Technology and self-driven learning
I am still pretty proud of the vid I made for my website design project, I'm not going to lie. I think the process of learning a technology for a specific purpose and with a sense of play attached, while having a firm deadline to motivate work and reduce tinkering was really good for me.
I want to think about the kinds of technologies I used to make that piece, and how I learned to use those technologies and what community conventions helped frame my approach. It's interesting because one of the articles I'm considering using with my final paper is resonating with what the actual experience of creating this fanvid was about. Right now I'm reading ""Tech-savviness" meets multiliteracies: Exploring adolescent girls' technology-mediated literacy practices", an article by Kelly Chandler-Olcott. In the first part of the paper, before the case study research discussion, she discusses how theorists have to think about the use of technological tools in specificity within their context, arguing "The use of particular technological tools [....] mediates participants' pursuit of particular outcomes as well as construction of various identities." I think, in terms of the sophistication and possibilities offered by a technological tool, as well as the ways mentors stamp their preferences on people they teach to use a certain tool, those minor interactions and possibilities and limitations really get shaped by the tool, that technology provides a huge amount of structure for the shapes of communities. I think that's true offline, as well, but particularly true in online communities.
Just thinking about the kinds of software and online platform tools I used in that vid--I used firefox, safari, megaupload, handbrake, livejournal, mpeg streamclip, twitter, gmail chat, imovie (until I abandoned it because all of my mentors were familiar with Final Cut), garageband, itunes, final cut express, mediafire, VLC media player, Avatar fansites and wikis, youtube, UW webspace, and my mac's OS and native finder tools. Some of those tools (livejournal, twitter, fansites and wikis) were to facilitate content information that helped me make decisions about the vid. Some were more accessing tools that helped me acquire source and export works in progress and the final version (megaupload, itunes, UW webspace, mediafire, youtube). Some of these were to help me get technical support on using the software and help me work through technical problems (gchat, twitter). Many were to help me manipulate the files and cut them into appropriate pieces, change their file type, and allow me to reassemble hundreds of pieces into a self-determined whole (VLC, MPEG Streamclip, Handbrake, Final Cut, iMovie, Garageband). Others allowed me meta-acess to the programs and sites I needed (my mac's OS, firefox, safari).
I learned almost all of these tools within social contexts. I learned all of them--even ones that seem so normal and ubiquitous now, like my strong preference for Firefox over Safari, came from social interactions in which I was encouraged to try the tool in question, had enough about it explained to me by a mentor until I could use it well enough for whichever purpose, whether that was making a podcast or converting a video to use on my ipod or something as complicated as making a vid. All of those aggregate small interactions have strengthened and built my portfolio of technological tools until I was comfortable enough with enough of them to attempt something as sophisticated and painstaking as vidding. I could never have made a vid if all I had had to work with was a formal workshop on iMovie--though I think that could work for some people who are more solitary learners than I am.
(Screenshot of Final Cut with my project vid open and clips assembled on the timeline in finished order)
Anyhow, I don't have a lot of conclusions except that I like research that explicitly acknowledges informal learning practices and community-centered engagement with technology. I certainly think there's a place for formal instruction into technology, but I also know that, at least in my own experience, I tend to have a better grasp of tools if I learn them through a mixture of trial-and-error and mentoring, and I only feel truly conversant with something if I am assisting others in learning it as well and taking on a mentoring role. I tend to think having an element of play adds a sense of accomplishment, too.