My name is Brian Ham, and I teach Elementary Music and Middle School Technology Elective at a K-12 school in Saudi Arabia. For this task, I decided to use my school bag, which I would normally carry everyday that I go into work. Of course, with the onset of COVID-19, I have been working everyday with students online, but have not been physically going into work since mid-march. Despite this, I still wanted to use this bag as an example because it contains all of the most common items that I use for work.
In the attached picture, you can see my bag as well as the items that I normally carry in it. Each of these items contain elements of text technologies, which I will explain below:
- Empowered Learner Magazine – As a member of ISTE (international Society for Technology in Education), I receive a monthly subscription to the membership publication. It is always full of interesting and informative articles about technology in education, as well as practical tips for integrating tech into the classroom. This is actually why I keep it in my bag, because I have used it many times over the past year for strategies that I have actually implemented into my courses. The text technology for this item is quite obvious, seeing as it is printed material. However, just inside the front cover, there is information for Professional Development webinars, and the different events are represented by QR codes, which is another type of text technology (check out the picture here)
- Pen and Pencil – Even in our modern digital world where almost everything we read is viewed electronically, pens and pencils are still a necessary piece of text technology, especially in my job. I still constantly need to jot notes down quickly for a wide variety of reasons, both inside and outside of my classroom. In fact, there are many times when it is just easier and more convenient to use a pen/pencil than to pull out my phone or load up my computer
- ID Badge – The ID badge is a bit small in the photo, but if you were able to zoom in more closely you would see a variety of text technologies at play. On the front, it has the school logo and school name, which communicates my site easily to the viewer (we are part of a larger district). It also has my employee number and name. Just below the name, there is a small barcode, which grants me entry through the school gates and doubles as the library card. On the back (which I did not photograph), there is a QR code that digitally directs me to the campus map as well as emergency contacts and important phone extensions.
- MacBook Air Laptop – I consider this device to be the most important and indispensable item in the bag (outside of the ID Badge), because it is the nerve centre of my teaching practice. Almost everything that I do for all of my classes runs from my computer and it is essential to my daily success. I use this device to engage in multiple text technologies. I write, receive and communicate words in text, create, distribute and consume both audio and video, communicate with emoji and digital messaging, create and consume graphics as well as website URL’s and online databases.
- Portable Hard Drive – The red device is a USB hard drive which I use to digitally store multiple text technologies. Documents, audio, video, and images and the different types of texts involved in each element can not only just be stored, but then distributed to new locations, which is a form of communication.
I believe that the items in the bag help me to project a “businesslike” image to the outside world because it contains no real personal items. I consider myself a professional, and I want my bag and its contents to reflect that feeling. It is a very conscious effort on my part to not keep items in the bag that show my personality, because i tend to have a very “work vs play” mentality. I think that the bag shows that I have “literacies” both in reading/writing as well as in the digital sense. Most, if not all of my communication, reading and writing are done digitally, and the bag items are essential for allowing me to do that.
15 years ago, my bag actually did not look that different! I was just starting my teaching career at that time, so I made sure to have a professional-looking bag with similar items (computer, pens/pencils, USB Drive). I will say that my computer was a lot bigger and heavier, and I carried more pens and paper, but the “businesslike” spirit was still there in terms of the types of things I kept in the bag.
If an archaeologist was going through this bag many years later, I think they would say it belonged to someone who used technology extensively. They would also probably note the lack of personal items and conclude that the owner worked independently, and was maybe even a bit solitary and detached from others. Interestingly enough, I actually work at a highly collaborative school, working closely with others and maintaining strong collegial relationships, even some friendships. However, you would never know that from looking in the bag!