Understanding YouTubers

Pic: Elrubiusomg by Kawwi-CC-BY-SA-4.0.

I have to say that I did not have a clue who Youtubers were until last weekend (4/10/15  to 4/12/15) that a group was treated as rock stars in a convention in Buenos Aires, Argentina.

When I started to read and listen about them I noticed that I have heard about them through my nephew who follows some of them to get good tips to win video games. Up until now, I never gave too much thought about them.

What I researched is that YouTubers are young folks between 15 and 27 years of age. They record, edit, and upload videos online and they do it because they like it. Great examples of DIY culture, by the way. They discuss a range of topics that can go from tutorials for online games to fashion tips so these YouTubers also receive the names of vloggers (bloggers in video).  Young people like to follow them because they feel they can identify with them, they are considered “real” (the next-door-kid) and teens enjoy the sense of humor that many of their idols infuse onto their videos.

Teens follow YouTubers who have created their own YouTube Channels, and I mean, really follow them because there are about 50 million followers. This sheer number made me realize that we are in the presence of something massive that can be considered agents of change. They may not have started with any goal in mind but what they do is literally attracting attention, at least, they got mine =)

As an educator, I couldn’t stop but think, what will this new culture mean? It means that teens are turning to videos—and not just to Google to search for information. Hence, teens are not so much into print but they are mainly looking for multimedia formats. Content is generated based on what is of interest around them and it shows a great deal of creativity in many cases. For example, Rubius parodied the song “El Torero” by Chayanne using the context of the video game Minecraft so he called it "Minero" (The miner). This video received 20,000,000+ visits. Impressive, right?  

Teens are not only passively following these big names but they are interacting with them by leaving comments on their sites, answering to surveys, and talking about them with their friends. YouTubers listen to their fans and acknowledge their requests in their videos, something that make the fans grateful. There is a lot of empathy in these virtual relationships. 

In terms of teaching and learning, these teens have expectations to find teachers that integrate technology in many formats onto their practices. Can we say that these teens’ demands have been made silently? The question is not so rhetorical when we come to see that high-school drop-out rates are skyrocketing. The clash between expectations, what students want and what teachers do, seem to broaden and shows a tension in the quality of education. 

This example of YouTubers makes the clash evident, but it is also an invitation to examine our practices and ask ourselves, have we integrated technology into our curriculum? Do I have a plan or do I go with the flow? What do I have to do to take my practice to the next level?

Digital citizenship: who are our models?

How do we learn to behave online? In the case of adults, unless we take classes about this concept, it is pretty much by trial and error, and by imitation of what others do.
We emulate what we see others do. For example, a few years ago I read about a writer called Roni Lauren who blogged about her work. She used pictures she found online and wrote a disclaimer about them following what others had written on their blogs. She thought she was fine until one photographer sued her. As she mentioned in her lessons learned, she paid for a pic she did not need. She could have taken a picture herself or resorted to the use of pics used under Creative Commons (CC) licenses. She strongly advices bloggers to use CC pics so they would not have to go through what she did.
What happens with Twitter users and followers? There are a few cases that are worth taking a closer look. In the UK in 2012, a couple of journalists made allusions about a person who may have incurred in misconducts without specifying his name but providing enough details that putting two and two together was not difficult. As a result, a series of twits emerged and were retwitted creating a great scandal about this situation. The person in question was wrongly accused and he decided to take legal actions against the journalists, the person who wrote the first twit, and those who retwitted it because they had not exercised their critical thinking wisely. The interesting thing about the action the victim took was to include those who had retwitted the information because they had not taken into consideration if someone could be hurt. The distinction he made was that those writers who had only 500 followers would pay a fine and make public apologies but those who had more followers would have to pay a greater fine in addition to apologizing. What's the point here? This case left a precedent that it is not ok to twit anything and that there could be legal repercussions if one proceeds without care.
From an educational standpoint, we also learn to tweet based on what others do. So it is necessary to discuss what we see, read, and the reactions that we notice when we see tweets that are not ok. As educators, we need to engage our students in exercises that involve writing tweets and discussing their ramifications.

Digital Identity: real or fake?

                                             CC BY Andres Rueda
The first time I thought about the concept of digital identity was when I introduced the term digital footprints to my students. This means the digital bits and pieces we generate in our exchanges with others in public forums and posts we leave online. They can help move us forward in our career if we make smart moves or backwards if we choose the web as a way of venting our emotions on more personal levels.This is a great video that educator Johnson prepared a few years ago. While some of the stats may be outdated, the impact is still valid.

I have noticed that the younger generations in particular, but not exclusively, have a quite different idea of the notion of what they share publicly vs. privately as the Flacso educators eloquently analyzed in their link to Radio Program. The educators noticed that the youth do not tend to take this distinction into consideration and believe the world should be an open forum for them to say what they want. While free speech is a right for every human being, there are social protocols, also known as Netiquettes-- to follow in order to show respect for others even when disagreeing with their ideas. And what about their most inner precious struggles? Should Facebook be equated with an open psychoanalytic session (minus the coach) for others to share how to tackle the issue at hand?

What I know about digital footprints and netiquette have shaped what I share online. I understand that I am gradually building an online persona, but the question is, should it be so different from the real one? Professionally speaking, I do not think so. I believe that online platforms provide me with a venue to express ideas that can reach a wider audience than just the students in my class. Will this change? This is a question that I will continue to explore as I become an active participant of the online communities.For the moment, I tried my hand at a a poem (using Genious) in a multimedia format using Zeega. Enjoy it!

To blog or not to blog? That was MY main question

Back in the mid 2000's, I started to see a proliferation of blogs and was interested in creating my own. My biggest concern or inquiry was how often I would have to update it--and the thought of it made me stay away from initiating the project. I would often equate writing a blog with keeping a personal journal. When I was a teen, I kept my journal but I didn't write on it often so I felt I was leaving something out and I didn't like it because I felt "guilty". If I felt I would have to keep up with my blog on a regular basis and be concerned with what to post to keep it updated, the task was going to become a burden. Knowing myself-- the project was going to end within a month. As predicted, I started a blog that had one post and never resumed it until today (the original post was deleted by the system).

I found answers to the question of the title of this post to blog or not to blog in a gradual basis when I started reading resources about about PNL and PLE. An excellent ebook, in Spanish though, is called Entornos Personales de Aprendizaje: Claves para el ecosistema educativo en red by Castañeda and Adell. Ebook about PLE (In Spanish)
Steve Wheeler is also big on PLE and I learned a lot from his tweets and blog entries, this is just one of his entries Steve Wheeler's blog
I have just finished reading the book Digital Literacies by Dudeney Hockly and Pegrum.
Finally, one of the most illuminating insights I got came from reading Greg McVerry's blog entry about PNL in this week's discussion of learning event#2 from Walkmywoldproject . What I like about this post is that he clearly explains the uses and relationships between Twitter and Blogs in a way I have not seen before. That is, a Twitter is a medium to share ideas and to get to know what others are discussing. A Blog, on the other hand, is a place to reflect on what was collected so as to take a pause on what was posted, receive feedback and interact with others through our writings.

I am happy to say that I understand the reasons underlying the use and practices of keeping a blog. I am thrilled to start a new year with this project that will gradually strengthen my PLE and PNL.

A ride in an amusement park: a reflection on the dimensions of learning

I recently visited an amusement park and one of the attractions was a 5-D cinema. This meant that I needed to wear 3-D glasses while I could watch a movie and feel my seat adjusting to the motion of the film, my heart sped up as the velocity increased and there was even some water drops sprayed when the scene was under the sea. Wow! It was not just the visual but other senses that were involved in the experience. Younger generations play online games, and use X-boxes that contribute to their lively experiences. I left the park thinking about the learning process and about the audience that enjoyed it. Am I engaging my students with all or most of their senses when I teach (or just the visual and auditory)?

This is one example of the innovations that technology can bring to a classroom. I may not need to have seats that move while my students learn. Yet, I feel that my teaching needed to evolve to introduce changes that ensure students are active while they learn. I have made baby steps towards that direction.

Family Enjoy Movie Ride by ThrillfxRide CC BY-SA 3.0