Midterm #2 - Reflective Blog Post

As part of our 2nd Midterm, I am required to write this blog post.  The specific instructions say, "evaluate how well you have been meeting each of the course learning outcomes".  So, here are the Learning Outcomes & my self evaluation of each:



1.  Students understand western civilization across general historical periods in terms of 

• prominent themes and ideas 
• major events 
• influential people and works 

During the Enlightenment, there arose great thinkers such as Francis Bacon, Rene Descartes, & others such as  John Locke & Adam Smith.  I think, though, I can most identify with Margaret Cavendish.  Not only do we share the same first name, but she - like I - is looking at a changing world & wonders when things got out of hand!  Of course, her theories have proved to be all wrong (and downright silly), as I'm sure my concerns are too.

I love the results (but not necessarily the process of getting through) of the Royal Society of London and the American & French Revolutions.  Each in its own way have added to the wondrous world that we live in today.

During the 19th Century, there seems to have been a flurry of great thinkers - mathematicians, scientists, musicians, & literary authors.  Perhaps there are great thinkers all the time, but especially since we are studying them, I am noticing that all the folks we have touched on during the 18th & 19th Centuries overlapped the years they lived.  Was it the social movements & changes that inspired such greatness?  Or was the Lord just pouring out inspiration all of a sudden?!  Regardless, it was there!

Mary Shelly is probably a best example of the greatness of the age.  I don't necessarily like her book, Frankenstein,  but my kids will attest that I am an incredible wimp & don't like anything that involves tension or fear.  But that is irrelevant to my point.  Mary Shelly conceived & wrote the story of Frankenstein while vacationing with Lord Byron.  She, her poet husband, & the great author Lord Byron spent a rainy summer reading ghost stories, discussing the natural philosopher Erasmus Darwin's experiments of reanimating dead tissue.  All this led Lord Byron to suggest that they all try their hand at writing a supernatural tale.  After a waking dream, Mary had her story & began to write.

I have to ask myself - what on earth led her/them to such strange stories??!

I love the work of Joseph-Marie Jacquard - a silk weaver who dabbled with an invention to improve his work.  Other weavers didn't like it at first, fearing it would outsource them, but within 12 years, it was generally accepted, declared a public property, and he was given a royalty on each machine reproduced.  He wasn't a great mathematician, he didn't belong to a Royal Society, & he didn't begin life with a silver spoon in his mouth - he was simply a hard working man who tinkered with an idea to make his work a little easier & more unique.

I wonder if he was a drab little man, or if he was more like the Absent Minded Professor, who forgot to eat, but had a lot of fun?!

We have begun to look at the 20th Century in class also, but I believe that is a topic for the final, as the class web page has not posted a summary of the 20th Century yet.

2.  Students understand a set of basic computing concepts as well as characteristics of digital culture and can relate these both to history and to critical issues of the 21st century.

The Computing Concepts discussed in our class have been within the territory that is somewhat familiar to me.  This has been a blessing, as it is nice to have a long history of understanding to build upon when learning new things.  Our family got our first computer in 1992 & within a year, my husband began building his own for us.  I was exposed to how desktop computers are built - and our children were tutored as they grew.  I now know this to be "Von Neumann architecture" - interesting to put a name on it, I always figured that it just was.

Because my sweet husband was busy "bringing home the bacon", I was a bit more free to learn how computers work.  For a short time, I was a pretty good resource to all our friends who had computer complications.  I could usually talk them through why a program wasn't working the way it was supposed to.  It made us a pretty good team - Paul worked on the hardware & I on the software.  Paul's "fee" was always a plate of homemade Toll House chocolate chip cookies, no nuts!!!

Anyway, while I had no formal training on software, I seemed to understand much of it & how it worked.  When we talk about it in class, it makes logical sense to me - sort of like the next step of something quite familiar.  I understand why the "mythical man-month" explains why it takes longer to finish a project if you feed extra people into the group that is working on it.  I also can connect it to the idea of crowd-sourcing computing work instead of just using your usual staff.  This also leads to the idea that was mentioned in last Tuesday's class about working as a free agent from home!

I loved learning about the organization that writes the standards that all computers use.  It makes sense that there is such a group - I just had never heard of them before.  I assumed that computers were somewhat like cars - there were simply "the way things were done"... silly me!

I loved the idea of hacking as an old, traditional form of practical jokes - an art form that smart people can be involved in to spread their creativity without the harm or danger of some other activities.

3.  Students take control of and manage their own learning, in part by using the emerging media and communication tools to develop digital literacy in three areas:

• Consume - Students independently and intelligently seek out, gather, filter, and qualify information sources.

Consuming is something I have very little trouble with.  I suppose that is the way with most people.  I can get online, look something up, buy a book from Amazon.com, read an article in Wikipedia, find the Home Food Storage order form at LDS.org, or even go to ziplocal.com to get a phone number.  I use Google documents to coordinate group work for classes.  I use Google earth to find the quickest route between home & school or where the latest missionary transfer is moving to, or add in a drawing of the Starship Enterprise into the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  I search the Internet using Bing or Google - I have tried several different search platforms & have found them to be all pretty much the same - I like Bing because it gives me a different pretty picture every day, no news unless I specifically ask for it, & the search home page is simple.  Also, I regularly use a simple screen capture along with Microsoft Paint to edit what I have captured - especially when for some reason I cannot copy something to the computer's clipboard.  I simply use the prtsc key on my keyboard & paste it into Paint.

I guess I need to do a couple blogs about the stuff I do all the time - thus fulfilling my lab requirements!

• Create - Students generate varied types of content and media in response to the course and as part of self-directed learning.

I suppose I do create quite a bit of digits, but never quite think of it in this way.  For microblogging, look at my Facebook posts lately - I've been posting a "Thankful Jar" in November.  I was on Wikipedia the other day & discovered Wikiversity, which I wrote a blog about - I signed up with an account & plan to add some curriculum to the available pile (that would be a great way to share all my HomeSchooling stuff!) - but I haven't even begun to do that yet, as I am up to my eyebrows in finals projects!  I also plan to participate in a couple crowdsourcing events - perhaps even finding some screen saver-type projects to contribute my non-use time to.  I use Google Maps regularly, & have just learned how to create & save a map (but not yet figured out how to delete an old one!)

Once again, I simply need to write a blog about what I am already doing.

• Connect - Students share what they consume or create, interact with others both in person and online, collaborate on meaningful projects, and use social media seriously.

Connect, as always, seems to be the stumbling block I fall over every time we talk about the 3 C's - it is certainly my area of the most growth!  I have an account & the toolbar for diigo, but as you can tell from the number of links, I don't use it much - Mostly because I forget - but also because I tend to look at stuff that I'm not sure is valuable to the class (frivolous stuff, I guess!).  I have started a Google Calendar, but right now, my life revolves around school, & most of my classrooms don't have sufficient Internet to be tied to it for my calendar - I am hesitant to use it for my entire life - there's just too many times that I am not connected to the Internet - I need it to be available all the time.  I have downloaded Skype & learned about it, but have not used it yet - I've tried a couple times to set up a conversation with folks, but ended up just on the phone instead.  I very much see that this area is my challenge!