Tomorrow afternoon, Monday, June 9th, I’ll be taking a big trip overseas: I will be in Israel for 2.5 weeks, Vienna for a week, and Berlin for a few days. I’m going to be busy; my cousin is getting married in Israel, and I’ll be meeting with a lot of people in Vienna. I will take lots of photos, most of which will be uploaded to Flickr, (I may set up a separate gallery on my website), and I’ll (try) be active on Twitter - when I have Internet access I’ll be online.
My agenda:
In Israel, I will be at my cousin’s wedding - almost the whole family is coming - and I will be touring the country (Tel Aviv, Jerusalem, Golan Heights, etc).
I’m visiting Vienna with my mom, Karen Frostig (check out her new website!), to meet with various people about the Holocaust and Holocaust Education. My mom is a Jewish artist, activist, and author.
In Berlin, I’m just visiting, you know, for fun.
Do you have any recommendations? Places to visit? Good food? Free WiFi? Let me know: kabren@kabrenlevinson.com.
Here is the video from my capstone presentation. It’s about 35 minutes, and the audio isn’t great (I was only using the built-in microphone of the video camera). Anyways, hope you enjoy!
Here are the materials associated with my capstone:
This is a video about a final project for a class I’m taking, “Search for Meaning.” It’s about my soul and how I think the soul creates lenses - it alters my perspective of the world. My vision of my soul, is a falling stream of shards of glass, mirror, and other material. As these shards fall, they form together to create a lens. As you age, you loose and gain shards. Just an idea.
On Friday May 2nd, I had the privilege to attend a Digital Natives Forum at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School. The event was labeled as an “interdisciplinary roundtable discussion: Investigating young people’s use of digital and networked technologies.” When I arrived, I was surprised to discover that I was the only teenager, or “young person”, at the meeting. I already felt out of place.
Background
The event was amazing - I found out how adults observe and understand teenagers’ use of technology and the Internet. At the beginning of the meeting, there was a short presentation by Andrea Flores and John Francis citing research conducted about kids using technology. They talked about identity, privacy, skills and tools for teenagers and adults, and the importance of design. For more about the content of the forum, check out this blog post and my Twitter, I live-blogged most of the meeting.
Silence
I didn’t speak during the entire meeting, only to some people individually during lunch. I wish I had spoken up. I learned, but didn’t teach. It felt like people in the room didn’t understand what kids were about. With the exception of a few, it seemed that people were only beginning to formulate their opinions; it was too early to introduce the young-person’s point of view. Being a teen in the room, it felt like we were being addressed as the problem that needed fixing. Per usual, adults were assigning issues to kids. As the group discussed how some kids feel safer sharing their thoughts online versus offline, I only felt comfortable sharing my thoughts on Twitter. I let the group silence me.
For next time…
The only problem, I can think of, was the lack of primary sources, or “young people,” in the room. Yes, case studies and reports were cited throughout, but as my history teachers tell me, you need primary sources to support your argument. I was the only teen in the room, and I wasn’t even previously involved with the project. It is difficult to discuss teens, or any other group of people, without them present. Not only that, it is undiplomatic to discuss and refer to teens as if they’re not in the room, when in fact, I was sitting right there. My presence was never acknowledged - the adults failed to exploit me as a resource. It felt weird having adults tell me how I used technology.
I will be streaming my capstone presentation tomorrow, Wednesday May 21st at 12:00 PM EST. My capstone was all the Academic/Educational Technology work I’ve been doing over the past many months. Check it out. Join in in the discussion remotely! I hope the stream will work, school Internet is slow.
I talk about the list of recommended educational technologies I am releasing to the public in a Wiki. You can find the list here: http://kabren.wikispaces.com/rec-tech . Go in, make your edits. I am only a student; if you’re a teacher working with technology, let me know what you’re using and why you use it.
Here are two videos. The first is about the EduTech conference I attended this past Wednesday, April 9th, and the second is about my capstone “Plan.” Enjoy!
Read this blog post to understand what I’m talking about. Also, those videos I’ve talked about will be put up on Sunday - I got a little busy.
A Tech Fellow
Working with Martha was a job for a “tech fellow,” a crucial part of my educational technology program. Over the past few days, with the help of the assistant head of the school, I’ve been rethinking the roles of the “tech fellow.” Much of our conversation had to do with the marketing and branding of the “Tech Fellows” program. We used the Geek Squad as an example; they have uniforms, they’re easy to identify; they have phone numbers, they’re easy to contact; they have cars, they come to YOU. A “tech fellow” just doesn’t sound right - if I were a teacher, and was deciding between contactacting a “tech fellow” or the “tech squad,” for example, I’d probably call the “tech squad.” We need to make it known who we are, make sure it’s easy to contact us, and make it clear that we (the student) will come to YOU (the teacher). Of course, since this is high school, we won’t actually have the uniforms and cars (I wish), but metaphorically, we will.
Customer Service
Another aspect of being a “tech fellow” or on a “tech squad” is customer service. Instead of walking into the job with an agenda, we need to make an “ego-less swoop.” A tech fellow neds to make sure the teacher is in control; we ask what the teacher wants to accomplish with technology, before jumping into what we think they should be doing. Even though my school is a progressive school, for teachers, suddenly having students be the “smart ones” will be tough, and perhaps, frightening.
It’s a Brand
A lot of the issues I’m facing right now have to do with marketing and branding - how can I get teachers to use and enjoy an educational implementation of the Geek Squad. As the assistant head of my school said, you’d be more likely to call upon “Mr. Fix-It” than “Boston Electric” because “Mr. Fix-It” contains the word fix - Mr. Fix-It will fix my problem.
