An EMErging Blogger

This week I have been back in the Blogesphere after a break last week while traveling (thanks to Token #1!).  You may have gathered from my 2nd post this week that last week was absolutely crazy. This week was a LOT better in terms of classes, but the wedding planning was kicked up a notch. We have been speaking with 5 different vendors this week trying to make decisions and sign contracts. Now I know why everyone says "I wish I hired a wedding planner." Maybe we should have.... In my very first blog post I wrote about my concern for finding interesting topics to write about and how I was worried that I wouldn't be entertaining. This week I've realized that I don't care so much about that anymore- hah! I'm not having too much trouble coming up with topics anymore, and it's no big deal when nobody reads or comments. After all, this is a learning experience for me, and my posts will only improve with practice!  I've had fun playing with the week 5 t...

Since I've been on the topic of West Coast Swing this week, I thought I'd share the popular points-tracking app that we use in the community. It's called SwingPoints , and it lets you keep an eye on your points and your friends' points. Let me share a quick rundown of how the points system in West Coast Swing works.        Points are only awarded through the Jack & Jill division. In this division, each dancer registers separately. I have now moved up to Advanced, so I would register myself in the Advanced Jack & Jill division. The leaders and followers are lined up on the floor for the preliminary round and a random number generator (or a dice) determines how many dancers to rotate. The person you stop in front of is your partner for that song. The music begins (it's random) and you dance for approximately 1 minute and 30 seconds with this random partner. Then, you rotate a 2nd time, dance, and rotate a 3rd time. The judges are judging each dancer indi...

I'm sure many of you in EME6414 have traveled while completing your online studies. Usually it's not too difficult to find some time here and there to log in and complete coursework..... when you're still in your home country. The moment you travel into another country where cell service isn't an option and your days are packed with family gatherings and appointments.... well, things get a million times more complex. That's what happened to me last week in Canada. You may have noticed my absence from blogging last week. Yup. That happened. My internet access was inconsistent, and when I did manage to snag it for a bit, it wasn't long enough to accomplish any real work. We had to meet family, drive from Oakville to Scarborough, and then to Mississauga and back to Toronto. Seriously, if I had a constant internet connection during all of the hours we spent in traffic, I'd have been able to get all of my homework done for all three classes.... twice ! And...

Some of you may know that I dance.... some of you may not. I was recently at a dance competition in Canada, and did rather well in my division. I placed 3rd in Jack & Jill with a leader that I had never met before. We exchanged brief introductions as the music began, and then we danced our way to 3rd place. ( Our placement also means I can now move up into the Advanced division. ) As we danced, my friend recorded video, which I will share below. TOSHC Intermediate Jack & Jill (3rd place)- Song 1 of 3 See 2 here and 3 here It's rather common to see a bunch of people with phones in their hand, darting around the ballroom to get a good angle of the couple they're recording on the floor. A few years ago, event directors would try to stop people from doing this in an attempt to get event attendees to purchase the event video. This has shifted, and now events are streamed online for a low cost or even free. Directors are seeing the value in this because dancers frequen...

As we wrap up week 3, I am exhausted! This week was a challenge for me for all of my classes because I traveled out of the country and have limited internet access. We are visiting my Fiance's family and attending a dance event, and I have attempted to balance both social activities with my studies. Any time I have had a moment I've opened up Twitter, Instagram, and Nuzzel, and read through blog posts from classmates through my phone's chrome browser (when I've had internet). I've also (at times) gone out of my way to take photos for social media material. I've been mostly successful with keeping up with my studies, although I did have to stay up until 11am last night   this morning to work on a number of things. Granted, from 5am-6:30am I was in the ballroom dancing with the "breakfast club" aka dancers that had been dancing since the music began at midnight. I usually like to get 4-5 hours of dancing each night at these events, but homework called!...

I'm sure you've heard of cyber bullying and how it affects people- especially teens. We see it all over the news and social media, of stories about how cyber bullying affected lives, how others overcame cyber bullying situations, and even tragic stories of how it can lead to suicide.  Last week I posted a question to the eme6414 discussion board about cyber bullying vs trolling, and the motivation for it. This post isn't about motivation, but I was curious to learn more about the similarities and differences between the two. I have never been a victim of cyber bullying, but have definitely experienced quite a bit of trolling.  Dr. Dennen shared some of her thoughts about motivation and the types of settings bullying and trolling tend to appear in, including " the gaming and programming worlds, plus the bits in the news about successful women in male-dominated fields..." I think this is absolutely true. In my experience, I have seen and experienced trolling in ...

You know those times when you go out to dinner or an event with a group but it all goes on one bill? Sometimes establishments aren't keen on splitting that bill, especially when it's very busy. What do you usually do? Maybe one person puts it on their card and others give them cash. But, cash is kind of rare these days, so people resort to other options. Paypal, Square Cash, Venmo, Google or Apple Pay, or Facebook Messenger are all popular choices. But one thing that these apps don't do, is automatically split the original bill, by item. Splitwise does (see below). About a year ago, one of my friends started encouraging me to use the Splitwise app because it could easily break down group costs for individuals. I downloaded it and found out how easy it was. Here are some screenshots so you can see how it works.  First, you add some friends (above image). You can add them by allowing Splitwise to access your contact list, or by entering an email, phone number, or name...

The second week of EME6414 and this blog's existence is coming to a close, and I've noticed some big changes since last week, both in my perspective of and familiarity with social media.  I'm definitely starting to better understand the differences and overlaps between formal and informal learning and how social media can be used to enhance classroom learning. For more info on that, read my previous blog post here .  This week I didn't allow myself to get stressed out. I didn't sweat the topics for my blog posts this week as they came pretty naturally from readings, curiosity, and ideas from other classmates' blogs. If you are stressing about topics, don't let it overwhelm you! Just browse around social media for ideas and they will come to you. I hope that this mentality can cross over to next week! I also stopped worrying about number of comments and interactions this week. The world of social media is inconsistent, with some posts getting dozens, hund...

In this week's readings I chose articles that discussed the dichotomy of learning attributes- informal learning vs. formal learning. I find this concept interesting, because some theorists arrange the two antithetically on opposite sides of the learning continuum. Yet, others have decided that there is overlap, with many points on a line where the two could meet. Here's a little diagram I made to help visualize. Here are some of the attributes for each. Formal Learning Institutionally sponsored Highly structured in classrooms, courses, and schools Learners receive grades, degrees, diplomas and certificates An agent (teacher or LMS) is directing learning Informal Learning Self-directed and learner controlled Exploratory, including learners creating, organizing, and packaging their learning based on personal preference Spontaneous Takes place outside of the classroom, course, and/or school The point of overlap I think we can all think of some examp...

Have you ever played an online game with people but had a difficult time communicating with them? Some games don't have built-in communication features, which makes it hard to coordinate raids with your guild, when to jump out from behind a corner, and where everyone should be focusing their DPS (damage per second). Discord solves this problem.  I'll admit it- I'm a total gamer nerd. I've had to limit my gaming this last year due to school, but I've used communication programs for gaming since college. Back then, I was very into MMORPG games, coordinating raids, pvp, and grinding parties with my guild through Ventrillo (aka Vent). Vent was fantastic because it allowed you to speak with others in your guild, but was a separate program that required you to minimize your game screen to adjust volume, change channels, and play with settings. It also meant that if you were offline and your guild needed you, they needed your actual phone number to text and ask for h...

Last night as I was winding down for bed I came across an article on PetaPixel called "Court rules copying photos found on the internet is fair use."  I immediately raised an eyebrow and clicked it, because... Uhm, What??   My first reaction was that this couldn't possibly be true. I can't tell you how many times I've learned about copyright law over the years. It's a topic that permeates day-to-day activities in the library world, and it's something that has come up a number of times in the ISLT program. Knowing copyright laws with regard to reproduction and fair use is incredibly important in education, social media, and... well, really everywhere. Suddenly, I found myself down the rabbit hole of Fair Use laws , rebuttals to the rulings here and here , clicking through Wikipedia pages on copyright law , and browsing the full 7 page court ruling . Here's what happened A photographer named Russell Brammer took a photo using a slow shutter spee...

We are coming to the end of week 1 in EME6414, and...... wow, I'm super stressed! This has been a very interesting week for me, because I've learned a lot about Web 2.0, Social Media, and what it means to be a networked individual. At the same time, I have never attempted to juggle so many social media accounts before and I'm finding it overwhelming!  What I've Learned From course readings this week, I've learned a lot about the history of the internet, mobile devices, social media, groups vs. communities vs. networks, the 'ingredients' of social media, the idea of produsage, and more. This has been a great overall view into the current state of the internet and human relationships. I've spent a lot of time diving down the rabbit hole of Twitter this week. Before this week, my last tweet was in March 2017. I had only made a couple of tweets in the past; nearly all were re-tweets. This week I learned how to tweet my very first picture in the class Se...