I normally type everything I need to in my day- whether it’s on my laptop or on my phone. This task was surprisingly difficult, because I did not realize how much I had weaned away from handwriting over the years. Everything for school work was written by hand up to the end of highschool, but typing became much more integral in my life starting with my undergrad. Today, I rarely write anything by hand- and when I do, they’re short comments or check marks when marking students’ assignments. I found my hands cramping up after a while and my recently done nails were digging into my palms, making the experience uncomfortable. I used a pen for my writing and did not have to edit any errors- however, if I had made a mistake, I would’ve had to use white-out. This would leave a mark of my mistakes and errors, whereas in typing, there is no trace of this left in the final product. For me, the most significant difference was the speed in which my thoughts could be produced into text. I’m much faster with typing and I got frustrated at times because I would forget what I wanted to write next as my thoughts were running faster than I could write. This is important for me, because I tend to forget things often- that I can translate all my thoughts into text before they’re gone. Definitely pro-typing.

Record an unscripted, 5 minute long story using a voice-to-text app.

For my short story here I would like to talk about the science fair project that I had with my science 9 students at Port Moody secondary last year. The entire process lasted from the beginning of the semester which was around the beginning of February all the way to the end of May. At the beginning of the semester all of my grade nine students, roughly about 50 students, where to question something in their life that they were curious about. As the semester went on they refine their question made a hypothesis and from there began to design their own experiment. Some of the topics that my students came up with were do different frequencies of sounds affect the growth of plants, what is the best bridge design to support the most amount of weight, and even does classical music help stimulate short-term. My students presented their experiments results and findings to the entire school during our own science fair Celebration Day. On this day they were given feedback from other teachers there. You’re able to refine awesome of there. End message. A select few group switch hosen to attend the Coquitlam science fair hosted at the Coquitlam Library. As my students were grade nine students they entered into the junior category. Out of the six groups we were able to send to the science fair we swept the board with first-place second-place third place. In first place was a very bright student who decided to designer experiment by herself. Her experiment looked at testing the effects of digital or printed methods of learning. Sheerid to see whether students could memorize more information in a digital format or on a printed hard copy format. She learned a lot from this experiment as well as all of my other students. It was a really proud moment for them as students and Learners and also for me as an educator.

Analysis

The story above has not been altered in any way after the speech-to-text process (using https://speechnotes.co/). Grammatical and spelling mistakes are all included as originally seen. For the most part, the translation was on point, however there are a couple of weird typos that occurred, which are not even words that exist in the English language. I thought it was interesting that the speech-to-text app would process my spoken language into these silly words rather than an existing vocabulary. Some sentences absolutely do not make sense. These errors cause the entire story to make less sense, which is why I would consider these “mistakes”.

What I also noticed is that I was consciously trying to speak as if I was reading the story from text. Maybe it’s the grammatical differences or the way sentences are formed, but I can see that there is a difference between written and spoken language. Knowing this in the back of my mind, I found myself speaking differently than I normally would if I was telling this story to a friend. If I had time to script the story, it would make more sense and flow much better. This activity was eye-opening and made it clear that there is a distinction between written and spoken language and I’m excited to continue learning about where these distinctions lie.

Annotations:

[02:32] I found myself comparing my knowledge of English grammar to Korean grammar as well. From my personal knowledge and from what I have gathered about Asian language through peers, I’ve always found that it takes on a quite scientific form. Like you mentioned, the verb always stays the same and additional words are added. There are no exceptions. Whereas in Western languages, there seem to be a lot more exceptions to grammatical rules and spelling.

[17:06] It’s almost overwhelming to think about all the different ways text and language can be represented (e.g. from left to right, east to west). I wonder- are there any resources for educators to aid in an easier transition for students learning English?

[29:13] All these options show us that words are just a part of understanding for an individual and that there is learning encoded outside of text. Text only begins to aid in communicating ideas and messages in a written form, but there is much that cannot be encoded in text.

[39:20] While I respect the language of other cultures, I wonder if this inability to count numbers is really due to a difference in culture rather than a lack of education in certain parts of the world?

[50:05] He brings up the idea of ideas being lost in translation at the UN. This is seen not only at the UN but even in every day life, such as subtitles for TV shows or movies. Many of my English-learning students try to learn English by reading subtitles, but this could in fact be inhibiting some potential learning due to the ideas lost in translation.

In addition to my annotations, my biggest takeaway from Borditsky’s (2017) lecture is that language is a living thing. It is always changing through generations, and there is really no right or wrong language- just different ones. With the advancements in technology, the language we use and texts used to communicate has also changed. Overall, I found this lecture eye-opening and a great start to looking at how language shapes the way we think.

My name is Elizabeth Kim and I’m a secondary science teacher in the Coquitlam school district. I’ve taught many different courses in science and math over the years, but currently I am teaching junior sciences, chemistry and science for citizens. I’m halfway through the MET program- and am on my 6th, 7th and 8th course this term.

This is the bag I usually use for work and daily activities. These are some of the items that you can find in it:

1. Two sets of keys (one for my personal use and one for work)
2. A wallet
3. Laptop
4. Two reusable straws in a cute pouch that my mom made (she is a guru with all things sewing)
5. My favourite hat (always be prepared for a bad hair day)
6. Varies staple beauty products (lip balm, hand lotion, perfume)
7. A pen
8. Fisherman’s friend & gum (for the sore throat brought by the beginning of the school year)
9. Acetaminophen (for ultra headache relief)

Not pictured is the cellphone I used to take this picture, but it is probably one of the most important items I carry around with me.

I think it’s interesting to see the different ways these items can be used as text technologies. In the more obvious sense, my laptop and cellphone are used to communicate and engage with language in a digital way. However, in my wallet, you’ll find more subtle examples of text technologies. The text on my driver’s license which gives personal information about myself, or even the text “Michael Kors” on the wallet which portrays an approximate value of the item. My keys contain a scan-in gym membership card, a usb, car keys, and a garage remote, which all contain digital information to allow me to carry out specific functions in my day to day life. In a more traditional sense, the pen can also be used for communication with others and with myself.

Text technologies has changed over the years. 15 or 20 years ago, my bag would not have had the advanced technology of laptops, convenient cards and cellphones. Reusable straws were also not considered a necessary back then, so it would probably not have been included in my daily bag. The biggest difference is the advancements in technology. My bag would probably contain more paper-based notebooks, pens, erasers, etc. compared to the compact technology I carry around today.

This is an exciting idea to think about- that just two decades ago, my bag would have looked so much different. What will my bag look like two decades from now? What kind of new text technologies will I have daily access to and consider a part of my life? In this course, I hope to explore some of the technologies that have been developed and the process in order to understand what the future of text technologies might look like.