The End?

At last, a final reflection on what I learned in Digital Civilization, but this is certainly not the end. What I learned throughout the semester will stay with me throughout my life and continue to influence my perception of nearly every aspect of our society. I learned how to consume, create, connect as well as think about society through the eyes of a digital revolutionary. I fully intend on talking about these issues and the need for change in our growing digital world long after this class. Not only will the content I learned stick with me after this course, but I will also be forever reminded of the principles of life-long learning taught by every activity in this class.

History: Let me just say, this is where I truly tried and truly failed in this class. It's ironic that I have made it my job to become an expert in research techniques because at the beginning of this class, I had a horrible time trying to find information on each era discussed in class. I searched the internet for hours, trying to find something interesting about every era and finding no results, but here is a few blog posts that made it through the dirge of scholarly journals and books

• Growing Accessibility to Information A post about how our accessibility to information and participation in information sharing has evolved since electricity was first generated.  
• JFK Loves TV! I posted this after researching how JFK used technology in his presidency. Because of all the information I found, I could make it really fun to imitate him in class, and I found a great connection to digital tools in politics today.
• Civil War: The Real Beginning of America This post allowed me to contemplate the importance of the Civil War although I did not get a chance to write down all of my thoughts about the subject.
• America's view of WWII Germany: evil, merciless soldiers or victims? I looked in depth at what Nazi Germany was like for the citizens of Germany. They can sometimes be categorized as evil soldiers, but many of them were scared citizens trying to fight for what they thought was right.
• Some Thoughts on WWII Art This post was compiled of my ramblings on what I thought of WWII propaganda and how it related to the bigger picture of 1920's culture.
•  What I Know about the Renaissance I posted a basic overview of everything I knew about the Renaissance from previous classes and other reading (which turned out to be quite a lot). Renaissance Humanism was a more focused blog post on Renaissance humanism specifically.

Core Concepts: This is where I excelled (if I do say so myself). I worked endlessly to learn as much as I could about these digital concepts. Seeing that I came to this class knowing nothing about these concepts, I'd say that I've come pretty far.

• Digital Divide has Invaded my Apartment This was my first dive into trying to write about a digital concept, and I used experiences from my day to day life!
• Thoughts on Censorship These were my ideas on censorship and how it is necessary sometimes for freedom to thrive although it might at first seem to restrict freedoms.
• Openness in Scientific Journals I wrote a simple, short post on my thoughts of openness in scientific journals and relating it to the original purpose of these journals (history!)
• Is the Internet Scrambling Our Brains? This was my first blog post that I was truly proud of. I read an interesting book on how the means in which we consume information is affecting our brains. I made meaningful comments about the texts and tied it into history (at least I meant to add something about how typewriters affected the way people wrote poetry and philosophy). I also included pictures to make it look more visually interesting.
• How has the Internet Affected our Research? This was a post building on my reading about internet affecting the way we think. It was also a jump-start into what would become my class project.
• Technology Takes its Tole Comments on the dark side of participation
• Growing Accessibility to Information This post (as previously mentioned) uses history to talk about the unique opportunities we have to participate in information sharing to make progress much faster

Digital Literacy: I also think I worked really hard to consume, connect, and create in this class, especially since this was the main focus of our eBook.

• Library 2.0 Pitch I organized the Library 2.0 information I had gathered into these three categories: consume, create, and connect, listing specific ways for students to improve their research in each category
• With my posts on 20th Century from the View of Metamorphosis and My Posted Comments on Eden's Post, I began to use non-traditional sources to consume information (such as using a work of literature to study and era and other students' blog posts).
• As previously mentioned, I wrote Is the Internet Scrambling our Brains? from what I had read in a book. This taught me, that while digital tools are useful, it is important to use traditional research methods as well.
• Research Tips from Professors and How to do Real Research on Google taught me how to best consume information. The tips from professors also gave information on how to connect with real people as well as text in order to get necessary information. 
• Library 2.0 Pitch I organized the Library 2.0 information I had gathered into these three categories: consume, create, and connect, listing specific ways for students to improve their research in each category. In order to gather this information in the first place, I had to use the very research methods I discussed such as social book marking sites and Google scholar. 
• My new ways to consume information led me to create my own work, as seen in my pitch. I then connected with other interested people in order to improve my research. Perhaps the most useful example of this came from my pitch of this Library Research 2.0 outline to a First Year Writing professor, as outlined in Actual Results of My Pitch. 
• After speaking with the professor and other interested parties, I created new builds such as Seriously Revised Connect Section of the Ebook. 
• Helping Students Connect I used my research to create new content and connect with other students. 
• I kept creating information as I grew more of a passion for it, all the while finding other experts to connect with as seen in Inquiry: An Annotated Bibliography. I also created a film as described in Lights, Camera, Action!. In my video, I described My Personal Experience with Connecting.

Self-Directed Learning: I also worked hard to learn all that I could to make more meaning our of the class.

• Is Gamifying Voting Really the Best Thing? In order to post this, I found a video that discussed what we talked about in class and tried to start an online discussion about it.
• Research for People with Lives I took it upon myself to find research tips by creating a Google form. Unfortunately this did not work, so I moved on to the next step which snowballed into what became my proposal for our group project.
• I went out of my way to talk to others in order to social proof my idea and create as much content as I could for our eBook. I also worked hard in the name of Shameless Advertising for Our Event.
• While this was all worth while, the learning does not stop here. I created many extensions of our eBook chapter including a video and a lesson plan for professors to teach Library 2.0 techniques. These should be released soon.

Collaboration

• I worked hard to organize both my historical group and my digital group throughout the class. I also worked hard to present JFK Loves TV! and How Has the Internet Affected Our Research
• I also created a Research Project Pitch and worked hard as a group leader to organize meetings and assign tasks. My only regret in regards to collaboration, is not doing more to make sure all group members were working hard on specific tasks for our project. 

Playing Catch Up: My addition to our ebook intro

I wrote this for our ebook a while ago and never posted my work, so here it is!


John Seely Brown, Chief Scientist at Xerox and director of its Palo Alto Research Center, said the following after observing the learning patterns of modern adolescents. “The new literacy, beyond text and image, is one of information navigation. The real literacy of tomorrow entails the ability to be your own personal reference librarian-to know how to navigate through confusing, complex information spaces and feel comfortable doing so. "Navigation" may well be the main form of literacy for the 21st century. The next dimension, and shift, concerns learning. Most of us experienced formal learning in an authority-based, lecture-oriented school. Now, with incredible amounts of information available through the Web, we find a "new" kind of learning assuming pre-eminence:  Learning that's discovery-based. We are constantly discovering new things as we browse through the emergent digital ‘libraries.’" (Brown, John S. "Growing Up Digital: How the Web Changes Work, Education, and the Ways People Learn." USDLA Journal 16.2 (2002). Print.)

These libraries without walls are considered today to be logical extensions to libraries, as both enable people to engage with various types of information and resources of knowledge. 1 A team of researchers at the Academy of Finland published an article about these digital libraries and the benefits of using digital tools in a library setting. According to the article, “Through the technological development of electronic resources the means to collect, store, manage, and use widely distributed knowledge resources have become more effective, serving the library users even better.... Modern libraries are therefore being redefined as places to get wider access to information in many formats and from many sources.” (Holmberg, Kim, et al. "What is Library 2.0?" Journal of Documentation 65.4 (2009): 668-81. Print.)

Fortunately, the mass stores of information found in these digital libraries is not the only advantage of modern digital tools. Not only can we consume information on the internet, but we can use social media to connect with experts in the field, or even other interested people to gain greater insight into the topic.

Shameless Advertising for DigiCiv

As the title of this posts suggests, I did lots of shameless advertising to try to get people to come to our event. I made announcements in my honors classes and education classes because I thought they would be interested in how the digital revolution has affected education and research. I also made specific, personal invites to the following:

1. Professor Goldberg and his brother are both extremely interested in changes in our digital world, specifically regarding research. (Professor Goldberg is the previously mentioned professor, who was interviewed for some social proof of my idea).
2. Professor Earl was interested in how the digital world has impacted education, government, research, and other areas.
3. Mark Poret previously taught a computer class at BYU and showed extreme interest new digital tools and how they are reshaping education. He was also extremely interested in how they have affected government. He was not able to come due to a scheduling conflict, but he will most likely look up information about the event and talk to me about it sometime next week. 
4. Mike Poret is Mark Poret's son and a student at BYU. He is extremely interested in technology and how different areas have affected the digital world.
5. Amy Shiflet is a student who is concerned about our inadequate educational system and how we can change it to adapt to modern times.
6. Kylie Smith is also a student who is concerned about our inadequate educational system and how we can change it to adapt to modern times.
7. Mikayla Boren  is also a student who is concerned about our inadequate educational system and how we can change it to adapt to modern times.
8. Professor Ray teaches a class on using drama in the classroom. She is very concerned with our educational system leaving various types of learners behind and wanted to know what we could do to adapt schools to our modern times.
9. Julius Adebayo is a student who was very interested to know new research methods to save time and make his research more meaningful.
10. Nick Jones is a student who is extremely interested in business and economics. He showed interest in learning how the business world is affected by new digital tools.
11. Brian Jackson is a coordinator for the First Year Writing department and is extremely interested in using digital tools in his teaching. Our group wanted to talk to him specifically about using Library 2.0 techniques in First Year Writing courses. I thought this event would be a perfect opportunity to introduce him to Library 2.0 along with other areas of the digital revolution, so I called and left him a message. He never replied, but I hope to get a hold of him soon to present him with a lesson plan that can be implemented in the First Year Writing program.

In spite of my efforts, Julius was the only invite I specifically saw at the event, although others may have been there without my knowledge. In addition to my efforts in inviting people, I was also active on the stream during the event until my computer died (a little more than half way through) and stayed for a relatively long time afterwards to answer questions.

Seriously Revised Connect Section of the Ebook

Perhaps the most important aspect of Library 2.0 is connecting. John Seely Brown, Chief Scientist at Xerox and director of its Palo Alto Research Center, demonstrated the importance of this aspect through the history of electricity. Although Michael Faraday’s small generator produced electricity in 1831, an entire generation passed before an industrial version of Faraday’s generator was built. It took another 25 years for electricity to find its way to power companies, neighborhood wiring, and appliances. This was an extremely long process for one idea to actually be put to use in daily life. According to Brown, “with the internet that we have today, we do not need to wait generations for an idea to develop into reality. Ideas can spread rapidly, inventors can catch the attention of sponsors and their vision can become a reality much more quickly.” This spread of ideas is generated by connecting to other researchers though the plethora of digital tools available to nearly every researcher on the planet. By contacting other researchers and experts, we can share insights and achieve goals much more quickly than ever before.

It is common to research a topic by looking up articles and news reports from credible websites and databases. While this is a wonderful start, research should not begin and end with sorting through articles to paraphrase on a report or a business proposal. Perhaps the most effective way to research is to find the experts in the desired topic and use them to find the best information without sorting through thousands of articles on a database. One may accomplish this process in several ways.

First, a researcher might search a topic on a database of scholarly articles or look at bibliographies of several works on the subject in order to discover the experts on the subject.

Next, one might find the resources the expert used or is interested in through social bookmarking, Google Plus, Facebook, blogs, or other Web 2.0 tools. As previously discussed, social bookmarking sites allow you to see links used by other researchers for any desired field. By finding the links marked by an expert, it becomes much easier to find more information on a research topic. Experts can usually be found on Google Plus or Facebook as well. These professionals are extremely excited by their area of interest and are likely to post information about it frequently. Some may even create a Facebook page entirely on their topic of interest. Their profile pages can contain a wealth of knowledge for any researcher interested in their work. Another useful tool to find information is to find an expert’s blog. Blogs may not be purely academic, but they will probably contain useful links for more information on their topic of interest.

While this may be very useful to any researcher, finding information is only the shallow end of connecting. In order to truly make research meaningful, one must use these digital tools to contact the experts after reading their material. This process develops an understanding network building and will prove to be a valuable research tool in any type of research as well as the professional workplace. For any researcher who is lacking interest or motivation in their work, connecting to other experts is sure to inspire greater interest in the topic and augment motivation to effectively find the best sources possible and create truly remarkable work. Communicating with experts in the field makes research a far more worthwhile and memorable experience than it might otherwise have been and allows those experts to then comment and improve the researcher’s work.

Although connecting with an expert may seem daunting to the average researcher, current digital tools make it relatively easy to contact experts on any subject. These tools also create much easier methods for experts to respond to requests. For the many experts who teach or conduct research at universities, contact information can be found through university directories. Once an expert’s google plus profile is found, email options are usually provided. It is also relatively easy to comment on Google plus or any facebook page. With properly expressed interest, a comment from a researcher usually elicits a response from the expert in question. Conversation can also be sparked through comments on an expert’s blog.

Researchers could also visit an office which might have more information on the subject. For example, in order to find more information on how technology has influenced education, a researcher could visit any school office and ask what new forms of technology the school had implemented and how it had influenced student learning. Interviews are generally considered scholarly sources and can generally be cited in research papers and other published works. If distance poses a problem, interviews via phone, video conferencing, or video can be effective as well.

My Personal Experience with Connecting

In my first year of college, I was assigned to write a research paper on a recently discovered ant in Australia. As I began my research, I discovered that I needed more information, and the few articles available were written by one expert, who happened to be a professor in Denmark. I found the website of his university and translated it into English in order to find his contact information. I sent him an email, expressing my interest in his work and explaining the research I was conducting. He responded fairly quickly, and we began communicating about my work. He gave me much more information for my research and gave me permission to use all of his images and charts. I then published my work for everyone to use because hardly anyone knew about this incredible species of ant. Making that connection made my research so much more meaningful and created a spark of excitement in my work. That experience led me to write about Library Research 2.0 because I want others to experience that spark that I felt and make their research so much more meaningful.

Lights, Camera, Action!

Yes, we finished filming the Inquiry video today! I had a lot of fun trying to get my interview right and getting odd looks as we filmed students in the library (with their permission of course). It was fun to film, and we think we got some good shots. Basically we filmed different students working in the library. Some worked with computers, some read books, and others studied with friends. We then filmed the main content, most of which will be a voice-over for the video. We then filmed my interview about my experience in Library 2.0. Here is how it goes...


Opens with inspirational music and a black screen with "Bringing Research up to Speed: Utilizing Library 2.0" written in white.

Inspirational music fades into the background with a clip of me introducing library 2.0.


"In the modern world research has become vital to success. Whether you are a student, teacher, or any professional in the workplace, you need to know how to find information. Library 2.0 is the key to making the most of the time you spend on effective research through the digital tools we have today. (At this point, my explanation of Library 2.0 becomes a voice over as we flip through different clips of students doing research.) The three tools within Library 2.0 are consuming, connecting, and creating. You can more effectively consume information through social bookmarking sites, google scholar, RSS feeds and other digital tools. You can then use these tools to connect to the experts in order to enhance your research and add a spark of excitement in your work. After you've found your information, you can share your work with those experts and other researchers through ebooks, video, TED talks, and other publishing techniques."


At this point we will show my interview about my experience with consuming, connecting, and creating in new ways to make my research meaningful and my inspiration for this project. We will then show the clip of all the students working in the "no shh" zone and end with clips of students working together (both of these will be shown with the final voice over as the background music slowly gets louder until it is at a normal volume when my voice over ends and we show the last clip of students working together).
 
"If we all use these tools to consume information effectively, connect with the experts, and create our own work for others to use, we can completely revolutionize research as we know it."


This would be the end of the ebook video. We would also like another version to show in the library, youtube, and on the library's website where it ends with a black background and information about where to find more information written in white.

Helping Students Connect

Just realized I did not post this on the 21st when I saved it as a draft, so here this is super late.

Today I found a valuable opportunity to use connecting research strategies to aid a fellow student in their research. This student was struggling to find useful sources for a research paper. She had one extremely useful article but found nothing else to back up her work. I suggested some of the research strategies I have picked up to help her connect to the authors of that article. We found his contact information, and she sent him an email. I do not know if she emailed him back yet, but it was great to see her replace boredom and frustration with excitement and energy as she discovered the joys of connecting in research.