Badges and Challenges? Say no more!

We are now in week three of our EME6414 class and it's time to turn the competition on. As an athlete there is this sense of competition that befalls me once there I see or hear the word 'challenge.' I'm super excited to see what this week brings and I hope that I can win some things.

Now sure how badges and challenges will work virtually but I am up for it! Let's have the time of our lives since the '"training wheels are off."

Who's ready?!

Is RSS Feeds the Answer?

How are folks juggling multiple social media applications and websites? I was excited to create a 'scholarly Twitter' because my following on the personal on can get crazy with the posts at times, lol. Then we were tasked with creating an Instragram. I immediately knew I was going to use my personal one, because how does one keep up? Is it possible to have all these apps managed on one website? Well I don't know the answer, but what I do know is that we got a solution for reading our class blogs and that solution is RSS feeds.

I am able to read all of the class blogs from one website. The only drawback is not being able to comment with visiting the blog (not a big deal) but it would be convenient. Also, it wouldn't surprise me if I am the one not using it correctly, lol! But now, I read a post from VD and saw that we are working with Reddit in week 3. Is there an end to the madness of social media? Could TikTok be on the horizon? I am excited yet, anxious about the possibilities :).

*Creating accounts for this class is optional but I'm diving it head first to gain first hand experiences, not only for for myself, but also my little ones. That way I am able to help them navigate the world of Web 2.0 or Web 3.0 when my 1 year old gets older.

An Immigrant's Journey - A Reflection

Reading about digital immigrants and digital natives had me reflecting on my immigrant journey and how some of those same things intersect. 

I immigrated to the US from Jamaica while still in elementary school. As one can imagine, moving to a entirely new country with new customs etc., can be daunting as an adult. But imagine as a child. To give some background on my educational struggles, Jamaica was conquered by the British therefore our language and spelling is based upon the British English. Now, think about little me in school spelling things they way I know how, and your teacher writing Fs on your spelling tests or marking up your paper with red ink. Everyday I went home deflated. This particular teacher never took the time to understand why I would spell color or behavior, to name a few, with the letter u. So they would be spelled as 'colour' and 'behaviour' respectively. 

As I reflect on what a digital immigrant, I thought about how my teacher felt it was only one way to spell things. As if the US English was the only version that existed. She still never took the time to ask me where I was from never asked why I couldn't spell the terms using the US English, everything was assumed. Which in my eyes meant I just didn't belong in her class nor that grade for that matter. I remember coming home and telling my mom that I felt 'stupid' because it seems English isn't for me. Whilst she would rebuttal with "maybe she doesn't know what she's talking about." After receiving a not-so-favorable grade on my progress report, my mom decided a meeting needed to be held not only with the teacher but the principal as well. 

In the meeting, I remember my mom pleading with them saying I recently moved to this country and I will need time to adjust. It's as if they weren't trying to hear her because they kept repeating, "she's not spelling on grade level," "I'm not sure she can even read on grade level." Then the teacher asked, "are you sure she was placed in the right class?" At this point I burst into tears because I felt my mom and I were fighting a losing battle. From that moment on I knew that there was no convincing these folks I just had to find some way to assimilate, and do so quickly.

Fast forward to today where I was not only the first in my immediately family to graduate from college, but I am back in school pursuing my second masters degree. Sometimes we are faced with challenges in our younger years and at that point in time we can use the challenge as a fuel to prove everybody wrong or use it as an excuse to not be great. I chose the former. From that moment on I told myself I would never let anyone, little girls or little boys feel the way I did. When I taught I was always focused on the whole child. If they student weren't doing well physically, mentally and emotionally there was no way I could expect them to perform well in class. And now I'm applying the same things to my little girls. We can do anything regardless of the cards stacked against us, as long as well have a strong support system.

Have you faced any similar challenges? Or does anyone have any immigrant stories to share? Feel free to engage in the comments :).

Digital Immigrant...?

In this week's reading we were introduced to an article titled, "Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants", by Marc Prensky. To sum it up. Prensky argue that the digital immigrants are those who were not born into the digital world but have adapted or been fascinated by the aspects of new technology (Prensky 2001, p. 1-2). Throughout the article he states time and time again that the digital immigrants are having a hard time adjusting to the new technology and fostering the capabilities of the digital natives. Although I agree with the point he's making, I think my beef is with the term immigrant.

In my experience, moving from you home country to live permanently in a foreign country, you have to do more than the native of that country to assimilate and fit in. You aren't given a choice to simply do the minimum to get by. Prenksy argue that it's lazy of the digital immigrants to say they can't fit in or build the knowledge gap between them and the natives. Yet, I feel like the natives were born into the country to they naturally have a upper hand. Whereas the immigrants are working twice as hard. The term lazy here is also problematic because there are factors that play into why the digital immigrant is finding it hard to adjust. Some questions that come my mind are: are they being supported through the transition? Finally support could be them being provided the tools necessary to obtain the knowledge the natives have. Are they getting training or professional development to assist with the new technology so they can then teach? Prenky failed to touch on such support which to me leaves the argument a bit baseless. 

Sorrentino also argued that Prensky way of thinking can be considered elitist due to the fact that they are are some countries and areas within the united states that aren't afford to have the new technology available to others. How do we account for home without internet access? Socio-economic factors play a HUGE role in what is available for some that aren't for others. Before an argument can be made about digital immigrants not wanting to assimilate, let's ask ourselves, is the playing field leveled? Are they being afforded the same access as the natives? Who is providing the support? 

Let me know your thoughts!!! 

Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants part 1

Sorrentino, P. (2018). The mystery of the digital natives' existence: Questioning the validity of the Prenskian metaphorLinks to an external site.

Does Social Media Help or Hurt? (Reading Reflection, Maybe?)

This week's reading was good. Particularly the article "Social media? Get serious! Understanding the functional building blocks of social media." The article discusses the framework a business should use, they frame these items as building blocks, in order to successfully develop strategies to aid in understanding, responding and monitoring different social media activities. Of course, reading this article as a company or even an individual you feel empowered to not only apply these strategies to help empower your business, but you also feel as though the steps are so simple that a caveman can do it. So I asked myself, why aren't all business taking these steps to create a website so a customer can browse products or having accounts across different social media platforms. Then it hit me... 

Does social media help or hurt? 

Before getting further into my argument I want to define what I mean by hurt. Hurt in this context is a company losing money or their reputation taking a hit. Recently my husband and I tried to order from a restaurant a friend of ours recommended. Of course, the first thing I did was look for the restaurant on Instagram and Twitter to see if a social media account exist. The answer was no! Before writing them off though I said to myself, maybe the owners are older so let me do a simple google search. What resulted was the business' information BUT they had no website. I personally find it archaic to allow customers to call in orders if they can't see the menu online. Especially for those who haven't eaten there before. How can I know what to call and order if there is no way for me to see what you serve? I decided to go into and ask why there isn't a website for the business and/or social media pages and one of the owners responded with, "we plated a to go box sloppily and the customer posted the picture online." What resulted, as you can imagine, is a rush of negative reviews on Google and their comments section on Instagram and Twitter. So they deactivated the social media pages. The new approach for this business is to dine-in or come in to place a to-go order. Their online option was never reintroduced because the owners never recovered from the backlash. On the other hand, the owners now double check the orders that are plated and boxed to go to ensure everything is up to their standards. In this personal example, I could argue that the business was hurt financially because they no longer offer and online ordering option, however, ensuring plating and boxing is up to standard is something that was improved, so in this sense it also helped them become better. 

Since I had that personal example I went researching about how BIG brands were hurt by social media. You all can let me know if any of these sound familiar or if you were directly impacted:

Apple: remember when they were deliberately slowing the battery life in the older iPhones? 

Amazon: Tried to get its headquarters in New York City, then the plans were nixed due to public outcry. However, this was not only on social media.

Facebook repeated privacy breaches 

United Airlines broke the guitar of Canadian Singer Dave Caroll. Then he posted a video on Youtube that chronicles what transpired. The title of the video if you are wondering is "United Break Guitars." Which results in the company's stock plummeting 10% costing the stakeholders millions of dollars.

Also, there are plenty of restaurant who are boycotting social media, not because of them being intimidated by what has to be done to be successful, but because they are afraid of the backlash similar to my person example. For this reason, I understand why most companies are staying away. It literally takes one negative post to bring you down, quite possibly out of business depending on the magnitude of the audience that gets exposed to the negative post.

Uncomfortably Vulnerable

I always marveled at the information that can found in the internet with a simple Google search. Now the same information can be obtained on Twitter. By simply posting a questions, users quickly provide an answer, most time based off their experience or them doing the research and providing a link. Where social media differ from Google is once a "controversial" tweet hit the stratus fair, it can be viewed and shared so many times and then the trolls will be all in your mentions. I've seen this happen to folks near and dear to me, also strangers that are contained within my online community. This is part of the reason my internet usage has been reduced to simply browsing or commenting and liking a post. 

Now, I enrolled in this class partially because I want to be empowered to post on the web without feeling as if my voice doesn't matter or that how I feel doesn't matter. I've always wanted to start a blog but had no idea where to start, where my topics would come from or how I would build an audience. Yet, I now have the opportunity to do so and I got so overwhelmed when I read the assignment. The idea that other people could potentially read and comment so me so anxious I wanted to drop the class. But there is growth when one becomes on uncomfortable and makes themselves vulnerable. So I am putting myself out there. 

I've created a Twitter account: @doublem_eme6414. Please follow me, even though I haven't posted anything as yet. This semester I am challenging myself to work through my vulnerability and create a blog that is not just focused on one topic, but one that users can relate various things that I write about. 

Welcome to my journey, I hope you all enjoy the ride. Just keep in mind that "I'm an artist so I'm sensitive about my stuff" - Erika Badu