There is NO AWOL in #ds106

The past two weeks have been devoted to Audio in #ds106 and I feel like I have been unconnected.

Fortunately, there is nothing like AWOL in #ds106, because there are......

...notifications from the group on their Daily Creates, their radio commercials and teasers... or people like Ary Aranguiz who is participating in StoryHackVT and seek our support... or Kevin Hodgson who is always dabbling with some new tool and sharing his incredibly creative work.. or Alan Levine on the road spreading the #ds106 word and looking for stray MOOSE!

Not to mention Mariana Funes who posted a #Phonar that prompted me to record my own... and new member #106 Gail Desler who may be overwhelmed by the fanfare of her auspicious arrival as the 106th member of our G+ group (I had to drop what I was doing to add a celebratory GIF in her honor)....or running into Janet Webster in Stephen Downes online Moodle MOOC2, or wondering where Dave Barr went... All of this makes me feel connected to a community -- a community of learners, of artists, of creators. An open community with no rules or teachers, where you are free to come and go as you please, yet you KEEP SHOWING UP because there is value in these connections.

So, while I was consumed by other work, I was able to find a way to combine some of the key elements of audio into a few key ideas that resulted in the following work.

Because this is audio week, I went back to an idea that I had earlier, but never put together.  I was taking pictures for the Design Safari and took a picture of the wind chimes in the bathroom for "A Good Use of Space."

I realized that I had accidentally switched the setting to video and I recorded the sound as well.  This made me remember an old childhood song that I wrote with a friend (I can't remember the whole song or the friend), but I thought it would be a cool exercise to record as an audio exercise.  Not to mention, it would help me get more familiar with Audacity and Movie Maker.  Here is the result:



Motivated by Mariana Funes'  "What the Hell, I'm doing a #Phonar as a Daily Create", I decided to combine a few elements together, the personal story and the Daily Create #647.

Write a satirical article riffing off a typical news story inspired by the Onion.

The personal story talks about the creation of the news story of the Mendenhall Glacier.

Things would not be complete without a Daily Create "Notice the Ground Beneath Your Feet.Document with an Enhanced Photograph." This opportunity afforded me a chance to bring our community a little closer with the Mosaic above. I took the liberty of using a cool beach sarong to use as my "ground." I then took all of the images posted for the Daily Create and made a mosaic illustrating the importance of our connection, our intersection, and our relationships that make #ds106 the magical place where 'Puff' lives.

"Puff"

We Are All [Artists]

We started off Design Week with inspiration from Tim Owens @timmmmyboy.  I loved it and used it as inspiration to create a Haiku Deck using all original photographs.  (First time ever!)

We have been asked to reflect on all aspects of design -- "What is design? It is everywhere you look- anything we create or manufacture has key design elements.   This exercise makes you acutely aware of your environment.  You begin to see things in new ways. Even fonts and typography are elements of design.  Are you a Comic Sans Criminal:  Spoiler Alert - I was formerly a CSC)?  Did you know that typography can evoke a sense of place?   

I have become so attuned to design that I spent the week watching TV with no sound.  It really is an eye-opening experience!

We have been given a plethora of Design Resources for review in order to become more familiar with elements of design.  My favorite resources is from Duke University's Lab in Digital Knowledge:   "What Do 21st Century Literacies Look Like?  This is ds106 in action!

"When we expand the digital meaning-making conventions that make up 21st century literacies, we expand our ability to interact and connect with each other. Designing in this new digital medium contributes to the development of an even wider collective effort of understanding and communication."

In order to demonstrate our understanding, we were to undertake a Design Safari.  As I write this summary, I realize I don't follow directions very well, and selected one image from my week's catalog of photographs to illustrate my understanding of the concepts. Since it was a safari, I couldn't resist importing the images into MovieMaker and adding a safari soundtrack (thank you YouTube Downloader/Converter).  What I like best about the piece is that it is a safari in Hawaii.  My granddaughter loves to make dioramas when she visits, so the title slide is her contribution.  (We were supposed to upload to Flickr tagging photos #designblitz and blog about whether the images were effective or not...next task).

Another assignment was to design a poster...These projects all involve some aspect of re-editing existing content to change the meaning or making something new that visually represents an idea.  

I decided to use this opportunity to combine ideas for 2 different classes and the 6 Word Memoir was the perfect opportunity.  I ended up with a poster as well as a slide presentation in order to share the idea of "Promoting Creativity in K-12 Education in multiple ways.  I have already received feedback that the font and placement is too busy on the poster and am working on the revision.

 6 Word Memoir

I have also watched with fascination the development of a ds106 collaborative story writing project started by Ary Aranguiz using gifs to tell a story.  Not having the opportunity to participate as yet, this project is the embodiment of "experimentation with collective design processes combined with the development of the images" that is described in "What Do 21st Century Literacies Look Like? 

As Tim Owens pointed out, a creative environment can foster creativity, and ds106 is giving us that environment."

Digital Creativity: Harnessing the Collective Energy

"It is innate for human beings to create stories and to create art."  ~Jason Eskanazi

In Week 5 of DS106, we were challenged to create stories through our photographs. Using suggestions borrowed from David duChemin in his book Ten:  Ten Ways to Improve Your Craft,  we were asked to be more deliberate in taking photographs.  In an age where everyone takes pictures of everything ALL THE TIME, they are doing just that.  They are taking a picture to record an event, not a photograph -- a creation, a play on words,  light, or perspective.  Not since I took a photography course in college have I been so deliberate about taking photographs.  At the time I had a 35mm SLR that my father bought on a trip to Vietnam in 1965.  We developed our own film.  We captured ideas and translated them to images.

The first exercise was a PhotoBlitz.   The exercise challenges you to think quickly and creatively.  You take 11 pictures given certain key words in 15 minutes that evoke the given idea.  I chose Ho'okipa Beach on Maui's North Shore for the exercise.  Other students expressed feeling awkward taking photographs in public (who is this weirdo)?  Beach goers are more relaxed and I was free to roam.  I chose to create a Haiku Deck on Visual Literacy using my pictures.  Schools focus on Literacy, Digital Literacy, Numerical Literacy and Cultural Literacy.  Rarely do we see focus on the importance of Visual Literacy and how it can be used to draw connections across the curriculum.

We were then asked to select what we considered our five best pictures.  These were my favorites....

PhotoBlitz!

"And we find that people doing this week’s work come away noticing the world around them in more detail." ~Headless #ds106

My next photography exercise was not assigned.  We took a Road Trip to Hana and I decided to try out the suggestions that I learned during the week.  Follow the rule of thirds, change your perspective, get pickier, pay attention to the moment.  No longer was I just clicking, I was actually designing the picture.  Not too bad for an amateur with an iPhone.  I also employed the Fast Tricks for the iPhone to further enhance my skill set.

Road Trips, a set on Flickr.

The final exercise I was able to complete was to "pimp up" my Flickr account.  That included creating a set of my best photos.  I decided that I would select the Blue Ribbon photo for each week of #ds106.  This way I can see the progression of my work (hopefully)!  As you can see above, I was able to embed a Flickr set into my blog and used FlickrSLiDR to embed the Blue Ribbon Photo of the Week in a Flickr Slideshow below.

Blue Ribbon of the Week

Created with flickrSLiDR

I spent a considerable amount of time looking at the work of fellow DS106ers, commenting on blogs, seeing incredibly creative images, methodology, and hard work that has been expended this week by the community.  I am energized by the collective energy that is evolving.  Each idea generated creates a flurry of activity, support and partnership.  Consider Rochelle Lockridge & Christine Hendrick's Audio Week in Review, or Ary Aranguiz's CollaboGiffing Project, Mariana Fuenes's determination to isolate the "eyes" in Ary's animated GIF and John Johnston's Photoblitz App..to name a few.   

DS106 channels the collective energy into the creation of stories, sounds, and art that allow us to make make meaning of our experience.  In Is There Such a Thing as Digital Creativity by Julian Sefton, she suggests that the process of selection, manipulation and decision-making in meaning-making through comparison of editing across media...points to the way that digital creativity – or at least meaning-making in the digital era – brings together in the new ways processes that used to be separate and bound by academic convention.

DS106 showcases the power of digital creativity by harnessing the collective energy of the group.  In eLearning and Digital Cultures: A multitudinous open online course, Jeremy Knox (a co-facilitator of the course),  observes that where work was collected and displayed together, the observer begins to get a sense, not of the individual merit of a single piece, but of the collective energy and intensity of the multitude...a shift away from thinking about individuals to thinking about connections, flows, and relations that exceed us as human beings.

DS106 transforms digital creativity into an engaging (often intoxicating) social experience.  We move from passive participants to active content creators. In the sharing of our individual stories, we contribute to the collective energy of the group.   In his blog, Kevin Hodgson reminds us that  the activity of making shifts consumers away from mass-produced materials and therefore, provides an individualistic sense of creation; and that the social element of digital literacies has the potential to increase engagement and heighten the creative element of making something that will impact the world.

What DS106 exemplifies is the synergistic creativity of the group, the importance of collaborative storytelling,and the opportunity to hone the skills necessary for creating, communicating, collaborating and networking in a digital world.

Chrysalis

In Week 2 of DS106 Bootcamp, Gardner Campbell encourages us to become architects of our own digital lives.

I spent the week "breaking ground."  I worked on a new image for my blog, I looked for new blogs to follow, I assembled the arsenal of digital tools that I will need to erect this "CyberInfrastructure."  I am not looking for a digital face lift, I am looking to add a digital voice to my digital identity. 

That's where I got stuck.  I wanted to reflect on the past week and all I could do was assemble the words of others. I tried weaving them together in a narrative, but it didn't sound right.  And then, I found this remix from Tom Woodward and I realized that this is exactly the piece that I was missing in 
the digital literacy puzzle: remix, redesign and reinterpret what I have learned 
so that it has meaning for me.

So, here is my attempt to recreate what I learned this week.  Week 3, bring it on!

I selected this image of the alphabet by Norwegian photographer Kjell Sandved, because of the concept of the emergent chrysalis.  My friend, Cheryl Arnett had one set up in her classroom this month for the beginning of the school year.  Her young students were fascinated when the butterfly emerged from its cocoon.  I imagine my digital voice emerging in this way.

"Technology amplifies the recursive practices of narrating, curating & sharing.  You need to learn how to control feedback."

Digital lessons learned:

Embed, Embed, Embed

Link to a Certain Time in a YouTube Video

Creating Animated GIFs with MPEG Streamclip and GIMP

Adding Labels to Blogger

Adding a Twitter Feed to Blogger

Post from Blogger Direct to Google+

Right Brain, Left Brain. Who is steering the ship?

I had heard about #ds106 earlier this year and was hoping that I would have a chance to participate in the experience.  That opportunity presented itself in a "headless" section that started last week.  I had also enrolled in Coursera's Creativity, Innovation and Change MOOC and thought that this would be the perfect way to tap into my creativity.  I have not been disappointed.  It is only the first week and I am having the "time of my life!"

I was hesitant to jump in, and posted the following question in the Google+ Community:

When I receive the following response from Christina Hendricks, I decided I had nothing to lose.  Alan Levine @cogdog, our fearless leader, (despite being headless) also chimed in:

The first week is appropriately described as "Boot Camp."  Our first directive suggestion was to introduce ourselves to the group using Social Media.  I posted in Google+ as well as Twitter.

I have spent the past week setting up a new blog (I wanted to compare Blogger to Wordpress), participating in Daily Creates (exercises designed to stimulate creative activity), and getting to know my fellow classmates.  Of course, my computer decided to go ballistic at the same time, so I have been experimenting with different iPad apps to complete these tasks.  My latest Daily Create effort #602 is by far the best (the sixth for me).  I am learning to integrate my analytic and creative mind.  In addition to this worthwhile effort, I have been having fun coming up with a caption in order to enhance my Tweets:

And of course, we were given 3 videos to watch and look for those essential "nuggets" that really resonate with you.  For me, those nuggets looked like this:

 "Disruptive Wonder"...everyday fundamental things and experiences frame reality in a way we often take for granted...The random jumble of letters that I have confined to a single possibility of making my name.  And then I wondered, what else could these letters spell? "

This is the question that Kellie Anderson posed.  Had it not been for fellow Frainger, Ary Aranguiz @trendingteacher, I would have never thought to play with the letter of my name.  After several tries, I came up with this.  I like it!

Cathleen Nardi = Learnd Teach-in 

"Do Not Try to Create and Analyze at the Same Time.  They are different processes."  

This little nugget is embedded in The Daily Creates (tdc) (don't ask me where because I can't find it again).  This is the biggest 'AHA' that I had this week. It actually became manifest during tdc#600.  All of a sudden, my analytical mind took a back seat to my creative mind.  It was a mind blowing experience!  I can compare it to my yoga practice.  If I am thinking about how I will NEVER be able to do the wheel pose, chances are I won't.  If I just let go, and allow my body to form the wheel, guess what, it happens.  For me, tapping into the Universal energy is what creativity is all about.

" I also try in several ways to encourage the class (encourage=give heart) to blog as part of the journey to the magic."

I was thrilled to meet Gardner Campbell again in my MOOC journey.  His keynote address at OpenEd 2012 formed the basis of a Tumblr blog earlier this year.  His words resonate with me.  His encouragement to blog is essential in the process of this creative work.  It is only by reflection that we actually make sense, making meaning of what we experience.

So now that I have the building blocks of Daily Creates, blogging and communicating with my online co-participants, now I actually need to find a voice and a theme that I can use to tell my story.  Thankfully, Boot Camp is a two week process.  I hope to find some inspiration in the next week.  Perhaps my headless image (see above) who has taken charge in what appears to be a crisis will be my inspiration. 

Thanks for listening.

Going Headless in #DS106

I just finished a class in Art & Inquiry with MOMA's Learning Education Team.  The class made me realize the importance of imagery and communication.  With that in mind, I enrolled in Digital Storytelling 106, as a catalyst to get my creative juices flowing.  The Fall section of the class is "headless" meaning there are no teachers, no directors.  The class is run by an extremely creative group of volunteers who have already taken the class. 

Our first assignment was to introduce ourselves.  I had just completed a peer review of a lesson plan for  the Poet & the Mouse (lower left image), which was, of course headless. This made me wonder about headless imagery in art.  The image above was the result. Our group is big on making play on words with the "headless" theme, as you can see from this Twitter exchange:

In addition to the class syllabus, there is a "Daily Create." The Daily Create provides a space for regular practice of spontaneous creativity through challenges published every day. Each assignment should take no more than 15-20 minutes. There are no registrations, no prizes, just a community of people producing art daily.  

For these experiments in daily creates, I have been using my iPad in order to become more familiar with the creative apps that are available.  My first attempt was "Impression".  I used FrameArtist (as I did with the Headless image above).

Make an impression: take a picture of an indentation

The best part about DS106 is that I have reconnected with my 'Fraingers,' a group of people who have connected via MOOCs from all over the world.  Their passion for learning and creativity continually inspire me.

My goals for this class are:

• To improve my MOOC discipline by participating regularly in Daily Creates and adding entries to my blog.
• To use my iPad as much as possible to learn new apps in the creation of digital artwork.
• To transform my writing from its clinical style to storytelling by finding my voice.
• To have fun!!!