Final Project

Love is often in many places, but true love is sometimes hard to find. Dinner and a movie is a hypertext interactive work created in google sites. Google presentation was used as well as Prezi. There are several external links to you tube videos, audio clips and informative websites. There are both fiction and non-fiction characteristics and some opportunities for the reader to post their own comments. Its primary theme is that of a dinner and movie date. Love and familiarizing with one another is also a recurring primary theme. Secondary themes include, astronomy, social justice, past/ present concepts, music and water. Navigation can be reader directed as the pages are listed on the left tab. The reader can also simply follow the links within the texts and images and ignore the site tabs. Enjoy!

Final Blog

I have truly enjoyed every minute of this class and have grown both professionally and personally throughout its entirety. I believe that electronic literature has a language of its own which is grounded upon the solid foundations of written and spoken language, visual imagery, artistic expression and technology code. Like any other language, E-Lit has its own degrees and forms of literacy. It also needs to be utilized on a regular basis to ensure that the user will never lose their skills, or fluency and to help keep them up to date with ongoing changes. Although I may have had strengths and weaknesses, trials and tribulations in any given area at any given time, I still savored every moment interacting with the digital works and with all of our classmates and leaders in the field during our cooperative learning sessions. Thank you Dr. Zamora, and thank you all for such an engaging and wonderful learning experience for myself and the students and teachers I serve.

Re-post the link to your electronic literature review assignment by April 29th.



Post some of your initial ideas regarding Project 3 in preparation for next week's workshop class.

With regards to web tools for project 3, I am hoping to return to google sites due to its ease in linking and its overall accessibility from my various computer platforms throughout the day and evening. I will experiment further with hiding the sidebar and revealing less of the overall site structure. I am also hoping to insert a linear powerpoint slideshow to help introduce some themes. I am also hoping to insert a prezi that might reflect a more dynamic 'menu' of choices for the reader to navigate. Visual imagery might include sky images as opposed to the water and sand imagery from prior projects. I am hoping to experiment with barcodes/ QR codes on a modified food menu that would link to other various options. From a literary standpoint, I am hoping to include some simple forms as, "I am" statements, 6 word memoirs, short poems with 3 words removed from them in a way to create a new poem, and possibly some other brief works that I still have to determine.

Project 2 (April 16, 2013)

Waves in the sand is based upon the original poem titled,"Footprints in the Sand". It attempts to define electronic literature from two perspectives. Two parallel stories (1 in blue font as the sky, and the other beige font as the sand) are told as reflective of; blue-metalinguistic/natural flow and beige-practical/satirical. I attempted to expand upon the original recurrent themes of presence/ absence with a sense of natural permanence and continuous flow, despite the absence of tangible/ visible signs. I used prezi as my platform in the hope of adding depth and dimension to the work. Project 1 was very visual and utilized less text, more links and less audio/ video modes. In Project 2, I attempted to evoke a sense of multiple modalities. 2D text meeting 3D slides, still images and audio combined in order to create a personal experience that might trigger memories relating all 5 senses. It is best viewed in full screen and sequential, and with slow clicks of the forward arrow to allow ample time to enjoy the audio clips. Prezi (similar to powerpoint) can be used as a teaching tool in addition to an animation tool due to its ability to convey broad themes and details at the same time by clicking the arrows in varying directions.

Blog # 8

Be prepared for next week's class workshop on Project 2.  For your blog next week:

1.  Choose the software you would like to use in creating your next piece. Write about that choice explaining briefly why you decided to go with that application.  "Play around" with the software, and develop some initial foundation for your project that you may build upon in the week before deadline (April 16).

I am most likely choosing Prezi as the software for project 2. I experimented with i movie and enjoyed it, however was concerned about portability and ease of access from various computers. Work, home and university might have had mac/ ibm transferrability issues. Also, my work will likely not have as much video imagery as much as still image and text movement needs. Lastly, my laptop had a 2009 version and I would have to pay about 16 dollars for the upgrade, which I wasnt sure I needed. Also, I considered powerpoint which i am already somewhat comfortable with. I liked it as a safety net, but thought that i would be settling, or shortchanging myself from a more dynamic and technologically challenging work. Prezi subsequently became my top choice. After some adobe flash player and adobe reader upgrade issues and free upgrades, I was ready to experiment with Prezi, and thoroughly enjoyed it.

2.  Write an early outline of the narrative/text/poem you will be creating.  Describe the intended content for your piece, along with the style and design features you would like to invoke.

I plan on modifying "footprints in the sand" poem in both content and form. I want to rename it "Waves in the sand" I am hoping to use various still images with some background audio. There will be small pieces of text within the visual/ auditory formats, however I am hoping to end with a larger piece of text that resembles the original poem but with different meaning. Instead of good times/ tough times and presence/ absence, i will attempt a different theme of continuity, ebb/ flow, erasure and the overall permanence and longevity of 'sand' regardless of its quantity. Quantitative presence vs. qualitative affect/ impact will hopefully tie into technology and e-lit as a continuos flow that is evolving like waves of sand on a beach. Parts of it may come and go but its impact and imagery as 'the place where land meets sea', will always remain. The hope is that the reader may connect digital writing/ new media as that same bridge where print lit meets electronic lit and the field of composition/ literature can serve as that permanent beach with many grains of sand and great depth. I still have alot to work on regarding these ideas within the theme.

3.  Prepare a question (or a few) to pose to Dr. Flores during our twitter session. 

Is Prezi an adequate tool for digital poetry, moreso can letters move (within slides) similar to flash? or just the slides that move.

What are your thoughts on technology access issues in schools. e.g., old cell phone policies merged with use of tablets or phones for educational purposes?

How can students use technology while in school in a functional, non distracting nature?

Blog # 7 Spine Poetry (April 2)

Blog # 6 (March 26)

Please write a reflection - your thoughts/questions resulting from reading Amanda Gould's article on Electronic Literature.

Do we have equal access to international versions of e-literature collections?

I enjoy and support the strategy of reading e-lit in depth for the purpose of writing e-lit.

What role does e-lit have with middle school students/ high school students? (e.g. literary magazines, school newspaper, yearbooks, etc.).

How can e-lit address the ccss of viewing media and filtering knowledge as well as producing knowledge for our young learners?

Is there a place for computations, and/or critical thinking/ problem solving/ memory/ executive function training within the realm of e-lit? Either for learning enhancement or learning remediation.