Tag: Medium.com

Essays on Medium

Morgan A, Responding to Criticism: The Dividing Routes

AJ A, Life Lessons: A Student’s Most Valuable Education

Ryan B, “Stupid Is as Stupid Does”

Lauren B, Ignoring the Birds: Grades Over Academic Interests

Amita C, The Little Battles

Maggie C, Embracing the Classroom and the Book: How Education Catalyzes Appreciation

Peyton G, Cameron Fyre’s Day Off . . .

David H, Each One Teach One: Teaching More Than Reading and Writing

Elise J, The Not-so-Golden Ticket: Education for Low Income America and How Mentorship Shapes the Success of Underprivileged Youth

Anaya L, It Is a Pleasure to Defy.

Jimmy M, Educational Conventions Constrict Potential

Zubia M, Esme’s Education: A Guide for Advancing Teaching

Maddie M, Une Belle Vie: What Is a Good Life?

Mike M, Ignorance Isn’t Bliss

Mike O, The Wire as an Examination of the Public School System

Nidhi R, The Seeds of Growth: Coming of Age in Good Will Hunting

Nathan R, *INSERT NAME HERE* What Educating Rita Teaches Us About Individuality

Hannah S, Motivation

Hayley S, Learning: The Savior of Many

Kelsey W, Where Magic Meets Education

Class, Mon, 11/18

Affordances

An affordance is a suggested use—something that an object, technology, or environment allows you to do readily or well.

The design and architecture of environments enable certain types of interaction to occur. Round tables with chairs make chatting with someone easier than classroom-style seating. Even though students can twist around and talk to the person behind them, a typical classroom is designed to encourage everyone to face the teacher. . . . Understanding the affordances of a particular technology or space is important because it sheds light on what people can leverage or resist in achieving their goals. For example, the affordances of a thick window allow people to see each other without being able to hear each other. To communicate in spite of the window, they may pantomime, hold up signs with written messages, or break the glass. The window’s affordances don’t predict how people will communicate, but they do shape the situation nonetheless.

danah boyd, “It’s Complicated” (Yale UP, 2013), pp. 10–11.

Digitizing

In Groups

Please scan quickly through the following pieces as examples of writers trying to make thoughtful uses of the affordances of the web.

Use these texts to generate a list of at least five ways (more if you can) in which the affordances of the page and screen differ. (An easy example: Turn vs. scroll. You turn the pages of a book, but scroll through an online text.) Be ready to offer examples of the affordances you identify from the four Medium essays.

To Do

  1. Wed, 11/20, class: Studio time. Create an account on Medium.com, and begin digitizing either Essay 1 or Essay 2.
  2. Mon, 12/02, class: Post the digitized version of your final project to Medium.com. We will create an “arcade” that allows all of you to walk around and see what other peope in the class have done. We’ll then talk about what you changed in your pieces (and why) as you shifted modalities.
  3. Wed, 12/04, class: Closing thoughts and evaluations.
  4. Mon, 12/09, 5:00 pm: Email me the revised version of Essay 1 or Essay 2 (optional).
Design a site like this with WordPress.com
Get started