Technobiophilia

When setting my screen saver to things like waterfalls or sunsets never would I have thought that my choice would have something to do with my need to soothe my mind or connect with computers but this is exactly what Sue Thomas is telling us.  She explains that we are naturally attracted to nature’s metaphors because we are instilled with biophilia, ‘the innate attraction to life and lifelike processes’. Biophilia is present in our everyday lives through what she calls ‘technobiophilia’. Technobiophilia is the innate attraction to life and lifelike processes as they appear in technology. This digital understanding connects to #metaliteracy because it shows how customization of a learning process can help to connect and expand knowledge that is made digital.   

 

 

Digital Storytelling MOOC Talk

Storytelling is a form of communication that has been around since the beginning of time. While many believe storytelling to be something that is only portrayed through novels or something to do around the campfire, Brian Alexander explains it as a bigger picture while trying to get us the understand the impact that it has on our day-to-day lives. In his video Alexander defines storytelling as “a sequence of content, with a problem, that engages the audience with emotion and meaning.” Through the advances in our technology today, digital storytelling and metaliteracy has given this sequence of content a new perspective. Whether you know it or not everyday through filtered pictures, 6-second videos, or 140 character snippets you are showing the world your story. I never realized that by using using social media I would be telling a story but if you think about it, you are giving people from the outside topics to relate to, think about, and create an understanding which ultimately combines both together the use of digital storytelling and metaliteracy.  This video opened my eyes to the fact that I am in fact telling a story to my peer’s every time I post on social media which makes me wonder, is this the story I want to be telling?

 

#metaliteracy

 

Democratization of Social Media

We live in a world today where information is always at our finger tips. 10 years ago the technological advances that we have today seemed almost unimaginable however, today they are helping us to learn and spread ideas faster than ever. The article, Media and News Literacy, explains this phenomena best as “The democratization of social media allows for more participation and interaction related to the news than ever.” While there are many advantages that news literacy and social media can bring to everyone, it is also a double edged sword that bring some major disadvantages. 

The first advantage this #metaliteracy brings is that ability for the entire world to communicate at the click of a button. With this it gives everyone the ability to give and receive information. This gives the average person the ability to publish their ideas and opinions while being able to interact with others giving people different outlets to learn new information. A perfect example of this sharing of ideas and information would be this MOOC that we are doing right now. This program allows us the engage, share and learn information online within a community. This program gives the people out there that are not professionals the ability to share and learn about new ideas and news topics through social media.

Another advantage of the democratization of social media is the availably of information. We no longer need to wait until the next day to get the news paper to hear about news but we can now get it through twitter updates or online news articles. This stream of constant information allows to be educated while being able to make informed decisions to this information being presented to us. 

Although there are many advantages to #metaliteracy there are also some disadvantages. While ability to spread information is a valuable tool, it still leaves room for the possibility of wrong information being spread quickly. For example, the man who lied about the flooding of the New York Stock Exchange building during Hurricane Sandy. This information was spread quickly to tons of people creating a mass panic however, was eventually proved to be false. This is an obvious problem of the world of social media because we are not always able to tell what is in fact true. 

A final disadvantage of #metaliteracy and social media is the actual social side of it. Though having relationships with people through social media sites is a way of interacting with people, the ability to talk behind a computer might begin to dissolute the actual relationships that people have in real life. The danger in this is that communication and relationships of human beings might become ones that only partake behind a computer screen. 

What is Metaliteracy?

Metaliteracy is a concept that is completely new to me and something that I am still trying to fully understand. What I can gather so far is that is that it is a new way to share ideas through different outlets of social media. Because of the wide range of social media outlets there are out there today, the ability to share information and connect with others that have similar ideas has become easier than ever. I hope to take from this course the ability to collect valuable information, apply critical thinking skills to that information and finally be able to share that information and those ideas with others. Knowing how to use these skills and becoming metaliterate will hopefully provided us with skills for the future such as analyzing information, engaging in discussion, using different online communities, and taking and providing feedback from others. Already I believe I am beginning to become more metaliterate by the use of this blog. This is my first time ever using a blog so I hope by the end of the semester this will be something that improves my communication, research, and writing skills.

 

#metaliteracy