WRT 304 (Reading and Writing in Digital Environments) is an extremely hands on course that introduces students to a variety of fun ways to express themselves, share their opinions, and engage with others work online. The class has been a very fun way to practice a new type of writing (blogging). I’ve taken courses that teach essay writing, creative writing, poetry, but I’ve never had the opportunity to learn about blogging and how I might go about doing it.
My favorite parts of the course were keeping up with my blog posts and the Codecademy work. I am really proud of how my blog posts turned out and I feel way more confident sharing how I feel and what I think about online than I did at the start of the class. The Codecademy lessons were a huge confidence boost as well, and showed me that I am capable of learning things I have no idea how to do, even online. It’s easy to psych yourself out when it comes to learning about technology and how to best navigate the internet, but if you push through, it’s usually worth it.
“This course takes a hands-on approach to exploring, reading and writing in digital (web) environments. Students in the course consider ways that digital writing environments create opportunities for writers to address multiple audiences, to bring together visual and alphabetic texts and to involve readers in the construction of those texts. Students in the course develop a variety of digital texts including blogs, website and wikis. Students’ work is collected in an ePortfolio design and assembled over the course of the term.“
– UNE Official Catalog
Work Sample(s)
The three “projects” linked below were big components of the class:
Blog
My blog was focused on internet culture, influencers, and spheres. Each post discusses a specific influencer or sphere or some aspect of internet culture. I had a lot of fun learning how to add hyperlinks, quotes, and embed videos and images to help the blog posts come to life and feel a little bit more interactive.
DS106 Work
The DS106 work was fun and challenging. They each required an open, creative mind, and often patience. They sometimes led to technical difficulties that were fun or difficult to work through (either way, working through them led to new knowledge and skills).
Codecademy Badges
Codecademy was a blast. I always thought any level of “coding” would be above my head and impossible to learn but I was very wrong. The simple coding I did through Codecademy actually came very easily to me and I had a lot of fun doing it. I will probably continue trying to find ways to get better at and practice basic coding.
