3D Game Lab

I have really appreciated the information gained from the 3D GameLab quests. Information about copyright, fair use, accessibility, etc. is obviously crucial information for me in teaching, covering everything from creating a coursepack--I’m supposed to get permission to include items, who knew?--to modeling responsible use of digital material. But it also feels like I’ve opened Pandora’s box and that there are so many things I need to consider when using digital materials. Take images for example; it was great to learn about resources to search for non-copyrighted images, however, in the back of my mind I keep thinking about the ease of and scope of Google images. 

It’s so easy to find things and I get so many results. But, even Google has a disclaimer that images may be subject to copyright. I think about all the images I’ve used from Google images throughout the years for projects, class PowerPoints, etc without even considering whether I am supposed to use them. Now of course, from the quest on fair use I learned about the stipulation of using materials for educational purposes, but even after looking at several resources discussing fair use, I am still a little fuzzy on the exact parameters.

Thinking about all this information just made me realize what a gap there is of an understanding of responsible use of sources with the explosion of online material. I teach my students about responsible use of sources by discussing paraphrase, quoting, citing, etc, yet I don’t necessarily have the knowledge to pass onto my students how to responsibly use digital materials (though the quests are helping me with that). If I follow the push of many of the position statements we examined at the beginning of this class and have students not only analyze digital materials, but create them, then I wouldn’t be doing my job if I didn’t address appropriate source use a project like that. For my project for this course in designing a research unit, a part of the “major project” will be (I think) to create a flyer. As part of the scaffolding for the project, then, I will need to include instruction of responsible source use for images.

Webb, R. P. (2006). Reconceptualizing classroom-based research in computers and composition. Computers and Composition,  23, 462–476.

In this article, Webb examines the three major types of scholarship in classroom-based research relating to computers and composition: theoretical framing and analysis, qualitative case studies, and quantitative analysis. She closely examines an example of each of scholarship assessing its use and shortcomings. For theoretical framing she looked at Wysocki and Johnson-Eilola (1999), which examines conceptualizations of literacy using Walter Ong, Sven Birkerts, and Stual Hall. Webb argues that work like this is crucial to ensure the field is on the same page about what “technology literacy” means. Webb also reminds readers that theoretical work is necessary because  no scholarship and no pedagogy is free from theory. She examines Longo, Reiss, Selfe, and Young (2003) as an example of a qualitative case-study. Through student responses, gathered through surveys and interviews, the scholars discussed learning situations in a class they co-taught. Webb argues that research like this allows us to examine ideas in contextualized environments, but the trouble becomes using what was learned to generalize about other situations outside of this context. Webb analyzes Vicki Tolar Burton and Scott Chadwick (2000) as an example of quantitative analysis. Using surveys sent to a diverse range of students throughout a university, allowed the researchers to see a broad picture of the research support and practices of undergraduates and graduates at an R1 institution. Webb argues, however, that the numerical data does not account for more contextualized, relevant information, like the purpose of the research assignment in the course or how much the assignment was worth in the class.

Because of the shortcoming of the each method, Webb argues for a mixed-method approach, using Hewett’s (2000) comparison of face-to-face oral peer feedback with computer-mediated written response. Hewett used both qualitative data (examining students’ specific responses) and qualitative data (statistics about types of comments generated by coding the conversation). Webb presents this type of scholarship as a model to use multiple methods to answer more questions and have more generalizable information.

Webb ends the article with some of the challenges with this type of research, suggesting the problem that this type of scholarship might not accepted within English studies and thus could hinder someone’s quest for tenure. She suggests that senior faculty in the field make sure to educate others in English studies about the work being done in computers and composition and support junior faculty.

This article, connected to many of the readings we have completed for the 800 portion of this course. I appreciated the in depth examples of scholarship, reinforcing some of the key concepts of Engaging in the Scholarship of Teaching and Learning. The warnings at the end of the article also connected to the discussions starting with Boyer and present in all our readings about the need for a scholarship of teaching that is valued and that is rigorous so it can be used by other teachers. However, institutional privileging of the research of discovery and/or already recognized types of scholarship, makes engaging in research outside of this type potentially risky. I appreciate that the readings are carefully to remind scholars of the risk, however, it’s also frustrating that this risk continues after all these years.

On a separate note, I was so excited to learn about Hewett because I am becoming more and more interested in analyzing feedback interactions within writing centers, and while this article is focused specifically in the classroom, it will be a really helpful one to read.