roswell, 2013). Related scholarship separates the user identity from the purpose of technical tools in the classroom and arming students with the critical consumerism of when and why to use any suggested tool (Renwick, 2015; Tan & Guo, 2009). Ultimately, when we think about access to technology perhaps being a social justice issue, time innovating needs to be prioritized IN the classroom. We know that marginalized students are more likely to be put in front of screens to drill, practice, and perform in a high stakes environment (Dolan, 2016). Classrooms teachers of all contents and grade levels can consciously flip this current practice by building classroom spaces where groups can collaborate, share, and innovate in space, low-stakes places and where the teacher expertise is not valued over the distributed expertise of the class members. As such, the teacher models the disposition of learning with new technology. It’s not money that necessarily determines this kind of technological wealth, but money and time can definitely be a factor.

REWRITING THE “TECHIE” IDENTITY: HOW DO WE CATEGORIZE OURSELVES AND OTHERS WHEN IT COMES TO TECHNOLOGY USE? Vignette “You don’t understand. I’m terrible at technology. It hates me.” These are sentiments that instructors hear from students anxious about engaging with emerging technologies. The teacher may respond with acceptance instead of developing a growth mindset when it comes to early adoption and application of tools. Another student opines, “people call me techie, but I don’t see myself that way. It is frustrating. I take the time to troubleshoot, often using google or visiting help forums. I figure it out, while others get frustrated, angry, or just quit. I’m happy to help others, but I wasn’t born knowing how to use technology. I haven’t watched all of the Star Wars movies.” How others label and stereotype is part of technology adoption, as is the real anxiety that many have in the face of a history of feeling unsuccessful with emerging tools. 193

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Discussion Resistance to or acceptance of an identity as “technology savvy” can be a hindrance when students and colleagues begin working with emerging technologies. In any classroom, students may come with low self-efficacy in their stance toward technology (Bandura, 1977). Thus, as teachers implementing emerging tools, we need to build the dispositions of play and experimentation instead of environments where students have to already know the information. While it reflects upon our earliest schooling that students learn to specialize and identify within specific groups, in the realm of technology implementation it is each teacher’s role to break down these perceptions. Just as we need to build resilience with math in girls in light of current research that shows that girls are more likely to identify as someone who is not good at math than boys, we need to break down identity-construction that labels learners as tech-savvy or not. While boys are more likely to see a difficult math problem as something to struggle with, girls are more likely to suggest that they do not fit into the mold of a mathematician (Bohannon, 2014). They are also less likely to collaborate with peers in math or science fields, further handicapping chances of success with projects or as overall practitioners (Benenson, Markovits, & Wrangham, 2014). This comparison to math and gender is relevant because of the ways in which teachers can frame a classroom around breaking down of learner-imposed identities. Situated learning theories posit gradual growth stemming from everyday activities with the expert scaffolding a novice (Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989; Vygotsky, 1978). However, if learners are resistant to the activities because they view themselves as less capable, or unable to benefit from the expert/novice relationship, then the loss of opportunity is magnified, this generation loses novices and the next generation loses experts. In this way, identity-construction becomes of primary importance to the learning process. While geek-culture includes the tropes of fifty years ago that stereotyped nerds as those who wore pocket-protectors and were bullied, techies today may be mis-catagorized as somehow inherently different than the populace. Breaking down these stereotypes is what education strives to do and is just as important in the areas of technology but cannot be disentangled from student identities and framing who they are and who they want to be. Using technology as a tool, seeing it as a tool and not a status symbol is an important step for educators. This requires a conscious effort in rejecting tools that are just flashy and sleek, and keeping the purpose of the education as the main point of any adopted learning tool. Again, it asks educators to prioritize the process over the product in technological literacies and online portfolio work, especially when we are learning with our students (Cope & Kalantzis, 2009; Gee, 2009; Kist, 2010; Knobel & Lankshear, 2007; Mueller, 2015). Using technology requires critical consumption and this can be fostered in teacher education programs. It is important to note as well, that preservice teachers worry about being judged on their own technology-know-how instead of their teaching skills. Technology has always been a piece of teaching, but its importance can be overemphasized. One seasoned colleague tells the story of struggling with her own technology in education courses, and how she eventually triumphed over the 8mm film projector that she was expected to set up and thread. She happily claims to have retained those skills to this very day, and offers to show them off to any students who are feeling overwhelmed with the portfolio project. While an exaggeration, it does make the point clear to students, the methods will change but the power technology can bring to the classroom is real, and the point of mastering it, whether they consider themselves to be technologically savvy or not, is to benefit your students by having the most power behind your instruction that is possible at that point in time.

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CONCLUSION So we question: who benefits from the creation of online portfolios as an assignment in a teacher training course? It is important to remember that faculty members in teacher education programs can benefit from online portfolio publication by students. A public online portfolio shows artifacts and reflective practice that can be studied and researched, and can be used to demonstrate to accrediting bodies that a program of study is producing. In addition, a portfolio can be used for formative and summative assessment, especially when artifacts included show growth over time. A student chooses what to include, and what to leave out, and demonstrates a record of learning. Faculty also benefit from a hands-on, active learning opportunity that students can see correlating with their future practices in their own career. Motivation for online assignments remains high, even for, or especially for, university students and faculty benefit in tangible ways from including such assignments in their courses, and yet the cost to a particular student can be high when they are transparent about their shortcomings, even when it shows reflective practice. A less tangible benefit to faculty is the possibility of scholarship in the area of technology. There are numerous outlets for scholarly papers, presentations, and even videos that are available to faculty as long as the topics align with the interest of the publisher. With so much news and resources being devoted to technology in education, it would remiss, if not hypocritical, not mention the opportunities such a focus brings to the career of a faculty member. At a university level, the benefits are somewhat more difficult to see, but are still present. The accrediting standards at most institutions have for years included a section on incorporating technology, so the inclusion of an activity such as online portfolios adds to the evidence that universities are innovating and sustaining what is known as best practice. At this particular juncture, the university is being asked to track their graduates, and develop measures to demonstrate the effect their graduates have on the field of education. A university-owned site with online portfolios, especially if they are updated to reflect the job a preservice teacher takes after graduation, can be a method utilized to track graduates in accordance with accrediting standards. This chapter is an example of the position we find ourselves as teacher educators, reflecting the neoliberal status quo, and our desire to transform education for liberation and democracy in a way that deconstructs the Education Industrial Complex. Can we do both? Maybe what we find is that it must be one or the other and thus online portfolios must inherently be subversive.

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Loveless, D. J., Griffith, B., Bérci, M. E., Ortlieb, E., & Sullivan, P. (2014). Academic knowledge construction and multimodal curriculum development. Hershey, PA: IGI Global. doi:10.4018/978-1-4666-4797-8 Luke, C. (2000). New literacies in teacher education. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 43(5), 424–435. McMeans, A. (2015). Incorporating social media in the classroom. Education, 135(3), 289–290. McPherson, S., Wang, S. K., Hsu, H. Y., & Tsuei, M. (2007). New literacies instruction in teacher education. TechTrends, 51(5), 24–31. doi:10.1007/s11528-007-0066-0 Mitra, S. (2010). The child-driven education. TED Talk. Retrieved from http://www.ted.com/talks/sugata_mitra_the_child_driven_education?language=en Mueller, R. (2015). Shifting from product to pedagogy: Investigating the use of e-portfolios as pedagogical practice. PRISM. University of Calgary. O’Connor, P.J. (2016, September 27). Graduation Address. University of Auckland. Oakley, G., Pegrum, M., & Johnston, S. (2014). Introducing e-portfolios to pre-service teachers as tools for reflection and growth: Lessons learnt. Asia-Pacific Journal of Teacher Education, 42(1), 36–50. do i:10.1080/1359866X.2013.854860 OBrien, D., Beach, R., & Scharber, C. (2007). Struggling middle schoolers: Engagement and literate competence in a reading writing intervention class. Reading Psychology, 28(1), 51–73. doi:10.1080/02702710601115463 Parkes, K.A., Dredger, K. S., & Hicks, D. (2013). ePortfolio as a measure of reflective practice. International Journal of ePortfolio, 3(2), 99-115. Post, M. C. (2013). Education leadership and policy. Reading Today, 31(2), 4. Renwick, M. (2015). 5 Myths about classroom technology: How do we integrate digital tools to truly enhance learning? ASCD. Rowsell, J. (2013). Working with multimodality: Rethinking literacy in a digital age. New York, NY: Routledge. Rowsell, J., & Harwood, D. (2015). Let It Go: Exploring the Image of the Child as a Producer, Consumer, and Inventor. Theory into Practice, 54(2), 136–146. doi:10.1080/00405841.2015.1010847 Simplicio, J. (2015). How to effectively use social media as in-class teaching tools. Reading Improvement, 52(4). Strudler, N., & Wetzel, K. (2011). Electronic portfolios in teacher education: Forging a middle ground. Journal of Research on Technology in Education, 44(2), 161–173. doi:10.1080/15391523.2011.10782584 Tan, L., & Guo, L. (2009). From print to critical multimedia literacy: One teachers foray into new literacies practices. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 53(4), 315–324. doi:10.1598/JAAL.53.4.5

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Trent, J., & Shroff, R. H. (2013). Technology, identity, and community: The role of electronic teaching portfolios in becoming a teacher. Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 22(1), 3–20. doi:10.1080/147 5939X.2012.720416 Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind and society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Watson, C. E. (2012, March). Current trends and future directions regarding ePortfolio research. Proceedings of Society for Information Technology & Teacher Education International Conference, 3968-3970.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Critical Pedagogy: Teaching that embodies the art and writings of scholars who question, who consider varied perspectives, and who advocate for those who may not have an audience. Education Industrial Complex: The vast network of forces that result in monetary profits for certain people and groups at the expense of authentic education. ePortfolio: Different than an online portfolio, and ePortfolio affords digital tools like video, audio, and multi-media, but does not assume a wide audience as one that is published online. Literacy: The practice of using text to communicate and create in varied space. New Literacies: Coined by Knobel & Lankshear (2007), this term encompasses the dispositions that users of emerging technologies engage in to collaborate, participate, share, experiment, and innovate. Online Portfolio: An online portfolio is designated as a collection of artifacts and professional reflections to demonstrate and share learning in online spaces to known and unknown audiences in regards to specific objectives. Teacher Education: For the purposes of this chapter, teacher education refers to higher education schooling that licenses K-12 teachers.

ENDNOTE

1

…the teacher should understand, and even be able to criticize, the general principles upon which the whole education system is formed and administered…not like a private soldier in an army, expected merely to obey, or like a cog in a wheel, expected merely to respond to and transmit external energy… [but] an intelligent medium of action.

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APPENDIX: DESCRIPTION AND RUBRIC OF ONLINE PORTFOLIO ASSIGNMENT Using the assistance of the Media Fellow, create a professional record of your learning. The portfolio should include assignments from class—the blog (response journal) entries; your read aloud lesson plan and reflection; your literacy lesson plan and reflection; and your author study presentation. The content and presentation of the portfolio should align with the rubric on Canvas. Use the rubric (Table 1) as a guide.

Table 1. Sample rubric for discussion Excellent

Average

Poor/Missing

Language

Professional language with vivid detail and correct grammar/ punctuation. Maximum points: 15

Conversational language but with correct grammar and punctuation. Maximum: 13

Informal/inappropriate language. Many errors with grammar and punctuation. Maximum: 12

Copyright/ Privacy

Emphasis on original images. Other images are cited accurately. Privacy of students maintained. Maximum: 15

Author successfully employs images and cites them correctly. Privacy of students is maintained. Maximum: 13

Author does not protect student identity, nor cite photographs from outside sources. Maximum: 12

Navigation

Clear purpose throughout site. Intuitive use of buttons linking to external and internal content. Maximum: 15

Some of the links are broken. Links mostly go to where the user expects. Maximum: 13

Links are broken. Navigation is confusing. User has difficulty navigating through site. Maximum: 12

Readability

Effective use of color, contrasts, headings, and engaging images. Appropriate space between text and images. Maximum: 15

Graphics enhance text. White space is adequate. Most titles and headings are clear. Colors do not distract from the content. Maximum: 13

Page feels cluttered. Headings are missing or unclear. Colors are distracting, lack of contrast make the text difficult to read. Maximum: 12

Documents

Necessary documents open as PDF. No unexpected downloads. Maximum: 15

Overuse of PDF documents rather than translating content into the website. Maximum: 13

Links download documents without warning. Links to documents are broken. Maximum: 12

Components

Includes 4 components (lesson plans, literacy prop box, children’s literature list, projects from other classes); About Me page; Contact Page, and Resume Maximum: 15

Includes 3 components (lesson plans, literacy prop box, children’s literature list, projects from other classes); About Me page; Contact Page, and Resume Maximum: 13

Less than 3 components included; Any or all of additional components missing (About Me page; Contact page, Resume Maximum: 12

Consistency

Clear, consistent layout throughout (including positioning, color, titles). Layout enhances the readability of content. Maximum: 10

Logical organization of pages and content. Maximum: 8 points

Unclear or confusing organization of pages and layout. Maximum: 6

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Implications for K-12 Education

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Chapter 12

Interactive Art Applications (I-Apps) in the Development of Younger Learners’ Creative Thinking Sylvia Vincent Stavridi Bibliotheca Alexandrina, Egypt

ABSTRACT Interactive art-based application is an informal approach to new creative learning methods, in which younger students are visually stimulated, and actively engaged to discover nature and grasp the original concept of core content areas in academic disciplines, such as science, mathematics and geometry from a broad perspective. This chapter tries to explore the means to further young children’s creative thinking in today’s techno-scientific world. But much of the analysis holds more generally for the intersection between visual art and interactive aesthetics, and how the exploration of visual art forms shapes new ways for primary school students to reform their creative practice to effectively interact in an increasingly smart setting. The chapter then concludes with a focus on the attribution of aesthetic value in integrating digital technologies with human ideas as an interactive tool to infuse immersive visual thinking into children’s fun learning apps.

INTRODUCTION Children at younger ages are living in a new technologically automated open access driven world where technology has become an integral part of their daily lives. As they become increasingly more reliant and immersed in technology, educational thinking has to remotely adjust to incorporate the best innovative practices in elementary education and promote the active involvement of younger learners in a technology-learning process that is imaginative and stimulating. Educational thinking has to cater for the ability to think in more broad, adventurous and clear ways, and to reason critically and innovatively. Thus, teachers are challenged to reconsider the features of efficient creative learning methods to furDOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch012

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 Interactive Art Applications (I-Apps) in the Development of Younger Learners’ Creative Thinking

ther skew the curriculum. Looking into visual art provides a context particularly well-suited for visual reasoning and cultivating thinking, because works of art demand thoughtful attention to discover what it has to show and say. Within this context, the continuous exploration of new ideas and newer artistic teaching methods reflects the creative thinking process to improve learning outcomes for children (Wright, 2010; Winner, Goldstein, & Vincent, 2013). The methodological combination of certain visual components combining arts with a variety of digital technologies can be carried out to extend knowledge and allow continuous exploration of new ideas. This in turn reinforces children’s creative thinking process (Wright, 2010; Winner et al, 2013; Sharp, 2001). However, art-based interactive applications do not seem to have been specifically developed for use by elementary school students. There is even less research regarding proper pedagogy related to the development of appropriate instructional design, especially for software applications that address the creation of visual material. The article approaches the subject for the way the aesthetics of interactive visual art is viewed and represented in the technological learning practices within the current national education system. Furthermore the article overviews art-based educational applications which should be brought into play activities at a classroom level to give younger learners the flexibility to display information in different ways to enhance their spontaneous levels of creativity. Initial materials were generated to comprise overviews of research into creative thinking, art aesthetic, and interactivity in order to create an intimate correspondence between specific visual art forms and academic language, in scientific contexts. After considerable debate on creativity and creative thinking, contemporary approach to creativity research has adopted a definition that creativity is the human process of generating ideas that are both unusual and significant (Mishra & Singh, 2011); whereas creative thinking, aka innovative, encompasses the acts of inquiring, exploring, imagining the outcome, taking risks, reflecting, and innovating that focuses on the nature of interactions between the human and medium rather than upon outcomes (Ross, 1989; Erik, Markus, Michael, & Greg, 2011). Hence an artful educator and teacher should pay great regard on the thinking process and how to engage younger learners emotionally, intellectually, and not to settle with one perspective to nourish their natural creativity and adaptability. According to Ross (1989), flexibility is the feature of a creative act; in turn the absence of any rules encourages children to move freely from one mode to another to envision most effectively and re-present what they know. Abbs (1989) believes that going beyond the context of the formal approaches offers an aesthetically pleasing space where children can persistently explore, experiment, and make connections in each aspect. In conclusion, creativity is a process that vitally includes creating originality and mentally envisioning the formation of images which can then guide actions and creative problem solving (Wilson, 2014). This creative process must take place in dynamically interactive ways as the creative thinking in the context of interactive art requires thinking clear, deep, and organized as well as broad and adventurous. While engaging, the physical visual art activities lack the immersive interactive creative technologies designed to increase concentration and engagement, to make it easier for them to grasp scientific concepts. Mishra (2012) states that computer technology as a comfortable and motivating medium does not replace the emphasis on creativity and critical thinking, but it re-emphasizes those skills to extend and refocus human creativity and critical thinking. Creative technology empowers the integration of 2D and 3D digital artworks media with human ideas. A stimulating conclusion is tearing down barriers and merging some of the advantages of traditional visual art activities, and developing and refining visual ideas with the visual, acoustic and haptic possibilities of digital interactive technologies.

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BACKGROUND: INTERACTIVE DIGITAL VISUAL ART APPLICATIONS AS DRIVING INFORMAL EDUCATIONAL REFORM At primary levels, visual arts are the most securely established artistic disciplines in elementary schools where the aesthetic value in the art gives each area of the curriculum its mutual drive (Taylor, 1992). Perkins (1994) and Austerlitz (2008) explicate that visual art is an essentially supportive context that can be associated with interactivity to: • • • • •

Multi-Sensory exposure. Instantaneous accessibility. Personal engagement; clearly connected with the process of producing an art work. Positive thinking dispositions; thinking constructively, broadly and adventurously. Wide-spectrum cognition (visual processing, analytical thinking, posing questions, testing hypotheses, verbal reasoning, and more).

Aesthetics perforates each form of visual art into specific areas of the school curriculum to evoke thoughts, feelings, and understandings of meaning. Anderson (2004) argues the need for teachers to articulate the potential of the arts to reform and inform the broader elementary curriculum so children become more open to new ideas and concepts. In relation to aesthetic considerations, each form of the visual arts can be seen and understood to give further insight and understanding with more opportunities to engage in related practical activities in academic teaching. With a focus on visual art as one of the major forms of arts, attention is drawn on an aesthetic that embraces more the creative mode than the arts, the conversion of an idea to an artifact. For example, design is coupled with technology to explore the role and implementation of specific forms of visual art and link their use to consolidate their place in promoting science and mathematics to stimulate imagination and develop creativity. Thus arts are the characteristic ways, in which aesthetic experiences, like creativity, shall be fostered throughout the curriculum (Abbs, 1989) and aesthetic experience is concerned with increasing conception awareness of line, form, design, and dynamics (Abbs, 1989; Eysenck, 1975). Visual art, science, mathematics, and technology are integrated activities shaped by aesthetic experiences, in which art is the representation and science the explanation (Taylor, 1992). Therefore, the arts feature more than servicing agencies for a science-driven curriculum (Morrison & Wallace, 2001), when science, mathematics, and arts creatively come together with other instructional activities and are properly taught through the support of technological tools, then learning becomes more enjoyable and promptly engages children in the full use of their senses. Visual art offers the best kind of unconstrained thinking and informal learning. When visual art training takes a particular art form to imagine the unimaginable, it’s more like an image or idea in minds brought into being. In fact, experiencing in appropriate forms of visual art gives a reasonable transfer for younger learners to develop their capacity for creative expressions, and become better at envisioning structures in forms and noticing continual changes in nature (Hetland, Winner, & Sheridan, 2013; Taylor, 1992). A qualitative survey was conducted to investigate the potential role of visual art in pedagogic interactivity as a goal to develop learners’ creativity at primary school levels by evoking critical thinking which is often conceived as indivisible from creative thinking. A common line was drawn between critical thinking associated with the perception of the interaction-based visual art and the developmental curve of creative thinking which seemed to arise to maximize creative outcomes (Carroll, 2013). Elder and Paul (2008) 204

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focused on the interrelationship between the two—intimate interplay between critical and creative as indivisible, integrated, and unitary. Recipients engaged in a stimulating learning active experience that includes frequent opportunities for reflection and expression learn to let their minds thoughtfully and thoroughly engage. They become critically creative/creatively critical thinkers and more focused and responsive to come to terms with the perceptual world. They eventually make creative and constructive use of previous knowledge of their imaginations that can be related to new information. For that reason, learning activities have to be based on artistically interactivity designed as aesthetically attractive to younger learners as an analytical, critical, or deconstructive model of interactivity to provide a great deal of interesting information to fit their needs and interests. Its translation into a digital medium will enable the introduction of new dimensions to the learning activities to insert art, science, mathematics and technology into a creative setting to blend artistic entertainment with instructive standards of learning.

INTERACTIVE VISUAL ART PRACTICES: AN INTEGRATED ELEMENT FOR EXPLORATION AND DISCOVERY A discussion based on a questionnaire, as a sample for this study, reflects the objective opinions of teachers and some professional development activities on the need for design-related activities embedding interactive art media that adopts well for brainstorming to create digital humanities activities. The survey inquired about specific aspects of their practices; visual art integration in scientific/academic curriculum, teaching with interactive digital technologies as informal learning aid, and the requirements that must be met to apply such creative practices to learners’ play activities. The participants were all residents in Alexandria, working in six private elementary schools in different areas of the city. A total of 12 science/math teachers; 6 art educators; and 4 IT specialists participated in the survey. Seven were interviewed individually, while the others responded by mails. A fact worth mentioning is that not all IT instructors are specialized in computer technology, and as such, the benefits of incorporating a wide variety of technological tools into the curriculum would be affected accordingly. The survey shows that one’s use of digital activities and interactive applications depends on whether they are available as a free trial or whether they are free/open access web-based applications (100%). 80% were more likely to agree that bringing in software and digital applications within the curriculum can be a great way to perform complex tasks in a simulated activity, transform an assignment, and add artistic practices outcomes to a range of disciplines. They noted based on the emerging trends, children who e-read become more responsive and creative in the interplay between academic content and digital interactive platforms; (smart desktops and tablet computers). 75% of teachers say that smart technologies establish a positive account of dynamic formative interventions. That the “doing” may open possibilities for the “seeing” and that interactive visual-based applications must be about exploring, drawing out hidden connections and symbolic ideas as a means of expressing and communicating ideas. Art educators observed that mathematic and scientific ideas are better expressed in dynamic visual arts than in static written or drawn forms. More than 90% stressed the effectiveness approach reflective learning environments on the learners’ creativivity, whereas the application of visualization-related skills in informal simulated learning is being considered. Digital applications with multimodal functions such as video/audio and aesthetic communicative functions allow younger learners to visualize the interactive, exploratory component of mathematics and architecture. The children by the age of six have a first draft understanding of forms and compositions and begin to organize drawings of the objects with 205

 Interactive Art Applications (I-Apps) in the Development of Younger Learners’ Creative Thinking

reference to perception. It can also be noted that at ages 7 and 10, children become more conventional and increasingly interested in experimenting with unusual forms, color combinations, different solutions, and compositional arrangements. They usually use their creative imagination and are normally able to envision a wider set of relationships around them. While getting older, at ages 10 and 12, youngsters’ observations increase, and they are more attentive to what is being shown in front of them, so much so that they abandon their imaginative and creative curiosity. The use of creative technology for arts instruction plays an integral role in exploration, knowledge, and discovery (Stavridi, 2015). Stavridi demonstrates that the dynamic visualization is the interactive exploratory component of academic subject matter (e.g. science, technology, and math), which is virtually experienced. Most respondents mentioned that the integration of visual art-applications programs is expected to work well because of the empowerment that younger learners’ evidence in exploring from the hub of not just a visual static reference, but also combined with dynamic content to more fully understand important relationships between forms and functions. Accordingly, the efficient interaction of mathematics with visual art in combination with smart technology offers a clear perspective on a particular subject and allows learners to conduct lab experiments to manipulate geometric shapes in two- and three-dimensional space, and to perform mathematical simulations in an artistically intelligent environment. Two math teachers explicated that learning through interactive stimulating environments advances much further into informal education which may lead into distraction. Moreover, they perceived education as something serious, where no time for interactive art-based activities which is still seen as the least important. By contrast, more than three quarter of respondents believed that a child could be simultaneously active while engaged in observing and reacting in the process of art related perception in interactive art. They argued that interactive form, content and process mood are an invaluable aid to engaging, analyzing, and responding practice. Younger learners shall be used to the idea of translating ideas into different forms as interactive visual arts put that aspect of the feeling into it. Most mentioned that the development of software applications should be developed jointly by software designers and IT specialists to create a proper interactive learning/ pedagogical platform. The results of the discussion are synthesized into the table below (Table 1) to easily locate specific visual art forms commonly integrated for visual art training in our national elementary curriculum: painting, drawing, sculpture, and architecture. Communicating ideas through these four art forms shows benefits to areas like science, which helps to understand both factual and theoretical frameworks (Stavridi, 2015). It then grows into deeply sensed experience through interactive practices which are more beneficial than others in terms of impact on critical thinking and visual perception skills. The table also aims to promote discussion for improving interactive digital activities associated with visual art. These forms contribute to a competent level of critical thinking, geometric reasoning, and a developed ability to mentally envision forms and observe skills closely that could transfer to the study of science and geometry, or be deployed in mathematics. (Table 1) Referring to the Authentic Intellectual Work (AIW) criteria for teaching, the visual arts are undoubtedly gaining ground as a way of making academic subjects’ learning more innovative in maximizing expectations of intellectual challenges for all learners to increase their interest in academic work. Tsai (2013) recognized that the creativity process involves skills such as creative and critical thinking, which in turn could contribute to produce better thinkers. Ross (1989) reported that the use of visual art for teaching in-depth understanding of all subjects in the academic curriculum as artistic practice is an indispensable tool for strengthening imaginative consciousness and developing creativity, awareness, understanding, and visual knowledge. However, Winner et al. (2013) concluded that children are 206

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Table 1. Visual art forms and creative-related skills Visual Art

Competencies

Painting

• Extends visual knowledge. • Shapes conceptual imageries. • Uses intuitive imagery.

• Analyzing • Envisioning and Observing • Exploring

Drawing

• Differentiates between real and imaginary. • Analyzes, communicates ideas and thoughts, and transforms them into new images. • Re-presents scientific theories.

• Observing • Imagining • Understanding

Sculpture

• Extends critical capabilities. • Develops skills in interpretation. • Addresses questions of value and quality

• Construction • Visualizing • Critically thinking

Architecture

• Unfolds a wide range of ideas. •Introduces concept of space and spatial visualization. •Improves geometric reasoning.

• Critical understanding • Visualizing • Creative thinking

natural learners and that integrating the arts improves academic performance and makes children more innovative thinkers has not yet been proven. Although Winner’s findings failed to support the view that creativity is causing academic achievement, it has been stressed on the educational value of learning as a process matter “to know and understand”. Such improvement in function is due to the effect of visual art experiences younger learners received. Undoubtedly, technologies integration gives a vital means of reaching younger learners in and through the arts as investigative methods (Laverick, 2014). Dezuanni, Dooley, Gattenhof, and Knight (2015) argued that digital technologies and interactive multimedia platforms adapt younger learners to new ways of doing things in creative expression, create virtual tools to generate ideas, and explore concepts. The “intermedia” of digital art provides the learners with platforms for open exploration of images and animations that allow them to explore more and to imagine their ideas in extensive ways. More studies (Youssef & Berry, 2012; Loveless, 2003) have investigated the effective interdisciplinary method aimed at improving the creative thinking skill of students in elementary schools based on the interaction of 2D and 3D visual art representations in a computational digital design context. They argued that the 3D construction involves not only the physical act of making, but also offers new ways of representing and interacting with information and extending further knowledge. Relying on our assumptions about how digital media applications based on visual art-related experiences, enhance student’s creativity, we conclude that visual art is a successful means by which younger learners can foster creative thinking. The use of layers in dynamic images stimulates the brain to refocus learners’ ability to reflect on their own thinking, and to provoke their creative thinking in a playful manner.

CREATIVE REFLECTIVE LEARNING AS A SOLUTION As we live today in a digitally connected world, 21st century children are more engaged in technology and digital activities than ever before. Incorporating digital creative approaches and dynamic representation of conceptual forms in academic subjects through visual art in primary schools’ learning activities will subtly enhance the user’s imagination in a play/learning manner. Integrating a variety of technologies into visual art via design pedagogy reactivates the brain to make mental changes for better understanding

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of complex information which has been abstracted and represented in visual representations (Friendly & Denis, 2001). The use of advanced gadget and interactive technology in media learning can allow teachers to target creativity and stimulate younger learners to envisage a whole range of possibilities to be able to determine central ideas, develop, and analyze them in a dynamic visual forms, such process involves thinking, visualizing and doing. Kozhevnikov, Chen and Blazhenkova (2013) implied that creativity involves a dynamic procedure of active generation and described technology as “tools of the mind” that had been developed to give the ability to immersive visualize what couldn’t be seen, reinforce capacity to discover nature, and grasp reality in the sense of theoretical comprehension. In this diverting process of creation in both the physical and digital worlds, children actively engaged in technology fully explore the multidimensional core concepts in the creative subjects, such as visual art in order to fully achieve higher level of understanding on more complex topics. Hence, the link between education in the arts and understanding the aesthetics of digital interactions, builds a new path towards creative learning methods that should be grounded in the arts to move beyond standardized academic content, or formal class teaching methods across all content areas and activities (Walker, Winner, Hetland, Simmons & Goldsmith, 2011). Lately, visual art initiatives supported by technological tools have been approached in elementary classroom teaching, and many studies have been investigating whether learning by visual arts in conjunction with interactive technologies might bridge conceptual boundaries between visual art and all other subjects in the academic primary curriculum such as science, mathematics and technology to acquire the creative thinking associated with flexible problem solving and innovative skills the children need so as to be imbued with something of the excitement and thrill of discovery. The interactive informal constructivist approach to learning academic content, together with multimedia technology of various kinds, entertainingly encourage children to be involved in planning investigations. When the still and moving visual imagery and aural components of communication are connected to the content, the media tend to support visual comprehension and creative learning. As freedom is the heart of creativeness, interactivity is the dialog that occurs between the brain and thinking/thoughts, in which investigation helps younger learners to think more critically about the content-area material much more than a textbook supplement. This in turn allows them to apply their learning beyond the classroom. It has been suggested that young children perform significantly above average in intellectual and creative areas when engaging in a larger range of interactive activities in which the artistic realm is more universally integrated, and as children are opened to distinctive opportunities for exploring the many intersections between affect, perception, and exploration. This kind of digital age educational environment requires teachers to be more aware of the subject matter they teach to work in partnership with subject specialists and art educators to identify the links and possibilities between visual arts and the rest of the curriculum to effectively employ visual thinking methods and strategies. The integration of the new use of digital technologies and visual arts activities with other scientific subject area in such interactive programs will have to be thought through as a contribution to the development of creativity in young children, in translating the invisible relation between forms into real world matter. In order to bring further confirmation to the result, the author has searched about 40 free, welldesigned “edu-tech” interactive web and desktop applications, aimed to suit age ranges between 6-12 year-olds that may run on Microsoft Windows, Apple, or Android. Only those interactive digital learning activities most relevant to this study are allocated to the learners for performance. Though, the variety of creative accessible education apps in the children’s apps market lengthened the selection process, the 208

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author has taken into account the inclusion of the four specific forms in visual art previously mentioned above (Table1), as well as the creative-related skills associated with the app’s activity. In addition to the feedback received from the questionnaire answered by the 20 participants, semistructured individual interviews were conducted with seven teachers and two designers who have previously participated in the survey. While putting in consideration the bellow questions, they were asked to experiment; review, select, and rated the activities in apps on the basis of academic concerns and their relevance to the learners’ interests, and ability to increase attention. The main concerns were how computer technologies can be useful in digitally altering visual artworks in creative ways, how to create design that provides convenience to younger learners to become more engaged in their compositions and nurture their imagination, and how interactive digital art based applications are to be developed successfully so that the layout design, the visual presentations, and the aesthetics of interaction are designed to encourage discovery play and refocus creativity? The lack of awareness in visual art interactivity is a barrier and that should be taking into consideration when evaluating the effectiveness of the application on the platforms with which they interacted, and what should be actually integrated. An overwhelming percentage of the teachers in our primary schools 80% considered the lack of ICT skills, time, and basic hardware skills. However, the evaluation of these interactive digital applications goes beyond traditional usability and attractiveness. The researcher presumed that interactivity can create complex involvement when interacting with media in which interactive features allow users to control media content and interface layout and become actively involved in accessing and processing incoming information in a variety of ways. For practicality purposes, the researcher excluded the ones which are complex in visual imagery, or use sophisticated symbolic representations in combination with accelerating interactivity that can prevent younger learners from reflecting on their own thinking or formalizing clear visual imagery. Jagodzinski (2009) signaled the extensive potential for aesthetic dimensions of visual art and noted that the sensuous level of perception affects younger learners’ ability to understand and may present an overwhelming amount of confusing data. Ferneding (2007) ascertained the importance to explore the meaning of understanding visual perception; instead of creating complex “linked views”, using the visibility aesthetic of technology that requires less interpretation to create interactions aimed at understanding the combinations of data. Due to the rapid changes in technology and media, the National Center on Universal Design for learning framework (UDL) (2012) advocates for effective design principles that respond to the needs of younger learners’: multiple means of representation, action, expression, and engagement. In this context the set of functions or features that should be implemented in the software are the affective dimensions through which the learners perceive ideas and concepts, interact and express knowledge, get engaged and stay motivated. Hence, it is important to clearly define the concept of interactivity and conceive the effects of interactivity on visual imagery, given that newer interfaces are constantly developed and introduced. The author reasons that multimedia design should be dynamically attractive enough to mentally simulate users, but should not be too distracting to prohibit more learning exploration outcomes to occur. Dynamic presentations create a reasonable balance between the learners’ prior knowledge and visual experiences to build new understanding (Bull, 2013). Mayer, Heiser, and Lonn (2001) recommended that designers must consider the importance of the simplicity of instruction which stimulates the exploration of the learners’ minds so that they become more aware of visual details and can more adequately distinguish refined visual stimuli. Digital applications with multimodal composition enable creativity; interactive educational multimedia composition, embedded illustrations, simulations, images or interactive graphics, animation, and/or video/audio. These can illustrate key concepts and make the 209

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static information more comprehensible for all learners to understand (Babiker, 2015). In correlation, incorporating dynamic graphics and more interactive content to balance visual representations, creates an immersive engagement and formalizes clear visual imagery that includes aesthetic and sensory appeal, attention and awareness. These applications, in turn, depend on the application platform (e.g., desktop, or mobile web app.) they run on to carry out all of the activities in the process, whereas interactive web-based platforms support the interaction between users and systems. As “children learn by doing”, digital learning must rely heavily on good instructional activities. Interactive art-centered design and the building of rich media applications create new insight and understanding that intersect art, science, mathematics and interactive media. According to this view to discern validity, further exploration on the effects of dynamic display on the design balance and the educator-developed learning activities was raised to supplement learning in a constructive mode that inspires creative thought. The evaluation moved more fully into exploring multiple perceptions and possibilities within this intelligent setting. Given enriching interactive educational experiences in the form of experimental works of art and interactive games, the following factors must be incorporated in order to create well-tempered educational applications that aspire towards visual art. These guided points can be used to help teachers in elementary schools aesthetically assess the effectiveness of interactive applications. 1. App’s General Features: It was previously indicated that “creating is doing”, so good instruction relies comprehensively on activity and visual aesthetic practices reflecting on the arts. Plain, interactive art-centered design with an educational focus on academic disciplines, e.g. science, math, and geometry, is preferable to expand the methodology to incorporate extra creative learning activities like drawing and coloring in which games are easy to navigate. The main feature is designed to provide new opportunities for learning performance to think abstractly and imagine possibilities based on the process of “Creating by Doing”, in other words to transform objects by creative action “ Making Art”. The learners are motivated to actively de-/re-construct ideas within representation. This re-examination of the tools of visual expression for comparing and constructing is a way of achieving creative ideas. The applications are designed to support either single or multiple-user interactions. Due to this powerful multiple means of engagement, the application can thereby allow children to become more engaged in their compositions. 2. App’s Content Material: The generated artworks express ideas and emotions that use graphic aids through computer-assisted artworks or artworks created with traditional and digitalized methods as an aid in science, technology, mathematics comprehension instruction. Interactive visual art incorporating more appropriate, accessible contents, tasks, goals, and challenges through the exploration of different combinations including, jigsaw puzzles, a mixture of animation, modeling, art direction, textures, etc. to be used to generate or communicate abstractions. Ideas are placed in new relationships to one another to cross the boundaries between disciplines. The focus is on the creation of artworks for critical reflection of ideas.Based on aesthetics, art criticism, and methods of inquiry from the visual arts disciplines to serve the curricular objectives for the different educational settings. The range of knowledge to be developed is actively decomposed and recomposed. 3. App’s Visual Features: The visible graphical interface and visual images are simple, clear, concise, interesting, exciting, and valuable. The design should be kept as simple and consistent as possible to expand the ability to mentally map the content. Most of the time, the display between dynamic and static information is applied in a combined form to increase concentration and engagement. 210

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The interconnected language is more primitive and more logical. Computer-generated graphics, data, and performative works use digital media that are adapted to fit their needs and interest. The design provides an opportunity to integrate spatial concepts aimed at improving the creative thinking skill based on the interaction of 2D and 3D visual representations. 3D construction involves not only the physical act of “doing”, but also the power to effectively interact as well as affect the software components. The overall design of applications offers support for multiple means of representations, of action and expression, and of engagement. 4. Audio Features: Some have voice-over instructions to guide children through different stages of game play. The sound effects and animated imagery are connected to the content to prevent distraction. 5. Aesthetics of Interaction: The design of the applications influences participation and interaction. Multimedia components, such as graphics, animations, and/or video/audio, and visual displays in presentations, such as imageries, are irrelevant or distorting they can be distracting and interfere with learners’ understanding of concepts in specific domains within a discipline. The software is designed to facilitate integration and creates a form of translation of science, mathematics into sets of visual languages; mathematics, science. Computer graphics are moving together to produce interactive aesthetic educational activities beyond the formal structure of a static context into interpretability of the interaction proposition of the intimate correspondence between visual art forms, and scientific contents, closely related as a responsive experience to represent conceptual forms in terms of process, insofar as what described between invisible and visible. Simple translation from outline concepts shifts to working interactive images. The linking bonds between traditional artworks activities and interactive art-based digital games is deeply aesthetic in nature, fused with drawing, painting, etc., enables fully concentration on the activity itself. 6. Apps’ Tasks: Discipline-based activities are chosen to suit the artistic inquiry modes of learners and are deployed in new ways that allow wide space for the imagination to stimulate creativity and imaginative application of knowledge. It is therefore important that the design of activities is established in consultation with special art educators in order to select activities that illustrate the same principle in a range of different contexts. Concepts, ideas and knowledge from the domain of pedagogy enter as input to illustrate abstract concepts. The activities on these apps serve three outcomes: 1. Visualizing and constructing mental images and concepts in math-science program to create in the mind of the observer perceptions and senses beyond what can be captured by the static shapes on papers. 2. Switching between the imagination and attentional control through visual art to increase creative and critical thinking, and further affect creativity. 3. Serving as unconstraint exercises of the imagination and are open to variable purposeful exploration.

RECOMMENDATIONS Interactive digital applications are rather limited or standardized to be applied to enhance literacy and language and what is means to younger learners’ creative thinking is not yet sufficient. It is beneficial 211

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to design interactive digital technologies applications that are aesthetically pleasing for younger learners with a balanced design in order to grasp meaning and express ideas and emotions; more inquiry, more engagement, and more thinking. Also more studies are needed to prove that learning by visual art in an interactive creative setting is essential for its transformative effect on a variety of factors including creative abilities.

CONCLUSION Innovative technology is not as important as the creative possibilities it provides in helping younger learners build and practice critical thinking skills, and to better comprehend and resolve complex problems. Technological innovations provide new possibilities for the application of visual art—to train the mind in the process of producing new ideas naturally to foster creative thinking, increase engagement, decrease destruction, and provoke creativity. However, it is often difficult for educators and teachers to choose high educational quality applications due to either the great variation in multimedia features that are incorporated or the lack of digital/media literacy awareness and technology-mediated instruction. They are not acquainted with the possibilities that define the choice of a given set of functions or features that should be implemented in the software. Although there is still much to be learned about how to design and construct educational software applications that offer effective interactive learning experiences and can be customized to support artbased learning for engaging in critical and creative thinking, graphical and software developers have to decide which multi-modal elements to incorporate into the software while carefully considering children’s age and exclusively include those which have significant aesthetic value. The aim of this chapter is to build know-how for the interactive digital media designers and digital content developers to investigate further into the edutainment-technology perspective on combining learning and visual art for future digital educational applications. The existing research has addressed the benefits in combining traditional and digital artworks in a dynamic digital/real world to engage younger learners in multiple modes of understanding concepts, as well as how to define developmentally appropriate interactive activities in the apps to be added to the curriculum. It is now possible to interact with new developments to more clearly locate the potential place of the dynamic nature of visual arts and its relevance to the creative act to be vividly illustrated in the capacity of younger learners to employ their creative ability to learn at heightened levels of involvement and originate new ideas. This overview study has led the author to the following conclusions: • • •

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Cross-arts implications are to be dynamically implemented and relevant to the whole curriculum to promote younger learners’ creativity across all subject areas to freely contribute to their own learning. Theories and concepts are best learnt in a dynamic context where teachers can relate ideas to practical implications so younger learners can creatively interact with. Looking into human emotions and needs is a fact that should be obvious to specialist designers. Software programmers ought to focus their effort on the effectiveness of interacting with new technologies and link them with the aesthetic field of making, presenting, responding and evaluating in order to communicate their design as clearly, concisely and graphically as possible. The interactive learning applications should give great consideration to the inclusion of artistic peda-

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•

gogical agent in their software applications because of their positive effects on younger learners’ imagination and unleashing creativity. Also Software must be designed to convey information and ideas and to facilitate full integration of visual art with other instructional activities to help younger learners determine central ideas or themes while improving their imagination. Both educators and teachers should be involved in programming and benefit from the insight of art educators to ensure that technological medium and pedagogical concepts have been interacted at a deep level.

REFERENCES Abbs, P. (1989). A is for aesthetic: Essays on creative and aesthetic education. London, UK: Falmer Press. Austerlitz, N. (2008). Unspoken interactions: Exploring the unspoken dimension of learning and teaching in creative subjects. London, UK: The Centre for Learning and Teaching in Art and Design. Babiker, M. (2015). For effective use of multimedia in education, teachers must develop their own educational multimedia applications. The Turkish Online Journal of Educational Technology, 4(4), 62-68. Retrieved April 10th, 2016, from https://www.researchgate.net/publication/282761669 Bull, P. (2013). Cognitive constructivist theory of multimedia: Designing teacher-made interactive digital. Creative Education, 4(09), 614–619. doi:10.4236/ce.2013.49088 Carroll, J. (2013). Creativity and rationale: Enhancing human experience by design. London, UK: Springer Verlag. doi:10.1007/978-1-4471-4111-2 Dezuanni, M., Dooley, K., Gattenhof, S., & Knight, L. (2015). IPads in the early years: Developing literacy and creativity. New York, NY: Routledge. Elder, L., & Paul, R. (2008). The thinker’s guide to the nature and functions of critical & creative thinking. San Francisco, CA: Foundation for Critical Thinking. Erik, D., Markus, B., Michael, G. P., & Greg, R. O. (2011). Rational versus intuitive problem solving: How thinking off the beaten path can stimulate creativity. Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, 5(1), 3–12. doi:10.1037/a0017698 Eysenck, H. J. (1975). Educational consequences of human inequality. London, UK: Dent. Ferneding, K. (2007). Understanding the message of the medium: Media technologies as an aesthetic. International Handbook of Research in Arts Education. Springer. Retrieved May 14th, 2016, from www. springer.com/gp/book/9781402029981 Friendly, M., & Dennis, D. (2001). Milestones in the history of thematic cartography, statistical graphics, and data visualization. Retrieved from http://www.math.yorku.ca/scs/gallery/milestone/milestone.pdf Hetland, L., Winner, S., & Sheridan, K. (2013). Studio thinking2: The real benefits of visual arts education. New York, NY: Teachers College Press.

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Jagodzinski, J. (2009). Beyond aesthetics: Returning force and truth to art and its education. Studies in Art Education, 50(4), 338–351. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/stable/40650346 Kozhevnikov, M., Chen, J. Y., & Blazhenkova, O. (2013). Creativity, visualization abilities, and visual cognitive style. The British Journal of Educational Psychology, 83(2), 196–209. doi:10.1111/bjep.12013 PMID:23692530 Laverick, D. (2014). Teaching with technology and interactive media to promote creativity and arts-based learning in young children. Educating the Young Child, 10, 61–75. Loveless, A. (2003). Creating spaces in the primary curriculum: ICT in creative subjects. Curriculum Journal, 14(1), 5–21. doi:10.1080/0958517032000055965 Mayer, R. E., Heiser, J., & Lonn, S. (2001). Cognitive constraints on multimedia learning: When presenting more material results in less understanding. Journal of Educational Psychology, 93(1), 187–198. RetrievedMay14th2016 doi:10.1037/0022-0663.93.1.187 Mishra, L. K., & Singh, A. P. (2010). Creative Behaviour Questionnaire: Assessing the Ability of Managers to Produce Creative Ideas. Journal of the Indian Academy of Applied Psychology, 36(1), 115–121. Retrieved from http://medind.nic.in/jak/t10/i1/jakt10i1p115.pdf Mishra, P. (2012). Rethinking technology & creativity in the 21st century: Crayons are the future. TechTrends, 56(5), 13–16. doi:10.1007/s11528-012-0594-0 Morrison, R. G., & Wallace, B. (2001). Imagery vividness, creativity and the visual arts. Journal of Mental Imagery, 25(3-4), 135–152. Retrieved from http://www.xunesis.org/publications/morrison%26wallace_ JMI_2001.pdf National Center on Universal Design for Learning. (2012). Universal design for learning guidelines. Retrieved April 10th, 2016 from http://www.udlcenter.org/aboutudl/udlguidelines Perkins, D. N. (1994). The intelligent eye: Learning to think by looking at art. Santa Monica, CA: J Paul Getty Trust. Ross, M. (1989). The claims of feeling: Readings in aesthetic education. Sussex, UK: The Falmer Press. Stavridi, S. (2015). The role of interactive visual art learning in development of young children’s creativity. Creative Education, 6(21). Taylor, R. (1992). The visual arts in education: Completing the circle. London, UK: The Falmer Press. Taylor, R., & Andrews, G. (1993). The arts in the primary school. London, UK: The Falmer Press. Tsai, K. C. (2013). Being a critical and creative thinker: A balanced thinking mode. Asian Journal of Humanities and Social Sciences, 1(2), 1–9. Retrieved from http://ajhss.org/pdfs-1/Being%20a%20Critical%20and%20Creative%20Thinker.....pdf Walker, C. M., Winner, E., Hetland, L., Simmons, S., & Goldsmith, L. (2011). Visual thinking: Art students have an advantage in geometric reasoning. Creative Education, 2(1), 22–26. doi:10.4236/ce.2011.21004 Wilson, A. (2014). Creativity in primary education. New York, NY: SAGE Publications Ltd.

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Winner, E., Goldstein, T., & Vincent, S. (2013). Art for art’s sake? The impact of arts education, educational research and innovation. OECD Publishing. Retrieved August 10th, 2015 from.10.1787/9789264180789-en Wright, S. (2010). Understanding creativity in early childhood. Mean-making and children’s drawings. London, UK: Sage.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Aesthetics: The philosophy and theory on nature, beauty, and exploration of the arts. Digital: Media created in particular ways to facilitate the re-examination of doing things for further understanding the new frontiers of value. Edutainment-Technology: The modern methodological potential of technology in learning, which is created on the concept of education and entertainment. ICT Skills: An abbreviation which stands for information and communication technology. These practical competences encompass the ability to effectively become more independent consumers of technology. Interactive Technologies: New digital tools that make content more immersive and improve learners’ engagement. Multimodal Composition: A term linked to multi-literacies that incorporate various modes of social meaning. Visual Art: A re-presentation of natural beauty beyond the power of reason and the physical boundaries of materials. The visual work of art is a means of communication to transfer meanings, thoughts, and emotions.

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Chapter 13

Technologies of Resistance: Facilitating Students’ 21st Century Thinking Using Material Tools Ann D. David University of the Incarnate Word, USA Annamary L. Consalvo The University of Texas at Tyler, USA

ABSTRACT A key paradox of education in the 21st century is the simultaneous focus on standards, accountability, and assessments, alongside the call for schools to prepare students for the ever-changing digital world. Educational technology is often touted as the solution to all the problems that supposedly plague education. Teachers, though, often resist educational technologies for good reason, but resistance can lead to student not having opportunities to engage in 21st century literacies. The authors propose that teachers can tap into material technologies—like sticky notes, chart paper, markers, scissors, and tape—and frame those multimodal compositions as 21st century thinking. The chapter offers extensive examples of material, multimodal student compositions, and descriptions of the instructional practices that supported their creation, all from middle and high school classrooms that were under heavy pressure to teach toward success on the state standardized test. The examples are organized around the concepts of self-representation, academic literacies, and artistic expression.

INTRODUCTION Almost 20 years into the 21st century, schools seem to focus on either test scores or educational technology. An odd pairing as no standardized test that the authors have seen would actually support and students in learning how to interact with and use digital technologies in purposeful ways. So the key paradox of education in the 21st century is the focus on standards, accountability, and the assessments that follow, with the simultaneous call for schools to prepare students for the changed/changing digital world. As a parent, Ann has some experience with this push to utilize educational technology in schools, DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch013

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as scholars, Ann and Anna have seen teachers leverage material tools to engage students in those elusive 21st century literacies without having to buy into the educational technology racket. In this chapter, the authors present a reflection of resistance that troubles the widespread use of Istation, a proprietary education technology targeted at kindergarten–eighth grade students, including Ann’s Then, the authors offer counter-examples of classroom practices that developed students’ 21st century literacies, while also resisting the insistence that the magic, metal boxes will fix all that ails education.

PARENTING WITH A PHD IN AN AGE OF EDUCATIONAL TECHNOLOGY Seesaw, iStation, and ABCya! are some of the proprietary digital technologies that my children used during their first-grade year (not a copy editing error, I have twins). I asked a lot of questions about these and other technologies. Their teachers could usually answer my questions about privacy, personal data, and purposefulness because they work in a school that supports thoughtful integration of digital technologies. Occasionally, when the answers to my questions lead me to wonder about the educational technology’s purposefulness, I respectfully resisted. But resistance is hard because there is great pressure—from other parents, administrators, districts, the public, the markets—to incorporate educational technology into the classroom. The state, feeling this pressure, finds ways of spending taxpayer money on digital technologies. Educational technology companies also spend a lot of money—on marketing alongside development—to make products that promise the moon. Students will learn to read! Students will explore 21st century technologies! Students will be prepared for the new economy! This pressure and the money create an atmosphere in which educational technology must be in the classroom for the classroom to be considered good. To step back from this chorus of voices and consider the larger purposes of the technology, I ask questions: Are my children creating things meaningful to them? Are they learning academic skills? And, are they participating in a community with these technologies? What follows is a short story of my experience with two different digital education technologies—Istation and Seesaw—that both of my children, in different classes, used. One I resisted, the other I embraced. The story explores my reasoning, which is necessarily informed by my knowledge of and scholarship around literacy. Istation—not affiliated with Apple, despite the name—is a proprietary, web-based educational program that fits well into the triumphal narrative of education technology. Istation’s use is widespread in Texas, where the state funds subscriptions for third through eighth graders. My children used the literacy portion of Istation three times a week for their first-grade year. The interface consists mostly of game-like modules where children combine letters to make words or match letters with sounds, generally practicing isolated literacy skills. Their teachers seemed to have resisted the technology by minimizing the student’s engagement with it. This theme of resistance to Istation was confirmed when speaking with teacher friends, most of whom also questioned Istation and reported that it ate up class time, while failing to support children in learning to read. And my anecdotal experience is supported by the findings from a legislative report on the use of Istation in Texas schools: “With few exceptions, no significant differences emerged among students from different groups in terms of relationships between use of Istation and STAAR-Reading performance” (Garland, Shields, Booth, Shaw, & Samii-Shore, 2015, p. 5). In this way, the program fails on two counts: my children were not creating anything, and they were not learning academic skills. While my children compared it to a videogame, this cycle of short games and tests did not seem particularly supportive of the complex thinking hailed as one of the key competencies for the 21st century 217

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world or economy (National Research Council, 2012). If anything, the activities they described struck me as mere replications, or perhaps amplifications (Hughes, 2005), of worksheets. Their word sorts-involving paper, glue, and scissors--furthered the same literacy goals and took much less infrastructure. Furthermore, my children wanted to show me their word sorts, and refused to recycle them. The word sorts were a form, admittedly limited, of creation—taking two pieces of paper, cutting the words out of one, and making neat columns of words on the other. With Istation, my children never reported making anything or sharing anything. Which means Istation fails the final test: it was not about community. In fact, Istation undermined the classroom culture because my children knew that Istation ranked them and their classmates, and that they got different—and usually harder—questions than their classmates. In thinking about how adaptive instruction—one of the hallmarks of the program—plays out in the classroom, it presents an electronic version of pigeons and bluebirds reading groups. Kids are highly sensitive to hierarchy (Gamoran, 1986) and mine certainly understood that Istation was one more way to see who was better or worse at reading (Johnston, 2004). This building of a hierarchy, even more than time spent staring at screens and not interacting with one another, got in the way of the children building a classroom community. Istation reinforced notions of competition, did not allow for cooperation, and explicitly told students that some of them were better than others. My exploration of the research available on the Istation website did nothing to assuage my unease with the technology. The studies available on the website are white papers and research reports. Only one peer-reviewed article was posted, which presents evidence that Istation scores are only predictive of State of Texas Academic Assessment of Readiness (STAAR) reading scores, the ability to read independently. Istation produces beautiful data charts, but there is no causal, or even correlational, link shown between working with Istation and gains in reading skill. Working with Istation seems to improve a student’s ability to work with Istation, if anything, and not a student’s ability to “read and understand a wide variety of literary and informational texts” (TEKS, 110.12.a.1). Finally, Istation’s Terms of Use and Privacy Policy it can “disclose Personally Identifiable Information” and that by using Istation, users grant it “irrevocable permission to use in perpetuity, without compensation and without restriction” any “Submission” (Istation Terms of Use, n.d.). Given my research and my children’s experience, Istation is an educational technology I resist. A reader may logically ask, given my story of Istation, if there is any educational technology I can support. And the answer to that is a resounding, “Yes!” Seesaw is a digital portfolio app and web interface that my children, their classmates, and their teachers used to collect artifacts—digital and paper-based. Seesaw became one way the teachers corralled all of the making that students were doing in the classroom with a whole range of tools, digital and material. Videos were shot by both the teachers and the students, who learned to shoot video and upload it to Seesaw as part of the process. One of my sons talked about deciding when to collect a video or artifact, and he knew the process for doing it independently. From their stories, and the portfolios I saw, my children had a lot of control over decisions around building their portfolios. They were making things while learning academic skills embedded in the projects they were digitally archiving. Once uploaded, I could comment on artifacts tagged with my child’s name. If multiple children were in a video or artifact, the teacher tagged them all and multiple parents could comment. This ability to comment across artifacts extended the classroom community to parents. Further, I could download those artifacts in commonly available--and often free--digital formats. Finally, Seesaw says in both its Terms of Use and Privacy Policy, “We don’t own the content you provide – students and their schools own all Student Data added to Seesaw” (Seesaw Terms of Use, 2016). Seesaw is a different kind of educational technology from Istation, and one whose use in the classroom I support. 218

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For many schools, districts, teachers, and even parents, Istation masquerades as great educational technology. It promises interactivity and the word “technology” is, after all, synonymous with metal boxes moving electrons around to display slick websites. Then these websites produce data in an easily printable form (they know their market), so that teachers and administrators can point to the data as an effort to “help” students who do not meet arbitrary scores on standardized reading assessments. It is, after all, very difficult to develop the expertise necessary to understand educational technology and use it well in a classroom to facilitate learning (Price & Kirkwood, 2014). Many educational professionals, and most parents, simply do not have the time or the foundational knowledge to invest in a more thorough exploration of educational technologies (Biesta, 2015). Further, and this is really the rub, educational technology is sold as using those metal boxes to solve all of the real and perceived challenges of teaching and learning (Tompsett, 2013). Many children do struggle to read in the ways and at the rate that state and national standards expect them to. Istation promises to fix that so-called problem, while affording a teacher, school, and district the ability to point to the program as a key piece of educational technology. But there is evidence that it does not support children’s reading development (Garland et al., 2015). And spending time in the Istation interface did not prepare my children for the new economy (Boyles, 2012), Web 2.0 (O’Reilly, 2005), or developing media literacy (Jenkins, Clinton, Purushotma, Robinson, & Weigel, 2006). In addition, from what I could tell, Istation was not in any way related to the supportive community of learners that their classrooms were. With this framing story of resisting and welcoming digital technologies into classrooms, the remainder of the chapter offers another way into this complex question of education technologies, teaching students to be literate in the 21st century, and building communities of learners. My coauthor, Anna, and I propose resisting uncritical acceptance of the metal box with all those electrons, instead recognizing the value that has always existed in other, older, material technologies. To this end, the chapter highlights material technologies that can support students in developing rich understandings of literacy, their own literacy practices across a range of technologies, and their skills, sufficiently sophisticated, to navigate through literate landscapes as yet unimagined.

THE LONG VIEW When considering the intersection of literacy and educational technology, literacies equated with magic boxes are no different from other literacies in that all are socially constructed (Vygotsky, 1978; Wertsch, 1991). Practices and tools associated with screens are unquestionably part of 21st century society and culture, regardless of the tendency to alternately venerate and demonize them. Importantly, though, 21st century texts composed with the assistance of digital devices and hailed as new, have grown out of literacy practices and tools that did not involve electricity. Cave paintings are first evidence of multimodal texts. Literacies have always been social: Cicero’s letters, Roman walls, or Revolutionary War pamphlets, like Common Sense (Standage, 2013). So, the deluge of education technology’s tools and practices washing over today’s schools are, also and always, embedded in the society and culture. Lest it is forgotten: “the devices are only a necessary precursor to the real story” (Bomer, Zoch, David, & Ok, 2010, p. 11) and that the real story is that of teachers and students engaging in meaningful literacy practices in their school contexts: creating texts, learning, and building community.

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Simply telling teachers to learn to code, or promising them that the newest app will fix their test scores and students, reinforces the idea that students, teachers, and schools are lacking some easily learned, 21st Century skill. These pitches to adopt the newest ed tech are divorced from situated school contexts (Knight, 2009). Those contexts are a complex mix of histories of people and institutions, the affective realities of everyone involved (Day & Hong, 2016), and situational facts of existence, like slashed budgets and fixation on test scores (Saltman, 2012). Seemingly innocuous are the insidious time eaters like administrative, social, and bureaucratic tasks that are trickled down to teachers, taking time away from students. Never mind the technological time wasters that tech champions rarely address, like the 20+ minutes taken out of a 60-minute period to make sure everyone is logged into an ancient computer. In addition, a consumerist ethos within education (Harrison & Risler, 2015), fueled by global fast capitalism (Gee & Lankshear, 1995), is part of the same existential threat facing society as a whole (Bauer, Wilkie, Kim, & Bodenhausen, 2012). With so many educational technologies, teachers “are transformed into data entry clerical workers by the [various] platform[s], becoming responsible for data collection in the classroom that will ultimately contribute to big datasets that could be analyzed and then ‘sold’ back to school leaders as premium features” (Williamson, 2016). Though these issues are not new. Oversold and Underused (Cuban, 2001), a discussion of the spotty, uncritical, and failed adoption of panacea-promising digital technologies, was published 15 years ago. Given all of these actual realities of teachers and students in classrooms, it is unsurprising that the mention of educational technology is met with resistance of the “good sense” (Gitlin & Margonis, 1995) variety.

Resistance Anyone who has interacted with digital technologies within educational context can understand resistance as a valid response. These problems now include invasion of privacy, unreliability, ownership, and expense, to name but four. Resistance through literate practice is familiar to youth: graffiti and tagging (MacGillivray & Curwen, 2007), tattooing (Kirkland, 2009), or going off script during discussion (Gutierrez, Rymes, & Larson, 1995). And, while learning can happen regardless of the learner’s openness (Alexander, Schallert, & Reynolds, 2009), resistance can also shut down instructional conversations (Consalvo & Maloch, 2015). Student resistance pushes back against boredom (Intrator & Kunzman, 2009) or lack of adequate and appropriate instructional and relational support (Finders, 2005; Greenleaf & Hinchman 2009). Teachers may resist for reasons of common or good sense because of the high degree of emotional labor (Hargreaves, 2001) the profession requires. And, they may also resist for other, complex reasons that can include senses of risk, loss, aversion, and more (Tagg, 2012). Thornburg and Mungai (2011) observed that “most research has obscured the political wisdom of those teachers who resist reform” (p. 207). An administrative fiat to integrate technology, for example, ignores the capital teachers can bring to a conversation about school change. “Sometimes, though, resistance is not about who is right or wrong. Sometimes it is about needing help and not knowing how to ask for it” (Vetter et al., 2012, p. 118). If resistance to digital technologies is reframed as teachers and students asking for help it is clear that offering more hardware or training--which has been the default solution for well-over a decade--does not offer the help the teachers and students need. At the same time, resistance alone does not support teachers and students in learning what they need to know about literacy to thrive in the 21st century new media landscape, defined below.

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Multimodality and 21st Century Thinking Literacy is multimodal, though not necessarily, and certainly not always, screen-based. Why is a multimodal understanding of literacy essential in the 21st Century? Because “new social and material conditions…place emergent demands on the communicative repertoires of people to participate in the global economy as well as on the construction of knowledge and the performativity of self” (Jewett, 2008, p. 243). So, by taking a multimodal stance toward language, teachers can “understand and connect with students’ literacy worlds and mediascapes and…build on these to develop students’ explicit understanding of a broad range of multimodal systems and their design” (p. 261). But the current media and policy environment reifies metal boxes moving electrons over the host of existing technologies—like pens, sticky notes, butcher paper, and other material tools—that can also support students in developing this range of 21st century literacies (Bomer et al., 2010; Consalvo & David, 2016; George, 2002; Shipka, 2005). Before further discussing literacy practices, though, it seems important to be specific about what is meant by 21st century literacies or skills. The temptation, as noted above regarding Istation, is to say phrases like “21st century literacy” without a clear sense of what those practices are or could be, except that they are related to magic boxes (Cuban, 2016). So, as with the long view above, returning to the core concepts of the 21st century can point a way forward. “Media”--the screens that surround us and litter some classrooms--refers to kinds of materials in which a composition is rendered. In the late 20th century and to the current day, the word has, to a degree, been repurposed to mean digitalia. Yet materials and mode live side by side, even though corporate interests would have the public believe that the magic box is the only media worth investing in. Jenkins and colleagues (2006) name eleven key competencies for media literacy in the 21st century (see Table 1) and, to a competency, each can be exemplified with material technologies. These competencies challenge the assumption that such skills can be acquired “on their own without adult intervention or supervision” because, in reality, students need to be “engage[d]... in critical dialogues” (p. 12) about the new media age. “[J]ust do it” approaches, like sustained silent reading (SSR) Table 1. 21st century cultural competency definitions Play

“[T]he capacity to experiment with one’s surroundings as a form of problem-solving”

Performance

“[T]he ability to adopt alternative identities for the purpose of improvisation and discovery”

Simulation

“[T]he ability to interpret and construct dynamic models of real-world processes”

Appropriation

“[T]he ability to meaningfully sample and remix media content”

Multitasking

“[T]he ability to scan one’s environment and shift focus as needed to salient details”

Distributed Cognition

“[T]he ability to interact meaningfully with tools that expand mental capacities”

Collective Intelligence

“[T]he ability to pool knowledge and compare notes with others toward a common goal”

Judgment

“[T]he ability to evaluate the reliability and credibility of different information sources”

Transmedia Navigation

“[T]he ability to follow the flow of stories and information across multiple modalities”

Networking

“[T]he ability to search for, synthesize, and disseminate information”

Negotiation

“[T]he ability to travel across diverse communities, discerning and respecting multiple perspectives, and grasping and following alternative norms”

Note. From Confronting the Challenges of Participatory Culture: Media Education for the 21st Century (White Paper), 2006, page 4, by H. Jenkins, K. Clinton, R. Purushotma, A. J. Robinson, & M. Weigel. John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation.

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or drop everything and read (DEAR), have limited success (Allington, 2012, p. 20) in supporting critical dialogue. And this dialogue cannot happen at all if resistance to technology is the only position a teacher takes. So, the dialogues between educators and their students concerning the new media must go beyond, “Don’t tell anyone online where you live” or “Don’t text what you wouldn’t say to someone’s face.” The naming of competencies--creating the necessary language with which to have a dialogue--allows for parents, teachers, and students to purposefully consider the ways in which they are using any tool available to them and serves these people by providing language necessary to either support or resist, articulately. Also, despite an increased effort to expand access to educational technology based on magic boxes and broadband internet, schools serving children of color or children living in poverty continue to be under-resourced, pointing to ever-cheaper digital technologies that still cost money that many schools do not have, or pitching the use of the textbook budget to pay for iPads, does not address the underlying issue of access. How to address access, then? One answer is to repurpose technologies that teachers already have—technologies that they and their students are familiar with, but can be harnessed to teach these 21st century competencies (even better than Istation can). Teachers can offer students paper technologies: chart paper, sticky notes, butcher paper, pages of books, pages of magazines, notebooks, lined paper, copy paper. And, they can support their students in composing on that paper with pencils, pens, markers, colored pencils, and crayons. These technologies resist commodification of students, schools, and themselves. Beyond resistance, the material technologies listed above, combined with thoughtful and sustained professional development, can offer teachers frames with which to reposition students as agentive makers in the world who craft their identities, engage in academic literacies, and resist thoughtfully and selectively. Students can become makers capable of composing texts that embody the eleven 21st century competencies defined above.

METHODS: PEOPLE, PLACES, AND HOW WE CAME TO UNDERSTAND THEM Below, the authors discuss how teachers and students used material tools to enact 21st century thinking by relying on experiences in two schools outside a Southwestern city, one of the fastest growing metropolitan areas in the country. Both authors were investigators embedded in these schools as part of separate research projects. Before the research discussed in this chapter, Ann had spent the three previous years researching and working with the ELAR teachers at Ortega Middle School (all names of places and people are pseudonyms). Anna was in Kathy’s classroom at Governor High School three times a week for a year. Each relied on ethnographic methods for data collection procedures and amassed data that included reams of field notes, hours of classroom video and recorded audio interviews, thousands of photographs of student work, student artifacts, and copies of curricular resources. These schools, Ortega and Governor, are reflective of the culturally, linguistically, and economically diverse students now populating suburban and exurban schools, as many families are pushed out of city centers due to housing costs. At the time of the research, Ortega enrolled over 90 percent “Hispanic” (as labeled by the State of Texas) students, and a similar percentage of students who qualified for free and reduced-price lunch. And, based on teachers’ anecdotal experience shared with Ann, over 50 percent of the students were multilingual. The demographics from Governor were more diverse than Ortega’s, with “Economically Disadvantaged” students at over 54 percent, and students designated as “Limited English Proficient” at 11 percent (Texas Education Agency, 2009). All of the teachers in this study resisted taking a deficit perspective (Valencia, 1997/2012) of their students: that is, a perspective that essentializes 222

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poor and minority students by reifying an if-then fallacy of their “deficit” culture, family, or intelligence leading to low academic achievement. That deficit-stance though, influenced administrators and districts to apply pressure to the teachers to meet performance goals on the state’s standardized tests, which in turn resulted in expectations to teach to the test (Booher-Jennings, 2005). What makes these teachers unique, in our view, is that they managed to navigate these standardizing forces and deficit-views in ways that continually opened up spaces for their students, resisting a deficit view of students, to engage in literacy practices more reflective of 21st century thinking skills not reflected in, nor measured by, the standardized tests. This chapter shares compositions and practices from five teachers’ classrooms. These teachers were all teacher-consultants with the local National Writing Project site and were, broadly speaking, able to implement a reading/writing workshop model of instruction in their classrooms. At Ortega, the entire ELAR department supported workshop instruction and used what institutional power they had to support workshop and push back against mandates and requests to get back to basics (see, for example, Wood & Jocius, 2013). Kathy, at Governor, did not have the same level of institutional support, though she had one colleague who was also a workshop teacher. All made comments about using workshop instruction, engaging students’ existing literacies, and building communities of learners in their classrooms during the time they were research participants in separate research projects. During the serendipitously synchronized time in these classrooms, the researchers individually noticed the ways in which the teachers were using material tools—like sticky notes, chart paper, butcher paper, markers, and tape—to engage students in a range of literacy practices that were more than replications of the standardized tests. Many of these practices were happening on the walls, ceilings, whiteboards, and bulletin boards of the classrooms and hallways, while many others were happening in the students’ writing notebooks (Bomer, 1995). In conversations about individual research projects, and in discovering these noticings in common, the researchers began a more purposeful examination of these texts and the practices that led to them. This examination involved photographing the texts themselves, interviewing students or the teacher during or after the making of these texts, and taking additional field notes around the making of the texts. As mentioned earlier, this separate research was conducted over the same period, and offices next door provided the investigators the opportunity to peer debrief (Lincoln & Guba, 1985). As a result, compelling commonalities were found that continually resurfaced (Hall, Johnson, Juzwik, Wortham, & Mosley, 2010). These shared points centered on ways in which the teachers in the separate studies used writing on classroom walls to focus on academic literacies, to have important conversations, and to talk back to various texts. Oldfather and West (1994) used jazz as a metaphor with which to describe this kind of collaborative inquiry. The researchers draw on their work in describing the research as Table 2. Teacher participants Name

School

Grade

Annabeth

Ortega MS

8

Olivia

Ortega MS

8

Harriett

Ortega MS

7

Tina

Ortega MS

7

Kathy

Governor HS

11

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it “allow[s] us to understand experience in new and deeper ways” (Oldfather & West, 1994, p. 23). Data analysis occurred in three overlapping phases. First, the researchers arrayed photos, video stills, and student artifacts on butcher paper in order to begin categorizing the data by literate purposes accomplished (e.g. intertextuality, collaboration, student voice). This array served as an early-stage data display (Miles & Huberman, 1994). Second, hospitable analytic constructs were sought, by which the multimodal products and processes could most thoroughly be described. After cycling through several, including Maloch, Patterson, and Hoffman’s (2004) local texts, Jenkins et al.’s (2006) eleven 21st century literacy practices and cultural competencies (see Table 1) was selected to serve as a way to discuss material compositions through a more digitally-infused lens. Third, the researchers talked through each data example and episode, confirming and disconfirming (Patton, 1990) it with others as the researchers navigated through each competency on the way to determining the most felicitous fit. While these teachers did not use Jenkins et al.’s competencies to explain these practices to their students, the teachers’ expertise helped them recognize that multimodal, material practices were powerful ways of developing adolescents’ literacies. The researchers overlaid Jenkins et al.’s framework onto the practices they saw enacted, because using these competencies as lenses more fully explained and supported exactly these sorts of instructional invitations.

RESISTANCE THROUGH MATERIAL MEANS: SELF-REPRESENTATION, ACADEMIC LITERACIES, AND PARTICIPATORY CULTURES This chapter discusses how teachers and students resisted deficit understandings of their literate potential through the use of material technologies. It is organized by three larger constructs, informed by Jenkins et al. (2006): self-representation, academic literacies, and participatory culture. Self-representation as a kind of identity work includes the ways that students and teachers used material tools to explore who they are and who they could be. The construction of self-representation here is informed by Jenkin’s uses of affiliations, affinity spaces, and expressions. It also includes a discussion of the multiplicative identities that it becomes possible to take up in digital spaces, though for many students, their identity expression varies in and out of school (Hull & Schultz, 2002). The concept of academic literacies is important because Jenkins et al. (2006) position schools as a key location for supporting students in the new media age asking, “What should we teach?” (p. 19). And, further, they acknowledge that, for students to “engage with the new participatory culture, they must be able to read and write” (p. 19). Finally, classrooms where a participatory culture exists means that “[n]ot every member must contribute, but all must believe they are free to contribute when ready and that what they contribute will be appropriately valued” (p. 7) in ways relevant to both the social and academic context of the classroom. These complex and interwoven ideas come together in the actual texts that students made within the context of the classrooms and schools described below. This section explores multiple examples of classroom texts and practices within these three emergent themes: self-representation, academic literacies, and participatory cultures. Within each example, the authors also highlight how the competencies are woven throughout the work of teachers and students. The goal is to describe the texts, and the instructional and composition practices that produced them, to such an extent that teachers reading this chapter could remix the descriptions and try out these ideas in their own classrooms. The authors want to reiterate that the practices described in the following sections happened in highly surveilled classrooms where pressures to succeed on standardized testing were 224

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constant. Regardless, these teachers drew on the “pervasive uses of texts to support learning” (Maloch et al., 2004, p. 146). These were also school sites where access to educational technology was limited to computer labs or a few laptop carts, the machines tended to be old, and the processes for both scheduling labs or retrieving files were byzantine. These teachers took the position that texts and students have power, and by thoughtfully resisting the limiting educational technology available to them, they crafted participatory classroom cultures, which in turn supported 21st century literacies without relying on digital technologies.

Resisting Deficit Models: Self-Representation as Literate Individuals Much attention is paid to the ways in which students represent themselves online, and the fear that they are leaving behind digital breadcrumbs in the form of tweets or SnapChats of their most awful and awkward moments. Adults focus on telling students that those embarrassing pictures never go away, instead of teaching them to thoughtfully represent themselves. And adolescents rightly resist this punitive interpretation because of the enjoyment they find in those online spaces. On the other hand, teachers and students are constantly performing selves in school, whether it be through sanctioned academic work, unsanctioned literate practices, or literacy work that lives in the liminal space between sanctioned and unsanctioned. The authors suggest here that there are material ways to foster intentional and strategic self-representation, and that teachers can model such skills. Annabeth’s classroom was a large and well-lit, with a bulletin board where she implicitly taught her students about identity and self-representation. A bulletin board (see Figure 1) was covered with photographs, as well as her maiden and married name. These photographs are far more prominent on the board than her school-related messages. Though photographs, she showed students that her identity extends beyond the singular Ms. F. Artifacts include a tiny alligator—the school’s mascot, a reading bumper sticker, and a pennant from her undergraduate university. Her two college degrees—a bachelor’s and master’s—are hung above the bulletin board. These collegiate artifacts are particularly powerful identity markers in her school, given its demographics and the reality that few of her eighth-grade students will matriculate to college. As the year progressed (Figure 1 is from August) across the year, she added old school ID cards, student art, and small gifts from students. Through this bulletin board, Annabeth appropriated artifacts from across her life—wife, mother, friend, teacher—to represent herself to her students. Her bulletin board, then, was little different from a Facebook wall, Twitter profile, or about.me page. While never a focus of instruction, it changed as she changed, signaled affiliations and relationships, was multimodal, and was public. While Annabeth could not afford all of her 150 or so students a section of the wall, she could ensure they all had a space with which to experiment: their notebooks. The students had literal space to explore self-representation in relatively unregulated ways. Students wrote in notebooks approximately every other day across the year, around various warm-ups and invitations to explore strategies. They also used the notebooks to experiment with their own strategies, like quote walls, tagging, drawing, and written conversations. These notebooks, then, became the students’ walls, where they simulated the work of crafting online representations through the material tools of pencils, pens, markers, stickers, and paper. This complex self-representation work carried over into the notebook entries as they blended academic expectations around writing with their own experiences of the world, using an academic literacy to write their way into their developing selves.

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Figure 1. Teacher bulletin board

At Governor High School, Kathy designed sequences of instructional invitations for students to explore their own and alternate self-representations. These structured literacy events were spaces grounded in shared viewing of documentary films or photography and writing in notebooks. Kathy’s instructional design supported the students in exploring a range of ways they could represent themselves, and a range of selves that they could represent. Late in the school year, after several similar cycles of exploration, Kathy initiated a contemplation of physical disability by showing Murderball (Rubin et al., 2005), a film about ferociously competitive athletes who all use wheelchairs and were members of the US quad rugby team. She also showed documentaries about individuals who had been faced suddenly with loss of limbs through injury or disease. When it was time to move to notebook writing work, Kathy asked her students to imagine a scenario in which they had lost use of their own limbs. This movement from film to notebook, both multimodal texts, deepened student engagement with the topic and task. In this teacher move, Kathy was asking her students to multitask across these various documentaries to develop a projective identity (Gee, 2004b). She wanted her students to both project their own values into this

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imagined self, and “strongly identify” (Jenkins et al., 2006, p. 28) with that self to inform their action going forward in this newly imagined world. In his notebook, Pedro imagined himself having spent years of his life in a wheelchair, focusing on the exclusion that comes with being seen as different: “I have been in the wheelchair for four years, life has been very complicated even though people say were all equal they all look at me different.” He wrote, in his new character, that he missed playing sports terribly: I like doing things by my own strength. It’s hard to go out to the park and see young guys playing basketball and soccer and me on a wheel chair just looking really makes me feel different, like if I was an alien. Asserting his anger, he then turned his mind toward finding a purpose in his disability and asked for strength to deal with the “test God gave me” (all Pedro’s entries from notebook, April 15, 2010). Pedro did not resist the complex writing task set before him. Instead he so thoroughly performed this imagined Pedro that he appropriated his own love of sports and gave voice to anger and resentment at not being able to play them. This imagined Pedro, though, did resist the idea that losing mobility was a purposeless event, and projected faith into this imagined space. Pedro was adept at multitasking and navigating across multiple media—multiple films, his notebook, and his own experiences—to craft a self-representation that aligned with his notions of self and the task at hand.

Reclaiming Academic Literacies: Resisting SkillBased Understandings of Literacy Jenkins et al.’s (2006) definition of 21st century cultural competencies assume the competencies are being explored in school contexts. They acknowledge that media literacy—the umbrella under which these competencies fall—should be woven into all disciplines, using practices relevant to each discipline. In this way, their proposal falls within the larger work of defining academic literacies (Lea & Street, 2006). Academic literacies “views …acquiring appropriate and effective uses of literacy as… complex, dynamic, nuanced, situated, and involving both epistemological issues and social processes including power relations among people and institutions, and social identities” (p. 228). So, within a school context, an informed and sophisticated teaching stance toward academic literacies is one in which teachers support students in better understanding school expectations around literacy, how to navigate those expectations, and how to continually grow into those expectations. A teaching stance in support of academic literacies also resists the push toward autonomous (Street, 1995/2013) literacies that feed a generalized skills-based discourse (Ivanic, 2004) around literacy. And while doing all this, teachers continue to support students’ range of literacy practices that do not always align with those schoolbased expectations. In Kathy and Annabeth’s classrooms, academic literacies existed well beyond the skills-based discourses so common in curricula centered on accountability, acknowledging that students’ literacy was inherently social and multimodal. Kathy’s students explored academic literacies through picture book making, drawing on the competencies of simulation, appropriation, and negotiation. And when Annabeth’s students used mind maps to explore their readerly selves, they developed abilities in transmedia navigation, networking, and play. Kathy had students design pictures books, an academic literacy (Dean & Grierson, 2005; Rank-Buhr, 2013), as a vehicle through which to engage in an authentic writing process, to learn and adapt the hero cycle, and to foster a participatory classroom. Kathy began the unit by sharing her collection of published 227

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picture books and having students vote to determine class favorites. Kathy read aloud those favorites both to (re)familiarize students with the texts and to remind them of positive childhood literacy experiences. Next, students shared a personal story illustrating a life lesson learned with interview partners. Students then individually wrote and illustrated a picture book, appropriating through sampling and remixing their partner’s narrative, the hero cycle, and the design of picture books in their lives. Their partners’ stories were transformed into picture book plotlines where a character facing tribulation is helped, through kindness, friendship, or honesty, to regain equilibrium. Composed at the beginning of the year, the finished books hung from the ceiling for the rest of the year, serving as a reminder of students’ stories and the range of literacy practices available to them in the classroom. In “Pedro the Giraffe,” written by Julian, Pedro is an “old giraffe” who helps his hungry and injured little monkey friend, Matthew, get some bananas. Julian rendered the setting in colored marker with palm trees and sunny or rainy weather, reflecting the happy or sad tone of the text passage, an appropriated idea from the mentor texts Kathy showed students. In the story, Matthew is afraid to ask for help. He finally musters up the courage, and finds that Pedro is happy to help him: “So Matthew decides to ask Pedro for his help, Pedro decides to help his best friend because he understands his friend is injured and cant find food no where else” (Figure 2). Students simulated real-world processes (Jenkins et al., 2006) through interviewing partners and reconfiguring those strengths and dilemmas into models of potentially instructive stories with a beginning, middle and end. Figure 2. Remix picture book pages “Pedro the Giraffe”

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This composing work fit smoothly into an academic literacies frame, as it both honored student experience while acknowledging the power that standards and curriculum had in the context of school. The personal value came from the fond memories of picture books, and students seeing their own stories reflected back to them by partners, which required a level of negotiation not always evidenced in classrooms. The institutional value came in through Kathy’s remixing of ELA basics like the hero cycle and beginning-middle-end story construction, which required the students to network across their previous classroom experiences and Kathy’s expectations. As a lived, real-world process, developing a text to share with an audience, resists literacy as a set of autonomous skills to be taught and regurgitated on tests. Further, the process Kathy created and Julian engaged in was infinitely adaptable to Julian’s, and any learner’s, needs. No adaptive software program, no matter how expensive, can offer this level of customizability. Engaging in academic literacies in the ways defined above is difficult when teachers are expected to teach both writing and reading (not to mention the rest of the language arts), and then integrate technology, during a 45-minute class period, as Annabeth was. Even with these pressures, Annabeth chose to reject a narrowing of the curriculum, instead placing the students’ experiences at the center of their academic life. Over the course of December and January, at the end of a reading day, Annabeth asked students to reflect on their reading lives by composing a mind map that explored the question “Who am I as a reader?” (Figure 3). Figure 3. Sample student mind maps

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These maps supported transmedia navigation and networking as students moved across their various reading experiences, linked them together, and composed multimodal texts that represented themselves as readers. Play was also a component of the mind map, as students continually revised and crafted their maps across two months, some going so far as to realize their design was not working and starting over. This difficult work is play insomuch as play can be “a grind...in anticipation of a payoff down the line” (Jenkins et al., 2006, p. 23). Composing the map was a deeply metacognitive practice for the students, engaging them in multimodal design and supporting them in experimenting with a range of 21st century literacy practices. While digital mind mapping tools certainly exist, like Inspiration that was marketed heavily to schools in the early aughts, Annabeth could not easily get her students into a computer lab to access those tools. And, frankly, the educational installations of Inspiration are far less inspiring than the artful maps Annabeth’s students created on paper with markers and pencils. This work, too, resisted those skills-based practices like closed sentence stems or writing prompts modeled on standardized writing assessments.

Artistic Expression as Resistance: Participatory Classroom Culture A participatory culture grows out of a messy, unequal, and inherently social convergence among individuals, affinity groups, and businesses who are all producers and consumers of compositions. Participatory culture is, then, a “culture with relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, strong support for creating and sharing one’s creations, and some type of informal mentorship whereby what is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices” (Jenkins, 2006, p. 3). Further, participatory culture has expanded as the tools for engagement and sharing have spread through the reach of digital technologies. That said, Jenkins (2006) makes an important point about how, ultimately, convergence is not about the gadgets or “media appliances,” but about “social interactions with others” (p. 3). These social interactions, then, build a participatory culture that fosters particular literacy practices. In these two school settings, the participatory cultures meant that teachers made space in their classrooms and hallways, relatively unsanctioned spaces, for students to create. In the making of this space, the teachers resisted deficit-stances toward their students’ and narrowed, test-focused understandings of literacy. Further, these participatory cultures resisted digital technologies that limited student productions or narrowed the allowable engagements with those technologies. The seventh- and eighth-grade teachers at Ortega encouraged students to resist the standardized testing and the skills-based discourse (Ivanic, 2004) it grew out of. They positioned the test as different from other literacies, and not the defining literacy of the students’ lives with classroom participatory cultures thick with literacy practices. Despite this classroom culture, the pressure to succeed on standardized tests meant that some days in the spring were given over to school-wide mock testing. Students spent the whole day in one classroom, testing, reading, or sleeping--all regular instruction stopped. Students took either released standardized tests or other sample standardized tests that may or may not have been aligned with the actual state test, while teachers actively monitored. The goal of the mock testing was to prepare students for the experience of the real tests and to produce data. Tests were scored and numbers were crunched by district officials and the results were sent to teachers in massive, complex Excel spreadsheets. Assessment is, after all, the largest driver of educational technology (Rebora, 2016), though not a digital technology meaningful to students. One day in April, the seventh-grade teachers chose to resist this mock testing, and the larger deficit-views of students that propelled it, by doing art. Students made blackout poetry and collages. With this art, the teachers created a gallery in the hallway, immediately following the mock test, for display. 230

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Figure 4. Student collages and found poetry

The students created these texts within the oppressive atmosphere of a mock test day, exercising their judgement that multiple and varied literacy practices needed to be represented. Through the gallery display, students saw this other way of being literate, and could make judgments about which literacy leaders—the testers or the teachers—valued their knowledge and experience. In creating these found poems, students appropriated existing texts and redesigned them. All the while, they performed the identity of artist and poet: multitasking between reading the texts, coloring the pages, and building their composition, negotiating the words in the original text and the meaning they were attempting to reveal. The work was linguistically interesting, aesthetically pleasing, and socially challenging. These local texts, designed and redesigned by the students, served to resist the reductive, skills-based understandings of literacy so prominent in the standardized testing in which students and teachers were mandated to participate. Further, these collages and blackout poems mirror memes or social media postings of quotes, often crafted through Canva or Photoshop. Kathy, too, created space for her students to create and resist. She left a zone of whiteboard space where students could engage in wordplay using tile poetry words or dry erase markers.

Figure 5. Tile poetry

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The poems were posted anonymously, although their making was visible to anyone who happened to be around—not unlike graffiti on a city wall (MacGillivray & Curwen, 2007). This was one way in which students were invited to play with language and perform self-representation, representation that might not often find an audience in the sanctioned classroom script. They also engaged in distributed cognition, when drawing on school poetry forms, like haiku, to form poetry. Even the work of wordplay is a performance, blending academic literacies and artistic expression. This performance and play mimics what happens in digital spaces when students construct Facebook pages or memes. In crafting poetry from the available designs (New London Group, 2000), they were working with material tools, drawing on 21st century thinking, without the benefit of magic boxes. Playing with language was open-ended and unscripted, and underpinned the participatory culture of Kathy’s classroom, a culture that resisted limits on students and the limits of digital technology.

CONCLUSION In this chapter, the authors opened a window into classrooms where teachers reframed technology, and the concept of educational technology, by moving out of the metal box, and into deep engagement with 21st century literacies with material tools. The authors revealed instructional practices that pulled forward material technologies of the past, technologies that resist the marketization of schooling and literacy by edutechnopreneurs who seek to commodify technology, teaching, and learning. Butcher paper that records student thinking and is posted in the hallway, or sticky notes covering a writer’s notebook, cannot be measured, standardized, or, most saliently, sold. This resistance to the market, does not equal a simultaneous resistance to 21st century literacies. Though, the conflation of the market and education, via digital technologies, requires thoughtful analysis because of how much “content comes to us already branded, already shaped through an economics of sponsorship, if not overt advertising” (Jenkins et al., 2006, p. 14), which has no place in a school. Further, the texts composed by these students were grounded in the participatory cultures of classrooms where student choice and voice were valued in such ways as to teach the standards, and engage in the range of competencies necessary to navigate this new media age. In fact, the texts students composed “can be understood as material instantiations of students’ interests, their perception of audience, and their use of modal resources mediated by overlapping social contexts” (Jewett, 2008, p. 259). Even with this vision of a 21st century classroom, it can be difficult to envision. Where do we go from here? When teachers don’t have access to the metal boxes? When the pedagogy espoused by the metal boxes does not actually engage students in 21st century literacies? When administrators’ fiats for data counter-indicate their understandings of how children learn best? Our answers are that teachers can tap into ancient technologies that support students in making marks on paper, and consciously frame those distinctly un-digital compositions as 21st century thinking. And, they can count things: the seventh and eighth grade teachers at Ortega counted the number of books students had read from August through mid-January and posted those numbers on the wall. Each teacher, of the four, had totals of over 1,000 books. So, in a school where quantitative data produced by various digital technologies mattered, oftentimes more than teachers’ professional knowledge and expertise, these teachers and students produced quantitative data. It was data that acknowledged the institutional expectation that students were reading, but did so in a way that honored students’ engagement with the reading process and left out reductive technologies. Annabeth and her colleagues, then, found ways of resisting the prevailing expectations around data and literacy. Kathy resisted a narrowing of the cur232

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riculum and the insistence that paper-based literacies somehow did not count in a high school English class. Instead, she created a participatory classroom culture where her students could both experiment with self-representation and practice the 21st century competencies so necessary for full engagement in this changing world. And to return to where this chapter started: what of my children, moving beyond first grade, slogging through Istation, while filling math journals, and writing journals, and science notebooks with scribblings, and writing, and foldables, and data? I have confidence that they will be fine when it comes to reading, writing, and composing in digital spaces. I will offer them opportunities to read and write and draw and collage and play Mario Kart and take pictures with my phone (and eventually their own) and generally engage with the world through a wide range of tools. And I will talk to them about how work online is a lot like work offline. For example, they ended first grade by designing a farm (see Figure 6) as part of a month-long math and finance project. I pointed out to them that their choices about how to fill a grid and use their resources wisely seems a lot like the kinds of skills they will need when my husband and I finally let them play Minecraft. Because the parallels are there, I try to position my children to be engaged thinkers and makers by drawing their attention to the skills they are learning and how those skills can serve them in a range of different contexts. Finally, both authors will work in our various capacities to support the hard work of teachers, including their purposeful resistance to educational technology for the sake of magic boxes. The authors will continue to leverage our knowledge and positions to advocate for the rich literate practices that build participatory cultures in classrooms and prepare all students for the world cannot yet imagined, boxes or no.

Figure 6. Minecraft-esque farm

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Patton, M. Q. (1990). Qualitative evaluation and research methods (2nd ed.). Newbury Park, CA: Sage Publications. Price, L., & Kirkwood, A. (2014). Informed design of educational technology for teaching and learning? Toward an evidence informed model of good practice. Technology, Pedagogy and Education, 23(3), 325–347. doi:10.1080/1475939X.2014.942749 Rank-Burh, W. (2013). Using picturebooks to promote academic literacy. Voices from the Middle, 20(4), 47–48. Rebora, A. (2016, June 6). Teachers still struggling to use tech to transform instruction, survey finds. Education Week. Retrieved from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2016/06/09/teachers-still-strugglingto-use-tech-to.html# Rubin Rubin, H. A., Shapiro, D. A., & Mandel, J. (Prods.). (2005). Murderball [movie]. United States: Lions Gate Home Entertainment. Saltman, K. J. (2012). The failure of corporate school reform. New York, NY: Routledge. Seesaw Terms of Use. (2016, June 2). Retrieved from http://web.seesaw.me/terms-of-service Shipka, J. (2005). A multimodal task-based framework for composing. College Composition and Communication, 57, 277–306. Standage, T. (2013). Writing on the wall: Social media - the first 2,000 years. New York, NY: Bloomsbury USA. Street, B. V. (1995/2013). Social literacies: Critical approaches to literacy in development, ethnography, and education. New York, NY: Routledge. Tagg, J. (2012). Why does the faculty resist change? Change, 44(1), 6–15. doi:10.1080/00091383.201 2.635987 TEKS. 110.12.a.1. (n.d.). 19 TAC Chapter 110-Texas Essential Knowledge and Skills for Language Arts and Reading. Texas Education Agency. Retrieved from http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/rules/tac/chapter110/ index.html Texas Education Agency. (2009). Academic Excellence Indicator System 2009-2010 Campus Performance. Retrieved from http://ritter.tea.state.tx.us/cgi/sas/broker Thornburg, D. G., & Mungai, A. (2011). Teacher empowerment and school reform. Journal of Ethnographic & Qualitative Research, 5(4), 205–217. Tompsett, C. (2013). On the educational validity of research in educational technology. Journal of Educational Technology & Society, 16(3), 179–190. Valencia, R. R. (1997/2012). The evolution of deficit thinking: Educational thought and practice. New York, NY: Routledge. Vetter, A., Reynolds, J., Beane, H., Roquemore, K., Rorrer, A., & Shepherd-Allred, K. (2012). Reframing resistance in the English classroom. English Journal, 102(2), 114–121.

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Vygotsky, L. S. (1978). Mind in society: The development of higher psychological processes. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Wertsch, J. V. (1991). Voices of the mind: A sociocultural approach to mediated action. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Williamson, B. (2016). A sociotechnical survey of a public sphere platform. Retrieved from https:// codeactsineducation.wordpress.com/2016/09/02/assembling-classdojo/ Wood, S., & Jocius, R. (2013). Combatting I hate this stupid book! Black males and critical literacy. The Reading Teacher, 66(8), 661–669. doi:10.1002/trtr.1177

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS 21st Century Thinking: A set of habits of mind necessary to engage successfully in participatory culture. The habits include: play, performance, simulation, appropriation, multitasking, distributed cognition, collective intelligence, judgement, transmedia navigation, networking, and negotiation. Academic Literacies: Sets of practices for engaging with and producing predominantly alphabetic texts which are valued in academic settings such as in elementary, middle, and high school; these practices are often understood as autonomous and skills-based. Material: Tools that exist in the physical world and require physical engagement, such as pencils, sticky notes, chart paper, markers, etc. Media: Media refers to how a composition is designed and rendered, whether paper and ink, canvas and paint, or moving emoticons in a social media post. Multimodal: Texts that are designed to utilize multiple channels for communicative purposes. Some examples of channels for paper-based texts could include: alphabetic text, paper choice, front color, and illustrations. Examples of channels for digital texts could include alphabetic text, still images, video, audio, and hyperlinks. Resistance: Actions, or inaction, that teachers and students take toward policies that rob them of agency in the context of the classroom, school, or learning; or actions, or inaction, that teachers and students take in response to a deficit stance toward their profession or learning potential. Technology: Any invented tool whether material (e.g. paper, pencil), or digital (e.g. computer hardware, infrastructure, software) that is intended to be used for communicative purposes for self or others.

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Assessment Shouldn’t Be a Pay-Per-View Activity:

Offering Classroom Teachers Authentic Student-Centered Assessment Activities Robert Williams Radford University, USA Dan Woods Radford University, USA

ABSTRACT This chapter begins with a consideration of the state of school-based assessments as an unavoidable consequence of the contemporary societal emphasis on accountability and curricular prescriptions at the state and national level in the United States of America. Additionally, the authors comment upon the potential inaccuracies inescapable in large scale, high-stakes, standardized assessment instruments, especially when such instruments are turned to the task of evaluation—whether norm- or criterionreferenced—in a teaching and learning engagement. Likewise, the chapter concludes with suggestions and templates (elaborately configured with specific activities and assessment rubrics included) to support teachers who want to develop their own, rigorous, valid, and reliable assessments instruments embedded seamlessly in student-centered learning activities, and that accommodate the reality of literacy as a culturally situated behavior that, for contemporary learners, includes all manner of meaning-making in all manner of modalities from the pencil and paper to the purely electronic (and potentially wordless, at times) video- or audio-based.

INTRODUCTION There are few more polarizing topics in education today in the United States than those dealing with both standardized curricula and standardized accountability measures, particularly standardized tests as measures of student achievement, teacher quality and effectiveness, and accountability of schools themselves (Ravitch, 2001). Additionally, in a time of heightened regulatory and legislative attention to DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch014

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schools as sites of social reproduction and worker preparation (Apple, 2004; Darling-Hammond, 2011; Giroux, 2015), many companies have sought to turn the continuing emphasis on supposed accountability into dollars. Test-making, test-taking, test-prepping, and test-practicing are all drawing, like moths to the flame, edupreneurs and established companies alike because of the potential for profit. Virginia alone stands to spend millions on testing materials in 2016-2017, and in 2012, Ujifusa (2012) estimated that nationally states would spend approximately 1.7 billion dollars in 2012-2013. Factoring in college and university admissions tests such as the SAT, the ACT, the GRE, the LSAT, and the MCAT, societal costs for tests ostensibly purchased to measure student achievement and competence rise into the stratosphere. And while the primary purpose of this work is not to comment specifically on the validity (questionable as it is) of such practices, or even those who advocate for such measures, we have become increasingly concerned—as teachers and professional educators involved with teacher preparation—about the side effects that these initiatives seem inescapably to create, the negative side effects involving everything from increased cynicism among teachers and administrators to the reduced reading comprehension in learners, and to lost opportunities for society. Most specifically, we are distressed with the glaring misuse of standardized assessment instruments in service to high-stakes evaluation—often with no other performance measure in place—and that are increasingly used to evaluate everything from individual teachers to whole school systems. Too often, when such misuse occurs, those outside of the system or outside of the entity being evaluated are led to believe that these one-time, one-size-fits-all instruments do capture the learning of the individual student, or the value and overall quality of the individual teacher, the individual program, the specific school, or even the overall educational system. Not only are such approaches to evaluation a misuse of what is inherently more of an assessment instrument than an evaluative one, such approaches are incredibly poor practice (Popham, 2010; Duckor, 2014). Indeed, such approaches lead to even poorer policy at every possible administrative and bureaucratic level. We agree completely with Linda Darling-Hammond, a noted author in the field and an advisor to the 2008 Obama campaign, who has been repeatedly quoted as follows: “high-stakes testing has failed wherever it has been tried” (Kohn, 2000, p. 26). However, as a matter of consequence, and no doubt motivated in part by teachers’ desire to remain employed, such instruments have crept (or been shoved) into virtually every elementary and secondary classroom in the country (No Child Left Behind [NCLB], 2002). Unfortunately, these same assessment instruments are manifestly not being adopted by teachers for utilitarian reasons, as would be the case if such instruments offered better information or even more information about what students have learned. Additionally, such instruments are certainly not being adopted because they offer opportunities for more meaningful learning experiences. No, with the immense funding pressure being tied to the use of such instruments growing greater all the time, from the Bush era (and now discredited) Reading First Initiative (Yatvin, 2002; Gamse, Jacob, Horst, Boulay, & Unlu, 2008) to Arne Duncan’s signature intiative, the so called Race to the Top (U.S. Department of Education, 2009) to current legislative efforts being promoted under the banner of the Every Student Succeeds Act (Every Student Succeeds Act, 2016), such instruments have become the norm. Clearly, this normalization of testing-performance-as-sanctified-truth has nothing to do with effective practice or the design of an efficacious learning environment (Appropriate Use of High-Stakes Testing, ND). Unfortunately, most administrators and classroom teachers have little time and less inclination to counter the pressure to adopt such instruments. The choice is abundantly clear in most settings: adopt the mandated instrument, at whatever cost and for whatever gain to a for-profit entity, or face drastic funding reductions (at the state and local level). Indeed, the intent seems almost worthy of conspiracy theory as teachers are left with little opportunity (, 240

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as was the situation until the advent of the current, long-running standards-based movement) to develop their own more effective, more nuanced, and ultimately more useful assessment instruments. And make no mistake, assessment is at times the most important component of the teaching and learning engagement (DiRanna, et al, 2008). Quality formative assessment not only assists the teacher, but also the student (DiRanna, et al, 2008). Quality assessment instruments allow learners and teachers alike to focus on genuine comprehension, genuine knowledge in application, and scaffolded successive approximations leading to truly educated and practiced performances, not artificial focus involving the completion of a task purely for its own sake (or the teacher’s approval). In short, in order to be meaningful and useful, assessments must focus on whether or not students have truly learned content, not whether or not they have learned how to successfully complete a performance cum assessment instrument. Further, students must have multiple opportunities to explore their own learning about content and to practice their reading comprehension and conceptual thinking as an intrinsic component of the learning process, as a part of every learning activity, and as a natural step toward the more meaningful knowledge that develops at the meta-cognitive level. Students must read and write and create and practice in a recursive, multi-modal frame that engages the learners with the maximum of interest and creativity, but also while satisfying the myriad calls for assessment and accountability for teachers, schools, whole systems, and reflective learning. Toward that end, we offer this text as position statement and guide in service to multi-modal, longitudinal assessment, and with multiple learning activities / assessment instruments ready-made for teachers to adapt into their own classrooms with little or no revision. So too, we propose these ideas and instruments and activities with an overall goal of offering teachers access to a repertoire of assessment instruments that are naturally embedded in reading comprehension and writing activities to replace standardized instruments offered by outsiders to the teaching and learning enterprise.

Follow the Money: Standards, Quality, and Assessment Compounding the pressure for teachers, seemingly every talk show host, every news commentator interested in education policy, and every social media platform trumpets the need for reform, or at least heightened accountability. If it is not the Council of Chief State School Officers (CCSSO), it is the National Governors Association (NGA) continuing to promote the so-called Common Core (Common Core, 2016) as a measure of what students should know and should be able to do upon completion of high school, or before entering college. However, as noted by Kohn (2000) it is important to remember that calls for such testing “allows politicians to show that they’re concerned about school achievement and serious about getting tough with students and teachers” (p.3). And obviously, as he further notes, “demanding high scores fits nicely with the use of political slogans like ‘tougher standards’ or ‘accountability’ or ‘raising the bar’” (p.3). These debates have slowly and inexorably developed into major discussions about what teachers should know before and after their entry into the profession, similar to the perpetual discussion about what students should know and be able to do at any given educational level. Lately, relative to teacher quality, the discussion has broadened significantly into the realm of how they should teach (De Lissovoy, 2013). Yet, consistently missing from this discussion to date has been any useful discussion of how we, as a profession, might counter the demand for relatively cheap (per capita) instruments designed to generate massive and consistent outputs of quantitative data to be fed to the insatiable maw of bureaucratic, administrative, and popular media consumption. Certainly, teachers and thoughtful administrators have for years now suggested individual portfolios as sources for documenting and comparatively analyzing learning over time. And frankly any move away 241

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from single administration, multiple choice instruments—whether adaptive, computer-based or not—must be applauded in that almost any move away from such instruments signals a move away from contemporary illusions of assessment and accountability as has been the case since the advent of mass produced, high-stakes testing. Yet most educators accept that the costs quickly skyrocket for alternate assessments compared to the relatively cheap, easily scored multiple-choice devices currently in place. And while all of the corporations and foundations and think tanks and legislative bodies engaged in educational policy have accepted the extra cost of including some version of a writing task in the majority of standardized tests by now, none so far has had the funding or the will to drop cheap and easy multiple-choice tests as a means to produce massive volumes of numeric data, all easily citable in charts, graphs, and colorful slide shows (Casey, 2013). Indeed, in a triumph of quantitative analysis, even the scoring mechanisms in place for these essay assignments are quantitatively reliable. Validity is another matter entirely, and no one yet claims true external validity for any of the widely used standardized instruments in place (Kane, 2013; Popham, et al., 2014). In fact, upon close analysis, much of the reported reliability most likely results more from scorer predictability and scorer’s predictable expectations than anything related to communicative competence in writing. Yet to begin to effectively compete—and no one should question that the situation is a competition for scarce resources—for assessment resources, particularly resources related to reading comprehension assessment, as teachers and teacher educators we must first decide just what we do and do not seek to assess in our individual learners, our individual teachers, our classrooms, our curricula, our schools, and our school systems. In the popular media, in the halls of government, in administrative offices, and even anecdotally, there is much lip-service given to the goal of assessing student learning, but upon deeper consideration it is quickly apparent that most accountability systems far more often actually attempt to assess teaching efficacy as it applies to some codified curricula. That is, most often, learner performances are measured upon a curricular yardstick that actually measures how well the individual teacher prepared the test taker to answer the test questions. Most disturbingly, aside from the socio-political dimensions, is that this, at its root, is a consumption-based model of education that differs only marginally from discredited, historical banking models where fact-based deposits were banked against future knowledge demands. This phenomenon certainly accounts for the rising scores in most state systems far more than any increase in student learning, since it is manifestly the teachers who have learned…to teach to the upcoming test. And of course if the primary goal of the public education system involves teacher’s learning about how to prepare students to take standardized tests, then we have been demonstrably successful on every level. In short, it would appear that our assessment efforts and practices to date are focused not on the learners, but on the teachers (Of course, this may not be a coincidence).

Teacher Accountability But what if the true or most useful purpose for a public education system involves educating future citizens to be informed, productive, and critically literate and thoughtful participants in their own society? Then surely teacher performance assessment only arises as a secondary measure of student learning, i.e. if the students become informed, productive, critically literate and aware citizens, that outcome must at least in part be related to, or a product of, good teaching. Of course, we are not suggesting that teachers should not be held accountable for their actions and evaluated on their accomplishments; we are, however, suggesting that our contemporary accountability systems have shifted the focus inappropriately toward assessing the teaching of test-taking ability, not assessing student learning and literacy, whether 242

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that literacy be social, civic, mathematical, or linguistic. Too many school districts have adopted the ideology which Kohn (2000) described years ago, of “teaching to the test” (p.29). Indeed, the natural assessment for any learning experience involves consideration of how well the learner (of whatever age or level of competence) is able to perform a task or knowledgeably discuss a topic without the teacher’s or mentor’s assistance. In terms of teacher quality, the question ultimately becomes: How should we assess and evaluate the teachers who in turn are assessing the learners (except when the state claims to do it for them). Indeed, it seems at every turn we’re confronted, as a profession and individually, with questions about who is measuring whom and what is being measured. For us as teachers, and as an extension of good pedagogic practice overall, a part of the answer has to include both learner assessment (inside the classroom, not run by the state) and learner and teacher self-assessment. And since today’s federally mandated and state-run accountability practices have become primarily multiple-choice bureaucracies geared toward standardized outcomes for all (Casey, 2013), while doing little to actually assess human literacies (much less a 21st century version of it), then we as teachers must focus on developing assessments for ourselves based on both our students’ learning and our students’ lived experiences in our classrooms. In short, this means we cannot depend upon either dehumanized measures that do not consider the human experience as a part of the learning experience, nor can we depend purely upon warm and nurturing measures that look only at an individual’s growth and development in some idealized universe with unlimited resources and unlimited opportunities for everyone to achieve a blissful state of nirvana disconnected from the reality around us. We must depend, as teachers and learners, upon a mixture of assessments and self-assessments that will accommodate the reality of literacies as culturally situated behaviors that, for contemporary learners, include all manner of meaning-making in all manner of modalities from the pencil and paper to the purely electronic (and potentially wordless, at times) audio or video based. Thus, we as authors and teachers have designed, developed, and implemented (over multiple years and across multiple public school levels) a variety of multi-modal, student-centered, reading, writing, and publishing (paper, audio, and video; analog and digital) activities connected to teacher-created assessment, student self-assessment, and teacher self-assessment instruments. We have personally seen students engage (with comprehension) with reading, writing, and publishing assignments that encourage creativity, and with constructing meaning and knowledge, not only superficial consumption. We have seen students work through assignments that provide the necessary structure and scaffolding for constructivism, but that also include assessment and evaluation instruments suitable to preempt ongoing federal and state measures designed to direct and manage and control teachers learning and, more intrusively, teachers’ methodology in their classrooms. Finally we offer herein a variety of ideas and materials suitable to take back teaching and learning evaluations for both teachers and students, unlike current models that assess an end product of teaching instead of an end knowledge or ability found in the learner. In fact, we have in mind not only cumulative assessment instruments, but also process-oriented (formative) assessments designed to be implemented at a variety of stages throughout the learning engagement. At every step, we are resolute in our desire to avoid what Kohn (2000) has described as contemporary assessment models that look at how well teachers have done their job in programming learners to respond to standardized cues, not at assessing the content the learners have actually assimilated (p. 29). Also, because we wholly believe that quality assessment should not be a spectator sport in which only the most affluent school districts can participate, all of our assessments are designed around activities that use resources that are free, or that schools already have.

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FAKE ASSESSMENTS AND REAL ASSESSMENTS Teachers most often enter the profession to teach, to guide, or to lead others (young and old alike) toward greater knowledge and intellectual heights, perhaps, or, in the case of coaches and health and wellness teachers, toward greater physical activity or ability and increased knowledge and self-awareness. Yet in classrooms, all too often leadership turns into basic management (crowd control) and learning assessment turns into basic accounting (grade averaging) much like scorekeeping and spending at an athletic event. This trend clearly aligns with Berliner’s (2010, para 1) assertion that, “Americans are smart about evaluating athletes and sports teams, and dumb about evaluating students, teachers and schools.” Teachers can move away from these less desirable roles for the teacher in the classroom, toward authentic learning experiences with embedded assessments, assessments that are an inextricable element embedded in the learning activities themselves. And we believe, if perhaps a bit obviously, that REAL assessment looks non-traditional and rarely involves the easy (and ludicrously profitable) standardized instruments currently in place. The obvious assessment problems involve everything from the inherent cultural biases of any language-based test or survey to the well-documented problems of attempting to gauge competence from observations or recordings of a performance (written, verbal, video, or some combination of all three). Educational psychology long ago recognized the significant disconnects possible when making judgments about competence based on a performance, since in fact the performance may or may not reflect any underlying competence beyond that of just “good test-taking skills” (Kohn, 2000, p.32). And therein lies the teachers’ conundrum: competence is never available for observation. Only performances may be observed. And given that inescapable reality, we concluded some time ago that the key to valid assessments of competence must include not only multiple performances over time, but multiple performance domains involving all the possible ranges of expression, from the oral to the written to the more graphic to the kinesthetic or action-oriented. Of course, historically, assessment instruments have routinely depended upon not only less than ideal numbers, e.g. one-unit test, two exams per semester, etc., but so too educators and administrative personnel have depended upon too narrow a domain of performance, e.g. written only, multiple-choice tests, etc. Likewise, education in general continues to fixate on superficial memorization or unquestioned facts, as is obvious with a review of the recently released content standards from the Common Core State Standards Initiative (Common Core, 2016) instead of more useful, more complex problem-solving abilities as are sought in the more robust assessment systems like the Programme for International Assessment (PISA). Yet we also know that as students move out of classroom environments into the workplace (even the educational workplace), REAL assessment always occurs over time and with a formative dimension to the assessment as repeated observations of performances are coupled with supervisory responses, second chances or remediation plans are offered, and multiple domains are involved. And while we may rarely analyze these events, the workplace is filled with examples of this type of assessment. For instance, the mechanic who does not score well on a multiple-choice test demonstrates competence through repair-work performances, not written ones; or the teacher who struggles in an interview demonstrates competence with a video of teaching performances. Or the banker whose oral performances leave something to be desired demonstrates competence by producing expert analyses in writing. Indeed, we need only consider such professions and occupations as the law, medicine, the professoriate, the welding shop, the automobile dealership (whether in the sales force or in the service

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bays) ad nauseam to see example after example of competence being assessed through multiple modalities and over extended periods of time. Except in classrooms, for purposes of external accountability. In every instance of real world employment and productive engagement, not only are multiple modalities accepted as performances to illustrate competence, within reason, but additionally apprentices and interns and newly hired trainees are officially or unofficially inducted into a mentoring or coaching system in order to acclimate the new person to the performances that will be observed and assessed. Except in classrooms, for purposes of external accountability. In the professoriate, one chooses a thesis director and a committee of soon-to-be peers even while working as an apprentice professor who teaches while performing research. In the welding shop, new hires routinely perform the more menial tasks of metal preparation and weldment grinding while serving as helpers to more experienced welders. Of course, the law and medicine, like teacher preparation, have well documented and long standing apprenticeship or internship models in place. Fledgling M.D.s and J.D.s aren’t judged only on any single, high-stakes test, but are instead reviewed and observed time after time after time, with exception-based mechanisms in place to accommodate those who score poorly on the requisite standardized instruments such as the Medical College Admission Test (MCAT) or Law School Admission Test (LSAT). After, all in the case of legal work, one need only be sponsored by a practicing attorney to sit for the Multistate Bar Examination, amended to include the legal landscape of the specific state in which one seeks licensure. Additionally, once the candidate clears any entry hurdles and begins work in the field proper, whether it be diesel mechanic school or law school, one repetitive element appears time after time after time in all these examples: Practice. Except in classrooms, for purposes of external accountability…and unless we count the time students spend practicing and being coached and mentored on that all important task of scoring well on standardized tests. In fact, in elementary, secondary, and post-secondary classrooms, for the most part, the externally mandated assessment instruments currently in place are almost without exception readily identifiable by their very lack of connection to real world practices in any field or profession (Eisner, 2002). At the risk of being redundant, we offer the following list of qualities by which these common, faulty attempts to know easily (FAKE), but actually quite useless assessments may be identified.

FAKE Assessments • • • • • •

Happen on a fake schedule, Don’t look like anything people do in the real world, Produce high anxiety in most subjects, Can be gamed through cheating or luck or cramming mnemonics, Are only reliable when they are designed by experts at designing fake assessments, Are never truly valid because they never truly connect the assessment performance with the competence sought.

And while we admit to having our tongues firmly in our cheeks with regard to the foregoing list, the negatives of standardized assessment instruments and standardized curricula designed to accompany those instruments, along with the instructional approaches that inevitably result from such measures, 245

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are unfortunately easy to identify and describe. More problematic is the task of designing replacements for those negative situations in modern, externally monitored and evaluated public and private schools. Toward that end, we have spent countless hours observing and reflecting on what it truly means to make strong inferences—assessments—about the learning and the competency of students based on the authentic performances of those same students. And as we discussed above, and as everyone in education knows, by far the most important distinction, and the classic paradox of learning assessments, involves the distinction between competence and performance. Indeed, legions of books and reams of essays have been written about these twin concepts in the lives of learners and humans. The topic arises in every discussion of the foundations of education, learning theory, educational psychology, developmental psychology, psycholinguistics, and instructional design. Teachers have wrestled with these issues as long as there have been teachers. Eisner (2002) traces formal educational assessment back to “the early attempts to create a science of the social” during the Enlightenment. Having that said, then, we offer the following ideas as a start on creating recognizable, engaging, adaptable, and life-like (REAL) assessment instruments, instruments we further connect to recognizable, engaging, adaptable, and life-like (REAL) learning activities. Because…

REAL Assessments and Activities • • • • • •

Happen over time without artificial scheduling, Look like the activities of regular life, Don’t produce high anxiety, Can’t be gamed, Can be designed by anyone competent in the field, Are always reliable...and more importantly, valid.

A caveat is in order: we cannot overemphasize that the typical public or private or university classroom continues to be one of the most difficult environments on earth in which to attempt assessments of competence in any field, except perhaps purely academic competence as is apparent from recitation or simple computation, performances which can be produced virtually anywhere (Kohn, 2000). Indeed, this basic situation probably accounts for some of the difficulty we routinely encounter in trying to move educational assessment away from unrealistic or FAKE domains. On the other hand, for our own purposes as teachers and as part of the development of this manuscript, we have developed all manner of easily assessable learning activities that equally readily transcend those traditional assessments while also blurring the traditional distinction between assignment and learning activity, between guided practice and independent practice, even between teacher-centric demonstration and student-centered engagement with content knowledge. In short, in our own classrooms we have worked reflectively and at length to create ways to assess learners’ deep-seated, broad-based competence, not potentially transient performances on simplistic instruments, performances indicative only of superficial test-taking skills and vocabulary as are typically consistent with relatively superficial content standards focused what essentially amounts to. Further, predicated partially on the concepts embodied in what has come to be called dynamic assessment theory (Yildirim, 2008), but essentially bearing in mind Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development from which that theory arises, we propose assessments embedded in and part of the learner’s response to the instructions embedded in the learning activity. In this way, an authentic assessment of 246

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a learning-based performance develops as the learner responds to directions and creates products as a result of that same direction. The process takes time as teachers assess individual student’s progress toward greater knowledge and competency in a subject, but fundamentally works in similar ways to the tradition of mathematics wherein one shows one’s work toward a final solution. So too, if we assess learning at multiple points throughout the process, we can more easily determine where students need further clarification, additional guided practice, more elaborate demonstrations, or some combination of all three. Teachers must further adapt and adjust instructions, demonstrations, guided practice activities, peer-assessment and review events, and individualized responses throughout the process. This sort of teaching and mentoring typically becomes intensely recursive as teachers offer further clarification and additional background resources (readings, preliminary activities such as pre-writing activities, web searches, etc.), all of which fall into the realm of elements influencing the ongoing assessments taking place in the instructional milieu. These assessment models also evolve along with the learners evolving knowledge and experience, and take into account the level of practice the learner may have had. Particularly in writing activities, the fundamentals for dynamic, repetitive assessments embedded within the learning activity are well documented and acknowledged in the field and in the literature. Composition theorists long ago confirmed that there is a process to writing and while it may not be the same for everyone, finding a process that works for the individual is an important part of the performance itself, leading to observable competence in the one creating an act of communication. In short, just in the area of composition, learners need to be offered multiple modes of expressing their competence. Finally, our designs uniformly work to adapt and adjust assessments of performances in an ongoing way while avoiding static assessment instruments that do not evolve with the learners being assessed. For just as anyone might often say, “I know it; I just can’t get it out,” so too learners may “know it,” may even be able to do it, in fact may be quite proficient at it, but may struggle to produce it on demand. And so our approach attempts to catch that competence repeatedly and over time, but without ever producing or being misled by performance errors having nothing to do with that same competence. In other words, real assessment works all or most of the time, with everyone or almost everyone, and never or almost never creates performance (i.e. “test”) anxiety. To conclude, then, we argue that authentic assessment develops as an intrinsic and inescapable element within virtually any well designed learning activity because that same learning activity may double as an adaptable, adjustable assessment instrument, thus seamlessly melding learning activity with assessment tool in a way that moves beyond the traditional separation of learning activity from later, stand-alone assessment or evaluation instrument (i.e. “test”). All the chapters that follow offer materials and ideas and models and templates that have been designed, piloted, refined, and field-tested in real classrooms for just this purpose. And in keeping with the models and templates offered, we propose that only through self-collection and analysis of in-class generated data about learners’ outcomes will teachers begin to be able to chart their own professional courses in support of the best interests of every learner. Indeed, at minimum, forward thinking teachers must continue to see themselves not as mindless agents of cultural reproduction, but as agents of change for a society always in pursuit of social justice and equal opportunities for all its citizens. We argue for this at all levels, from PK-12 to post-secondary to post-graduate, where external forces increasingly seek to encroach upon existing systems of curricular planning and assessment as never before. Further, in order to refute any charges of squandering precious

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instructional time—and in fact in order never to do so—we advocate learning activities which, as noted above, become assessment instruments in their own right. We further argue that current, externally administered and brokered, for-profit assessment models test far too often, far too superficially, and far too expensively, as if assessment and evaluation activities could somehow replace authentic learning activities. Thus, we do not offer cookie cutter templates or teacher-proof recipes, but an overall framework and coherent conceptual model through which the learning-through-doing activities, augmented by usefully designed rubrics and scoring modules, also serve as assessment instruments. In short, we are offering a way to more accurately align ongoing observations and assessments of performances with underlying competence, thereby providing teachers with better tools with which to provide learning opportunities and assess any underlying competence all at the same time. With our tongues only tentatively in our cheeks, we actually like to call this a selfassessing activity model (or SAA)…as in, “Saaaaaay! That’s pretty cool!”

REFERENCES Apple, M. (2004). Ideology and curriculum (3rd ed.). New York, NY: Routledge. Berliner, D. C. (2010, January 5). The answer sheet. Washington Post. Retrieved October 18, 2016, from http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/david-berliner/berliner-why-we-are-smart-abou.html Casey, L. M. (2013). The will to quantify: The “bottom line” in the market model of educational reform. Teachers College Record, 115(9), 1–7. Civic Impulse. (2016). S. 1177 — 114th Congress: Every student succeeds act. Retrieved from https:// www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/114/s1177 Council of Chief State School Officers. (2016). Common core state standards initiative. Retrieved from http://www.corestandards.org/read-the-standards/ Darling-Hammond, L. (2011, May 18). The service of democratic education. The Nation. Retrieved from http://www.thenation.com/article/160850/service-democratic-education De Lissovoy, N. (2013). Pedagogy of the impossible: Neoliberalism and the ideology of accountability. Policy Futures in Education, 11(4), 423–435. doi:10.2304/pfie.2013.11.4.423 DiRanna, K., Osmundson, E., Topps, J., Barakos, L., Gearhart, M., Cerwin, K., & Strang, C. et al. (2008). Assessment-centered teaching: A reflective practice. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. Duckor, B. (2014). Formative assessment in seven good moves. Educational Leadership, 71(6), 26–28. Eisner, E. W. (2002). What can education learn from the arts about the practice of education? The Encyclopedia of Informal Education. Retrieved from http://www.infed.org/biblio/eisner_arts_and_the_practice_or_education.htm Gamse, B. C., Jacob, R. T., Horst, M., Boulay, B., & Unlu, F. (2008). Reading First Impact Study. Final Report. NCEE 2009-4038. National Center for Education Evaluation and Regional Assistance.

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Giroux, H. A. (2015). Youth in authoritarian times: Challenging neoliberalism’s politics of disposability. Retrieved March 30, 2016 http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/33312-youth-in-authoritarian-timeschallenging-neoliberalism-s-politics-of-disposability Kane, M. T. (2013). Validating the interpretations and uses of test scores. Journal of Educational Measurement, 50(1), 1–73. doi:10.1111/jedm.12000 Kohn, A. (2000). The case against standardized testing: Raising the scores, ruining the schools. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann. Kohn, A. (2004). What does it mean to be well educated?: And more essays on standards, grading, and other follies. New York, NY: Random House Crown Publishing. No Child Left Behind Act of 2001, Pub. L. No. 107-110, § 115, Stat. 1425 (2002). Popham, W. J. (2010). Everything school leaders need to know about assessment. Thousand Oaks, CA: Corwin Press. Popham, W. J., Berliner, D. C., Kingston, N. M., Fuhrman, S. H. M., Ladd, S., Charbonneau, J., & Chatterji, M. (2014). Can today’s standardized achievement tests yield instructionally useful data? Challenges, promises and the state of the art. Quality Assurance In Education: An International Perspective, 22(4), 1–39. Ravitch, D. (2001). Left back: A century of battles over school reform. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster. Ujifusa, A. (2012, December 5). Testing Costs States $1.7 Billion a Year, Study Estimates. Retrieved from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2012/12/05/13testcost-2.h32.html?qs=testing+dollars+per+child U.S. Department of Education. (2009). Race to the Top executive summary. Retrieved from http://www2. ed.gov/programs/racetothetop/executive-summary.pdf Yatvin, J. (2002). Babes in the woods: The wanderings of the national reading panel. Phi Delta Kappan, 83(5), 364–369. doi:10.1177/003172170208300509 Yildirim, A. G. O. (2008). Vygotsky’s sociocultural theory and dynamic assessment in language learning. Anadolu University Journal of Social Sciences, 8(1), 301–308.

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Accountability: For the purpose of this chapter, accountability refers to the measurements imposed on classroom teachers to demonstrate their level of effectiveness in the classroom. Assessment: In the classroom context, assessment refers to measuring the effectiveness of a lesson, activity, or assignment. Critical Literacy: The aspect of critical pedagogy concerned with reading, writing, and other forms of composing expression. Evaluation: Observing or judging in an effort to measure a thing in relation to another thing or a standard-grading.

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Literacy: The ability to recognize patterns in observed phenomena—linguistic, technological, behavioral—and construct or comprehend orderly or systematic meanings in those observed patterns. Examples: Language literacy, pedagogic literacy, political literacy, media literacy. Multi-Modal: Using a wide variety of modes to communicate information. Including, but not limited to: linguistic, textual, visual, and spatial. Standardized: Lessons or assessments that are identical across a population. Student-Centered: Lessons and activities developed from the interests and life experiences of the students.

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APPENDIX: LEARNING ACTIVITIES AND ASSESSMENT INSTRUMENTS Activity: Create A Character How For this learning activity, students create people-based characters such as superheros who are similar to the ones so common in popular culture and video. The basic assignment reads as follows: Please create and describe a [blank] (superhero, supervillain, etc.) characters similar in type to those found in popular culture. Examples include such figures as Superman, Spiderman, Wonder Woman, and Invisible Woman (in superheros), but may draw from the fantasy genre and involve creating wizard or witch figures, or even mythological gods and goddesses in addition to the typical science fiction-based characters in most comics. At minimum, descriptions must include information on the following character traits: • • • • • • • •

Character’s Alter Ego and Alter Ego Job (if disguised in normal life), Character’s Species or Origin (home planet, accidental event, etc.), Character’s Affiliations (with other, similar entities, etc.), Character’s Abilities, Character’s Weaknesses, Character’s Personality Traits (serious, prankster, studious, strong silent type, outgoing party animal type, etc.), Character’s Preferences (favorite foods, music, clothes, sports, movies, locations, weather, recreational activities, etc.), Illustration (including multiple poses, static and in action, if possible).

Why Character creation works on both a motivational level and an analytical level as learners have cognitive ownership of their own creations (reference here?), a motivating factor, and as they see the identifiable aspects of character description (sub-sets of personality traits) that can be seen in the characters created by other authors. That is, in thinking about whether to create a character who likes the ocean instead of the mountains, learners are more likely to notice—or at least be aware of—such traits in the fictional characters they encounter in reading. Further, in working to create fictional characters, learners may also be encouraged to think about how other authors may have approached their own character building, a definite step toward a more critical stance as a reader. At the highest levels of cognition, too, such thinking can move toward consideration of the political or socio-cultural mores revealed when one considers a fictional character’s choices as reflective of broad cultural values for the society in which the character is situated.

When, Where, and with Whom Learning activities predicated on the idea of character creation can be implemented with even the very young, who tend to be very receptive to the concepts of pretend role-playing already (reference here?).

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Children as young as three, four, and five years of age, including Kindergarteners and first-graders, often readily pretend to assume the identity of favorite literary characters such as superheros or fair-tale inhabitants, and may be lead, especially at older ages, to think about creating their own versions of those characters. Certainly, older readers will often engage with their own inventions far more readily than with the inventions of others. Likewise, such learning activities lend themselves to both the beginning activities of a new reading or writing engagement, as an introductory move to initiate literary analysis-oriented thinking, or as a closing activity to help learners focus in on the particulars of character analysis and as a precursor to draft writing for reviews or even research-based analysis. In the classroom, this work is neither dependent on technology beyond routine pencil and paper, nor does it present problems for even the largest classes (except those problems of management as are always present with large groups). Additionally, this type of learning activity can easily be migrated to digital technologies including traditional word processing software on computers, but also including online platforms such as Go Animate (goanimate. com) and beyond.

How to Individualize, Accommodate, and Differentiate Creative oriented learning activities tend to be naturally individualized for personal preferences, and equally readily differentiated for ability and interests because the descriptive work can more or less supported structurally through the use of templates with varying amounts of completion left to the learner. So too, with teacher led guided practice and modeling on overhead, smartboard, whiteboard, and even blackboard. Paper-based and electronic templates with more or less left for student completion may also be distributed individually and adaptively, including templates suitable for iPad or touch screen, with or without modular drag and drop elements for even the most physically challenged learners are another option with this type of activity.

How to Assess Scoring rubrics offer the best compromise between evaluation (grading) and performance assessments (source here?), and in this case such rubrics may be adapted to address primarily the process work being done, or the final product quality, or the final product’s reflection of underlying thinking. Indeed, as with our fundamental premise that any truly valuable learning activity is also a valuable assessment activity, effectively constructed rubrics provide an opportunity for teachers to focus in on any number of domains of process and performance, and any combination of the two. Further, for assessment purposes only, rubrics may be developed with no numerical scoring, no hierarchy of valuation, and may then be used for everything from Individualized Education Program development to parental conferencing to administrative reporting and portfolio development. For instance, if one seeks knowledge about the learner’s level of self-actualization on the specific task, a rubric domain might look similar to this: • • •

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Least Initiative: Rarely self-starts or moves to new tasks without prompting. Medium Initiative: Self-starts approximately 50% of the time without prompting. High Initiative: Almost always self-starts without any prompting.

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Likewise, a rubric domain, with scoring values, for product completeness might look as thus: • • • • •

No Elements of Character Creation Completed: 0 Points. Minimal (3/10) Elements of Character Creation Completed: 3 points, does not meet expectations. Medium (6-7/10) Elements of Character Creation Completed: 6-7 points, minimally meets expectations. Good (8-9/10) Elements of Character Creation Completed: 8-9 points, appropriately meets expectations. Excellent (10/10) Elements of character Creation Completed: 10 points, exceeds expectations.

Activity: Home Tour How For this learning activity, students will create their “dream” home and then as a culminating presentation they will take the class on a virtual tour. This lesson combines technology and descriptive writing. Once you have decided how long the essay should be, students will be given the appropriate “house plan” template for the assignment, and then students are given time to explore a wide variety of home decorating and architectural magazines as well as home improvement catalogs and design websites. After being giving sufficient time to initially explore those resources students will begin designing their “homes” to fit the assignment requirements. 5 paragraph essay=5 room house (or at least a tour of 5 of the rooms). Students can then use the template as an outline by listing details of each room in the appropriate box. ßdon’t love that phrasing.

Extension After completing the essay students can use a program such as Prezi to create a virtual tour of the house that can then be presented to the class.

Why One of the primary issues we see with student writing is the ongoing struggle to maintain their focus throughout an essay. While we are not advocating a regimented writing program, we do believe that this visual structure will help students overcome the stream of consciousness essays we all too often see. This project, with its concrete foundation and familiar context allows students to develop a useable framework for writing essays that will last a lifetime. The context of a house works well with writing because students can visualize themselves walking from room to room (paragraph to paragraph) and thus develop solid transitions while maintaining the overall focus of the paper. Simply enough, if it isn’t in the “house” it isn’t in the paper and the concept of going from room to room allows students to learn how to transition from one writing space to another just as they would in the physical space of a home.

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The tour begins in the living room and that is where the “guests” are briefly told why they are here and what they will see today (introductory paragraph). While the overall topic is the house, the paper is divided into rooms just like in a house. The students transition from section to section as they would from room to room, with special emphasis placed on maintaining focus on one specific aspect at a time. i.e. when we are in the game room we talk about the game room and when we are in the “theater room” (encourage students to dream) we only talk about the theater room. This concrete focus on each room as a specific aspect of the house allows students to write with greater detail and fluidity.

When, Where, and with Whom This activity is easily adaptable to students from grades k-12. The concept of a house (whether it be a mobile home, apartment, palace, ranch etc.) is easily recognizable to all students and allows the most concrete to the most abstract of visionaries to work within the same realm.

How to Individualize, Accommodate, and Differentiate As previously noted, creative oriented learning activities tend to be naturally individualized for personal preferences, and equally readily differentiated for ability and interests because the descriptive work can more or less supported structurally through the use of templates with varying amounts of completion left to the learner. This lesson lends itself particularly well to a wide variety of learners because of nearly endless variety of “homes” across the world. Depending on the ability of the students and the level of detail desired this lesson could be a 5 paragraph essay with a specific number of details for each room/ paragraph, to a full blown creative writing assignment that not only describes each room, but events that have occurred in relation to the overall story.

How to Assess Here again, scoring rubrics offer the best compromise between evaluation (grading) and performance assessments (source here?), and in this case such rubrics may be adapted to address primarily the process work being done, or the final product quality, or the final product’s reflection of underlying thinking. Indeed, as with our fundamental premise that any truly valuable learning activity is also a valuable assessment activity, effectively constructed rubrics provide an opportunity for teachers to focus in on any number of domains of process and performance, and any combination of the two. Further, for assessment purposes only, rubrics may be developed with no numerical scoring, no hierarchy of valuation, and may then be used for everything from Individualized Education Program development to parental conferencing to administrative reporting and portfolio development. For instance, if one seeks knowledge about the learner’s level of self-actualization on the specific task, a rubric domain might look similar to this: • • •

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Least Initiative: Rarely self-starts or moves to new tasks without prompting. Medium Initiative: Self-starts approximately 50% of the time without prompting. High Initiative: Almost always self-starts without any prompting.

Assessment Shouldn’t Be a Pay-Per-View Activity

Activity: Create a Guidebook for an Imaginary World How For this learning activity, students create a guidebook for a whole new world. This is not an adaptation of the world we live in, but an entirely new world with new life forms, environments etc. This assignment can be tailored to a wide variety of students/abilities. The foundational activity involves the student creating a new world and filling it with a variety of flora and fauna. The level of diversity and the biological descriptions can be adjusted from just a few animals that breathe chocolate and only run backwards so they can see who is chasing them, on to entire ecosystems and even the planet. The key aspects that must be met should all be familiar from their science classes and own life experiences. Each environment must have some sort of atmosphere. It need not be oxygen or water, but there must be at least one “atmosphere” that the flora and fauna require in order to survive. The environment can be whatever size the writer prefers. That is, the environment could be as large as the solar system or small enough to fit on the tip of a pin. Also, it is important that the writer not be restricted to a “terrestrial” environment, but can create any form of environment they prefer. (Robert, I am thinking of the Space Whale from Dr. Who) For every “living” thing in the environment there should be a corresponding “encyclopedic” reference that describes the “thing” in relation to the five senses as well as describing how/what the “things” eat and how they reproduce (eggs, live births, wish on a star), as well as what geographic region they live in. As with traditional guidebooks, the author should be encouraged to include drawings or pictures of the inhabitants.

Why This activity allows students to integrate creative writing into a more formal business/scientific genre. This is also an opportunity for English teachers to collaborate with science teachers and explore our planets biodiversity. (There are tubeworms that live on the oceans floor in 800-degree water next to volcano vents and “breathe” methane.)

When, Where, and with Whom Students of all levels of skills and abilities can benefit from this activity. Teachers can easily adapt this lesson to students from kindergarten through 12th grade by expanding the number of “beings” and the detail of their corresponding descriptions. While a kindergartener may describe a terrestrial world with pink skies where the creatures survive on gumdrops and breathe air; a more advanced student may create an environment that exists in the empty space between planets and is populated by creatures that eat stardust and breathe dark matter.

How to Individualize, Accommodate, and Differentiate This activity is easily adapted to a wide variety of experience and skill levels.

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How to Assess Here again, scoring rubrics offer the best compromise between evaluation (grading) and performance assessments (source here?), and in this case such rubrics may be adapted to address primarily the process work being done, or the final product quality, or the final product’s reflection of underlying thinking. Indeed, as with our fundamental premise that any truly valuable learning activity is also a valuable assessment activity, effectively constructed rubrics provide an opportunity for teachers to focus in on any number of domains of process and performance, and any combination of the two. Further, for assessment purposes only, rubrics may be developed with no numerical scoring, no hierarchy of valuation, and may then be used for everything from Individualized Education Program development to parental conferencing to administrative reporting and portfolio development. For instance, if one seeks knowledge about the learner’s level of self-actualization on the specific task, a rubric domain might look similar to this: Least Initiative: Rarely self-starts or moves to new tasks without prompting. Medium Initiative: Self-starts approximately 50% of the time without prompting. High Initiative: Almost always self-starts without any prompting.

• • •

Likewise, a rubric domain, with scoring values, for product completeness might look as thus: • • • • •

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No Elements of the Menu Completed: 0 Points. Minimal (1-2 / 6) Elements of Menu Completed: 1-3 points, does not meet expectations. Medium (3-4 / 6) Elements of Menu Completed: 4-6 points, minimally meets expectations. Good (5 / 6) Elements of Menu Completed: 7-9 points, appropriately meets expectations. Excellent (6 / 6) Elements of Menu Completed: 10 points, exceeds expectations.

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Chapter 15

Incorporating Students’ Digital Identities in Analog Spaces: The Educator’s Conundrum William J. Fassbender The University of Georgia, USA

ABSTRACT Multiliteracies has gained significant favor in the past two decades due to the increased popularity of technology. Educators are not only finding new and exciting ways to make content relatable to students by including their digital lives in the classroom, but now the digital experience of teens is the topic of classroom conversations. The inclusion of students’ online identities has certain advantages, as many students may find the bridge between academic work and their out-of-school lives advantageous to their learning. However, educators need to give careful consideration of how to safely include students’ digital identities into the classroom, as these online lives are often carefully crafted for their networking platforms and are not necessarily intended for analog, classroom spaces. Throughout this article, the author explores the ways in which teachers incorporate teens’ online identities and troubles the notion that teachers can safely include these identities without co-opting their out-of-school online practices.

INTRODUCTION The following chapter will recognize literature both for and against multiliteracies, specifically related to social media, with the purpose of identifying trends and troubling notions of including online identities in the classroom. The chapter’s author, a middle school English language arts teacher, fell prey to the enticing inclusion of social media without considering the potential consequences of incorporating them within a school setting. Although it may be too late to right his wrongs as a classroom teacher, the author hopes that this chapter will give pause to teachers before using social media to draw connections between course content and the personal lives of students.

DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch015

Copyright © 2017, IGI Global. Copying or distributing in print or electronic forms without written permission of IGI Global is prohibited.

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IDENTITY CRISIS Adults like to believe that they can lead pluralistic lives where they simultaneously exist online and offline. We claim to be able to multitask by emailing our boss on weekends or responding to a text message from our significant other while in an important meeting. These are ways that we try to co-exist in different spaces all at once. However, adults often see these as sacrifices that we have to make in our technological world; it is the shrapnel of the digital explosion in our lives. Most of us watched as the technology boom evolved and worked its way into our lives. We adopted those tools that made our lives better/easier and eschewed those we believed we would not need. Most adolescents today are born into a technological world and are led to believe that they need everything: the newest and most up-to-date phone, all of the apps that their friends have, a computer that allows them to video chat/play games/edit video, blog, etc. They have not known a life before technology. To them, technology is not just what they do. It is who they are. This pluralistic existence that many adolescents attempt to live is bound to have some consequences. Research has shown that students have a lot to balance when it comes to differing expectations from their families, friends, and teachers. Phelan, Davidson, and Yu (1998) concluded that students had to develop different types of adaptation strategies in order to bridge their lives between home and school, classroom to classroom, and even from peer to peer. While Phelan et al. (1998) focused primarily on the role of race in these “multiple worlds,” this concept can be useful in understanding some of the issues that students experience in different digital and analog spaces. The transition from each world is not often as seamless as one might imagine. Although the distinction should seem simple, online identities do not cease to exist when the screen turns black. Media theorist Douglas Rushychenkoff explained that the rise in the number of teen suicides during the digital age is not due to the fact that technology is inherently depressing so much as “because we are living multiple roles simultaneously without the time and cues we normally get to move from one to the other” (Rushkoff, 2013, p. 126). Dissociative identity disorder, previously more commonly known as multiple personality disorder, is a condition in which a person may suffer from having two more discrete identities that manifest in different ways (American Psychiatric Association, 2013). A diagnosis like this is considered to be aberrant psychological behavior and potentially debilitating if not treated with therapy and/or medication. However, the dawn of social media ushered in an era in which we were able to create new personas for different spaces. Adolescents’ inability to shift gears between their online worlds and reality contributes to a sense of digiphrenia, which is an “uneasiness that results from the realization that there is more than one version of ourselves existing in online networks and the real world” (Rushkoff, 2013, p. 75). This fear leads many to be glued to their phones knowing that every moment they are not online is a time where their digital lives could be invited to an online hangout and they will be left out of the loop.

THE ONLINE IDENTITY In the same way that many teachers, like most professionals, portray different identities online than they do in front of their colleagues and students, young people are careful to separate their lives at home and online from the ones that they present at school. Even with the increase in cyberbullying, many young people feel more comfortable with the digital identities they have created as they seek out like-minded 258

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people through affinity groups and other networks. They tinker, they play, and they develop strong bonds with others who they may never meet face-to-face. However, adults need to establish spaces and develop strategies to learn about student online practices without lecturing or trying to repurpose these practices in the name of education. When this begins to happen, enjoyable online practices run the risk of becoming “schoolified,” which can be the death knell for popular sites and apps for adolescents. Schools have great potential to help students develop their digital literacies, but they cannot attempt to open the classroom up to conversations about online worlds without considering the impact they are having on students’ mindsets regarding their beloved online tools and spaces. Technology is making it increasingly difficult for students to separate their online personas from their face-to-face realities. Every day a majority of America’s youth carries a cell phone that holds their personal information, including that of the identities that they have created in online settings. The line of digital and analog worlds is becoming more obscure as technology becomes incorporated in the activities that used to be reserved for human-to-human interaction. Students are beginning to understand that their online identities speak for them, even when they are away from the computer. This obscuring of online and analog worlds raises many questions about America’s youth and how they are capable of navigating between spaces. Teachers may see it as their responsibility to help students bridge these evolving bifurcated spaces. However, adolescents are the curators of these digital worlds and the onus may be on them to help define and navigate between these identities. Subsequently, education may have to accept that this is one form of multiliteracy that does not belong in the classroom.

ONLINE IDENTITIES IN THE CLASSROOM Due to the deep-seated ways in which technology has been integrated into students’ lives, it makes perfect sense that a teacher would try to capitalize on their online practices in order to make learning more meaningful and to help them think more critically about the ways that they exist in online spaces. There were times in our society when the inclusion of social media in the classroom would have been laughable, as pop culture and leisure could never have been considered something worth studying within schools (Alvermann & Hagood, 2000). However, as times have changed and technology has established itself within the fabric of Western culture, it no longer has to fight for a legitimate spot in classrooms. Educators have started to realize the complex networks that students create outside of the classroom and now students’ digital labor at home is not merely tolerated, but deemed worthy of deep study within educational settings. The New London Group’s (1996) seminal article, A Pedagogy of Multiliteracies: Designing Social Futures, was a call to arms to educators to start using multimodal texts as key artifacts that would help young learners obtain and develop the skills they would need to be successful at work and within their private and public spheres in the future. They posited that the inclusion of multiliteracies would help students feel more prepared by exploring texts that included one or more of the five modes: linguistic, visual, audio, gestural, and spatial. However, it was not enough to simply start including multimodal texts within the classroom; there had to be a pedagogical design to include them as part of the class discourse. The New London Group (1996) believed that there had to be a conversation of public language that would make the private lives of students more public within the classroom to help them better understand how their home practices could be analyzed and made richer within the class community. This required interpreting of social contexts through critical framing as well as transformed practice by designing their 259

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social futures through multimodal practices. All of these seemed cutting edge in 1996, especially given the fact that the internet and computing hardware had not reached critical mass. As such, there is no way that the New London Group could have truly anticipated the technology boom and how multiliteracies, such as social media, would not only find their ways into classrooms, but how they would also enrich and complicate our everyday lives. The studying and legitimization of multiliteracies were greatly aided by the practices of critical media literacy (CML) which argues that out-of-school literacies are a valuable commodity to include within the class discussion to help young people become better, smarter consumers and members of society at large (Alvermann & Hagood, 2000). Like the New London Group, early adopters of CML seemed to be able to read the digital tea leaves, focusing on how media would impact young persons’ in-school and out-of-school literacies, without possibly being able to understand the potential fodder for discussion that social media would eventually afford. Given that the New London Group and CML set the table for the inclusion and deep study of pop culture and out-of-school practices within the classroom, it should come as no surprise that social media and other online practices would eventually become the topic of class discussions in the mid- to late-2000s, as teachers became interested in their students’ digital literacies as it related to language and networking online. Lankshear and Knobel (2008) believed that social media was tailor-made for literacy studies in schools for various reasons. Borrowing from Scribner and Cole (1981) who believed that literacy was a social practice, social media provides ample opportunities for peers to communicate with one another using multiple modalities (Lankshear & Knobel, 2008). These practices are honed over time and developed based on the networks one is a part of. The studying of social media was not only a studying of the networks themselves, but a deep study of the language used by members of certain groups to show how the use of vernacular could reify certain people into an online community while excluding others (Lankshear & Knobel, 2008). With that, the study of social media was no longer merely a study of multiliteracies, but a study of the identities that people create in online spaces. Thomson (2002) theorized that students come to school with a virtual school bag providing them access to certain cultural capital based on their interests, home life, and everything else that they bring to the classroom. This metaphor could easily be extended to show the ways that today’s virtual book bags are indeed “virtual,” including the online lives that they carry around with them each day from class-to-class. It is not enough to recognize that students are bringing these virtual book bags with them from home. Teachers who use CML understand that they must bring in their digital media texts and create their own digital works within the classroom in order to “push back with their own counterstories” (Alvermann & Moore, 2011, p. 157). Essentially, the incorporation of social media within the classroom setting must not only study how digital works have been produced, but how students can be more fruitful with their online practices so that they can bring what they learned in school back home with them in their virtual school bags.

SOCIAL MEDIA AS A MULTILITERACY Social media clearly meets the criteria of what the New London Group (1996) would consider a multiliteracy. Platforms such as Facebook include all five semiotic codes that make up multiliteracies. They invite users to communicate with one another through linguistic, visual, and audial modes. In addition, social media sites like Instagram encourage gestural signs through shared images by keeping peers up260

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dated using photos with friends and family. Additionally, emojis and selfies have true gestural power to illustrate emotion through illustrations and facial expressions, sometimes to the point where linguistic semiotics, such as captions and hashtags, are not even necessary to decipher the meaning of a post. Lastly, the layout of various sites requires a sense of spatial literacy that allows users to navigate the page intuitively. Most users have to play with a site in order to figure out how to maneuver from each tab with purpose. Once one has successfully toggled between pages, those practices become second nature, demonstrating spatial literacy for that site. The New London Group also believed that the study of multiliteracies should focus on making private lives public. It could be argued that social media lives are public lives because they exist in the vast internet space for all (or at least most) to see. However, any adult who peered into a profile of an adolescent might be surprised by how different a young person exists in online spaces. Teachers might be shocked by the pictures posted and language used by students who represent themselves differently online. In this sense, social media is a private life because, while profiles may exist for others to see, they are clearly not intended for the entire world to view. Moreover, studying social media as a multiliteracy is meant to open conversations about social contexts by encouraging students to bring their private lives into the public sphere in front of teachers and peers who may be less aware of their alter-identities online. Some educators believe that multiliteracies is important because it prepares students for their social futures in different facets of life. Although experiences with different literacies through variegated platforms and social circles can make conversations messy and potentially tangential, bringing in varying subjectivities is an important element of the discourse. In many ways, social media has the potential to be a great equalizer, as a majority of students, regardless of race, gender, and socioeconomic status, have social media accounts and belong to some type of social network (Greenhow & Gleason, 2012). Admittedly, this is a rather utopian view that contradicts several realities of the ways in which students interact within one another, especially with issues over equal access to broadband internet. However, studies like the one conducted by Greenhow and Gleason, may be more valuable in identifying the true potential that social media and other affinity spaces have in connecting students who might otherwise never interact with one another. This type of connection is rare amongst students from varying backgrounds and can be seen as a way to connect them through class discussions in preparing them for social futures with others who may be different from them.

Identity as Literacy It is hard to deny the ways that identity and literacies are connected. Moje and Luke (2009) took a deep look at the themes that have arisen in the area of literacy-and-identity research and determined that there were three major trends in this academic space: 1. Identity is socially developed. 2. Identity becomes identities as they are fluid in different contexts. 3. Identity is reinforced when recognized by others. Online literacies are no exception to these trends as they relate to identity. It is clear that these identities are socially constructed in online spaces, as adolescents attempt to create the persona that they think will be accepted within certain circles. They are reified through comments by others and through other capital, such as likes and shares. Adolescents take up various identities that are indeed fluid given 261

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the different spaces in which they exist. As argued, rarely does a young person’s online identity match their analog identities in reality, particularly in school. This fluidity provides value based on the varying contexts, as they enact agency to present themselves in such a way that they believe is most fitting given the setting. Lastly, identity can be a trial and error process for adolescents, as they are seeking approval from their peers. In that regard, they find value in their development of their online identities only through recognition from their peers. When CML is incorporated into the classroom, “identities and subjectivities are also formed in relation to the values and discursive practices of a discourse” (Alvermann & Hagood, 2000, p. 200). In other words, teachers are not only inviting students to bring in their identities, but they are in many ways trying to help students redefine and see the ways that they are reflected in media. When creating a discourse around social media practices, students may feel less comfortable talking about their online lives because those identities are not only reflected in their practices, but created as well. Adolescents are able to control who they are in online spaces by including (and excluding) images and editing information in their profiles. They exercise careful consideration when deciding how they want to be portrayed through their interactions with peers. They get to choose their language and have the power to control their personal portrayal. This process can take months and even years to establish in the world of social media. Many teens may even prefer the person they are online over the person they are in reality. As such, Facebook, Snapchat, Instagram, Ask.fm, and other online spaces have become sanctuaries for the bullied, oppressed, and overlooked because they can seek out relationships and connections that are missing in other personal spaces. It stands to reason that a teenager may not want to bring their digital lives into school, particularly if the teacher intends on creating a critical discourse that attempts to untangle and expose online identities by studying agency that leads to the creation and development of their sense of self in digital spaces. Although digital communities can be considered sanctuaries for students who feel cast out in schools, it has become apparent that the advent of these burgeoning digital spaces have also created a new landscape for bullies and victims. Parents are becoming increasingly more aware of the issues surrounding the severity of cyberbullying as the media reports more cases of varying types of bullying. Bullying manifests itself differently in digital spaces and motivations for bullies have been found to be unique given the different digital and online settings (Antoniadou, Kokkinos, & Markos, 2016). Catfishing, or the practice of purposefully obfuscating one’s identity in order to trick another into entering into an online relationship under false pretenses, has gained significant attention with the creation of a documentary and television program by the same name. Other types of cyberbullying can be more direct and take on similar traits as face-to-face bullying. While physical contact may not be possible online, relentless name calling and posting of potentially sensitive, embarrassing material can make online communities a disturbing space for adolescents. This style of peer victimization has been shown to be a major contributing factor to teen suicide ideation (van Geel, Vedder, & Tanilon, 2014), which only serves to further explicate the ways in which online communities are complicated networks that have important and possibly dangerous impacts on the lives of an adolescent’s developing identities.

FACEBOOK IN THE CLASSROOM When teaching eighth grade language arts, the author would include activities where students would create Facebook profiles and Twitter exchanges for characters from novels that they read, believing that 262

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a novel approach to characterization and dialogue would engage students in the content. However, the author often felt disappointed after these lessons when receiving feedback from students in the form of complaints. The author was looking for authentic ways for students to demonstrate what they learned from literature. They saw the author as another adult trying to invade their online space. It was hard to strike the balance between engagement and encroachment. Despite the author’s lack of awareness with social media in the classroom, researchers have been able to identify instances where the use of social media has been successful. A study by Kabilan, Ahmad, and Abidin (2010) showed how teachers were able to use Facebook to help students communicate with people from different countries in order to learn different languages. Not only did they discover an increase in language learning, but they also observed an increase in student motivation because the social networking platform being used was new to many students. They were able to connect with people throughout the world and practice a skill that they learned in school in an applicable way that increased their social network of acquaintances. Alvermann and Finders (2012) pointed out that sites like Facebook are powerful because they are interactive and capable of transporting both students and teachers into virtual worlds (e.g., Second Life, Webkinz, Meez) where the distinction between online and offline spaces is sometimes blurred to the point that popular culture texts produced and consumed in one space for fun and relaxation often become objects of intense study and work in another. Educators often view the blurring of these lines as a benefit to students, thinking that it is a way to connect to students’ lives, allowing them to bring in their virtual school bags in unique and meaningful ways. While connecting could be one way to justify social media in the classroom, boredom could make for a compelling argument from educators as well. Recent studies in educational psychology have looked at the reasons why some students find school to be boring. Markey, Chin, Van Epps, and Loewenstein (2014) concluded that, amongst other reasons, many students are bored because they believe they are wasting their time doing school activities when they could be doing other more enjoyable activities, such as playing video games, reading, drawing, or texting with friends. Understanding this, it would make perfect sense to include social media in the classroom, as it is a way to include the activities that students would otherwise be doing in an academic setting. Incorporating online worlds in offline spaces can help content become more relatable by bridging gaps between what students want to do during their leisure time and the school work they otherwise would rather avoid.

Student-Teacher Networking Mazman and Usluel (2010) surveyed college students about the use of Facebook in the classroom and determined that many young people were okay with the inclusion of the social media platform being used in a classroom setting. Students liked that it would allow them to connect with one another in a social way and that it could help them facilitate class discussions and collaborate with one another. However, of all the reasons they believed Facebook could be used in their classroom setting, most students believed that it had to prove that it had “usefulness” with the class activities (Mazman & Usluel, 2010, p. 452). In other words, Facebook had to be able to do something that students would not be able to do otherwise in a typical face-to-face class setting. This is critical when thinking about using social networks in classes, as many teachers do not consider how Facebook or any other social media platform improves upon the curriculum. The argument can be made that it is used only because it is convenient or it engages, which is not enough to justify the use of social media in the classroom.

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While Facebook may not be the best platform for teachers who hope to connect and communicate with students in a digital setting, there have been a slew of sites and apps that could be considered “educational spin-offs” of popular digital tools that adolescents use outside of class. TeacherTube is a site much like YouTube that houses videos that are educational and safe to show in the classroom. Remind is an app that allows teachers to text with students and guardians without giving out personal information. Edmodo is a networking site that allows teachers to post comments and assignments to groups of students. Edmodo is a particularly interesting tool as its interface bears a striking resemblance to that of Facebook. It borrows the premise of the Facebook news feed by displaying current posts and any subsequent threaded comments that teachers or students make about each post. Teachers can post notes, assignments, quizzes, and polls. Edmodo groups are closed networks, as students can only join class discussions if they are given the special code by the teacher. Additionally, teachers are able to moderate class discussions by having the ability to delete comments that seem inappropriate based on the teacher’s discretion. It is interesting how Edmodo is able to unabashedly borrow the interface and navigation of Facebook for educational purposes. Why is there a need for a site like Edmodo when Facebook can essentially serve the same purpose? The answers may be simple. Despite Mazman’s study, secondary schools rarely incorporate Facebook within the classroom. Teachers often shy away from becoming friends with their students in online spaces because they are afraid of what students might be able to dig up about them. On the other hand, students are equally leery of having another adult follow them online as they would rather avoid having another adult keep tabs on their lives. Edmodo can allow for online relationships to develop in an academic setting because teachers and students can separate themselves from their true online identities. A teacher is still nothing more than a teacher on Edmodo and a student is still the person that the teacher sees during school time. Neither party is sharing images of what they did over the weekend, stories about their family, or memes that may be considered salacious or risqué. Sites like Edmodo are important to teens because it allows teachers to connect with them in the ordinary ways without having to encroach on their online identities. Edmodo is safe because teachers can moderate class discussions, keeping control within a tiny network. However, Edmodo does little to help students with their digital literacies, as teachers create and enforce guidelines and rules. It reinforces the lack of trust that many teachers have with students in their own classrooms that if you give them freedom to roam online, they will stumble upon something that is inappropriate for school. There is little room for play and exploration. Implicit within Edmodo is the belief that teachers fear where technology will take students if they are not monitored. In short, Edmodo is little more than an extension of the classroom in a digital space. It is a concept that excites few students.

Co-Opting Student Interests It should come as no surprise as to why some students may be less willing to bring their online identities into the school space knowing that they will be analyzed for academic purposes. However, there are different reasons for teachers shying away from the inclusion of social media in the classroom. As media reports incidences of inappropriate relationships between teachers and students, school districts find themselves having to step in and create policies that outline expectations of appropriate online conduct between teachers and students. For example, the New York City Department of Education’s policy states that “in order to maintain a professional and appropriate relationship with students, DOE employees should not communicate with students who are currently enrolled in DOE schools on per264

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sonal social media sites” (NYC Department of Education, 2013). Policies like this make it clear that teachers’ and students’ lives should never clash in online spaces because such a connection would seem unprofessional and inappropriate. However, there are other teachers who avoid the incorporation of online identities into classroom spaces out of respect for students’ lives outside of school. According to the research of Burn, Buckingham, Parry, and Powell (2010, p. 191), “Media educators have often expressed a certain unease about being seen to ‘colonise’ students’ out-of-school media experiences.” Mindful teachers are considerate of the ways that online identities are incorporated in the classroom, as the engaging nature of these activities might be misconstrued for control by turning something inherently social into something academic. CML allows students to “reflect on the pleasures derived from mass media” in the classroom in an attempt to allow students to create their own multimodal text (Alvermann & Hagood, 2000, p. 194). However, teachers need to be careful of the ways that students purposefully parse out their lives to build walls between home and school. Leander and Boldt (2012) looked at the way a young boy, Lee, engaged with the reading of manga at home as compared to his reading practices within school. While Lee would act out sword fights with his friend and watch shows and play with trading cards based on his manga books at home, he was a subpar student in his reading class. Leander and Boldt (2012) concluded that his out-of-school practices were very different from his in-school practices and that, even if his teachers had included manga books in reading class, Lee would likely feel discouraged by the ways in which they were incorporated within the classroom setting because it would not allow for the improvisation and play that he incorporated at home (Leander & Boldt, 2012, p. 43). The same conclusions drawn about Lee’s interests could be said for digital activities that students partake in at home. Researchers have cautioned teachers from using students’ interests in the classrooms, seeing certain disadvantages to the incorporation of media and pop culture in school. Alvermann and Hagood (2000) borrowed the term co-opting from Luke (1996) by explaining the ways in which educators take leisure activities that are enjoyable and turn it into something academic and critical. If the point of watching TV, playing video games, listening to music, etc., are to distract students from the stresses in their lives, such as social pressure and homework/tests, then the inclusion of such activities in school has the potential to take the enjoyment out of these activities. Teachers do not bring in media so that students can talk about what they appreciate about it; they are meant to take a critical eye to their practices and make visible the frameworks and lenses from which they are creating identities and reinforcing social norms. By seeking a deeper understanding of media and pop culture, CML runs the risk of co-opting leisure activities in the name of learning. Researchers have attempted to address concerns of teachers co-opting other interests of students’ out-of-school practices, such as zines (Chu, 1997) and music (Joaquin, 2010). These examples of pop culture serve more as artifacts of leisure than identities. The stakes are higher when teachers encroach on identity, as they are toying with the online personalities that teens have painstakingly created in a realm that they never intended to be studied. When a student believes that school has co-opted a song that they liked, they may choose to stop listening to that song. Luckily for that student, there are millions of other artists and songs from which they can choose. When one’s online identity is co-opted, however, a part of them ceases to exist in a world they once coveted. Changes in Facebook membership proved to be more capricious than one could have anticipated in the late-2000s. Once adults started joining, teens subsequently decided to jump ship and find other outlets for online social interaction where they could exist with their community without the fear of being monitored by adults. The temperamental nature of

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social networks demonstrates the ways that social media will be easily co-opted by teachers, essentially ravaging an avenue of the social future educators attempted to help students better understand.

CONCLUSION Including the existence of different online identities can help bridge gaps between in-school and out-ofschool literacies to show that the practices are not as different as previously assumed (Alvermann & Moore, 2011, p. 156). The advent of social media ushered in a time where multiliteracy became increasingly important, as social futures might ultimately be defined by one’s (in)ability to exist in both digital and analog worlds simultaneously. The topic of social media provides an opportunity for rich conversations within the classroom, as the online existence of young people is anything but simple. This chapter attempts to trouble the notion that teachers should include students’ digital lives within the classroom. Although multiliteracies and CML are tailor-made for discussions surrounding social media and developing digital identities, the inclusion of such topics run the risk of being co-opted by educators, despite their best intentions. This is not to say that online experiences cannot be incorporated at all within the class discourse, but a teacher needs to exercise mindfulness of the goals and objectives before conducting conversations around digital identities. Careful consideration needs to be employed when ascribing responsibility to who bears the burden of ensuring that America’s youth is able to bridge the gaps between digital and analog worlds. It is adolescents who curate, reinforce, and contribute most to these digital spaces and teachers may need to capitulate to the idea that they do not necessarily have the responsibility to teach them about their own worlds.

REFERENCES Alvermann, D. E., & Finders, M. J. (2012). Is there a place for popular culture in curriculum and classroom discussion? In A. J. Eakle, C. J. Russo, & A. G. Osborne Jr., (Eds.), Curriculum and instruction (pp. 214–220, 227–228). Thousand Oaks, CA: SAGE. Alvermann, D. E., & Hagood, M. C. (2000). Critical media literacy: Research, theory, and practice in new times.. The Journal of Educational Research, 93(3), 193–205. doi:10.1080/00220670009598707 Alvermann, D. E., & Moore, D. W. (2011). Questioning the separation of in-school from out-of-school contexts for literacy learning: An interview with Donna E. Alvermann. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 55(2), 156–158. doi:10.1002/JAAL.00019 American Psychiatric Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (DSM-5) (5th ed.). Arlington, VA: American Psychiatric Association Publishing; doi:10.1176/appi. books.9780890425596 Antoniadou, N., Kokkinos, C. M., & Markos, A. (2016). Possible common correlates between bullying and cyber-bullying among adolescents. Psicologia Educativa, 22(1), 27–38. doi:10.1016/j.pse.2016.01.003

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Burn, A., Buckingham, D., Parry, B., & Powell, M. (2010). Minding the gaps: Teachers’ cultures, students’ cultures. In D. E. Alvermann (Ed.), Adolescents’ online literacies: Connecting classrooms, digital media, and popular culture (pp. 183–201). New York, NY: Peter Lang, Inc. Chu, J. (1997). Navigating the media environment: How youth claim a place through zines. Social Justice (San Francisco, Calif.), 24(3), 71–85. Greenhow, C., & Gleason, B. (2012). Twitteracy: Tweeting as a new literacy practice. The Educational Forum, 76(4), 464–478. doi:10.1080/00131725.2012.709032 Joaquin, J. (2010) Digital literacies and hip hop texts: The potential for pedagogy. In D. E. Alvermann (Ed.), Adolescents’ online literacies: Connecting classrooms, digital media, and popular culture (pp. 109-124). New York, NY: Peter Lang, Inc. Kabilan, M. K., Ahmad, N., & Abidin, M. J. (2010). Facebook: An online environment for learning of English in institutions of higher education? The Internet and Higher Education, 13(4), 179–187. doi:10.1016/j.iheduc.2010.07.003 Lankshear, C., & Knobel, M. (2008). Digital literacies: Concepts, policies and practices (Vol. 30). New York, NY: Peter Lang, Inc. Leander, K., & Boldt, G. (2012). Rereading A pedagogy of multiliteracies: Bodies, texts, and emergence. Journal of Literacy Research, 45(1), 22–46. doi:10.1177/1086296X12468587 Luke, C. (1996). Feminisms and pedagogies of everyday life. Albany, NY: SUNY Press. Markey, A., Chin, A., Van Epps, E., & Loewenstein, G. (2014). Identifying a reliable boredom induction. Perceptual and Motor Skills, 119(1), 237–253. doi:10.2466/27.PMS.119c18z6 PMID:25153752 Mazman, S. G., & Usluel, Y. K. (2010). Modeling educational usage of Facebook. Computers & Education, 55(2), 444–453. doi:10.1016/j.compedu.2010.02.008 Moje, E. B., Luke, A., Davies, B., & Street, B. (2009). Literacy and identity. Reading Research Quarterly, 44(4), 415–437. doi:10.1598/RRQ.44.4.7 NYC Department of Education. (2013). NYC Department of Education social media guidelines. Retrieved September 30, 2016, from http://schools.nyc.gov/NR/rdonlyres/BCF47CED-604B-4FDD-B752DC2D81504478/0/SMG_FINAL_20130415.pdf Phelan, P., Davidson, A. L., & Yu, H. C. (1998). Adolescents’ worlds: Negotiating family, peers, and school. New York, NY: Teachers College Press. Rushkoff, D. (2013). Present shock: When everything happens now. New York, NY: Current. Scribner, S., & Cole, M. (1981). The psychology of literacy. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. doi:10.4159/harvard.9780674433014 The New London Group. (1996). A pedagogy of multiliteracies: Designing social features. Harvard Educational Review, 66(1), 60–92. doi:10.17763/haer.66.1.17370n67v22j160u

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Thomson, P. (2002). Schooling the rustbelt kids: Making the difference in changing times. CrowsNest, NSW: Allen & Unwin. van Geel, M., Vedder, P., & Tanilon, J. (2014). Relationship between peer victimization, cyberbullying, and suicide in children and adolescents: A meta-analysis. JAMA Pediatrics, 168(5), 435–442. doi:10.1001/ jamapediatrics.2013.4143 PMID:24615300

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Analog Space: The physical spaces where face-to-face interactions occur. Co-Opting: The colonizing of students’ out-of-school literacy practices. Critical Media Literacy: The scholastic studying of literacies that includes texts related to mass communication, pop culture, and technology. Digital/Online Identity: Personas that originate and are developed through interactions on social media platforms. Multiliteracies: The study of texts that shifts beyond traditional forms of reading into the multilingual and multimodal concepts of literacy. New Literacies: The study of the ways in which technology and culture impact literacy through different daily social and culture practices. Secondary Education: Study of students and teachers from grades 6-12. Social Networking: Digital platforms that allow people to connect with others in online spaces.

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Chapter 16

Living the YOLO Lifestyle: The Rhetorical Power of Memes in the Classroom

Crystal L. Beach The University of Georgia, USA & Buford High School, USA Katie S. Dredger James Madison University, USA

ABSTRACT In this chapter, the authors discuss what it means for students to create, remix, and disseminate memes today—especially considering the connectivity and participatory nature of youth culture. The authors then discuss the importance of a critical media literacy pedagogy. Next, the authors investigate and rhetorically analyze some current memes. The authors also analyze the digital affordances of tools, the ways that messages are privileged and silenced, visual rhetoric, and remix. Finally, the authors explore further implications for educators to consider when using memes in the classroom.

INTRODUCTION Knobel and Lankshear (2007) define memes as “contagious patterns of ‘cultural information’ that get passed from mind to mind and directly generate and shape the mindsets and significant forms of behavior and actions of a social group” (p. 199). Memes today are created, remixed, posted, and reposted on social media and serve to simultaneously define the individual creator and the audience of the meme. In this chapter, we suggest that the messages, specifically memes, that adolescents in particular create and share define what Dredger, Woods, Beach, and Sagstetter (2010) call “adolescent space.” While adolescent space is different for each decade, today’s youth, with access to smart phones and internet, leverage their meme literacy to assert their beliefs, to affect change, and to be part of larger social groups. This publishing of beliefs reflects our modern age and gives readers insight into how such out-ofschool digital literacies can inform educators as they seek to transcend mandated and sanctioned literacies that may drive instruction. Seeing and analyzing such out-of-school literacies can help educators DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch016

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value student identity growth and foster independent thinking and critical consumerism that is needed in future generations if we hope to subvert what educators are now experiencing—a world where John Dewey’s (1897) words are reflected in America’s public education system where the: Only true education comes through the stimulation of the child’s powers by the demands of the social situations in which he finds himself. Through these demands he is stimulated to act as a member of a unity, to emerge from his original narrowness of action and feeling and to conceive of himself from the standpoint of the welfare of the group to which he belongs. (p. 77) The social situations in which adolescents today find themselves today are online, and meme creation is an act of unity. What we unpack here is the ways that identity is realized in relation to others and is visible in online spaces. While youth of today are honing their identities, they harness dispositions of New Literacies: participation, distributed expertise, sharing, experimentation, and innovation (Coiro, Knobel, Lankshear, & Leu, 2014). This theoretical framework privileges dispositions over tools. It offers a distinction in the teaching of current texts written for young adults even as pop culture because what may engage adolescents can change based on the students and what is read. When teachers and learners adopt dispositions of New Literacies, they are always asking, “Are there other ways that we could do this?” This spirit of innovation breeds more innovation, more tinkering, more play, and ultimately, includes more people and helps us to resist the urge to create and perpetuate canons, either of texts or tools. In this resistance, we honor a more Deweyan view of education, when we “believe that knowledge of social conditions, of the present state of civilization, is necessary in order properly to interpret the child’s powers” (Dewey, 1897, p. 77-80). Thus, in this chapter, we note what it means to create, remix, and disseminate memes today in a third space that bridges in and out of school literacies (Bhabha, 1990). We then discuss the importance of critical media literacy pedagogy. Next, we investigate and rhetorically analyze some current memes. We also analyze the digital affordances of tools, the ways that messages are privileged and silenced, visual rhetoric, and remix. Finally, we explore further implications for educators to consider when using memes in the classroom.

“YOLO” LIFESTYLE It’s 6:50 Monday morning. While most students make sure they are not too early to school – especially on Monday – I see several students filing into my room at the end of the hall. This is not surprising given that my classroom has become home to many students (some whom I’ve never even taught). As I turn into my room I hear shouts of “YOLO!” I ask what they’re listening to this morning since they are plugged into their phones. Dane (pseudonym) says, “You know, “The Motto” by Drizzay? You know, because I forgot my homework and all, I had to get here earlier, so YOLO.” Yet, “YOLO” isn’t the only message being remixed into memes all over social media networks. In fact, there are many social justice issues that adolescents are engaged with in online spaces in the forms of memes, such as issues of race, gender, and sexuality equality; political candidate support; and online movements that call for diversity in books (“We Need Diverse Books,” 2014). Sometimes criticized as hashtag activism that doesn’t do much beyond informing others of opinions (Dewey, 2014), memes can serve as an introduction into the ways that teens explore issues of audience, propaganda, and appeals to 270

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emotion. They also are particular to an adolescent space (Dredger, Woods, Beach, & Sagstetter, 2010) where pop culture references are leveraged for impact (Alvermann, 2012). For this reason, it is important to understand how digital mediums afford opportunities to create, remix, and disseminate memes.

CREATING, REMIXING, AND DISSEMINATING With the digital mediums available to students today to remix original messages to create their own message, too often students don’t understand the primary source of their intentions/purposes. Dawkins (2006) states that most memes are “being passed on in altered forms” and are “subject to continuous mutation” (p. 195). Those continuous mutations, or transmissions, are our students’ critical productions. The more we can help students be active consumers of the information they are a part of taking in and disseminating daily, the more people will be able to understand the how’s and why’s of the inherent structures within society that define them based on their interactions in various realms (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007; Lessig, 2008). The YOLO meme, for example, takes on a blended meaning, especially considering it’s spread through social media, which allows the new author to define it however s/he deems necessary for his/her specific situation and for a wide audience. With this point in mind, the “idea carrier” or “vehicle” (Knobel & Lankshear, 2007) is what is consistently changing, keeping the “YOLO” meme alive in all of the mediums our students are reading and producing this remixed message. In fact, “we live today in a society permeated by the digital, where our actions are frequently mediated by digital tools, and the objects we encounter are frequently shaped by digital intervention” (Martin, 2008, p. 151). Thus, the vehicle (such as Twitter, Instagram, or other online spaces) used with the “YOLO” meme gives adolescents a new way to voice their opinions and justify their choices. Our students in online spaces have a voice and an audience. What they may not have is a lens in which to examine their own and others’ publications in a critical way, in a way that reflects not only on the author who creates and posts, but also on the re-posters and the society that is reflected in the publications of these memes.

LOOKING AT MEMES THROUGH A CRITICAL MEDIA LITERACY LENS Giroux and Simon (1989) remind us that textual analysis alone doesn’t take into consideration “how meaning arises through the interface of audience and texts” (p. 61). Adolescents hear messages through memes on their mobile devices, which ultimately become forms of participatory media whether the meme creators realize it or not. Typically, media consumption has been thought to be a more passive activity, yet digital realms are changing the ways in which adolescents are consuming and producing (Dezuanni, 2010). Students should understand how and why their messages are constructed and produced in various realms and how those messages tie into the bigger picture of the real world. In the “real” world, society is a tough critic on how people act and behave. Society is not too forgiving on the footprints we, as everyday consumers and producers, create, be it in face-to-face interactions or digital spaces. “Care is needed because each individual is responsible for his/her own biography” (Martin, 2008, p. 154). In teaching students to care for their digital footprint, a critical media literacy lens is helpful in the creation of memes, as well as in the analysis of them. So in this way, critical media literacy is more than what educators sometimes consider it to be. In fact: 271

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Critical literacy is not a pedagogical technique to be learned but our ontological existence, i.e., part of our lives. It is something we do everyday to be informed agents in relation to others in a society where knowledge is socially constructed. We evaluate the texts in multiple forms critically to make our everyday decisions in various settings. Therefore, if critical literacy is what we encounter daily as human beings, it is important that it should become part of our education. (Lee, 2011, p. 101) Critical literacy does not include just the passive analysis of text and their place and effect in the world, but also the power and placement of works created and published in the world as well. Within our technological world of easy meme generation, publication, and dissemination, there is a responsibility for educators to see the multiple forces at work in a socio-cultural sense and to share these enlightenments with students, as readers and as writer-creators (Alvermann & Eakle, 2007). Our students are composing memes out-of-school, remixing published images to be heard as they make sense of a constantly changing world.

MULTIMODAL REMIXES AS MEMES As previously noted, a meme is essentially a message that can transcend generations, thanks to the connectivity of today’s digital networks, and be disbursed through multiple mediums in order to get an individual’s meaning across to one’s audience. Memes are often multimodal, which means that they include image(s) and words that work together. A meme is an example that falls under the umbrella term remix. Remix is synthesis, the curation of parts collected from varied places to make a new whole. Essentially, it is the word and image together that make a meme multimodal. Youth culture is particularly interested in memes thanks to the digital sphere, and, perhaps, the mobility that comes with creating content on-the-go (Leander & Vasudevan, 2011). Texts, such as memes, have become both multimodal and portable, which allows them to be mediated by each person who consumes, creates, and remixes them. Essentially, the remix, or meme, then, is a hybrid of the original text. Here, hybridity is in line with the original notion of the text as the social and cultural transmission complement it. However, participation with these texts is not solely contained within the digital platform, but instead “a set of practices embedded in shared norms and values” (Jenkins, Ito, & boyd, 2016, p. 184). Thus, while the ways in which the meme is communicated is important to consider, we also acknowledge that we must consider the participatory nature behind the hows and whys of the meme creation and dissemination. For this reason, in the next section of the chapter, we rhetorically analyze specific memes including “YOLO,” “Hey Girl,” “So You’re Saying?” and “Damn Daniel” that bridge the ideas of shared norms and values across time, place, and experiences.

“YOLO” When a high school student Dane told me, “YOLO!” that Monday morning, I asked him a serious question: what does “The Motto” have to do with your school work? This question prompted a vibrant discussion in all of the ways he and the other students believed in the “you only live once,” or “YOLO” lifestyle, as portrayed by the hip hop artist, Drake. From paying family bills to completing homework, telling one’s best friend the truth about something controversial to creating an attitude that would get 272

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one through any of life’s most difficult moments, I found “YOLO” meant much more to these young people than I realized. This remixed message had essentially become a type of lifestyle they identified with and embodied.

Students’ Definition of the “YOLO” Meme A quick search online of “#yolo” brings up queries showing how people use this phrase to highlight, explain, and defend their actions and thoughts. In fact, this word has become so prevalent in contemporary culture that the Oxford English Dictionary even added it to its list of new words (Domonoske, 2016). In addition, Zimmer (2012) stated, “In a sense, YOLO as a shorthand mantra defines youth, on a certain level. What is teenagehood if not the adventurous, often foolhardy, desire to test the limits of acceptable behavior—because hey, why not? YOLO!” Thus, why wouldn’t adolescents latch on to the popular artist Drake who tweets about “YOLO” (Drake, 2011) and releases a song surrounding the very essence of what they feel to be part of their identity as a young person? For example, Dane used it as an attempt to justify his decision to not complete his homework. Other students used it as a way to justify why they had a certain attitude. Even more had wristbands, hats, or shirts with the “YOLO” lettering proudly depicted on their material items. Whatever the case, the remix and creation of the “YOLO” meme quickly infiltrated their lives without any of them actually stopping to think about how and why the “YOLO” lifestyle might matter to them. While “The Motto” seems to be Drake’s definition of the socioeconomic success he has achieved and of his attitude, “YOLO,” explains why he acts the way he does and yet is a carefully crafted image. Similarly, the “YOLO” meme isn’t necessarily new. If we look at the message’s creation, one could argue that the “YOLO” meme my students use today actually has permeated western ideology since Horace penned carpe diem in approximately 23 B.C. (Grimm, 1963) and is indicative of the 17th century idea of seizing the day, shown in several of the privileged class’s author’s works during this time, such as Robert Herrick’s (n.d.) “To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time” and America’s Thoreau’s suggestion to “suck out all of the marrow of life” (1854). Bob Marley, in 1980, suggested that youth not worry about a thing, and the song has been a continually played hit by even today’s digital youth (Jahn, & Weber, 1998). And Disney, too, promoted this sentiment as a motto in 1994’s The Lion King as the viral song “Hakuna Matata” has been suggested to have led to globalization and African tourism (Bruner, 2001). As these examples show, though the message is not new, the dissemination and the medium of the meme is. “YOLO,” to differentiate from “No Worries,” implies action. As such, if one views “YOLO” based upon Drake’s expressions of his lifestyle, then adolescents would ultimately be using “YOLO” to identify with the behaviors associated with Drake and his success; their imitation of his success, however, comes in the form of creating memes, or remixed messages, that justify the decisions and actions they make. As such, we suggest that the “YOLO” lifestyle, while similar to carpe diem and no worries, is distinctively different in the adolescent space that our students live in today, partly because of the tools so readily available to create, remix, and publish, and partly because of the age that we are living in, one where media is consumed so readily. The issue surrounding the “YOLO” meme is that its definition has become so blended with popular culture references, such as “The Motto,” that one cannot accurately discern what “YOLO” means. However, the issue is not about creating a definitive definition for “YOLO,” but instead how one must rhetorically analyze the medium and messenger in order to understand the meme’s meaning for that specific author and situation. 273

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Rhetorically Analyzing the “YOLO” Meme The importance of the social context in the case of “The Motto” is that after adolescents consume Drake’s message, they in turn apply his motto to their everyday lives through face-to-face interactions and through social media venues in which the meme is created. Here, Drake’s “The Motto” is one example that shows how young people are active consumers/producers creating a message (the meme) that links to their identity in the real world. In a sense, they are remixing the message the hip hop mogul’s song portrays to fit their individual lives and situations while producing a meme that serves as the sign of their version of “YOLO.” Furthermore, “since the blaming of human actions on technology allows humans to escape responsibility for actions which were the results of their own choices” (Martin, 2008), it would appear that adolescents are using “YOLO” to simply run away from the tasks or consequences at hand. Again, this point stems back to their identity and why they identify with a particular message that may or may not support society’s definition of young people. In order to pay attention to the message in Drake’s “The Motto,” consumers must buy into the behavior of Drake, or essentially the message: “YOLO.” This buy-in can be viewed through a rhetorical lens to help one critically understand the multimodal components in place that bring the students into this piece. For example, “The Motto’s” hook has a catchy, up-tempo beat that grabs the attention of the listener and uses the “YOLO” message in a way that seems like it is directly stated in an almost conversational tone in second person as Drake raps directly to the listener by using pronouns directed to “you.” Then, listeners pay further attention because Drake draws them in through musical and lyrical bridges that pull them into his work. Next, consumers must remember the message, which is only further reinforced by Drake’s tweet of him overlooking a city on a balcony with his motto. Thus, even if consumers hadn’t listened to a pre-release of the song, they knew what “YOLO” meant after Drake’s tweet including both text and image. It also didn’t matter if these consumers were Drake fans or not; “YOLO” was suddenly a message for all to relate to and consume. Consumers could also remember the message because it suggests a sense of escapism from their current situations. After they pay attention to and remember the message, consumers have to be able to replicate the behavior/message, which is where they start to internalize the message portrayed by Drake’s “The Motto.” They find whatever way they can to use “YOLO” to identify a decision/action they have made/ done. One might say that there is not a right or wrong message once the consumer internalizes “YOLO” because at this stage, the message becomes personal and defines the individual for that specific situation. Finally, their motivation to imitate Drake’s motto is shown by the remix of their individual internalization of the message. So, while the “YOLO” lifestyle is internalized and remixed, it is still made social by sharing the message through the chosen medium of consumer. This motivation stems from popularity (such as retweets via Twitter) or laughs (such as early morning conversations about why one didn’t do his/her homework). They want to be a part of the “YOLO” lifestyle in which “slang serves a powerful function for marking an ‘in-group’” (Zimmer, 2012); they want to be identified by their acceptance of the message and their vehicle of choice to disseminate their definition of that message. In the case of Drake’s song, adolescents’ use of “YOLO” is not an excuse for participating in deviant and dangerous behavior (“Ervin,” 2012) nor is it necessarily a reason to flaunt one’s success or wealth. It’s also not an excuse to skip one’s homework. In fact, “YOLO” may even be seen as a privilege based on how one is using it and how one is delivering that message thanks largely in part to the mobility of youth culture through the digital sphere. After all, my students aren’t million dollar rappers like Drake 274

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nor have many of them ever been to Miami, which further supports the idea that memes take on multiple meanings based on the author’s mode of delivery and individual experiences. These multiple meanings define adolescent space. Just as terms like “salty” and “chill” are this generation’s code words that mark territory that adults don’t negotiate well, “YOLO” can be explained by teens and accepted by adults as a good thing, even if it it edgy. Joining the swim team despite a lack of athletic prowess, raising a hand in a class to share a possibly controversial point of view, and sending off an application to a reach college can all be sold as living the “YOLO lifestyle.” The bottom line is that Drake’s song and the meme produced from it should help educators see one thing: our students need practice in critical media consumption because ultimately what they are consuming is directly linked to their identity construction within multiple mediums that transcend time and place thanks to the mobility and participatory nature of youth culture.

“Hey Girl” Adolescents today are using technology and memes to affect change in what is known as the fourth wave of feminism, defined by the use of social media (Baumgardner, 2011; Cochrane, 2013). For example, Plank (2016) discusses the ways that the Ryan Gosling’s “Hey Girl” memes soften men’s reactions to discussions of feminism. Ryan Gosling, an actor portraying sensitive movie characters, has an image that reflects his characters. This image has been co-opted by meme creators to raise awareness about ways that male respect for women’s health and other issues can be seen as appropriate and equitable (Henderson, 2012; Hinsey, 2013).

Students’ Definition of the “Hey Girl” Meme Attributed to Douglas Reinhardt on Tumblr (http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/people/ryan-gosling), “Hey Girl” appropriates an image for humor and to enlighten and change beliefs about masculinity. “Hey Girl” memes hijack an image of a sensitive character like Ryan Gosling, or even Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau (Plank, 2016), and, by adding text, create an easily sharable masculine ideal that supports female equality. Youth today growing up in this landscape of “Hey Girl” memes see images of masculinity not marketed by Hollywood. Instead, anyone can be the media maker.

Rhetorically Analyzing the “Hey Girl” Meme While many look at the “Hey Girl” meme as exclusive to Gosling, the reality is that the digital sphere had more to do with the spread of this message than Gosling himself. In fact, the BuzzFeed video creates a parody of the “Hey Girl” meme, its creation mistakenly attributed to Gosling. It can be argued that the memes such as this have cemented a change in the masculine ideal that is shared on the silver screen (Waxman, 2004). This change is humorously shown as Russell Crowe, formerly the masculine ideal, sits down with Gosling, and challenges the co-opting of his image for supposedly his personal gain. This mention is peculiar in that there has not been a character that said, “Hey Girl” in a film of Ryan’s, as highlighted in the BuzzFeed commentary, but that the image is viral enough to be shared, despite its controversial take on a changing image. Though the video is meant to provide an emotional reaction with its lighthearted tone meant to evoke laughter, the bigger message viewers may not pick up on is that a feminist focus has been lost, 275

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and instead a capitalist one has taken over. In other words, the BuzzFeed video wasn’t created to show Gosling’s support of feminism, but instead it was created to advertise for his upcoming movie. This fact alone continues to show the complexities involved with memes and understanding where they started, why, and how they are being remixed throughout the digital sphere. And while those with access to digital devices can design and disseminate more easily than ever before, Hollywood is in the business of watching trends and capitalizing on them (Wagner, 2014). Ultimately, this trending meme is another example of remix and reuse of original creativity to meet a new purpose of the user. It can be troublesome that the original creator does not benefit monetarily, but the internet does keep a clean record of dates, so when an individual or group would like to claim original creation, they can. There are the hipsters and the wanna-bes, and whether it matters is determined by whoever cares. The playing field of mobility and easy access isn’t even, but it is possibly more accessible than it ever was for players to get involved. What comes of the participation in the form of credit, money, or notoriety can be unequal.

“So You’re Saying?” As previously noted, the mobility of youth culture in a networked era helps memes such as “So You’re Saying?” become prevalent around the world. Originally coined “skeptical 3rd-world child,” the image of a Chicago doctor and a young boy in Africa quickly became a meme that exposed many issues of first versus third world issues (BBC Trending, 2015).

Students’ Definition of the “So You’re Saying?” Meme Memes can be used to highlight another perspective on an issue that is generally seen one way. As an example, “So You’re Saying” or “So You’re Telling Me” memes highlight often disturbing situations that emerge in the face of economic prosperity, like anorexia and overscheduling anxiety, but also petty issues such as poor wi-fi connectivity. And while third world countries are not a new topic to the meme realm (Third World Success, 2012), the seriousness of the issues the people, in this case children, face in them is often overlooked by the humorous, sarcastic tone that is associated with their memes.

Rhetorically Analyzing the “So You’re Saying?” Meme These memes are effective, especially to adolescents who are beginning to see a world much larger than the one that they have been exposed to as children. This particular meme is an example where critical media literacy can help one move from a humorous purpose to a purpose of awareness, or, perhaps even better, one of action that is thought to be the one of the biggest benefits of using digital tools within the classroom (Herold, 2016). For example, one could pick any of these memes (Lockhart, 2013) to help students navigate complex issues that not only affect those in third worlds, but perhaps even those in their own backyards, such as affordability of health (meme 14) or other socioeconomic concerns (meme 18). Just as with the “Hey Girl” meme, it can also be problematic that the people within the meme (those living in third world countries) are not benefitting directly from the remixes. The authors of these memes essentially use the images of those less fortunate to call out the privilege of those who have so much more than the others.

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“Damn Daniel” Innocently commenting on a friend’s wardrobe with “Daaaaamn, Daniel,” a high school sophomore appreciatively videos and posts his fourteen-year-old friend’s threads daily, and it goes viral. With “Damn Daniel,” we see that “the beauty of the modern meme economy is that anything can become a meme” (Schwedel, 2016). Before the meme became an internet sensation, creator Joshua Holz tweeted a video of his friend’s (Daniel) fashion choices, highlighting his white Van tennis shoes in one of the clips (Holz, 2016). Yet, what makes “Damn Daniel” so popular? As Moss (2016) points out, “nothing impressive is going on . . . and yet, people are obsessed with it.” With 341,667 retweets, 468,537, and countless comments (as of June 28, 2016), we think it’s safe to say that something happened with Holz’s tweet.

Students’ Definition of the “Damn Daniel” Meme In first author’s high school classroom, students sneakily remixed “Damn Daniel” to “Danggg Daniel” to make its language school appropriate and to compliment each other in class. At first, I didn’t realize why students were all referencing Daniel. In fact, on one “Spirit Friday,” I wore some gray low top tennis shoes; however, my students thought she was wearing Vans, which are the tennis shoes referenced in Holz’s video, saying, “Dangggg Ms. Beach!” as they walked in the classroom. Finally wondering where this saying stemmed from, I asked my students, “Where did this come from anyway?” in which my students were shocked that I hadn’t yet seen “Damn Daniel.” Similar to “What are those?” teen slang about shoes seemed to be another place in adolescent space where adults were left out of the conversation. Through this anecdote, we hope to show ways in which Holz’s tweet resonates with students: as a fashion statement and a way to be “cool” among others. And it appears that others also thought Daniels’ style was cool as they rushed to buy white Vans on Amazon (Kirsher, 2016). However, as we alluded earlier, there is more to the “Damn Daniel” meme phenomenon that we must consider.

Rhetorically Analyzing the “Damn Daniel” Meme We contend that a big part of “Damn Daniel’s” popularity has to do with the mobile nature of youth culture. In fact, Leander and Vasudevan (2011) note: “mobility affects daily multimodal engagements —being in possession of a device with the ability to capture audio may initiate the recording of otherwise undocumented moments or inspire spontaneous spoken performances primarily for the purposes of digital archiving” (p. 129). Anyone with a device is a curator and publisher of content, and youth, new users, are harnessing the power in new and creative ways (Schwedel, 2016). As such, what we critically analyze is what makes us repost. Certainly Daniel is handsome and well-dressed, and without controversy. He appears as the socio-cultural model, unassuming and even reluctant to be the focus of his fame. Yet, questions surrounding the purpose of Holz’s video can come up in conversation, especially when working with memes and students. After all, this is often a common analytical task they are given within traditional, print-based, canonical texts. In fact, “do you think the star of the video is Daniel, double-strapping his backpack and putting careful attention into his appearance, or the narrator, the one elevating the whole thing to performance art?” (Schwedel, 2016). Here, we consider questions of characterization and tone, too. For these reasons, we see that “Damn Daniel” can be re-appropriated for a variety of audiences, for a variety of reasons, just as our students teach the classroom teachers. And,

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perhaps we all can learn more from today’s youth; after all, “Damn, today’s teens! Back at it again with the sick memes!” (Schwedel, 2016).

AFFORDANCES AND PRIVILEGES OF MEME PRODUCTIONS We acknowledge that we cannot discuss the memes above without bringing into the conversation a look at the affordances of digital tools, the ways that messages are privileged and silenced, the importance of visual rhetoric, and the power of multimodal remix that encourages consumers to pass along ideas. After all, we can’t ignore how youth culture is using the affordances and privileges of digital spaces and media to rewrite their identities in ways that are of importance for literacy educators (Alvermann, 2008). Perhaps ironically, the meme as a message is exclusionary in that it is a privileged medium available to those with access to smartphones, internet, and pop culture. In fact, there is a specific moment in which a connection occurs between the message, the tool, and the audience, as Alvermann, Beach, and Boggs (2015) describe as a “transaction that takes place within that moment: the consumption and production of media with the tools to disseminate ‘new’ information in a ‘new’ way created by the consumer, which invites new literacy forms that essentially connect everyone everywhere” (p.13). With this point in mind, connecting everyone, everywhere, might suggest those young people with access to smartphones that have data plans that allow them access to pop culture. However, as Utt (2015) notes, “privilege has gone pop,” and when we consider the previously mentioned memes, we begin to see how they might simplify the social complexities (from socio-economic and gender issues) that are present within those multimodal texts, especially when pop culture is concerned”. “And pop culture privilege isn’t actually a good thing. To the contrary, to talk about privilege without complexity, nuance, or connection to wider systems of oppression actively hurts movements for justice” (Utt, 2015). Freire (1970) reminds us that there is no neutrality in language. And the danger in more voice and time within these handheld devices is in the suggestion that “the oppressors do not perceive their monopoly on having more as a privilege which dehumanizes others and themselves” (p. 41). In other words, what happens when nobody cares about a selfie (Watkins, 2014) because they’re “too poor?” What happens when we know privilege is experienced differently, even by White people (Utt, 2015), but our conversations about privilege and texts don’t reflect those differences? And who owns these memes, anyway? Who controls their power and how they can be used in “transactions?” After all, we cannot ignore the ways in which the tech industry has expanded and shaped participatory culture (Jenkins, Ito, and boyd, 2016, p. 125). With these questions in mind, we would argue that even though Drake felt “YOLO” was solely his and should lead to (his) larger monetary gain (Galil, 2012), Dane and his crew were owning “YOLO” in their own way. The digital world in which we live asks for participation, and privileges sharing over ownership. In addition, the importance of visual rhetoric also can have an influence on the power of multimodal remixes, or memes. Take, for example, “Damn Daniel” versus #1000BlackGirlBooks. Marley Diaz, an eleven year old wondering why she was required to read so many books about white boys and their dogs, challenged the elementary school canon in her effort to diversify the protagonists on public school reading lists (Anderson, 2016). While this message is arguably absolutely necessary to book buyers, curriculum writers, and librarians in schools, the virility of the message didn’t compare to the sanguine “Damn Daniel.”

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For example, The Ellen Degeneres Show featured “Damn Daniel” (2016) and the clip on YouTube has over thirty million views. In this time of exposure, we have to ask why Ellen might choose Daniel over Marley as she works with her producers in the curation process. This choice speaks to privilege, safety, and consumerism. As political as daytime talk show hosts may like to be, moving beyond what is acceptable to their viewership is a chance of a drop in viewers and loss of advertising dollars (Moy, Xenos, & Hussain, 2012). This is an example of how the money makes the message, especially when examining dissemination. Dewey (1897) suggests that the “the image is the great instrument of instruction. What a child gets out of any subject presented to him is simply the images which he himself forms with regard to it” (p. 78). Thus, if we view these images with our students without criticality, we are simply amplifying the privilege of those producing them.

CLASSROOM IMPLICATIONS As adolescents continue to define their individual identities, they may miss the purpose behind the messages they hear on a daily basis through various forms of media. Problems can arise from these misinterpretations of the author’s original message, and adolescents need to know what those remixed messages are really implying especially when their media productions tie into creating their identities. Thus, perhaps “part of educating students, then, is helping them understand how to manipulate digital media, through which they may be working on a daily basis, to serve civic engagement purposes” (Alvermann, Beach, & Boggs, 2015, p. 14). For example, Hobbs (2011) stated: “Teachers who are already using news media, popular culture, and digital media to support academic achievement in language arts, science, history, and the arts are discovering the power of connecting students’ digital learning skills to fundamental practices in analysis, evaluation, composition, reflection, and social action.” We, too, have found this statement to resonate within our own classrooms and changing pedagogical strategies as the more we connect to students’ out-of-school literacy practices, the more we find that they can make connections to Herrick’s (n.d.) work, for example, and see how the “YOLO” message has changed over time and how various mediums impact its definition, too. Media literacy education “is a combination of all types of readings and subsequent productions, as well as remixes/pastiches of others” that allows students to have an opportunity to “explore what ‘real world’ literacies can look like in an academic setting” (Beach, 2015). With students choosing how they define their “YOLO” lifestyle and consequently the best medium to get their remixed messages across for their specific audience/purpose, it is imperative for educators to help adolescents have a stronger foundation in media literacy skills. Media literacy is “focused more on the nature of various genres of medium and the way in which messages are constructed and interpreted” (Martin, 2008, p. 161). Add “critical” to media literacy and we are helping our students think critically about the world around them as well as helping them become active, critical consumers and, perhaps more importantly, producers of that world that defines them. Stories inspire action, and adolescents can leverage the social media that they already use to change the world. Participation is a hallmark of New Literacies theory, and students today already harbor a penchant for getting involved. Memes can move them beyond hashtag activism. Yet, boyd (2016) notes that if we aren’t valuing our students’ literacy practices outside-of-school, such as through the use of consuming and producing memes, then we are disempowering our students’ abilities to “connect with others, learn, and participate in public life” (p. 32). And as Giroux and Simon 279

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(1989) suggest: “the strength of transformative media education lies in its ability to demonstrate that the meanings we construct and the ways we negotiate their construction cannot be separated from the skills necessary to review and restructure the systems in which we participate” (p. 65). In other words, we have to transform our own understandings to provide students with opportunities to critically think about how and why they identify with various messages and mediums, which ultimately leads to their identity construction. Again, we must help our students become active, critical consumers and producers in a society that often demeans their critical production because it is not what has traditionally been done in the classroom. The bottom line is that whether we are looking at a song, a tweet, or a meme produced in a variety of multimodal mediums, just because people are participating in online spaces, “doesn’t mean they understand its power” (Martin, 2012). In fact, “once you put it [a message] on a social media site, it is there for anyone to not only access, but they can then share that information, they can repurpose it, they can adapt it” (Martin, 2012). And, in a sense, that is what adolescents (and people of all ages) have done with messages that have pervaded our society for centuries. For this reason, ask students to think about what the message is, how the message is being displayed, and why the message is important. We also need to consider the ways that students have power in publication and support critical production by giving students opportunities to create their own analysis of the world around them. We can think about how students can use their media literacy skills to create a character analyses, pursue issues of social justice, or develop a positive digital footprint. This practice is particularly important in classroom spaces where not all students have equal access to internet and the tools to access it. If we aren’t valuing our students’ literacy practices outside-of-school, such as through the use of consuming and producing memes, then we are disempowering our students. After all, Alvermann, Beach, and Boggs (2015) remind us: If schools devalue students’ language by restricting them from creating and sharing information in meaningful ways, then students’ attention will be spent on what matters to them and what gives them the most social capital, or power, within society. Thus, it’s not about the highest score on a test; it’s about how many new followers one gets on Twitter thanks to a strategic tweet at just the right time, for example. (p. 14-15) And, we believe that those strategic tweets and authentic (and purposeful) language uses, often including texts that become memes or are already memes themselves, are what creates the learning opportunities today’s students need. These learning opportunities have the potential to go beyond glossing over texts, but instead opening doors for real conversations using the skills, such as rhetorical analysis and multimodal remix as memes, to not only pass state-mandated tests, but also “call on those who share our identity” so that “we can open the door for more accountable participation in movements for justice” (Utt, 2015). Rhetorical analysis of memes and multimodal remix as memes are powerful ways, then, to engage and challenge today’s learners.

CONCLUSION It is clear that what seems to be viral is just fresh enough to be current and is usually in response to current events; however, it doesn’t seem to be picked up or viral when it is too controversial. As such, we 280

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“comfortably” can read the world through viral memes. Yet, what is interesting is that it takes a keen sense of current events and a broad understanding of modern history to create the perfect mix of showing that you are in the know, just on the edge of being a hipster so that you can make people laugh and say, “I get it.” In fact, some of the best memes serve as political cartoons have. They make us think with an image. After all, consider how quickly the “Crying Jordan” meme remixed with the political events occurring around the Brexit controversy (Hirsh, 2016). Suddenly everyone, everywhere, is participating in the political happenings of the European Union. Yet, Jenkins, Ito, and boyd (2016) remind us of the following: Like internet culture, participatory culture has countercultural and anti-authoritarian valences reflecting its roots, but it is also increasingly intertwined with commercial and capitalist forms of cultural and technological production. The orientation towards collective action and peer-to-peer sharing sits uneasily next to values of individual freedom and autonomy. As internet culture has become increasingly global, Euro-American labels become even more inadequate to describe the political terrain of participatory culture. (p. 183) Here, we begin to better understand the complexities involved with extending beyond the local realm of face-to-face or text-only connections into digital, multimodal productions that branch into different times, places, and experiences. There are limitless possibilities available to today’s creators, and those possibilities blur cultural expectations and experiences. Regardless of race, gender, socioeconomic status, or any other difference, memes provide a way for people to remix a message by paying attention, remembering, replicating, and motivating. Yet one cannot forget that those with access to technology have the amplified voice. So, the traditional classroom is one that must adapt to meet the evolving literacy needs of adolescents today; this change needs to include a focus on how the messages students receive on a daily basis influence who they are in today’s digitally connected and participatory culture. After all, though “YOLO” may have faded from the spotlight at this moment, our students remind us that the “YOLO” lifestyle isn’t going anywhere. Even as teachers and researchers, we will never know when our research findings may be represented by memes involving cats (Gauld, 2016). In the end, remixed multimodal messages, or memes, will only continue to influence young people and their identity construction in today’s mobile, digital youth culture.

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Alvermann, D. E., & Eakle, A. J. (2007). Dissolving learning boundaries: The doing, re-doing, and undoing of school. In D. Thiessen & A. Cook-Sather (Eds.), International handbook of student experience in elementary and secondary school (pp. 143–166). Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer. doi:10.1007/14020-3367-2_6 Anderson, M. (2016, February 26). Where’s the color in kids’ lit? Ask the girl with 1000 books (and counting). Morning Edition. National Public Radio. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/sections/ ed/2016/02/26/467969663/wheres-the-color-in-kids-lit-ask-the-girl-with-1-000-books-and-counting Baumgardner, J. (2011). F’em! Goo Goo, Gaga, and some thoughts on balls. Berkeley, CA: Seal Press. BBC Trending. (2015, November 2). ‘Sceptical third world child’: What a viral picture tells us about child poverty in Africa. BBC. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-trending-34678592 Beach, C. L. (2015). Media, culture, and education: One teacher’s journey through the mediated intersections. Journal of Media Literacy Education, 7(2), 77–80. Bhabha, H. (1990). The third space: interview with Homi Bhabha. Identity: Community, culture, difference, 207-221. boyd, d. (2016). Introduction: Youth culture, youth practices. In H. Jenkins, M. Ito, & d. boyd (Eds.), Participatory culture in a networked era (pp. 32-59). Malden, MA: Polity Press. Bruner, E. M. (2001). The Maasai and the Lion King: Authenticity, nationalism, and globalization in African tourism. American Ethnologist, 28(4), 881–908. doi:10.1525/ae.2001.28.4.881 Cochrane, K. (2013). All the rebel women: The rise of the fourth wave of feminism (Vol. 8). New York, NY: Guardian Books. Coiro, J., Knobel, M., Lankshear, C., & Leu, D. J. (Eds.). (2014). Handbook of research on new literacies. New York, NY: Routledge. Damn, Daniel. (2016, February 24). The Ellen Show. Youtube. Retrieved from https://www.youtube. com/watch?v=_LUX70mXcEE Dawkins, R. (2006). Memes: The new replicators. In The Selfish Gene (30th Anniversary Edition) (pp. 189–201). New York, NY: Oxford University Press Inc. Dewey, C. (2014). #Bringbackourgirls, #Kony12, and the complete, divisive history of ‘hashtag activism.’ Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/05/08/ bringbackour girls-kony2012-and-the-complete-divisive-history-of-hashtag-activism/ Dewey, J. (1897). My pedagogic creed. School Journal, 25, 77-80. Retrieved from http://dewey.pragmatism.org/creed.htm Dezuanni, M. (2010). Digital media literacy: Connecting young people’s identities, creative production and learning about video games. In D. Alvermann (Ed.), Adolescents’ online literacies: Connecting classrooms, digital media, and popular culture (pp. 125–143). New York, NY: Peter Lang.

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Domonoske, C. (2016, Sept. 12). Dictionary fans might squee: OED adds new words, because YOLO. NPR. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/09/12/493630250/dictionary-fansmight-squee-oed-adds-new-words-because-yolo Drake. (2011). The Motto. Take care [MP3]. New Orleans, LA: Cash Money Records. Drake [Drizzy]. (2011, October 23). You only live once...YOLO [Tweet]. Retrieved from https://twitter. com/drake/status/128318788717383680 Dredger, K., Woods, D., Beach, C., & Sagstetter, V. (2010). Engage me: Using new literacies to create third space classrooms that engage student writers. Journal of Media Literacy Education, 2(2), 85–101. Retrieved from http://digitalcommons.uri.edu/jmle/vol2/iss2/1 Freire, P. (1970). Pedagogy of the oppressed. New York, NY: Continuum. Galil, L. (2012, December 29). Does drake own YOLO? Forbes. Retrieved from http://www.forbes.com/ sites/leorgalil/2012/12/29/does-drake-own-yolo/#7b915d1474cf Gauld, T. (2016, April 28). Suggested methods of presenting your findings [Facebook post]. Retrieved from https://m.facebook.com/tomgauldscartoons/photos/pb.290917344351807.2207520000.1462010022./881640778612791/?type=3 Giroux, H., & Simon, R. (1989). Popular culture: Schooling and everyday life. New York, NY: Bervin and Garvey Publishers, Inc. Gosling, R. (2012). Know your meme. Retrieved from http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/people/ryangosling Grimm, R. E. (1963). Horace’s “Carpe Diem.”. The Classical Journal, 58(7), 313–318. Henderson, D. (2012). Feminist Ryan Gosling: feminist theory (as imagined) from your favorite sensitive movie dude. Philadelphia, PA: Running Press. Herold, B. (2016, June 6). What it takes to move from ‘passive’ to ‘active’ tech use in K-12 schools. Education Week. Retrieved from http://www.edweek.org/ew/articles/2016/06/09/what-it-takes-to-movefrom-passive.html Herrick, R. (n.d.). To the virgins, to make much of time. Academy of American Poets. Retrieved from http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15923 Hinsey, V. (2013). Girls get digital: A critical view of cyberfeminism. On Our Terms. The Undergraduate Journal of the Athena Center for Leadership Studies, 1(1), 25–32. Hirsch, S. (2016, June). Horrified people still managed to make Brexit memes. Mashable. Retrieved from http://mashable.com/2016/06/24/best-brexit-reaction-memes/?utm_cid=mash-com-Tw-mainlink#4qgThIP.zmqs Hobbs, R. (2011, September). Digital and media literacy: Tapping into popular culture. NASSP Principal Leadership, 12(1). Retrieved from http://www.nassp.org/tabid/3788/default.aspx?topic=Digital_and_Media_Literacy

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Holz, J. (2016, February 15). Damn Daniel [Twitter post]. Retrieved from https://twitter.com/josholzz/ status/699432086965366784 Jahn, B., & Weber, T. (1998). Reggae island: Jamaican music in the digital age. New York, NY: Da Capo Press. Jenkins, H., Ito, M., & boyd, d. (2016). Participatory culture in a networked era. Malden, MA: Polity Press. Kirsher, M. M. (2016, February 22). A meme inspired people to flood Amazon and leave tons of comments on these white sneakers. Tech Insider. Retrieved from http://www.techinsider.io/damn-danielwhite-vans-sneakers-for-sale-on-amazon-2016-2 Knobel, M., & Lankshear, C. (2007). Online memes, affinities, and cultural production. In C. Lankshear, M. Knobel, C. Bigum, & M. Peters (Eds.), A new literacies sampler (pp. 199–227). New York, NY: Peter Lang. Leander, K., & Vasudevan, L. (2011). Multimodality and mobile culture. In C. Jewitt (Ed.), The Routledge handbook of multimodal analysis (pp. 127–139). New York, NY: Routledge. Lee, C. J. (2011). Myths about critical literacy: What teachers need to unlearn.[Online]. Journal of Language and Literacy Education, 7(1), 95–102. Retrieved from http://www.coa.uga.edu/jolle/2011_1/lee.pdf Lessig, L. (2008). Remix: Making art and commerce thrive in the hybrid economy. New York, NY: Penguin. doi:10.5040/9781849662505 Lockhart, S. (2013, May 1). The 50 funniest skeptical third world kid memes. Complex. Retrieved from http://www.complex.com/style/2013/05/the-50-funniest-skeptical-third-world-kid-memes/ Martin, A. (2008). Digital literacy and the “digital society.”. In C. Lankshear & M. Knobel (Eds.), Digital literacies (pp. 151–176). New York, NY: Peter Lang. Martin, M. (2012, May 21). Don’t trip over your digital footprint. National Public Radio. Retrieved from http://www.npr.org/2012/05/21/153203149/dont-trip-over-your-digital-footprint McKinness, E. (2012, September 14). Aspiring rapper, tweets ‘YOLO’ about driving drunk and dies minutes later. The Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/09/13/ervinmckinness-driving-drunk-tweet-yolo-dies-car-crash-dui-_n_1880348.html Moss, C. (2016, February 21). This teen named Daniel is all anyone can talk about this weekend ---Here’s why. Business Insider. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com/what-is-the-damn-danielmeme-about-2016-2 Moy, P., Xenos, M. A., & Hussain, M. M. (2012). News and political entertainment effects on democratic citizenship. In The International Encyclopedia of Media Studies. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley. doi:10.1002/9781444361506.wbiems126 Plank, L. (2016, March 25). Justin Trudeau tries making Ryan Gosling memes. Vox. Retrieved from https://www.facebook.com/Vox/videos/vb.223649167822693/499116863609254/?type=2&theater

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Schwedel, H. (2016, February 22). What is “Damn, Daniel,” and what makes it so good? Slate. Retrieved from http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2016/02/22/_damn_daniel_internet_meme_and_video_introduces_us_to_daniel_and_his_vans.html Third World Success. (2012). Know your meme. Retrieved from http://knowyourmeme.com/memes/ third-world-success#fnr8 Thoreau, H. D. (1971). Walden. Princeton, NJ: Princeton UP. Utt, J. (2015, March 3). When privilege goes pop: How today’s mainstream conversations on privilege can hurt justice movements. Everyday Feminism. Retrieved from http://everydayfeminism.com/2015/03/ pop-culture-and-privilege/ Wagner, K. B. (2014). Globalizing discourses: Literature and film in the age of Google. Globalizations, 12(2), 4. Watkins, D. (2014, February 4). Too poor for pop culture. Salon. Retrieved from http://www.salon. com/2014/02/05/too_poor_for_pop_culture/ Waxman, S. (2004, July 1). Hollywood’s he-men are bumped by sensitive guys; Six-pack abs not required for new masculine ideal. The New York Times. Retrieved from http://www.nytimes.com/2004/07/01/movies/hollywood-s-he-men-are-bumped-sensitive-guys-six-pack-abs-not-required-for-new.html?smid=plshare&_r=0 We Need Diverse Books. (2016). Retrieved from www.weneeddiversebooks.com Yandoli, K. L. (2016, April 21). Here’s Ryan Gosling talking about that “Hey Girl” meme we all love so much. BuzzFeed Celeb. Retrieved from https://www.buzzfeed.com/h2/fbaa/krystieyandoli/heres-ryangosling-talking-about-that-hey-girl-meme-we-all-l?utm_term=.ly0e0zPV60#.wyXbQx0zgQ Zimmer, B. (2012, August 26). What is YOLO? Only teenagers know for sure. The Boston Globe. Retrieved from http://www.bostonglobe.com/ideas/2012/08/25/what-yolo-only-teenagers-know-for-sure/ Idso04FecrYzLa4KOOYpXO/story.html

KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Adolescent Space: Different for each group of teens, adolescent space is marked by the popular culture that shapes their experiences and literacies. Damn Daniel: A popular internet meme that started when an adolescent boy filmed his friend’s fashion attire, especially calling attention to his white Van tennis shoes, and shouting, “Damnnn Daniel!” Hey Girl: A popular internet meme that started with creators using Ryan Gosling, a noteworthy actor often playing male character’s with softer sides, to advocate for feminism. Meme: A viral message created with media that is often spread through social networks. Multimodality: Using multiple modes, such as speech, gesture, image, or text, to communicate. Remix: Taking a variety of modes (from your own or another’s work) to create a new text with a new meaning.

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So You’re Saying?: A popular internet meme that started after a Chicago doctor shared an image of her talking with a boy from an African village to highlight first world versus third world issues. Youth Culture: A culture among adolescents that is often associated with connectivity through digital doings in today’s society. YOLO: (You Only Live Once) A popular internet meme that started after the hip-hop artist, Drake, used the term in his hit song “The Motto.”

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Chapter 17

Making Sense of Authors and Texts in a Remixed, Participatory Culture Crystal L. Beach The University of Georgia, USA

ABSTRACT Mikhail Bakhtin’s and Jacques Rancière’s theories can help educators understand students’ texts in today’s remixed, participatory culture. Specifically, this chapter will focus on two key terms: Bakhtin’s heteroglossia and Rancière’s emancipated spectator. First, the aforementioned terms will be defined in relation to the authors’ ideas and applied to literacy education. Then, these ideas will be connected to how authors and texts are shaped by remixing within a participatory culture. Next, Bakhtin’s and Rancière’s works will be discussed to understand how they speak to each other concerning remixing in a participatory culture, pulling from examples from the research literature. Finally, it will be important to consider the implications of their work for literacy educators and researchers.

INTRODUCTION My classroom is built on one main idea: helping my students become critical readers, writers, and thinkers of the world around them. My students are now reading and writing in a world that is constantly changing. In fact, they are reading and writing in a world that is changing so quickly that even we, as literacy educators and researchers, have a hard time keeping up with at times due to the many new ways of reading and writing within a participatory culture. If one reads any news headline, or scans social media feeds, one can see how adolescents’ reading and writing practices are being shaped by various influences. From tweeting YOLO during a test (The Huffington Post, 2013) to posting images to Instagram without thinking about what those messages might say about the poster and the viewers (Becker, 2013), to jumping into cultural issues such as bans on Instagram hashtags (Daer, Hoffman, & Goodman, 2014; Whelan, 2015), students are producing texts in ways that they are not always considering as acts of consumption, production, and dissemination of texts. Also, they are not always thinking about the ways in which their names may be connected to those texts forever, just like the Shakespearean plays we read in my classroom. DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2101-3.ch017

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 Making Sense of Authors and Texts in a Remixed, Participatory Culture

Yet, my students keep adapting and reading and writing, a lot, actually, and end up creating vibrant, multimodal, remixed texts every single day. Surprisingly, though, my students do not always see themselves as authors of texts. “That’s not real writing!” they say as they constantly joke with me. For this reason, I started thinking about what exactly a text and an author mean in today’s remixed, participatory culture. According to Alvermann and Beach’s (ongoing) research study, Becoming 3lectric, a remix can be defined as taking a variety of content, in any form, and “co-creating” a text. In other words, a remix is not just new, repeated content; it is the use of one’s language to create a new meaning to a text (Jocson, 2013, p. 71). In other words, a “remix means to take cultural artifacts and combine and manipulate them into new kinds of creative blends” (Knobel & Laknshear, 2008, p. 22). In regards to participatory culture, Jenkins (2006) defines it as: A culture with relatively low barriers to artistic expression and civic engagement, strong support for creating and sharing one’s creations, and some type of informal mentorship whereby what is known by the most experienced is passed along to novices. A participatory culture is also one in which members believe their contributions matter, and feel some degree of social connection with one another (at the least they care what other people think about what they have created). (p. 3) By using this definition, one immediately can begin to make connections between remixing and language use because members are co-creating texts in which (new) meanings, or contributions, matter. Furthermore, today one can see how the meaning of a text is consumed, (re)produced, and disseminated rapidly specifically due to the virtual economies (Alvermann, Beach, & Boggs, 2015) afforded to us by digital media in a participatory culture. In order to analyze authors and texts in today’s remixed, participatory culture, I will be using Mikhail Bakhtin’s and Jacques Rancière’s theories. Specifically, I will be focusing on two key terms: Bakhtin’s heteroglossia and Rancière’s emancipated spectator. First, I will define the aforementioned terms in relation to the authors’ ideas and apply them to literacy. Then, I will tie these ideas to how authors and texts are shaped by remixing within a participatory culture. Next, I will discuss how Bakhtin’s and Rancière’s works speak to each other concerning remixing in a participatory culture, pulling from examples from the research literature and discussing the reality of the participation gap. Finally, it will be important to consider the implications of their work for literacy educators and researchers.

BAKTHIN + RANCIÈRE = FREEDOM THROUGH LANGUAGE Before considering the connections between Bakhtin and Rancière, it is necessary to understand their own individual “languages” on the topic at hand, specifically concerning heteroglossia and an emancipated spectator. These terms help one to critically analyze how remixes in a participatory culture provide authors with an opportunity to “venture into the forest of things and signs, to say what they have seen and what they think of what they have seen” (Rancière, 2011, p. 11) since each text, each word, “tastes of the context and contexts in which it has lived its socially charged life” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 293). Simply put, emancipation (freedom) is found through the use of heteroglossia (languages), and the languages that makeup texts are shaped by the participatory culture in which both the author and reader are active, social participants.

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Bakhtin’s Heteroglossia Bakhtin (1981) describes a language that is “ideologically saturated” which develops “in vital connection with the processes of sociopolitical and cultural centralization” (p. 271). And while he notes that authors work towards a “unitary” language within a text for the reader, Bakhtin acknowledges that language is never really unitary because there are always forces in place that change how language is used/viewed depending on the response from the reader. This is where his term, heteroglossia, comes into play and suggests that language is both stable and evolving. Heterglossia, then, can simply be defined as an author’s language in another’s language. For example, an author is always writing with historical and socio-political power structures in play; every choice an author makes is steeped with that power, the voices, of earlier authors and the present readers of one’s work. This “double-voicedness” dialogues between the two languages in order to create a “refraction” of meaning that has deep connections to “fundamental, socio-linguistic speech diversity” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 324-326). In other words, an author’s intentions are constantly working with the agreements and disagreements of the reader’s reconceptualization of the author’s language. Since there are forces trying to unify the author’s language and also forces trying to break it apart, Bakhtin (1981) states: “stratification [or the multiple levels of language usage] and heteroglossia widen and deepen as long as language is alive and developing” (p. 272). In fact, “no living word relates to its object in a singular way” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 276). For this reason, one can see how the author and his or her language are constantly in flux and changing depending on how and why the reader is consuming the text. What Bakhtin is describing is the relationship between the author’s language (text) and the reader. Even if one is writing and may not be around for the response, one is still anticipating the response from the reader. The response from the reader is where “‘languages’ of heteroglossia intersect each other in a variety of ways, forming new socially typifying ‘languages’” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 291). Thus, the text is shaped every single time it is read; consequently, new languages are formed from the intersections of the past, present, and future response(s) of the “new author” of that information: the reader. Furthermore, Bakhtin (1981) states, “the word in language is half someone else’s. It becomes ‘one’s own’ only when the speaker populates it with his own intention, his own accent, when he appropriates the word, adapting it to his own semantic and expressive intention” (p. 293). In addition, “each word tastes of the context and contexts in which it has lived its socially charged life” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 293). Taking these points into consideration, one can see that Bakhtin focuses on the idea that language is constantly changing and is never original because it is always being used in certain socio-ideological ways that actively change depending on the response from the reader. Also, one can see that the notion of “double-voicedness” comes back into play because through the text, one voice is being pulled from the present (reader) and one voice is being pulled from the past (author). And due to this response from the reader, one might see how that power ties into what Rancière calls an emancipated spectator.

Rancière’s Emancipated Spectator Rancière (2007) described teacher Joseph Jacotot’s epiphany regarding his Flemish students’ Fènelon language acquisition in which “understanding is never more than translating” (p. 9) and “no one truly understands anything other than what he has understood” (p. 4). Here, Rancière’s (2007) example supports Bakhtin’s ideas of heteroglossia because he showed how Jacotot helped his students focus on the 289

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“capacity to say what one thinks in the words of others” (p. 10). Thus, through the translation, or intersections of language, Jacotot’s students learned and made language their own. The example of Jacotot’s students exemplifies what Rancière calls an emancipated spectator. He states: “Emancipation begins when we challenge the opposition between viewing and acting; when we understand that the self-evident facts that structure the relations between saying, seeing and doing themselves below to the structure of the domination and subjection” (Rancière, 2011, p. 13). Furthermore, according to Rancière (2011), emancipation means, “the blurring of the boundary between those who act and those who look; between individuals and members of a collective body” (p. 19). In addition, Rancière (2011) suggests, “to be a spectator is to be separated from both the capacity to know and the power to act” (p. 2). Therefore, an emancipated spectator is one who acts—who translates and narrates—in the world around oneself. This definition means that the individual is never satisfied with one reading of a text (or use of language), but instead must embrace the text and pass that knowledge, capacity, or energy to the other side/ oneself through one’s own language (Rancière, 2011, p. 14). Yet, the problem with understanding, or learning, is that there is a privileged position in schools: in order for a teacher to explain something to a student, a teacher indirectly suggests that the student cannot understand the information on his or her own (Rancière, 2007, p. 6). In other words, a “restriction” of independent learning (and understanding/ using language) occurs when the teacher tells the students everything. When this happens, students do not have a chance to learn by themselves through their own desires or by the learning situation (Rancière, 2007, p. 12). From participatory media uses to remixed messages that permeate both print and digital formats, learning situations and students’ desires to learn come in a myriad of forms. Yet, despite the differences in form, one thing is clear: the language students use is social and “interindividual,” meaning that language depends on the community that uses it and “everything that is said, expressed, is located outside the ‘soul’ of the speaker [or author] and does not belong to him” (Bakhtin, 1986, p. 121). In other words, language is in a constant flux and can be interpreted and used by others in many ways within a participatory culture. With so many different forms of literacy practices taking place (Alvermann, 2008; Alvermann & Eakle, 2007; Ito et al., 2010; Lankshear & Knobel, 2003), messages become quickly remixed, or re-constructed/ re-purposed, depending on the platform that disseminates the information. In addition, because there are so many platforms available to an even wider audience thanks to the digital sphere (boyd, 2014), anyone can consume information and produce messages, or use language, directed specifically towards his or her audience. Thus, when one views Rancière’s emancipated spectator in conjunction with Bakhtin’s heteroglossia, one can better understand remixing within today’s participatory culture.

REMIXING WITHIN A PARTICIPATORY CULTURE While an author has always produced messages directed towards his or her audience (Alvermann, 2008, p. 10; boyd, 2008), remixed messages provide an even deeper connection within a language community because the language never really belonged to the author but instead the relationship between the author and the audience. Each use of language has its own trend, style, or awareness of its “reader, listener, public or people” (Bakhtin, 1986, p. 98), which helps to create “an emancipated community [that] is a community of 290

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translators and narrators” (Rancière, 2011, p. 22). The author writes with an idea or desired goal for how the reader will consume the text; however, the reader has the power to translate the text, using one’s own language, in order to make meaning. As Bakhtin (1981) states, “language is not a neutral medium that passes freely and easily into the private property of the speaker’s intentions; it is populated—overpopulated—with the intentions of others” (p. 294). Thus, the author and text never have solely one point of understanding through creation, production, or dissemination; the remixed message is constantly in flux as authors change texts to dialogue with their audience members. Print texts are constantly remixed in their own ways, such as sports highlights in the big city paper versus the small town paper or multiple editions of books. With this point in mind, literacy educators and researchers are seeing a new way of remixing that potentially causes the idea of what has been traditionally viewed as an “author” and a “text,” and the power of each, to change and connect in new ways (Alvermann, Beach, & Boggs, 2015; Ito et al., 2013; Knobel & Lankshear, 2008). The “orientation of the word toward the addressee has an extremely high significance . . . a word is a bridge thrown between [the author] and another . . . a word is a territory shared by both addresser and addressee” (Vološinov, 1973, p. 86). This territory can be viewed as a culture in which the author and reader use heterglossia to engage with a double-voicedness (Bakhtin, 1981) that allows one to be free of constrained learning spaces (Rancière, 2011). The bridges, then, provide the connections to the past and present, while providing space to expect the reader’s future response. For example, my students took a sports highlight from the paper, combined a quote from the clip with an image they took from that game, and then posted the “new” text to Instagram. The paper and its writer are one author and text relationship. Yet, how the reader consumed the information, created a “bridge,” and made the text something quite different from his or her experience at the game created another author and text relationship using the same information. This anecdotal example is supported through various studies and analyses that focus upon digital media ecologies (Ito et al., 2010), connected learning opportunities (Ito et al., 2013), and “affiliations or group memberships, expressions through production, collaborative problem-solving, and circulations of information” (Jocson & Rosa, 2015). In addition, it shows that youth are engaging with, remixing, and disseminating texts in new ways for a variety of reasons. In addition, I have found within my classroom that my students are attempting to communicate a message with the intentions of being the “true” author, but the messages come out remixed because they have been passed through a different lens, or body of knowledge and experiences. In a way, students must first become a reader of the message before they can transmit their own messages. My students’ “double-voicedness sinks its roots deep into a fundamental, socio-linguistic speech diversity and multilanguagedness” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 326). In other words, my students’ many languages are all rooted within their experiences, within their family’s experiences, and through various other interactions that include many multimodal formats. And, in order to fully understand how their language is affecting who they are as an author and to whom they are writing, they need to explore their language uses in the variety of participatory realms they communicate with and in on a daily basis. Ultimately, with more versions of print and digital remixing becoming more prevalent within our communities (Alvermann, 2008; Alvermann, Beach, & Boggs, 2015; boyd, 2008; Ito et al., 2010; Jocson, 2013; Vasudevan, 2010a; Willians & Zenger, 2012), it is even more important for educators to consider how their students are instant authors of texts in the real world now, too. As noted above, my students speak in many different languages. However, they may not address all of them as legitimate because

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certain realms of society have instilled in them that “academic” language to pass state-mandated tests is the only way to be successful within it (Leander, 2010; Vasudevan, 2010a). Yet, not only are my students speaking with a “double-languagedness” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 356) in-class, but they also are using many languages within their digital communications, too, that create representations of complex relationships “between the visible and the invisible, the visible and speech, the said and the unsaid” (Rancière, 2011, p. 93). Their digital communications are essentially defined by specific historical moments, specific social situations, and specific chosen mediums they use for communication. For this reason, one can see how Bakhtin’s (1981) heteroglossia and Rancière’s (2011) emancipated spectator create a common ground for literacy educators and researchers to begin to analyze the discussions and literature concerning remixing in a participatory culture.

TYING BAKHTIN AND RANCIÈRE TOGETHER The language authors use to form a text is always shaped by the moment, which includes the people, places, events, and everything else that is present when that text is created and potentially remixed again and again; one cannot simply define a text as it is always changing based on the author(s). In other words, the author creates a text that pulls from the past, delivers in the present, and expects a future response that will vary from reader to reader.

Hybrids The new responses, or texts, students are creating can be seen as “hybrids” in which they are making conscious, deliberate choices within the digital realm and remixing messages to meet their unique needs. Yet what one sees through examples, like the YOLO tweet and Instagram images mentioned previously, suggests that students do not always consider what their hybrid texts say about them as an author or what their texts say to their reader. However, students are consciously thinking about their language use, through these constructions, because “their participation is deeply rooted in their desire to engage publicly” (boyd, 2008, p. 21). Taking Bakhtin’s and Rancière’s terms into consideration here, one sees that the language used to create texts are “marked by dialogic uncertainty, for writing [language] space is a site where multiple discourses clash, producing particular modalities of power dynamics in writing” (Doecke, Kostrogriz, & Charles, 2004, p. 34). Yet, this uncertainty is the only way the “emancipated spectator” begins to “learn something and relate everything else to it” (Rancière, 2007, p. 20). After all, it is not language that brings people together, but instead the “arbitrariness of language that makes them try to communicate by forcing them to translate” (Rancière, 2007, p. 58), or use language through different modes in ways that convey meanings within a specific moment. For example, my students constantly have to transmit and reprocess another’s words in class (through analysis of non-fiction and literary texts) and out of class (through their digital media uses), which is often a very difficult task because of the audiences to whom they are responding. In fact, I’ve found that while they honor the traditional, print-based language uses within the classroom, it’s through their own language uses that includes digital media where they strive to create meaning for themselves and an emancipation from the power structures that seek to question issues of wealth and poverty, for example (Bakhtin, 1981; Rancière, 2011). In a sense, my students’ identities are shaped by society’s use of 292

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language(s), which consists of the “living,” or constantly changing and developing, forms of language. While my students may understand that they code-switch in front of me, their teacher, then at home with their parents, and then at the basketball game with their friends after school, they are not always considering the structures in place controlling their language practices whether face-to-face or digitally. However, an increased awareness of these structures can transfer into their creation of new texts, or hybrids, specifically in regards to media power, agency, and engagement.

Media Power, Agency, and Engagement There are many discussions and examples of remixing in participatory culture that have direct connections to various realms, such as media power, agency, and engagement. For example, Kafai and Peppler (2011) draw upon findings about DIY (do-it-yourself) youth networks that make and remix a variety of media (p. 99). In fact, they suggest that remixing, as part of a participatory culture, is “the practice of creating original works that make knowing reference to previous works” through language resources to create multimodal, remixed texts (Kafai & Peppler, 2011, p. 102). The agency in which one creates these texts is where one can use Bakthin’s and Rancière’s concepts to further understand remixing within a participatory culture. Especially with DIY networks, youth have the motivation to create because they are the “expert in the room” (or network). In these spaces, their knowledge and voice is valued, and they establish a culture of connectivity that today’s youth value. Through Kafai and Peppler’s (2011) findings, Bakhtin’s heteroglossia comes into play when youth are remixing a work while connecting to the previous work from which they get their idea and recreate a text with their own language. In addition, Rancière’s emancipated spectator works in through this remix because it suggests youth are using language from previous texts to make their own translation or understanding—for their own purposes. Thus, a sense of participatory agency supports not just the language use of the youth, but also their ability to use language to develop the knowledge and experiences they need to be active, participatory members in society. In Burwell’s (2013) article, she points out that video remixes “uses methods of cultural appropriation and recontextulization to create uniquely compressed texts” (p. 207). These uniquely compressed texts not only provide an opportunity for new representations, but they also help uncover the dominant ideologies and commercial roots that are present within a participatory culture (Burwell, 2013, p. 207). In a sense, then, authors use a plethora of multimodal language resources to work with media’s power when they create a video remix that includes their own intentions with the varied contexts of language(s) (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 355). After all, one must be a “voyager of the mind” to continue creating meaning and understanding for oneself by “participating in the power common to all intellectual beings” (Rancière, 2007, p. 33). Also, Casey and Wells (2015) high school study on remixing found it to be very prevalent within social media. In fact, they reported that the high school teachers “confirmed that students were, generally, very engaged with class projects involving social and participatory media and that students were, generally, interested in the work of their peers” (Casey & Wells, 2015, p. 49). Through the heterglossia used to create a remix, or the multiplicity of social voices (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 263), students found their own way through learning to create an emancipation in which others take the remix (their knowledge) and decide how to use it (Rancière, 2007, p. 17). Engagement, then, is a big part of language use when one remixes within a participatory culture.

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Learning Spaces and Language(s) However, while media power, agency, and engagement are key components of remixing within a participatory culture, it is important to note that literacy educators and researchers cannot just look at these examples of learning and language spaces separately as they both influence each other. For example, students are using in-school skills outside of school and vice versa. The way in which students have to structure a 140-character tweet takes critical thought and organization to effectively disseminate their information just as their in-class essay does over the class novel. Thus, just as learning spaces and languages can come in a variety of forms and places, so, too, can remixes as the possibilities are endless to the connections students can make with them. A recent example of applying in-school and out-of-school literacy skills to remixing within a participatory culture includes remixing on Twitter and Instagram. One of my students posted about the upcoming class essay on Twitter and another posted about it on Instagram. Both of these messages were about the same thing, but both looked very different. The remixes that my students created, in this situation, ultimately influenced their audience members in different ways based on their chosen medium and intentions of their message. Here, students stylized the information I gave them in-class by choosing their medium of dissemination, then they created variation by taking that information and putting it in their own words (Bakhtin’s notion of heteroglossia), which ultimately created a hybrid, or remixed, message that resulted in the use of a meme (#thestruggle) posted on Twitter and a Venn diagram image of how this student understood a literary analysis on Instagram (Rancière’s notion of emancipated spectator). Here, Bakhtin’s ideas on deliberate, conscious use of languages, or heteroglossia, and Rancière’s ideas on changing design to evoke a sense of emancipation (2007, p. 91; 2011) show how a text created by multiple “writings” are seen by the intentions of my students to make meaning of what we discussed in-class. Through their interpretations, their active readings and composing, and their “will” to make meaning (Rancière, 2007, p. 54), these students made the essay discussion their own and created an opportunity for laughter and meaning past the classroom walls. However, many educators might wonder why these remixes matter. Sadly, “most forms of learning are much more integrated with the dynamic life of communities than our current formal education system” (Jenkins, Ito, & boyd, 2016, p. 7). With this point in mind, educators should view remixing within digital spaces and with digital media as a way for students to develop the necessary literacy skills to be successful in-school. For me, the meme and Venn diagram are just two of the many examples that I could share in which students made a personal connection to what we were doing in-class. Whether they realized it or not at that time, students were directly engaging with the Georgia Standards of Excellence (GSE) that we practiced every day; however, I would argue that they did so with higher order thinking skills that created opportunities for more active learning by creating texts that were completely new. And as Herold (2016) points out with smart, technology-infused pedagogy, “students should be making things and connecting with others and exploring the world.” In other words, it was not just about what happened in-class for one specific learning moment or about students using technology just to use it; learning through remixing transcended both time and place to create a “new” classroom space—moving from a passive multiple choice or print-based format to rich, multimodal expressions of knowledge and language use.

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The Participation Gap An important issue, however, is the current focus on the “participation gap” that results from a potential lack of access to technology (Jocson & Rosa, 2015, p. 372; Reilly & Robinson, 2006, p. 5). For this reason, it is imperative that remixing be visible in learning spaces, specifically within schools. When youth see new funds of knowledge through these learning spaces, they gain opportunities to make meanings through their own use of language, due to the multiplicity of voices in order to liberate themselves from the power structures in place. It is the “diversity of social speech types . . . a diversity of individual voices” (Bakhtin, 1981, p. 262) that “help[s] us arrive at a better understanding of how words and images, stories and performances, can change something of the world we live in” (Rancière, 2011, p. 23). Ultimately, active participation (emancipation) through remixing (the use of heteroglossia) does not come about as a result of having access to technology (Goldman, Booker, & McDermott, 2008, p. 193). After all, Irvine’s (2014) “Remix+” (moving beyond descriptions to explanations (p. 2)) shows people that cultural meanings, created through diverse language usage and the subsequent liberation from the ongoing dialogism between new and old expressions of meaning, explain why a participatory culture will always be incomplete (Irvine, 2014, p. 22). In other words, cultures are “in need of continual additions, supplements, and renewal of meaning” that are always “future-oriented” (Irvine, 2014, p. 22). Thus, remixing keeps society ready to participate and connect as it offers new affordances of language(s) and spaces of learning. In order to embody Ito et al.’s (2013) idea of “connected learning,” literacy educators and researchers must view texts as being a response to something in anticipation of the ongoing dialogism. In fact, for this idea to work, we must begin to understand that it “takes relationships to open up opportunity” (Jenkins, Ito, & boyd, 2016, p. 86). For example, Hull and Katz’s (2006) study on adults and youth in the Bay Area community highlights the debate over structure and agency (p. 43). The researchers worked with Randy who viewed and created digital stories through a variety of multimodal language resources, which helped him redefine his life trajectory. Randy took the language systems of others to enact an agentive self by populating others’ language with his own intentions. This action allowed him to do just that: take action and use language towards his own aims of being identified as a social critic (Hull & Katz, 2006). Hull and Katz’s (2006) work with Randy supports the notion that if one views texts by analyzing the use of heteroglossia, in which the author creates meaning through one’s own language use, one creates one’s own meaning and freedom(s) within today’s participatory culture. And, especially since schools today are dictated by standardized mandates, literacy educators and researchers work to create opportunities for freedom(s) is perhaps even more important to validate all that students are doing in regards to their literacy practices.

IMPLICATIONS FOR LITERACY EDUCATORS AND RESEARCHERS There are many implications concerning how Bakhtin’s notion of heteroglossia and Rancière’s notion of the emancipated spectator can help one understand remixing within a participatory culture. In fact, remixes are “articulations in forms that emerge from necessary” expressions (Irvine, 2014, p. 22). And they are necessary because they have to “work for a society, where everybody should be active” (Rancière, 2011, p. 63), or participatory.

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Researchers need to move beyond focusing on just the “craft” of the remix (Knobel & Lankshear, 2008, p. 27) to really see the possibilities for the future of remixes (Knobel & Lankshear, 2008, p. 26). Irvine’s (2014) vision of Remix+ can help with this focus on the “implementation of the normative generative, intersubjective, and collective meaning-making processes underlying all forms of expression in any medium” (p. 31), which will allow authors to reexamine mediated, participatory uses of language and the purposes behind their use. For example, when one begins to question the cultural connections made—to the past, present, and future—through remixing, then one can begin to see the combinations of “meanings, values, and ideas that came from somewhere and are on their way to somewhere else” (Irvine, 2014, p. 32). In other words, Remix+ moves authors and texts into a place where they understand the languages of heteroglossia, their impact on the text and the future of the text, and how they are emancipated through their language choices. Furthermore, Jocson (2015) implores readers to consider the following: In what ways does an ethos of collaboration, participation, and distributed expertise bust the very bubble that we as learners, creators, and tinkerers operate within, and in what ways do they allow us to become more thoughtful in the process of becoming the learners, creators, and tinkerers we have yet to be? (p. 48) This question helps literacy educators and researchers understand what allows students to act by their own movement—their own will (Rancière, 2007, p. 54)—in order to help students garner their knowledge to transcend the structures holding them in place. In fact, many researchers are beginning to consider youth participation in restorative justice practices (Winn, 2015, p. 65) and participatory politics through media (Jenkins, 2015; Kahne, Middaugh, & Allen, 2014). Especially with the recent current events ranging from overseas economic troubles to racial inequities in the United States, these participatory practices will push students’ thinking on the responses to texts, specifically those in the digital realm, and how people are using a multiplicity of voices to help their own narratives emerge. For example, Beach and Dredger (2016) argue that teachers may need to help students develop lenses in which to read these mediated texts, such as memes. They state: Our students in online spaces have a voice and an audience. What they may not have is a lens in which to examine their own and others’ publications in a critical way, in a way that reflects not only on the author who creates and posts, but on the reposters and the society that is reflected in the publications of these memes. (Beach & Dredger, 2016) Again, learning spaces and language uses in today’s digitally mediated world is complex, and we cannot ignore that our students may need help navigating these spaces (Jenkins, Ito, & boyd, 2016, p. 93). In addition, remixing in a participatory culture allows students to use language in ways that “have points of connection with earlier narrative genres” (Page, 2012, p. 186), which ties into Bakhtin’s notion of pulling voices/meanings from a variety of places while moving forward with one’s own meanings. Many of these new narratives are developing from social media (Seargeant & Tagg, 2014, p. 4), which also allow users the flexibility to choose their platform to disseminate their remixed messages. And the affordance of mobility and creating messages on-the-go cannot be ignored when considering these new narratives (Leander & Vasudevan, 2011). The power of choice and expression also further supports Rancière’s belief of searching for knowledge to emancipate oneself. Thus, the need for engaging in a variety of multimodal, remixed practices should be further investigated. 296

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In other words, there are certain power structures in place within society as a whole, within students’ own smaller communities, and within students’ own minds, that are at play, and these structures ultimately try to define how and when students use language. Unfortunately, the classroom is no exception to this fact, as Jenkins, Ito, and boyd (2016) remind us: The more authoritative a classroom structure becomes, the less students feel that their own voice and their own choices matter, the less free they are to pursue their own passions and interests, and the less likely the curriculum is to reflect the realities of their lives beyond the schoolroom. A participatory classroom, on the other hand, would be one where students help to shape the curriculum, define the norms of what constitutes appropriate conduct, and feel free to share what they know with others in their community. For those who are used to a teacher-controlled classroom, this shift towards peer-sharing can be frightening. (p. 95) A participatory classroom, then, would be one that embodies the “connected learning” mindset and includes opportunities to understand how authors and texts are working in today’s networked era. With the reconstruction, or remixing, of words taking place today occurring more noticeably, literacy educators and researchers can begin to see just how authors (students) and texts (their language uses) are shaped by remixing even though it is something that has been going on in both print and digital realms over time. This suggests that students’ places of learning must evolve (Vasudevan, 2010b, p. 78). In addition, today “the term ‘text’ is not at all adequate” (Bakhtin, 1986, p. 136) as texts are produced in a plethora of ways with a different meaning/reading with each way they are produced by students. In a sense, society has created a completely new idea of what constitutes a text and how one chooses to engage with it and emancipate oneself. Markham (2013) states: “The form and cultural practice of remix offers a lens through which we may be able to better grapple with the complexity of social contexts characterized by ubiquitous Internet, always-connected mobile devices, dense global communication networks, fragments of information flow, and temporal and ad hoc community formations” (p. 65). Here, one can see that authors have a voice (and a choice) in their meaning-making practices. For this reason, it is important to specifically focus on Rancière’s works, which have been largely undiscussed in the field of education (Pelletier, 2008, p. 1). All-in-all, Rancière believes that through questioning knowledge, one becomes emancipated, and this is why learning spaces should not focus on transferring knowledge, but by establishing equality between the teacher and student. When educators read their students’ work through the lens that Markham (2013) suggests, they are validating that their students can (Rancière, 2007, p. 23), and they are working against the deficit perspective that is sometimes given to many learners in the literacy classroom due to failure to perform on state-mandated tests. For this reason, using Rancière’s work, specifically with Bakhtin’s work, allows one to consider the many forms of language students use to remix meanings and “do” literacy when those in (perceived) places of power (e.g. State Department’s of Education) devalue their vibrant and meaningful practices of knowledge creation, production, and dissemination. After all, educators do not want their students “faking cultural literacy” (Greenfield, 2014) because they give up due to the fact that the “image [or text] is not about to stop being pensive” (Rancière, 2011, p. 132). Students will need to engage with a variety of remixed texts that are loaded with language(s) in order to be critical, participatory citizens. So, with all of these new texts and opportunities to be an “author,” how does one strive to incorporate what Bakthin and Rancière were advocating years ago? First, one needs to acknowledge how students 297

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use language within their own communities (Alvermann, 2008). For example, one must emphasize why code-switching matters. Also, one must teach students why the power structures in place are there and what they mean for them and how they use language. In addition, one needs to be open to ways in which one is creating multimodal, remixed texts, but also teach students how to use other’s texts (Alvermann, Beach, & Boggs, 2015; Burwell, 2013), whether directly or indirectly, with proper credit, such as through Creative Commons licenses. When the focus is no longer on “the copyright ontology force field of assignable property” (Irvine, 2010, p. 31-32) in which authors can/cannot use language, then authors and texts become more participatory and, perhaps, creative by valuing everyone’s voice. After all, Jenkins, Ito, & boyd (2016) remind us that “participatory culture is not contained within a platform or set of technological features, whether Facebook, Twitter, conventions, or self-published zines. Rather, it is about a set of practices embedded in shared norms and values” (p. 184). Our students, then, help to define today’s culture, which gives us even more reason to make sense of their work and find the connections to what we do within our classrooms.

CONCLUSION In the end, both Bakhtin and Rancière give literacy educators and researchers’ theories that help them understand how students are authors and producers of texts every day. Educators must ensure that their students do not focus on their “death” as an author within socio-ideological communities that might attempt to silence their voices, but instead help them see that the joy from creating a text, the “laughter that lifts the barrier and clears the path” (Bakhtin, 1986, p. 135), is not only immediate, but focused on the future for all as well. After all, today’s students, or authors, are reading, writing, and thinking critically as they produce new texts. And these texts include a multimodal remix of ideas that pull from the past, deliver in the present, and reach toward the future within today’s participatory culture.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT I would like to thank my advisor and mentor, Dr. Donna Alvermann, who introduced me to Rancière and remix, as well as Dr. Bob Fecho, who introduced me to Bakhtin’s work early in my doctoral career. They inspired me to see the connections I’ve noted within this chapter which have made me a better researcher and teacher.

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Alvermann, D. E., Beach, C. L., & Johnson, J. (2014). Remix. Becoming 3lectric. Retrieved from http:// www.becoming3lectric.com/remix/ Alvermann, D. E., & Eakle, A. J. (2007). Dissolving learning boundaries: The doing, re-doing, and undoing of school. In D. Thiessen & A. Cook-Sather (Eds.), International handbook of student experience in elementary and secondary school (pp. 143–166). Dordrecht, The Netherlands: Springer. doi:10.1007/14020-3367-2_6 Bakhtin, M. M. (1981). Discourse in the novel. In M. Holquist (Ed.), The dialogic imagination: Four essays (C. Emerson & M. Holquist, Trans.). (pp. 259–422). Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Bakhtin, M. M. (1986). From notes made in 1970-71. In C. Emerson & M. Holquist (Eds.), Speech Genres and Other Late Essays (V. McGee, Trans.). (pp. 132–158). Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. Beach, C. L., & Dredger, K. (2016forthcoming). Living the YOLO lifestyle: The rhetorical power of memes in the classroom. In D. J. Loveless, P. Sullivan, K. Dredger, & J. Burns (Eds.), Deconstructing the Education-Industrial Complex in the Digital Age. Becker, H. A. (2013, April 1). Beauty is only skin deep . . . but Instagram goes all the way down to the bone [Web log post]. Retrieved from http://www.suburbabble.com/post/46865510969 Birdine, K. (2013, April 2). Texas student, tweets ‘YOLO’ during test, gets suspended. The Huffington Post. Retrieved from http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/02/kyron-birdine-student-tweets-yolosuspended_n_3000138.html boyd, d. (2008). Why youth (heart) social network sites: The role of networked publics in teenage social life. In D. Buckingham (Ed.), Youth, Identity, and Digital Media. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press. boyd, d. (2014). It’s complicated: The social lives of networked teens. London: Yale University Press. Burwell, C. (2013). The pedagogical potential of video remix: Critical conversations about culture, creativity and copyright. Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy, 57(3), 205–213. doi:10.1002/JAAL.205 Casey, G., & Wells, M. (2015). Remixing to design learning: Social media and peer-to-peer interaction. Journal of Learning Design, 8(1), 38–54. doi:10.5204/jld.v8i1.225 Daer, A., Hoffman, R. F., & Goodman, S. (2014, September). Rhetorical functions of hashtag forms across social media applications. Paper and poster presented at the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) Special Interest Group on Design of Communication (SIGDOC), Colorado Springs, CO. Retrieved from https://www.academia.edu/8496360/Rhetorical_Functions_of_Hashtag_Forms_Across_ Social_Media_Applications Doecke, B., Kostrogriz, A., & Charles, C. (2004). Heteroglossia: A space for developing critical language awareness? English Teaching, 3(3), 29–42. Georgia Department of Education. (2015). English Language Arts Georgia Standards of Excellence (GSE) 9-12. Retrieved from https://www.georgiastandards.org/Georgia-Standards/Pages/ELA-9-12.aspx

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KEY TERMS AND DEFINITIONS Emancipated Spectator: A person who acts in the world around oneself based on knowledge one has made on one’s own. Heteroglossia: Taking another’s language and making it your own. Instagram: A social media image-sharing network. Jacques Rancière: A French theorist and philosopher who is known for his work advocating for the emancipated spectator. Mikhail Bakhtin: A Russian 20th century theorist who is known for his analysis of dialogism through the notion of heteroglossia. Multimodality: Using multiple modes, such as speech, gesture, image, or text, to communicate. Participatory Culture: A culture in which participants feels their voice or ideas matter resulting in a collective space of creation that is shared with others freely. Remix: Taking a variety of modes (from your own or another’s work) to create a new text with a new meaning.

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About the Contributors

Douglas J. Loveless is a lecturer at the University of Auckland in New Zealand where he teaches literacy and inquiry into education. He received his Ph.D. in Curriculum and Instruction from Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi. Previously, he has taught in public dual-language schools, collegereadiness programs for at-risk students and supplementary literacy programs for students of all ages. As an elementary teacher, he specialized in science education in Texas public schools as well as in Costa Rica. Using arts-based research methodologies such as visual art, animation, and performance; he explores the complexity of polymodal narratives, critical and situated literacies/pedagogies, and digital literacies. Pamela Sullivan is an associate professor in the Early, Elementary, and Reading department at James Madison University. She earned her M.Ed. and Ed.S. in school psychology from the University of South Florida and her doctorate in reading from the University of Virginia. She has been a teacher for students with varying exceptionalities, a school psychologist, and a reading intervention coordinator in the public schools in the United States and in the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianna Islands. Katie Shepherd Dredger, Ph.D., is an Assistant Professor of education in the College of Education at James Madison University in Harrisonburg, Virginia. A former public school middle and secondary teacher for thirteen years in Maryland, she works to examine intersections of theory and practice in today’s classrooms. Her scholarship has appeared in Journal of Media Literacy in Education, English Journal, Language Arts, The ALAN Review, International Journal of ePortfolio, Reading in Virginia, Educational Practice and Reform, Writing & Pedagogy, English Leadership Quarterly and Contemporary Issues in Teacher Education, English Leadership Quarterly, and Writing & Pedagogy. Her research interests include teacher education, adolescent literacy, content literacy, and the effective integration of emerging digital literacies within K-12 education. Jim Burns is an Assistant Professor of Curriculum and Instruction at Florida International University. He formerly taught English for speakers of other languages, history, and social studies in Fairfax County, Virginia Public Schools. His research interests include curriculum theory, masculinities studies, qualitative research methods, and the embodiment of power in governmental systems. *** Ottilie Austin is the coordinator of the online reading education courses at the University of Virginia. She designs and teaches online courses and has created online orientation trainings for students  

About the Contributors

and instructors. She trains new adjunct instructors and supports their teaching throughout the semester. Ottilie also works with in-service teachers and administrators across the Commonwealth of Virginia by providing literacy related professional development. She serves as the faculty advisor to master’s cohorts online and in the field. Her teaching and research interests include word study, literacy leadership and coaching, adolescent literacy and online learning. Ottilie has an Ed.D. from the University of Virginia in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Reading Education and Supervision, an M.Ed. in Reading Education, and a B.S. in Elementary and Special Education. Crystal L. Beach is a current high school English teacher in Georgia and a language and literacy education doctoral candidate at The University of Georgia. Her research interests include New Literacies, identity, multimodalities, and technologies in the English classroom. Brian Charest, Ph.D., is a former Chicago Public School teacher who now works at the Nova Project in Seattle. He earned his doctorate in English Education from the University of Illinois at Chicago in 2013. He’s presented locally and nationally and published articles on teaching, ecological schooling, social justice, and radical pragmatism. Most of his university teaching has involved community-based work of some kind, where students in his courses work closely with local community-based organizations, schools, and residents in “real world” settings. He’s also taught community-oriented writing courses and American literature at the University of Illinois (UIC). At DePaul University in Chicago, he taught a range of courses for teachers, including writing across the curriculum and a course on teaching young adult literature (YAL). His interests include education reform, teaching English, teacher education, social justice, civic and community engagement, and grassroots education reform strategies. Annamary L. Consalvo is an assistant professor of literacy at The University of Texas at Tyler where she teaches undergraduate and graduate courses in teacher education. She earned her Ph.D. from The University of Texas at Austin in Curriculum and Instruction, Language and Literacy Studies, in 2011. Research interests include the study of writing conferences in secondary contexts; disciplinary and adolescent literacy; the literary works and archive of YA author, Robert Cormier; and ways in which multiliteracies and new literacies inform teaching and learning in the 21st century. Ann D. David is an assistant professor in the Dreeben School of Education at the University of the Incarnate Word. She received her PhD from the University of Texas at Austin in 2013 in Curriculum and Instruction, with a specialization in Language and Literacy Studies. Dr. David’s research focuses on the teaching of writing, disciplinary literacies, and preservice teacher education. L Johnson Davis, rooted in an ecological approach to the development of human potential, is skilled at deconstructing existing frames and perspectives, using qualitative methods of inquiry for deepening understanding, and reconceptualizing current modes of thinking. Practical and research inquiries include: origins of human thinking and learning, transformational versus transactional learning environments, experience and meaning in the learning process, and Liminal Learning processes. Davis is a doctoral candidate in Education (Teaching, Learning, and Culture) at Claremont Graduate University and San Diego State University, a practitioner in innovative learning programs at an internationally-recognized charter school in San Diego, and founding director of the Otay Institute, a future-oriented collective focused on developing human potential. 347

About the Contributors

William J. Fassbender is a second year doctoral student in Language and Literacy Education at UGA. His research interests center around digital literacies, comics, and pop culture in educational spaces. Before pursuing his Ph.D, Fassbender taught middle grades English for five years and was an instructional coach for one year at a charter school in southeastern North Carolina. Samuel B. Fee is Professor and Chair of Computing and Information Studies at Washington & Jefferson College. His research interests extend into the realms of computing, education, archaeology, and digital media production. His work pursues answers to questions such as: How do we best learn and conduct research with technology? How does technology modify human interaction? He has co-edited a volume with Brian R. Belland on computing and education entitled The Role of Criticism in Understanding Problem Solving: Honoring the Work of John C. Belland (Springer, 2012), as well as a forthcoming volume with Amanda M. Holland-Minkley and Thomas E. Lombardi, New Directions for Computing Education: Embedding Computing Across Disciplines (Springer, 2017). More information is available via his web site at http://samfee.net/. Julie Janson Gray is the faculty advisor for the reading education program located off-grounds at the UVA Richmond Center. She works with in-service teachers who are in the graduate degree and post-master’s certificate programs for reading specialists as well as consulting with school divisions around Central Virginia in best practices in literacy education. Julie teaches courses online and at the Richmond Center, with a focus on clinical practice. In the summer, she directs a reading clinic which is a collaboration between the UVA graduate program in reading education, private and public schools, and a child development center in an urban setting which serves struggling readers. Julie is president of the Virginia College Reading Educators and Membership Co-Director of the Virginia State Reading Association. Her teaching and research interests include clinical practice, technology enhanced teaching and learning, and children’s literature. Julie has a Ph.D. from The University of Virginia. in Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Reading Education, an M. Ed. in Early Childhood Education from Kent State University, and a B.S. in Economics from the College of William and Mary. Colin Green has almost 30 years of experience in elementary teaching, teacher education, and curriculum and pedagogy work in Northern Ireland and the U.S. Dr. Green teaches and conducts research in the social foundations of curriculum and pedagogy, international education, and elementary teacher education. He has presented and published in the fields of urban education, elementary school literacy education, gender, and comparative schooling. Dr. Green has been the recipient of a number of grants from both the federal government and from foundations. He is currently working on a project to study “Identity, Pluralism and Education”, using Israel and Northern Ireland as comparative case studies. Leslie Haas is the Dallas/Fort Worth Director of Clinical Faculty for Urban Teachers in collaboration with Johns Hopkins University. Her research agenda includes English language learners and effective instruction, cultural and economic awareness in education, technology-based literacy opportunities, and teacher education/instructional coaching. These areas of interest have led her to both publish and present at the local, state, national, and international levels. Gail M. Hunger is interested in creating collaborative teaching and learning environments with an inquiry based process approach. Her teaching and research focus on theory and design-based research 348

About the Contributors

including collaborative team based design, active learning, and authentic instruction. She facilitates conversations with faculty across grounds to construct thoughtful connections between academic technologies, scholarship, and learning for authentic course design. She supports faculty innovation and serves as a member of the New Learning Technologies Committee at the College. Gail has extensive experience leading synergistic projects incorporating technology enhanced learning and course redesign at national and international higher education institutions. Gail has an Ed.D. in Instructional Design & Technology, an M.A. and B.A. in Mathematics Education. Kijpokin Kasemsap received his BEng degree in Mechanical Engineering from King Mongkut’s University of Technology, Thonburi, his MBA degree from Ramkhamhaeng University, and his DBA degree in Human Resource Management from Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University. Dr. Kasemsap is a Special Lecturer in the Faculty of Management Sciences, Suan Sunandha Rajabhat University, based in Bangkok, Thailand. Dr. Kasemsap is a Member of the International Economics Development and Research Center (IEDRC), the International Foundation for Research and Development (IFRD), and the International Innovative Scientific and Research Organization (IISRO). Dr. Kasemsap also serves on the International Advisory Committee (IAC) for the International Association of Academicians and Researchers (INAAR). Dr. Kasemsap is the sole author of over 250 peer-reviewed international publications and book chapters on business, education, and information technology. Dr. Kasemsap is included in the TOP 100 Professionals–2016 and in the 10th edition of 2000 Outstanding Intellectuals of the 21st Century by the International Biographical Centre, Cambridge, England. Thomas E. Lombardi is Assistant Professor of Computing and Information Studies and program coordinator for the Computational Science Concentration at Washington & Jefferson College. His research focuses on interdisciplinary computing and includes projects addressing network models of art and bioinformatics. He is co-editing a forthcoming volume with Samuel B. Fee and Amanda M. Holland-Minkley, New Directions for Computing Education: Embedding Computing Across Disciplines (Springer, 2017). For more information visit his website: http://telombardi.github.io/ Marlena Luciano is an educator in Louisiana. She graduated Magna Cum Laude from James Madison University in 2016 with a Bachelor of Arts in Communication Studies. During her time at JMU, Marlena helped found the Digital Communication Consulting Center where she worked as a Media Fellow and tutor. Additionally, Marlena was a part of the organization Students Helping Honduras where she built schools for children in the country. She also worked on various marketing campaigns with Headbands of Hope, a foundation dedicated to the fight against childhood cancer. Alongside this passion for such work, her experience with educating students as a Media Fellow inspired the role she holds today as a teacher in New Orleans. Joy Myers is an Assistant Professor in the Early, Elementary and Reading Department in the College of Education at James Madison University. A former classroom teacher, Joy loves sharing her passion for literacy and technology with pre-service and in-service teachers. Paige Normand is the founder and coordinator of Digital Communication Consulting, a tutoring program in the James Madison University Learning Centers. She trains undergraduate tutors to be effectively embedded as digital experts in courses across campus and has partnered with faculty from 349

About the Contributors

Engineering to Education and from first year General Education classes to 400-level coursework. Her program helps university students develop skills to produce more sophisticated and professional online content that extend beyond the classroom through faculty partnerships, one-on-one consultations, and campus-wide workshops. She also teaches for the School of Media Arts and Design. Joan Rhodes is an Associate Professor of Reading and Early/Elementary Education with over 30 years of teaching experience at the preschool, elementary, middle school and collegiate levels. She is a graduate faculty member in the PhD in Education program where she teaches courses in professional development and instructional theory. Rhodes directs study abroad programs to diverse countries including New Zealand, Italy and Costa Rica. Her research focuses on digital literacy, ELLs, and the impact of study abroad experiences on educators. Valerie J. Robnolt is an associate professor in the Department of Teaching and Learning in the School of Education at Virginia Commonwealth University. She teaches pre-service and inservice teachers methods of teaching reading and language arts. Dr. Robnolt has over 20 years of teaching experience as an elementary classroom teacher, reading specialist, literacy coordinator, and college professor. Alexa Senio is a Communications and Graphic Design Specialist for a large nonprofit federal contractor located in Northern Virginia. She graduated Magna Cum Laude and with Honors from James Madison University in 2016 with a Bachelor of Arts in Writing, Rhetoric, and Technical Communication. While at JMU, she helped found the Digital Communication Center and worked as a Media Fellow for the center. Additionally she helped start the James Madison Undergraduate Research Journal, helped design the Celebrating Simms exhibit in Harrisonburg, Virginia, and worked on the JMU Drones Challenge Project. She also published her Senior Honors Thesis Project, “Cross-Cultural Solutions Volunteer Handbook” in 2016. Will Sullivan is currently a student of the humanities at Virginia Commonwealth University. He specializes in Communication Arts. In 2014, Will was the recipient of the Engelbart Scholars Award. He is currently serving as the co-editor of Emanata, the VCU Comics Anthology. Sheri Vasinda is a literacy faculty member at Oklahoma State University where she supports preservice and inservice teachers in developing deep understandings of literacy processes and practices. With over 25 years of public school experience, she is passionate about supporting struggling readers and writers through purposeful and powerful pairings of new technology tools with strong traditional literacy strategies to amplify the effects of both. She continues to discover ways that technology affords authentic self-assessment opportunities and is exploring frameworks of thinking about the technology integration and pedagogy as well as new literacies. Westry Whitaker is an Assistant Professor of Middle and Secondary Education at the University of North Georgia. A veteran elementary and secondary teacher, he has taught 4th and 6th grade Eng/ LA at an exclusive private school in San Diego, CA, and he has taught 8th grade Eng/LA in an inner city setting in Wilmington, NC. A graduate of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2000, English lit & History), Wes received his Master of Education from the University of North Carolina at Greensboro (2002) and his Doctor of Education from The George Washington University (2014). A native 350

About the Contributors

of Wilson, NC, Wes began teaching at the University of North Georgia in January, 2015. His interests include English literature, literacy, curriculum theory/studies, teacher education, English methodology, qualitative research methods, diversity education, bullying, and social and civil rights advocacy. A passionate surfer and rock climber, Wes has traveled extensively throughout Central America and the American west. In his spare time, he enjoys hanging off rocks and feeling warm sand between his toes. Robert Williams is a native Appalachian and current resident of that region. He holds a B.A. in English from The College of William and Mary, an M.S. in English from Radford University, and an M.A. (Reading Concentration) and Ph.D. (Curriculum and Instruction) in Education from Virginia Tech. Over the course of his teaching career, Professor Williams has taught welding, machine shop, grades 8-12 English, Composition and Advanced Composition, Reading, and a variety of language, literacy, literature, and education courses for pre- and in-service public school teachers. Additionally, since 2010 he has taught online, hybrid, and traditional classes for undergraduates and graduates. As a faculty member, he continues to be intensely interested in issues related to teacher preparation; curricula, digital technology, and assessments in language arts; composition theory and instruction; reading; and psycholinguistics (including language and literacy acquisition and dialect studies). Dan Woods received his PhD from Virginia Tech majoring in Curriculum and Instruction with a focus on English Education. Before pursuing his PhD, Dan taught middle and high school English in Roanoke City and Montgomery County. He earned his M.A.Ed. from Virginia Tech, as well as a B.S. and M.A. in English from Radford University. His research interests include teacher education, critical literacy, and social justice. As of August 2011 he has been an Assistant Professor of English Education at Radford University; currently, he is the Coordinator of the English Education Program. Dr. Woods is also member of the Executive Board of the Virginia Association of Teachers of English and editor of The Virginia English Journal.

351

352

Index

21st century literacies 101, 216-217, 221, 225, 232 21st century thinking 216, 221-223, 232, 238

critical media literacy 260, 268-271, 276 critical pedagogy 199, 249

A

D

Academic Digital Communication 150 academic literacies 216, 222-224, 227, 229, 232, 238 accountability 3, 5, 7-11, 14, 18, 28, 40-41, 45, 183, 185, 216, 227, 239-243, 245, 249 adolescent space 269, 271, 273, 275, 277, 285 adult learners 172-173 aesthetics 202-204, 208-209, 215 Analog Space 268 assessment 1, 3, 9, 26-28, 31, 40, 45, 75, 77, 96, 105-107, 135-136, 142, 176-177, 180-181, 186-187, 189190, 195, 218, 230, 239-249, 251-252, 254, 256 asynchronous 174-176, 180

Damn Daniel 272, 277-279, 285 data analysis 45, 127, 224 data collection 26-27, 31, 73, 116-117, 220, 222 database 116-128, 132-133 Database Managements Systems 117, 132 databases 116-123, 126, 132 deconstruction 56-57, 62, 71 democratic 7, 16-18, 25, 30, 41-42, 47, 85-86, 91, 94, 96, 101, 122, 125-127, 184 Dewey 17, 25, 66, 184, 270, 279 digital 17, 43, 55, 58-59, 61, 63, 67-69, 73-74, 76-79, 81, 85-86, 93-94, 96-98, 101, 104-105, 107, 110, 116-118, 122, 126-128, 134-159, 171, 183-187, 189, 192-193, 199, 202-212, 215-220, 222, 224225, 230, 232-233, 238, 243, 252, 257-260, 262, 264-266, 268-281, 286, 288, 290-292, 294-297 digital assignment 134, 138-139, 141-142, 145, 148, 150 Digital Communication Consulting 136 digital literacy 101, 107, 135-139, 149, 151-159, 171 digital media 128, 143, 153, 155-156, 158, 207, 212, 260, 279, 288, 291-292, 294 Digital Native Myth 135-136, 146, 150 digital portfolio 135, 143, 146, 150, 218 digital space 55, 58-59, 68, 264 digital storytelling 137, 142, 146, 148, 150-156, 158159, 171 Dynamic Knowledge Repository 84

B Bakhtin 287-298, 302

C civics 118, 124-125, 128 Common Core State Standards 2-4, 45, 244 Complex Living System 71 Complex System 71 computer 3, 11, 23, 39, 68, 74, 77, 84, 91, 117-121, 125-127, 132, 153, 156, 203, 205, 209, 220, 225, 230, 238, 258-259 computer adaptive technology 3, 11 Computer Adaptive Testing 23 computing 72, 116-121, 123, 125-128, 153, 260 conservative modernization 24, 27, 30-31, 33, 41, 53 constructivism 132, 243 co-opting 257, 264-265, 268, 275 creative thinking 202-204, 207-208, 211-212 critical literacy 97-98, 101, 249, 272

E Ecological Schooling 23 edTPA 3, 106 Education Industrial Complex 57, 68, 184-186, 190,

Index

195, 199 education reform 1, 7-9, 14, 19, 27-29 educational systems 45, 55, 57-58, 60, 68 Edutainment-Technology 212, 215 emancipated spectator 287-290, 292-295, 302 Engelbart 72, 74-75, 78, 81 Engelhart 84 English language arts 257 ePortfolio 104-113, 115, 135, 199 evaluation 8, 106, 144, 177, 181, 209-210, 239-240, 243, 247-249, 252, 254, 256, 279

F Flipped Classroom 174, 180 frame 1, 11, 41, 47, 63, 71, 154, 194, 216, 229, 232, 241 framework 4, 24, 26-27, 41, 55-56, 58-62, 66, 72, 7475, 80-81, 84, 107, 111, 116, 118, 120-121, 126, 209, 224, 248, 253, 270 Functionalist Research 80, 84

G governmentality 24, 26-27, 29-31, 35, 41-42, 44, 47, 54 grit 9, 13-14, 19, 23 Gutenberg 74, 84

H hegemonic masculinity 24, 26-27, 31-33, 54 heteroglossia 18, 287-290, 292-296, 302 Heteropatriarchy 31-32, 40, 54 Hey Girl 272, 275-276, 285 high school 41, 60, 77, 125-126, 128, 216, 222, 226, 233, 238, 241, 272, 277, 293 human learning 55-56, 58, 60-62, 66-68, 80 Hybrid Courses 180

I ICT Skills 209, 215 illuminate 48, 85-86, 88, 98, 101 information technology 85-86, 121, 153, 171 In-Service Teachers 173, 180 Instagram 64, 94, 135, 260, 262, 271, 287, 291-292, 294, 302 instructional design 172-174, 180, 203, 226, 246 intelligence 6, 15, 30, 35, 56, 59-60, 69, 223, 238 interactive practices 206 interactive technologies 203, 208, 215 Interpellation 23

Istation 217-219, 221-222, 233

J Jacques Rancière 287-288, 302

L Learning Centers 136 liminal 55, 58, 63-69, 71, 225 literacy 7, 15, 61, 72-75, 78-80, 97-98, 101, 107, 125127, 135-139, 149, 151-159, 171, 175, 185-186, 188, 190, 199-200, 211-212, 217-221, 223-232, 239, 242-243, 249-250, 260-261, 268-272, 276, 278-281, 287-288, 290-292, 294-298

M masculinities 24-26, 31-33 material 5, 10, 44, 117-118, 135, 138, 147, 151, 157, 173, 177, 203, 208, 216-219, 221-225, 232, 238, 262, 273 meaning-making 55, 57-58, 61, 69, 155, 239, 243, 296-297 media 26, 34-35, 41, 43, 77-78, 80, 86, 90, 93-98, 128, 135-137, 139-141, 143-148, 150, 153-159, 187188, 200, 203, 205, 207-210, 212, 215, 219-222, 224, 227, 230-232, 238, 241-242, 250, 257-266, 268-271, 273-276, 278-280, 285, 287-288, 290294, 296, 302 Media Fellows Program 136, 150 meme 269-278, 280-281, 285-286, 294 metaphoric brain 61, 64, 66-68, 71 middle school 77, 222, 257 Mikhail Bakhtin 287-288, 302 militarization 19, 25, 33, 36, 43 military games 35-36, 38 multiliteracies 257, 259-261, 266, 268 multimedia 80, 105, 146, 150-154, 157-158, 207-209, 212 multimodal 157, 205, 209, 215-216, 219, 221, 224-227, 230, 238, 259-260, 265, 268, 272, 274, 277-278, 280-281, 288, 291, 293-296, 298 multi-modal 105, 212, 241, 243, 250 Multimodal Composition 209, 215 Multimodality 221, 285, 302

N Neocolonialism 1, 23 neoliberal 1-9, 14, 19, 26-33, 38-39, 41-43, 45-47, 57,

353

Index

59, 77-78, 86, 101, 184, 188, 191, 195 neoliberalism 1, 7, 9-10, 23-26, 30, 38, 41, 54, 86 New Literacies 155, 157, 185, 193, 199, 268, 270, 279 new literacy 101, 153, 278 New Literacy (also Known as 21st Century Literacies) 101 normalization 15, 117, 120-121, 127, 132, 240

O online identity 258, 262, 265, 268 online portfolio 135, 183-187, 189-191, 194-195, 199-200 origins of learning 63

P participatory culture 224, 230, 232, 238, 278, 281, 287-288, 290, 292-296, 298, 302 PBL 116, 118, 121-123, 127, 132 pedagogy 26-27, 30, 34, 44, 48, 72, 76, 84, 86, 91, 127, 137, 154, 158, 174, 184, 199, 203, 207, 232, 249, 259, 269-270, 294 peer tutors 134, 136-137, 141, 146-147 popular culture 34, 251, 263, 273, 279, 285 Post-Colonial Theory 1, 23 Practica Assignments 180 preservice teacher 104, 106, 115, 187, 189, 195 pre-service teachers 111, 173, 180 Problem-Based Learning (PBL) 116-118, 121, 126, 132

S Sakai platform 176, 178, 180 SBAC 3 Secondary Education 268 settler colonialism 24, 26, 32, 39, 54 Simple System 71 So You’re Saying? 272, 276, 286 social networking 153, 188, 263, 268 standardization 9, 11, 34, 67-69, 73 standardized 1-2, 4, 8, 10-13, 15-16, 19, 27-28, 36-37, 45, 57, 75, 79, 90, 184, 208, 211, 216, 219, 223224, 230-232, 239-245, 250, 295 standardized testing 11, 13, 19, 36-37, 79, 224, 230-231 storytelling 63, 67, 136-137, 142, 146, 148, 150-156, 158-159, 171 Structured Query Language (SQL) 117, 133 student-centered 106-107, 239, 243, 246, 250

T teacher education 45, 92, 104-108, 112-113, 115, 158, 187, 194-195, 199 testing 2-3, 8, 11, 13, 16, 18-19, 23, 32, 36-37, 47, 79, 96, 136, 143, 175, 224, 230-231, 240-242 tool 11, 36-38, 68-69, 73, 80-81, 94, 96, 105, 107, 121, 135-136, 139, 141, 146, 153, 155, 159, 175, 177-178, 183, 185-186, 193-194, 202, 206, 222, 238, 247, 264, 278 Toyama 75-76, 80, 84, 178

Q

V

queries 118, 122, 133, 273

visual art 154, 202-210, 212, 215

R

W

Rancière 287-298, 302 reconstruction 71, 297 reflection 66, 97, 104-107, 109-113, 115, 118, 147, 156, 183-184, 186, 191, 200, 205, 217, 252, 254, 256, 279 remix 224, 228, 269-274, 276, 278, 280-281, 285, 288, 293, 295-298, 302 republic 87-89, 95, 101 republican 87-89, 97, 101 resistance 34, 41, 43, 45, 65, 96, 194, 216-217, 220, 222, 224, 230, 232-233, 238, 270

writing 4, 12, 17, 66, 73, 75, 79, 104, 106-108, 118, 120, 126, 136-137, 142-143, 152, 154, 156-157, 159, 175, 182, 192, 223, 225-227, 229-230, 233, 241244, 247, 249, 252-255, 287-289, 291-292, 298

354

Y YOLO 269-275, 278-279, 281, 286-287, 292 younger learners 202-209, 211-212 youth culture 269, 272, 274-278, 281, 286