#5110 Media in Learning and Teaching W1

***For the few that have read my few blog posts***

Never been much of a blogger (obviously).  It seems really quaint, and I would love to spend more time writing, but that would require spending less time doing something else.  And I really am not willing to give up any time of the things I am doing now.  So for the next three months posts that you see here will be associated with #5110, one of my graduate classes at UNT.  Maybe the practice will stick?  I do somewhat more frequently post my independent thoughts, topics, and resources here. I named it Time Enough for a reason.

*** End of message explaining #5110's sudden appearance***

On the use of media to teach and learn...

Depending on your definition, media for learning and teaching, could date back to the cave drawings in France.  Media as an instructional method, even when crudely used, attempts to provide an experience for the learner when the real thing is not possible.  This could be the simplifying of concepts through the taking away superfluous information.  Or to replicate real life to the closest approximation so that the learner might as well have been there.  Or, to so further enhance an experience so that only through the use of media could you experience some new reality that would otherwise not be possible without the use of technology.

While designing instructional materials is a large part of my job for the past seven year, the use of media to communicate, learn, and teach is a human thing, not just a construct of education.  We use language, gestures, symbols, sketches, photographs, video, audio, models, diagrams, ect in nearly all of our interactions!  A life dependent solely on language to communicate would be very difficult.  Case in point (we are about to get super personal), my daughter (4.5 yrs old) has a "sluggish colon".  And in investigate/resolving this issue I was directed by her doctor to observe, evaluate, and document her daily expulsions.  Without the hilariously titled app "Poop Log"'s written description, analogies, AND drawings, this would have been a very difficult experience.  Even the Share function of the app was helpful as it turns out #crowdsourcing .  

That being said, the experience is how knowledge is constructed, not necessarily through the consumption of prepared materials.  Media is just one tool available to the process.