Connected – Alone, Together

Posted on March 25, 2016 by HJ.DeWaard

file6561312856929I teach with technology. I teach new teachers to teach with technology. I talk to teachers about teaching with technology. I am immersed and swim deeply in the ed tech pool. It’s in my Twitter, my blog, my personal learning focus. I am a connected educator. My connections reach out from my computer and mobile devices to local, regional, global friends, colleagues and like minded learners. How did this happen? Where and when did it happen? What do I do to find ways to stay closely connected while maintaining a sense of self? How do I disconnect when this is part of my persona?

I’ve used Sherry Turkle’s TED Talk Connected, but Alone? as a springboard for students to explore this notion of finding balance in this connected world. Now it’s my turn! It’s time to put the tech down, step away from the keyboard and find space for face-to-face conversations, quiet reflections and allow my mind to meander. Allison Fuisz just tried this while on March Break and blogged about her experience. She tweeted out to me and thus inspired this ‘Turkle Takeaway Time’. But I have to admit, I’m not finding it easy!

Once the connections are made, they are part of me, of my digital persona. These connections require time to maintain. There are conversations and ideas flowing from these sources and resources that will feed my mind, enlighten me, shape my actions. It’s not so much a fear of missing out (FOMO) but a feeling of sustenance. These connections could be as quick as a snack (just let me check my Twitter feed for a minute) or as substantial as a full course meal (ah Rhizo16 the banquet is being prepared!). Connections sustain me and fill me up.

While some connections are distractions, most support my digital presence and shape my digital self-portrait. I chose to engage, follow, wander where I will. But taking time away from my network and connectedness, making this a conscious choice to disconnect for a time, however long it may be…. is not easy. When was the last time you did this? Stopped! Did not pick up the mobile device! Did not check email or Twitter? How long does it last?

So I can thank Allison and Sherry for my next steps – disconnecting in a connected world. Not just a Twitter holiday, but a divestment of all things connected. I’ll focus on relationships in the real world, build my awareness of natural rather than digital entities and reflect deeply on what it means to be alone, together! It’s a reconnection of sorts, with people, places, conversations and activities, to feed my mind and soul in a different way! It may lead to new insights to my connected self! Allison – C’est la vie non?

 

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Let’s Talk about Professional Persona

Posted on February 24, 2016 by HJ.DeWaard
circle with four characteristics

4 Properties

Your persona in digital spaces is an important consideration for educators. It’s about being recognized in digital places in a professional capacity. Being recognized as an educator and a professional is not new. In Ontario, teachers are recognized by the Ontario College of Teachers. But recognition as a professional in spaces and places is shifting from the physical to the digital. It extends beyond classroom or school locations and reaches into professional learning communities that are evolving and fluid.

Building your public professional persona is about making critical decisions to create a presence to suit who you are and how you want to be recognized. Making decisions about your name, image, locations, and reputation need careful consideration. Safety and security need to be monitored. Your awareness of digital citizenship and participation should be a focus. Educators make decisions every day about their professional digital persona.

Persona

For me, it was a conscious decision to get connected, but doing so in a manageable and safe way. My work as an educator provides opportunities to read, write and share information about media production and digital literacies. This can serve as a model for other educators.

As I look for ways to share this experiential learning and decision making with my own students, I decided to ask teachers to talk about their process of building and managing their professional digital persona. An invitation was sent out using Twitter and many teachers responded. A google hangout is planned and questions were developed. The resulting conversation will reflect the diversity in decision making when it comes to participation, managing reputations and building digital identities as a professional in education. You are welcome to learn along with my students as these teachers share their professional digital persona. I thank each of them for taking the time to share their insights, challenges, tips and cautions.

The hangout will be broadcast live on Monday, February 29th at 8:00 p.m. EST. The recorded conversation will be helpful for reflection on professional digital persona.

You can watch the live broadcast or connect through Google+.

You can join the Twitter conversation using the #digpersona, #OntEd and #mdl4000 hashtags.

References

Hinrichsen, J., & Coombs, A. (2014). The five resources of critical digital literacy: a framework for curriculum integration. Research In Learning Technology, 21. doi:http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/rlt.v21.21334

Jenkins, R. (2015, April 3). The 4 Properties of Powerful Teachers. The Chronicle of Higher Education. Retrieved from http://chronicle.com/article/The-4-Properties-of-Powerful/228483/

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What’s in a name?

Posted on February 10, 2016 by HJ.DeWaard

It’s a matter of identity, isn’t it? My name links people to my digital and real identity. It’s how people can find me. When they call, it’s why I answer. They are using my name!

Screen Shot 2016-02-10 at 4.21.25 PMSo what’s in a name? This became part of a discussion last week when Marci Duncan explored digital identity in my media and digital literacy class. The challenge was to google ourselves and see what came up. In order to have a strong digital identity, your name has to have a strong digital voice! It has to shout out to those who are looking. Your name connects others to you. Consistently creating under the same name helps others find what you are saying.Screen Shot 2016-02-10 at 4.21.43 PM

But what if your name connects to people that aren’t you …. and those identities are NOT ones you want others who are searching for you to find?

The challenge is connecting who you are to your name. Sometimes your first venture into the digital world is one where you use a pseudonym or catchy moniker. In my network I’ve wondered how @cogdog or @nomadwarmachine became the digital persona of the real people these names represent. Once the connection is made, it’s not hard to keep them straight. Until you know how the name connects to the individual, it’s harder to keep them straight. At the starting point of building a digital presence, as many of my students are doing, their names are a choice of how they wish to be recognized. Creating a digital identity with a new name is not easy. This is especially true in a digital world that doesn’t forget (Couros & Hildebrandt, 2015).

So what name do you use? How do you establish your name in digital spaces.

Hello. My name is …. HJ.DeWaard.

With this simple statement my digital presence can take on new potentials. It makes a difference when we begin to establish our digital identity. After doing a search for your name, you may decide to establish a variation of your name. You may stick to the name you were given. Even if your given name is unique, it may not be an easy choice. The HJ stands for Helen Jacqueline by the way. This came about because there was already another Helen DeWaard active in social media spaces.

Screen Shot 2016-02-10 at 4.22.05 PMCulture and context will determine how you begin. Our ‘real’ names evolve from our backgrounds (family, geography, nationality). Our persona and presence in digital spaces emerges from our name. When developing an identity, our name is one way of being recognized. It is partnered and supported by our digital image. Despite the fact that the digital world may not forget, our digital names and images can be renovated and changed to suit our potential. Our names should not limit our existence in digital space or put up barriers for others to find us. In digital spaces, we can even teach others how to say our name (as Maha Bali did) so others can get to know us better.

This reminds me of a post by Sue Dunlop (@Dunlop_Sue) who shared the importance of accuracy in using a person’s name and honouring the names we are given. She was reflecting on Rusul Alrubail’s blog post Growing up with my name. Getting a name right is important, not just in the real world where we use our voices to connect and build relationships. Calling me by name and knowing that @hj_dewaard refers to me are ways to ensure that we can connect and build a relationship.

Screen Shot 2016-02-10 at 11.34.13 AMWhy is it so challenging to publicly declare our names in digital spaces? What are decisional factors when selecting or creating accounts in digital spaces? Do you keep it REAL or do you use an interesting moniker?

What is your public name? How did you decide how to name yourself for the digital world? How has your persona and presence changed as your name became known?

Reference: 

Couros, A. & Hildebrandt, K. (2015, October 15). (Digital) Identity in a world that no longer forgets. [blog post]. Retrieved from http://katiahildebrandt.ca/digital-identity-in-a-world-that-no-longer-forgets/

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My Media – participatory wandering

Posted on January 13, 2016 by HJ.DeWaard

My media meanderings start and end with my teaching. By teaching something to others, I feel compelled to explore and learn more about it first. So it is with my media and digital literacy work.

This week I’m exploring participatory culture with video, blogs and readings primarily from Henry Jenkins. The Seven Great Debates in the Media Literacy Movement by Renee Hobbs is also a critical reading. This is supported by the Teacher Backgrounder provided by Media Smarts Canada. Then a Google Form where each student has a ‘voice’ and makes a ‘choice’ about their beliefs about media literacy.

My meanderings, in preparation for my teaching, started with the Media Literacy Fundamentals from the Media Smarts web site. This resulted in one sketch note so far, with another one on the drawing board. When it comes to teaching about media should there even be a question about ‘why’ we should or should not be teaching it? Do we really need ten good reasons? Since tips are often helpful so that’s where I started.  Visualizing these in an easy to read graphic can push awareness faster and further. So I meandered to the tips first.

 

Media Literacy Tips

The results from the classroom discussions about media and participatory culture resulted in a ‘parking lot’ using Today’s Meet. Ideas and insights were posted after the readings and group discussions were completed. In order to extend this learning, I meandered into a word cloud generator and created an interactive image that captures the frequency of key words or concepts from this topic. The interactive version of this image is found on the course blog site.Media & Participatory Culture

My own meandering ended up with a closer look at the class results from the Seven Great Debates survey. Here I see the challenges teachers and teaching can have when integrating media literacy. There are paradoxical views and disagreement in key areas from the media literacy movement as outlined by Renee Hobbs. This activity helps each of us, as teachers, educators, and parents to examine our beliefs about media literacy and come to some common understanding or common ground. Those who feel that media literacy can or can’t protect kids need to have some deeper conversations to ensure that the outcomes are best for kids, independent of personal beliefs. You can see a snapshot of the results here or take a closer look on the course blog site.pie graph images for survey results

If you’d like to try this survey yourself, it’s available for an open audience. You’ll need to provide some contextual information so the results can be compared for analytic purposes. My students may learn more about media literacy and key issues from your responses –  part of our own participatory culture!

Media is a great place to wander, wonder and engage.

It’s your turn to participate!

  • tweet about your #media and #connectedlearning
  • complete the survey
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I remember you! How could I forget that face?

Posted on January 8, 2016 by HJ.DeWaard

How long has it been? Where did we last see each other? How could I forget your face? Finding and remembering the face of others in digital spaces and personal learning networks is a personal mission. As my digital house grows and more people enter in, I find myself wondering who’s left outside the door. Has someone not been included because they couldn’t access the digital rooms where I’m “hanging out”?  Jean Vanier often comes to mind when I’m looking to find a human face in digital spaces (It’s Only Human). Vanier reminds me it’s about revealing the heart and head.

Why should I worry or wonder about who’s left out? What can I do to make sure my digital constructs are accessible to others?

What does an inclusive digital space look like, sound like, or feel like when those who enter the space may not be able to see, hear or feel it the same way.

How can I humanize the digital spaces where I collaborate, engage and play with others when these others may experience the space with different abilities or come from different cultural contexts?

Remembering the human face of those I meet in digital places (twitter, blogs, Facebook, etc) will help me to connect text and tweets to a fully human need to belong, to feel connected and to be a part of something that’s meaningful.

Whenever I need a reminder of what is important, I return to the work of Jean Vanier. His voice, face, and presence on my computer screen speaks to me of forgiveness, belonging, and purpose. I find myself fully present to his message of inclusion and reflect on the importance of making digital spaces open and accessible for all.

The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) sets out standards for accessibility in the Web Accessibility Initiative. Part of this initiative is the User Agent Accessibility Guidelines. As I work with digital tools, I deepen my understanding about affordances and issues when the human side interacts with the web design and production side. As I extend my awareness of the W3C guidelines and my efforts to establish standards for accessibility, I can remember the face others in our collaborative digital places. Although much of what I read and review on the W3C site is beyond my control or my digital skills, knowing how to do small things that will make a difference is important in my efforts to make the web an accessible place for all.

So what can I do that will make a difference?

This question brings to mind one of my favourite stories while I worked with exceptional learners in the classroom. It’s the story of the starfish. Bit by byte I can do small things to make my digital creations accessible. If I remember there are human faces with a range of abilities accessing my digital work, I’ll remember to consistently follow through on small things to make my digital spaces a more welcoming place. It’s the human face of those in my digital learning network that keep me focused on making a difference and remembering to design spaces inclusively.

What small actions can I do consistently (like in the starfish story) that will make a difference? For each digital space I can consistently review my work by using the W3C Easy Check guidelines. Simple things like not using an auto start on video or audio that I embed onto my course site or blog page. Another small thing is making sure close-captioning is included, that it accurately represents and is synched to video content, and that I include a transcript with my video productions.

Screen Shot 2016-01-08 at 10.47.25 AM

Wave Accessibility Review

What else can I do? Using a web accessibility checking tools can help. There are suggestions of tools available through the W3C site. I’ve personally used WAVE to review how my course site needs improvements in accessibility. A more detailed report generator for those proficient in web accessibility guidelines is also available. Remembering to check the look and navigation of web spaces using various browsers can help me spot issues. Taking a look at what I have designed and created on a tablet or mobile device can also help me identify and correct issues in the production and publishing stage.

Since my #oneword2016 is colour, I looked for connections between colour and accessibility. I wanted to find out how my colour choices impact the readability or feelings of inclusion of my digital creations. I discovered an accessibility colour wheel that shifts my thinking about how colours may improve the content and accessibility of my digital creations. The WebAim Web Accessibility site provides a simpler version of a colour contrast checker. Since I’ve been playing with colour hex codes, I can test these colour codes and the colour palettes I plan to use in my web productions. Checking the colours I use consistently, eg. my Twitter settings, can improve how other people may or may not be able to access the digital media I produce in this space. I’m becoming more aware of the cultural connections to colour.

Even with these guidelines and best practices, it’s still up to me to build a sense of the person behind the ‘nom de plume’ or avatar image. Bringing my ‘self’ to electronic and web interactions creates a humanizing presence to digital spaces. While some individuals mask or shade their identities with unusual monikers and interesting avatars, as I develop a relationship, their personalities and attributes shine through. My own reluctance to share or reveal myself in digital spaces is something I consciously work to overcome. I need to remember that those with unique ‘abilities’ may also need some encouragement or patience to reveal their ’self’ before they feel a sense of belonging in digital spaces.

It’s the small things I can do to look beyond the disembodied blog posts, text messages, or tweets and seek the human face of others in these digital spaces. Looking for the human characteristics and qualities of the people I meet will help me find their face in these ever shifting digital places. Doing small bytes to make sure my digital house is an inclusive and accessible space will continue to be a primary and consistent consideration.

If you need a reason to think differently about how you design digital spaces to include the face of others, watch this video:

Couldn’t have said it better!

How do you make a difference and build inclusive and accessible digital spaces? Any comments are welcome. I’ll remember to look for your face the next time we meet!

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Colour – One Word for 2016

Posted on January 5, 2016 by HJ.DeWaard

As I drift into 2016, I’m once again reflecting on paths taken and those yet to be explored. After a year of focusing on ‘heart‘, it’s time to move in new directions. My shift will be a colourful one!

Attachment-1I’ll focus on COLOUR (or color for those who spell it without a ‘u’). I personally like to keep the ‘you’ in colour, as I’ll explain in a bit.

As a child, one of my favourite things to do was colour. A new set of crayons, pencil crayons or markers was a means of expression. Colouring books, paint by number, sketchbooks and blank paper were welcome gifts. Now I play with digital colour, using RGB sequences and #hex code. I’m playing with colour using ProCreate on an iPad, thanks to Sylvia Duckworth‘s BIT15 presentation. Exploring colour palettes and using colour to plan digital designs is an act of creativity and joy. I’m mesmerized by #EarthArt, Hubble images, and Colour-Hex. I’ve now created my own hex code favourites list.

Colour is connected to emotions and feelings. There are psychological effects of colour. As winter descends, with it’s white and gray colour palette, it’s a real and present feeling for many. Using colour as a healing therapy or using art (painting, colouring, creating) as a means of healing emotional injury can help students. A hot new trend is turning colouring into a social and recreational pastime for many. Maybe a colouring club will be introduced into school maker-spaces.

Relationships are coloured by colour! The colour wheel lays out the basics of how colours relate – monochromatic, complementary, harmonious. Some colour schemes work well together. There’s theory behind that. Hues, values and saturation determine tints and brilliance.

The same can be said about human relationships – our way of connecting and being in relationship is coloured by our bias, perspective and the value we place on colour – of skin, of clothing, of hair or eyes. As Canadians begin a journey of healing with the Truth and Reconciliation Commission report and a call to action, perspectives and bias about colour need to be examined, shared and openly discussed. Reconciliation requires a re-evaluation of colour.

P1030310Analogies and metaphors for colour are prevalent in art, literature, and history. Colour can determine regional and national culture. Colour is used to determine belonging, status or brand identification. My travels to Peru helped me realize the importance of colour to the indigenous people.

As a teacher, I can explore colour and the subtle shifts that colour can bring to a classroom space, be it physical or digital. In teaching, bringing colour into the equation can help or hinder student learning. Favourite colours should be part of every ‘getting to know your students’ activity. Examining colours within text, story, number and image goes beyond teaching Art – it’s the art of teaching.

As I connect to people around the world, I am becoming more aware of the impact and bias in colour. As a teacher, I need to be aware of the power of colour, the privilege inherent in colour and the cultural impact of colour. Rebecca Alber’s article (Edutopia – Check Yourself: Why Self-Reflecting on Privilege Matters) impacted my thinking about colour. Awareness and understanding will bring depth and value to the colours and perspectives I experience this coming year.

So, with a full year of living from the heart, I’m moving into new and colourful vistas. Colour me curious. Colour me hopeful. Colour me optimistic. Colour will be a teaching tool and a teaching trigger.

We can explore colourful characteristics together and our colourful language will be appropriate for all ages. I’ll remember to keep the ‘u’ in colour since ‘you’ will impact and shift my explorations of colour. You will share colours and this can bring us together, unite our ideas and feelings, and bring understanding to our pictures.

Looking forward to a year of colourful COLOUR and colouring, together!

Colour

And a song to go along with this one word – Colour My World by Chicago

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How do I teach? It’s complicated, complex, & a work of friction!

Posted on December 17, 2015 by HJ.DeWaard


Teaching students, who are becoming teachers, how to teach is complicated AND complex. There’s no simple solution. There’s no set of guides or magic method that works for everyone, all the time. To define a framework or establish a process is incredibly complex. Simple solutions or direct paths through the tasks are not possible. Yet that is what much of teaching has become. It’s a progression through a set of readings, activities and learning events from the start of a lesson, unit or course to the end point. Teaching accomplished! The analytics and assessments measure learner success and teaching efficacy!

Cynefin framework Feb 2011

My reflections this week are coming from the conclusion of a term as well as some #HumanMOOC explorations. I’m focusing on why I teach, how I teach, and what I teach. It’s complicated! But more importantly, it’s also complex! It involves my own learning, modelling visible thinking and doing it to teach it. It’s fluidly recursive between ‘good practice’ and ’emergent practice’ (as defined by the cynefin framework by Dave Snowden). It’s an infinite mobius loop that flips over and under – teaching and learning become one and the same. Interestingly, this loop of reflection is returning from a previous post (Work of a Different Kind).

After listening to The Rhizomatic Lense, Dave Cormier’s address at ICERI2015, I know that my teaching is becoming more rhizomatic than constructivist. This is resulting from frictions between open and closed teaching systems, between structured syllabus and free exploration, between outcomes that are targets for learning and personal reflective practice. It’s a foundationally different approach to teaching than any I’ve experienced. It’s complex.

Although it is complicated, there can be a set path to follow when designing a course or laying out a plan for student learning. Yet there is no ONE guide to guide all guides! There is NO one plan to plan all planning! As I crafted a ‘welcome cast’ for a new online course I looked for a guide or plan of what should be included, what sequence it should take, and how to create one. Turns out I need to write my own guide and plan to find my way through it! I learn to teach about instructor videos by learning about instructor videos. It’s complicated but there is a solution. It’s complex because there are many possible solutions for this one scenario.

Lesson planning and unit planning have been the bread & butter (or rice, beans or equivalent food staple) of teaching new teachers how to teach. Teaching to write a lesson plan has an outcome – it’s a well crafted, detailed lesson plan.  There is no doubt that planning lessons are complicated – lots of threads to weave into a plan of action (classroom management, learning outcomes, sequence to follow, materials to use, assessment strategies to employ, etc.). Yet the best planned lessons don’t measure up to the complexity of the teaching part. So many potential elements impact the actual doing of teaching, as any experienced educator can relate (particularly around holiday seasons).

So planning any video for online teaching or learning is complicated but not complex. There isn’t a simple solution when planning and creating video for online instruction since instructors, designers, equipment, context, content, and audience all impact the outcome.  It’s complicated because more than one solution can evolve for each circumstance. An abundance of options and opportunities makes this process difficult (as I experienced this week). The complex part comes when video is used interactively, collaboratively, and subversively to be a catalyst, to create friction for student thinking. How I integrate this ‘welcome cast’ into the course design as a means to get students engaging and interacting in the first week of an online course will determine a basis for the rest of the course. It sets the tone and establishes my presence as the instructor.

But my rhizomatic experiences are impeding my constructivist practices. Good practice tells me to present my video as a model, ask students to create something similar, while providing multiple means of expression and sharing insights in a collaborative discussion about self in digital space. But when rhizomatic learning steps in, there are no clear answers. When the community is the curriculum and the direction is driven by those in the learning space, be it ‘garden or stream’ (as it is described in the #HumanMOOC), the integration of an instructor created ‘welcome cast’ video becomes complex. It requires some emergent practice or new ways of doing things. There’s no guide or ten-tip solution.

How do I teach? I’ve used a constructivist methodology. My role has been as a catalyst or provocateur. My planning shapes events so students are doing, engaging and creating followed by reflective action resulting in peer and self assessment. The focus has been on me, as instructor and subject expert. The learning events, sequence and assessments are designed and planned before the learning begins. It’s been complicated but there’s always been a potential solution.

image of irises in a gardenHow will I teach? I don’t know. I can honestly say it’s emerging. It’s complex and uncertain. Ideas and techniques are rhizomatically growing in a garden community of like-minded ‘irises’ (Dave Cormier’s analogy in the keynote video). The #HumanMOOC is my current learning space where I’m exploring ideas of open curriculum, learner direction, fluid syllabus, self assessment and instructor as learning participant. My ‘welcome cast’ is a work of friction.

How will I use this video to instigate and agitate student engagement? Is that the purpose of a ‘welcome cast’?  Should it be a one way delivery of an instructional statement or the opening line of a conversation? How do I teach about critical digital literacy from this very first contact? Any answers are welcome. Take some time to comment.

https://vimeo.com/user46457816/

 

References

Attribution of image of cynefin framework – By Snowden (Own creation, own work) [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)%5D, via Wikimedia Commons

Irises image – Pixabay, no attribution required.

Video attribution – By HJ.DeWaard Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

 

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Mirror mirror on my screen, is it my self portrait you have seen?

Posted on December 11, 2015 by HJ.DeWaard

Mirror mirror on the wall, who’s the  …… ?

This line usually ends with something about being fair or beautiful or kind. Today I’m wondering if the screen on my computer can act as a mirror to reflect my human-ness, my digital self portrait, to show who I am and where I’ve been in online spaces.

This wondering is coming from a combination of things. Maybe from the final assignments I’m marking or from the stream of humorous tweets shared with other #HumanMOOC participants about being human online. How can I ensure I’m creating human interactions or am I talking to a cyber-bot? How is my self portrait painted online?

image of twitter conversation about being human

Conversations in Slack, for example, can have quirky injections from the Slack-bot who’ll make suggestions or recommendations. According to @arasbozkurt bots imitate and replicate, they don’t create!

So my blogs, tweets, and web creations are my human representations of my ‘self’.  My reflection in the mirror of my screen, and the ping-backs and retweets, paint a picture of who I am and where I’ve been. This connects and reflects the work I ask my students to do as they enter into new digital spaces, many of them beginning to blog for the first time.

My screen, and the interactions I see and create, paint an image of my digital self portrait. These zeros and 1’s, written in codes many of us never see, lay out a pattern of colours and shapes to paint my image in digital space. My creations – images, text, audio, video, recordings, mashups or memes – shape my image and portrait. I paint my digital self by the choices of tools, resources and spaces where I share and create.

Do I control or paint my own self portrait or do others control the choice of brushes, colours, or canvas? How do I make thoughtful, mindful, visible choices that add tone, tint, and background to the portrait that I paint? How does the portrait emerge from the dots and swooshes of colour and text?

I think, and hope that I am an attentive and cognizant painter of my digital self portrait.

  • Colours swirling in my digital self portrait include blues (Twitter), oranges and reds (my blog), greens (for all things Google), mauves for MOOC experiences and teal for @VirtuallyConnecting.
  • Shapes include circles (G+, PLN’s) and squares (hangouts, storify curations).
  • Backgrounds include gardens & streams (@HumanMOOC), trees & roots (#rhizo15), and towers (LMS, course production, teaching).
  • Brushes I use include the wide/broad brush of Twitter, the short/stubby blogging brush, the thin brushes of Facebook and LinkedIn, and the multi-purpose brushes of web design and Google tools.
  • My canvas is constructed from my K-8 education experiences and current higher education presence. It is a layered and solid space to paint.
  • Others add splashes of new and interesting colour combinations to my image, as one of my students did recently by adding this Go-Animate production to her blog.

I learn from watching how others paint their digital self portraits. For those who are in academic spheres, this recording of Who are You online? A blog talk discussion recorded on April 15 2015 shares insights and ideas about where to start painting. Participants talk about digital identity for scholars and academics using social media. This conversation reminds me that it takes time to paint with mindfulness and vigilance. Expecting my portrait to be finished quickly and ready for showing is unrealistic.

Screen Shot 2015-12-11 at 5.15.54 PMThis week’s conversation with Kate Bowles about Being Mindful, as part of the HumanMOOC course, reminds me to paint with self-awareness and to share my painting process as a lesson for others. I can model an awareness of the canvas and a responsive to new elements as I plan the picture. Kate’s conversation reminds me to be comfortable in the human struggle and messiness when painting my digital self portrait. It reminds me that my portrait is not a mirror image or a screen reflection. It’s nice to catch glimpses of the human side ‘over the shoulder’. It’s not created by bots with dots calculating equations to produce my portrait.

aiPXs4e

I intentionally select to represent myself in digital spaces with a self portrait rather than a digital footprint or a digital tattoo. I’m not creating an imprint in the dirt, left behind to be shaped by wind or weather. I’m not carrying an image impressed in my skin that can’t be changed or adapted without serious laser surgery. I’m painting as I go. Selecting as I emerge from the canvas of past and present.

My portrait is a work in progress, perhaps never to be completed. It’s not a Picasso or a Van Gogh, though I’ve played with Picasso style images in digital space and can create Van Gogh style effects in photo manipulation sites.

So, mirror mirror on my screen. Watch and see what I become! For now, I’ll paint on! I have some blank canvases yet to reveal the portraits to come.

How do you paint your portrait in digital spaces. What choices do you make in technique or colour palette? What subject matter will be in the foreground or background? How do you control the brushes and strokes that shape your image?

Step up. Paint on. Your digital self portrait is yet to be revealed.

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