Jordon Lovig ETEC 540

For the final exercise of the course, I’ve chosen to present two scenarios related to the topic of my final assignment, which describes text analysis technologies as a way to measure student academic success and mental wellness. In both scenarios, we have a UBC course instructor… let’s say his name is Jordon. Jordon teaches an online English Literature course for first year undergraduate students. As a new(ish) professor not yet on tenure track, Jordon is very interested in the health and wellbeing of his students, and believes that if problems are identifies early on, he can intervene before they grow out of hand. To this end, Jordon utilizes text analysis technology to moderate discussion posts of the students in his class. He’s keen to identify students that may be in danger of straying off the right path. Below are two scenarios as to how this could play out.

Scenario 1- Utopian

As part of the course material for his online English Literature course, Jordon posts a discussion prompt in the form of a question in the discussion forums. Students are expected to apply core concepts from that weeks’ reading material to answer the question, as well as post their own questions to generate further discussion.

Over the course of the first few weeks, Jordon employs LIWC-22 text analysis tools to measure various dimensions of each student’s text, including word count, analytic vs authentic word usage and words per sentence. Early in the course, Jordon notices that there is one student whose textual data skews differently from the rest of the class. The student- James- relies heavily on authentic words as opposed to analytical. James’ writing style is dynamic in that it uses pronouns, conjunctions and negations in much higher frequency than his classmates. Upon closer inspection of James’ actual text submissions, it’s determined that he seems to be writing more about himself than the course material. More than that, James seems to be going through a rough time- he references loneliness, isolation and a recent breakup on more than one occasion. In some instances James doesn’t seem to be interacting with the course material at all, just writing stream of consciousness style responses based on his personal life.

Jordon Reaches out to James to see if how the course is going and if he needs any help with the required readings. James is happy to hear from Jordon- in fact, he mentions that he hasn’t really had direct contact from anyone over the past several months, since his partner left him very suddenly, and he’s been feeling very alone and despondent. Jordon listens to the student, and lets him know that there is support available for him. He passes on the contact information for UBC counselling services and shares some of his own experiences with similar situation from his personal past. James is receptive to the message, and books his first appointment with counselling services the following day. As the days and weeks go by, James’ work in the course starts to improve. He’s engaging with the course material more and making valuable contributions to the discussion forum. James admits he was in a bad situation but didn’t feel he had anyone to reach out to, so many of his issues were coming out in his forum postings. He’s thankful for the early intervention, and his academics and mental health are on their way to getting back on track.

Scenario 2- Dystopian

Same as Scenario 2, Jordon is a new instructor for an online English Literature course, and he intends to use textual analysis technology to monitor the performance and mental health of his students by analyzing their forum posts on a weekly basis.

Once again, a few weeks into the course Jordon’s analysis reveals that a student, James, is contributing a bit differently than his classmates. James’ writing style is dynamic and his word choice is authentic, not analytical. With the best of intentions, Jordon decides that an intervention is warranted, so he arranges for a Zoom chat with James. Things don’t quite go as expected. James is totally taken aback by Jordon’s suggestion that he may not be in a great state of mind. James had no idea that his forum postings were being monitored so closely. He asks why he wasn’t informed that his data would be collected at the start of the course, and questions why UBC doesn’t have a clear policy with regards to use of student data. James reveals that he is from a cultural background with a proud tradition of oral-based knowledge transfer. Based on his prior learning, it makes perfect sense that he would engage with course material in a way that may seem “dynamic” and “personal” compared to his classmates. Additionally, James is currently on a personal journey exploring his own personal gender identity, which is why the use of personal pronouns are more pronounced in his work. If Jordon has bothered to actually read James’s posts closely and consider the inherit biases in the LIWC algorithm, perhaps he would have seen that this was the case.

James is now discouraged from engaging in the course material. He feels he is “under a microscope” and that relating the course reading to his own personal experiences is not a valid approach to learning. James withdraws from the course prior to the withdrawal deadline and discontinues his studies at UBC.

Jordon may have meant well in this scenario, but in his excitement to implement a new learning technology, he totally lost track of the human being on the other side of the equation. It’s a learning experience to be sure. In the future, he vows to inform students of his practices at the beginning of the course, to refer them to relevant institution policy if they have any questions or concerns, and to always remember that technology has its own biases coded into it. Hopefully, this won’t happen again.

#1

Joseph Villella, Task 10: Attention Economy

https://blogs.ubc.ca/jvillella540/2022/07/21/task-10-attention-economy/

Joseph and I had a similar experience with this task as we both found it enjoyable and entertaining, Where our experiences differed seems to be that his focus was more so on the practical applications of manipulative design interfaces where as I was more concerned with the frustrating user experience.

I appreciate how Joseph pointed out that the exercise was a good demonstration of the dangers of blindly clicking boxes and giving permission without really thinking things through. Organizations can easily fool end users into accepting terms and conditions that are not favourable to them or even installing malicious software on their devices if we don’t pay close attention to what it is we are agreeing to.

We both highlighted the cultural norms of certain colours an layouts leading to specific responses- for example, green means yes, red means no. Joseph’s post had me thinking that if a bad faith actor chose to do so, they could exploit these norms an manipulate end users into agreeing to terms or accepting conditions that the otherwise would not have. I also appreciate how he points out that we can combat these shady practices with early intervention- educating children at an early age.

#2

Jessica Presta, Task 11: Detain/Release

https://blogs.ubc.ca/jpresta/2022/07/31/task-11-algorithms-detain-release/

I enjoyed reading Jessica’s write up on her experience with the Detain/Release program, mostly because I feel it differed from my own quite a bit. I think that Jessica approached the task with a great deal of skepticism, and it sounds like she put a great deal of thought into her decisions.

My own experience was a bit more “by the seat of my pants” so to speak, as I found myself making decisions rather hastily and allowing the AI to do most of the thinking for me, particularly towards the end.

Jessica highlights some fantastic resources in her post that really speak to the dangers of relying on AI for decision making processes such as this. We both noted that bias can be hard-coded into algorithms, but only Jessica pointed out the potential for racist profiling before completing the exercise, where as in my post I note that I didn’t really consider the possibility until after the fact.

My take away is that it’s important to approach important tasks intentionally, do your research beforehand and be aware of potential biases before making your decisions- it’s not enough to simply acknowledge them after the fact. I feel that if nothing else, Jessica would make a better lawyer than me.

#3

Melissa Santo, Task 3: Voice to Text

https://blogs.ubc.ca/melissasanto/2022/06/20/etec-540-task-3-voice-to-text/

One thing Melissa and I have in common is that we both neglected to verbally add punctuation to our audio records. However, she points out this mistake right away, mentioning she thought of it as soon as the task finished, whereas I didn’t know that was a standard practice until… well, until I read her post just now.

Both Melissa and I highlight some standard errors in our text, which I think is to be expected using this sort of technology. One difference between our assessments is that Melissa focused a bit more on the technical aspect of the exercise, where as I was more focused on whether or not the technology got the general feel and theme of what I was trying to communicated.

We also both were more or less just speaking off the top of our heads, and we both chose an emotional story to tell. Melissa and I both noticed that the technology does a poor job of conveying feeling, which is a major limitation to the technology. Reading her post caused me to reflect a bit on this point, how as technology advances it still lags behind the human experience. I think this is especially true when it comes to analyzing the written word, something that both Melissa’s post and my own make a point of conveying.

#4

Jacey Bell, Task 6: An Emoji Story

https://blogs.ubc.ca/jaceysmetcollection/2022/07/08/task-6-an-emoji-story/

I chose to link Jacey’s task for this part of the assignment because the second I saw her emoji story I knew without question which movie she was talking about (UP, 2009).

Jacey’s contribution really helped me realize how communicating with images- in this case emojis- can be a totally valid and useful mode of communication, it just all depends on context. “Reading” through her post, the title of the film was immediately obvious, and only required one emoji. The plot was fairly easy to convey as well. I think this is because the film itself is very visual and light on dialogue. Additionally, it’s a pretty well-known movie and I’m personally very familiar with it. I think she did a great job of conveying the plot through the use of images.

Contrasting Jacey’s task to my own, it’s a world of difference. The novel I chose, “White Noise” by Don DeLillo, is almost the exact opposite of the film “Up”. My novel is very dense with a great deal of dialogue and very little imagery. It also doesn’t have much plot, it’s more focused on themes and ideas. As such, I think my post makes a great foil to Jacey’s- it’s an example of a work that cannot be easily communicated through use of images.

Again, my take away is that mode of communication is highly contextual. Some modes work very well in some cases, but don’t work well at all in others.

#5

Jane Wu, Task 9: Network Analysis

https://met.for.education/?p=337

I had some technically difficulties accessing the Palladio app, but the course instructor was kind enough to take some time to share the data with me via Zoom. Although I was grateful for his assistance, I was disappointed that I wasn’t able to dig around with the data on my own. With that in mind, for this linking assignment I wanted to be sure I selected a classmate who was able to access the data to see how our experiences differed.

Jane did a great job of pulling a lot of useful information out the raw data that was provided. She came to a similar conclusion as the rest of us- that there were some consistencies in song selection across groups and individuals. However, the community she was in (1) made some different selections than what I observed when shown the data. Percussion and Night Chant were both present in her community’s top selections. My analysis was from a broader perspective, looking at all the communities, where I noticed a greater emphasis on tracks that are more contemporary and familiar in western culture- Johnny B Goode, Beethoven’s 5^th, and Melancholy Blues.

I think it just demonstrates that the same data can be manipulated in many different ways, and there are a multitude of conclusions that can be drawn. I’m not sure I agree with Jane’s observation that “the graph did not tell us anything about the people that made the choices”. From my perspective, the data gave us a cultural context to the people making the choices. I think the preference for contemporary songs performed in the English language is indicative of the cultural background of the participants. I do agree that more data is needed, and we would need to better categorize the data before making any strong conclusions.

#6

Amanda Botelho- Task 1: What’s in My Bag?

Task 1 – What’s In My Bag?

I thought Amanda’s contribution was very interesting and I chose it as my final link because it stands as a contrast to my own submission. Whereas I had very few items in my bag, Amanda’s is packed pretty full. She’s prepared for emergencies, and has tons of essentials to get her through the day. By comparison, I travel pretty light. One thing we had in common is that both of our bags included items that say something about where we’re from.

But the main thing I noticed is that while the contents of my bag are all for personal use, Amanda has items on hand for others. Blue tokens that she uses in the classroom, Kleenex for her niece and nephew, ID to access her school and classroom.

This got me thinking a bit about the nature of people and what you can tell from the contents they have on hand. I’m a pretty solitary person, but my impression from reading her submission is that Amanda is outgoing, social and always ready to help others. I also think it demonstrates how the contents of our bags are fluid- they change according to our life circumstances. For example, this week I’ll be visiting my own niece and nephew in Calgary, so I’ll be brining presents, books and yes, maybe even Kleenex.

Our original submissions were just a snapshot of a single point in time, but I think if we were to do this task every term, the contents would always tell a different story.

This was another interesting task to work through, as I surprised myself with some of the choices that I made.

As a general rule, my political beliefs hold that as a society we rely too heavily on incarceration as a rehabilitative method. I feel that the public tends to view jail as a mechanism for punishment, not rehabilitation and therefore attitudes tend to skew towards “locking them up and throwing away the key” whenever someone is deemed unfit or unsafe to participate in society. As such, I felt right from the get go that I would likely be releasing the majority of defendants and that public opinion would be very much against me.

When I actually began the exercise, I was a bit surprised at my own choices. When reading the descriptions I found myself leaning a bit more towards detaining the defendants, especially when the risk of committing a crime or violence was deemed to be high. In one case a defendant even pleaded that they would lose custody of their children if detained, but when I saw that their risk of violence was “high” I thought to myself “good! You SHOULD lose custody!” It was an odd feeling, a bit of a Stanford Prison Effect- when given just a little bit of power, I found myself wielding it with a sense of righteous authority.

But things got even stranger after that. As the exercise continued I found that I was spending less time deliberating. The three categories- Failed to Appear, Commit a Crime and Violence were color coded for each defendant with green meaning low risk, yellow medium and red high. I noticed that in all cases where Violence and Commit a Crime were red, I would default to incarceration. Soon, I wasn’t reading the contextual info at all, I was just zipping through making my judgements solely on color. This is concerning because I don’t know exactly what criteria was used to evaluate the defendants in the three categories. I just blindly trusted the information I was given. Upon finishing the exercise I did some further reflection and realized that in each case the defendants face was blurred out, yet the color of their skin was plainly visible. Could this also be a contributing factor on my decision making, even unconsciously?

As a whole, the exercise was a great opportunity to reflect on biases in decision making. Not just the inherent bias present in algorithms or hard coded into the justice system, but my own personal biases as well. I don’t believe bias can ever be fully removed from the decision making process, but acknowledging it is a good first step towards making choices in a fair and equitable manner.

I ran into an obstacle with this class right from the get go. Unfortunately the Palladio app didn’t work properly with my operating system. I wasn’t able to upload the .json file and therefore, was not able to access the data on my own. Thankfully our course instructor made himself available to assist me. We met on a Zoom call and over the course of about half an hour we worked through the data together.

Watching him manipulate the data points across the various groups of students, something became very clear almost immediately: there was a selection of three songs which were present in each group’s selections, and nearly every single student included these songs on their curated list of selections from the Golden Record.

The songs are:

1. Melancholy Blues,” performed by Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven (Tack 14)
2. Beethoven, Fifth Symphony, First Movement, the Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, conductor. (Track 18)
3. “Johnny B. Goode,” written and performed by Chuck Berry. (Track 7)

While I did find it interesting that these three tracks were so ubiquitous among those selected, I can’t say I’m particularly surprised. While our class includes students from a variety of cultural backgrounds, it is a class taught in English at a prominent western institution. As such, I think it’s fairly safe to assume that most students in the class have had some exposure to western arts and culture, particularly music and film. From there, it follows that these three tracks would be selected by most students, as they represent the three pieces (out of 27 total) which are most recognizable in western culture. Johnny B Goode is the template for modern rock and role, Beethoven’s 5^th is arguably the most recognizable piece in the western canon and Melancholy Blues, while perhaps not as well known, is sung in English and in a familiar style of music.

I consider myself a pretty big music fan, and to be honest, when I first listened to the original 27 tracks on the record, I was a bit perplexed by some of the choices. There were very few songs that I recognized and some just didn’t sound very musical to my ear at all. But after looking at the data, I feel I have a better understanding of why many of these tracks were selected. Music is a universal experience, but as this exercise shows, it’s very tuned to cultural experiences. I think it was important for NASA to ensure that the record encompassed as much of the human experience as possible, and simply choosing 27 rock, jazz, country or classical songs wouldn’t have accomplished that.

As a predominately western audience, our class selected the songs that resonated most with them. But we don’t know how this data would look if it included selections from a more diverse selection of humans, such as someone who doesn’t speak English, or someone who has never heard a song on a radio. Since the intended audience for the Golden Record is definitively not human, it makes sense to include selections from as many periods and cultures as possible.

It took me a grand total of seven minutes and eighteen seconds to finish the exercise, which I feel is probably pretty standard given the obvious design challenges. To be honest, I’m a pretty big fan of brain teasers, and I do have an interest in UX design, so despite my frustrations I found this to be a pretty entertaining task.

Something I found interesting about the game is how it used multiple modes of communication to manipulate the user. Vague and misleading text was present pretty much everywhere but it also flipped the script on other tradition signifiers. For example it’s pretty much universally understood that the color green refers to “yes” but in this case, it actually corresponded to a negative response, which was pretty confusing right from the get-go.

Unfortunately for me, things didn’t really get any easier as the exercise continued. Nothing really behaved as expected. Drop down menus asking to select a date defaulted to the year 1900, not the present year, resulting in far more scrolling than necessary. Months were listed in alphabetical order, not chronological. Even once I finally managed to navigate the menus and indicate my date of birth, it still asked me to enter my age, which should be totally unnecessary.

The section where I was required to enter biographical information (name, title, gender) certainly gave me pause for thought. The fields of entry were all quite counter-intuitive which was to be expected at this point. However what I found especially interesting is that the form required me to select a gender that matched my “title”. For example, when I chose “Mr.” as my title but “female” as my gender, it gave me an error message and did not allow me to process. This got me thinking about the nature of asking for personal information in the first place, and why it is even necessary to do so. UX issues aside, why does it matter if my gender matches my title? Or to take it a step further, why do I need to indicate my gender or title at all?

Recently in my role at Capilano University I participated in a gender diversity audit, where we took a close look at the information we ask students to submit to the institution. Something we discovered in this process was that there is so much biographical info we ask for that we don’t actually use in any meaningful way. Sex as assigned at birth doesn’t appear on class lists, transcripts, diplomas or other documentation. So why ask for it at all? As a result of this audit, we’ve begun eliminating unnecessary data points from our student systems at CapU and the student body is very pleased with this. I think moving forward, we’ll be seeing more institutions take a more intentional approach when asking for personal information- only collect what is necessary.

This is especially important when filling out forms on the internet, because you can never be quite sure who exactly this information is being shared with. Typically you do have to provide consent, however the legal language can be vague and confusing. In the exercise for this task, it only asked me to accept cookies at the END of the process, which is certainly not a best practice when it comes to data collection and privacy.

Overall, this was a pretty entertaining exercise. I felt it was a great demonstration of what NOT to do when asking for people to share information. Hopefully these are lessons I can continue to bring forward with me in my professional practice.

This was a very interesting exercise. Curating the full list of 27 tracks down to 10 certainly wasn’t easy, and as I worked through the list I found myself editing my choices several times over. One thing I noticed right away is that it would be impossible to avoid my own personal biases when making my selections. Music is far too personal an experience, and any attempt to relate these pieces to my personal experience of the human condition is bound to reflect my own attitudes and beliefs. With that in mind, I simply chose to acknowledge that my bias would be present, and choose the ten tracks which I would personally want to launch into outer space as an introduction to humanity to the rest of the universe. So without further ado…

Java, court gamelan, “Kinds of Flowers,” recorded by Robert Brown. 4:43

I thought this was a fitting introduction to the record, as it provides a vivid description of the flora and fauna of the planet it originates from. It could invoke imagery of our environment in the listener, providing some context for the remaining tracks. It’s also Carl Sagan’s favorite track, and that fact alone merit’s it’s inclusion.

“Johnny B. Goode,” written and performed by Chuck Berry. 2:38

For me, this one had to make the list as it’s really the only example of modern, contemporary music. As such, it sounds very different from other pieces on the record, and I think it could give the listener an idea of how music on earth has evolved over the years.

Bach, Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in F. First Movement, Munich Bach Orchestra, Karl Richter, conductor. 4:40

I really appreciated how the podcast pointed out that this piece was included due to it’s mathematical elements. Obviously, we’d have to assume that any potential audience likely does not speak English (or any other human language) but math is universal. I think there’s a good chance that any advanced civilization would analyze the recording mathematically, so including this track is a good idea, and a reminder that not all forms of communication have to be traditional language.

“Dark Was the Night,” written and performed by Blind Willie Johnson. 3:15

I’m a big fan of Blind Willie Johnson and early American Blues, so this one is included for personal reasons. I appreciated how the podcast pointed out that they also wanted to “make a good record” when selecting their tracks. Based on that, this one has to be included.

Japan, shakuhachi, “Tsuru No Sugomori” (“Crane’s Nest,”) performed by Goro Yamaguchi. 4:51

I chose to include this selection due to it’s minimalist nature. I like the idea of basically just a single instrument performance. In a sense this is an expression of music as a solitary pursuit, which I feel it is for many people, myself included.

Georgian S.S.R., chorus, “Tchakrulo,” collected by Radio Moscow. 2:18

In contrast to the previous selection, the inclusion of this track shows the power of music as many voices coming together in harmony. The song is also a call to action, which I feel is very important- music can be a solitary pursuit, but it can also have a collective purpose, and this is a fine example of that.

Mozart, The Magic Flute, Queen of the Night aria, no. 14. Edda Moser, soprano. Bavarian State Opera, Munich, Wolfgang Sawallisch, conductor. 2:55

I think the list wouldn’t be complete without a little bit of opera. This track really demonstrates the power of the human voice, which is really the first instrument. Here, the orchestra serves to support the singer’s voice, and being an opera, the voice doesn’t just sing a song, but it tells a story. I’m not the biggest opera fan, but it’s a fine example of how music can be utilized to weave a narrative, so I felt this one was important to include.

Beethoven, Fifth Symphony, First Movement, the Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, conductor. 7:20

I suppose it’s subject, but in my personal opinion, this is probably the most well-known piece of music, so I chose to include it in my curation of ten. The opening bars are iconic- I feel that most people, particularly in what we refer to as “western civilization” could probably identify the piece within the first few moments.

Senegal, percussion, recorded by Charles Duvelle. 2:08

I felt it was important to include this track because it’s a great example of how music doesn’t necessarily have to be based on melody or harmony, but can be rooted in rhythm. The use of percussion instruments really makes this one stand out, and it illustrates how music is experienced very differently across cultures on our planet.

“Melancholy Blues,” performed by Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven. 3:05

I really liked how the podcast mentioned that this track was a representation of the lonely voyage that the spacecraft would be taking, so I chose to include it. I also think we could extend that metaphor to our planet earth, which is on a lonely voyage in our own solar system, and the only planet with intelligent life that we are aware of. Broadly speaking, I think this shows how music can be used to represent bigger ideas, and that’s very important.

For Task 7, I’ve chosen to provide a slightly updated version of the image used in Task 1. My reasons for this include the fact that the original image was a relatively low quality and not suitable for multi-modal approach I had in mind. Additionally, I’m reading a new book, so I wanted to provide an updated image to reflect where I currently am on my learning journey.

With this in mind, I chose to take the original static image and turn it into an interactive piece using a free web application called Genial. Using this application allows me to place interactive buttons on each item in my bag which then link the learner to an additional source of information, providing context and further learning opportunities. The great thing about this is it allows content to be displayed in multiple modes- videos, sound clips, games and interactive web applications.

Enjoy!

Direct link: https://view.genial.ly/62c4c955d27e63001ace2aa3/interactive-image-interactive-image

Did you rely more on syllables, words, ideas or a combination of all of them?

Because the novel that I chose is one that is admittedly light on plot but heavy on ideas, I relied heavily on these ideas when “writing” out my emoji story. In my initial attempt I tried to rely on words, however I quickly found that the choice of emojis simply wasn’t sufficient to communicate the plot in any meaningful way.

Did you start with the title? Why? Why not?

I did start with the title because I felt it would be the most straightforward way to begin. The title of my chosen novel is two words, both of which are relatively easily communicated using emojis. As a matter of fact, once I got the title down I thought to myself “this might be easy” but once I began translating the rest of the work in earnest, I quickly discovered this was not the case.

Did you choose the work based on how easy would it be to visualize? 

No, in keeping with the task instructions, I simply chose the most recent book I read, which also happens to be my favorite novel. I will say that this particular novel, and the works of the author as a whole, have a reputation for being somewhat minimalistic- light on plot, but heavy in terms of theme and ideas. As such, I think the works lends itself well to the excersize, even if I did have some difficulty putting it together. Central themes of the work include death and mortality, consumerism and paranoia in the media. As these themes are recurring throughout the novel, I felt I didn’t have to have too many emojis. The work itself can be a bit difficult to follow even written in plain English, so I quickly discovered that any attempt to convey the actual plot using emojis was more or less fruitless. That said, I think this shows that there is more than one way to communicate information- you can try being specific, which didn’t work well for this task, or you can use “broad strokes” to convey general ideas and themes, which I felt was far more appropriate.

For Task 4, I chose to write a manual script in the style of a journal entry. The topic I chose is my mom’s recent visit for my 40^th birthday.

Whether I choose to write by hand or to type on a computer tends to depend on the type of writing I am doing. I typically write by hand when writing personal pieces- things like journal entries, dumb little poems, and letters to friends and family. I also write by hand when making notes from course reading material. I find that when writing by hand, I absorb the information better. When typing, it feels much more mechanical, and I often find that I’m not really paying close attention to what is written. Because I do a fair amount of writing by hand, I found this task to be relatively straight forward.

Because this written piece was done in a stream of consciousness style, very few edits were necessary. When I made a spelling mistake or other error, I would simply cross it out and continue writing. Interestingly, I find that when I make a mistake while writing by hand I notice it and make the correction immediately, before I continue writing. By contrast, when typing I typically don’t notice my mistakes until the word processor catches them for me. I’ll generally type out the whole piece before going back and making any corrections. I’m not sure how this really affects the final product, but I feel that when typing I’m able to “get the whole thought out” at once, making edits later, whereas by hand I am continually thinking about what I’m saying and editing the work as I go along.

Probably the most striking difference between writing and typing is the fatigue that sets in when writing by hand. I notice my work gets sloppier as I go along and I wonder if this impacts the message that I’m trying to convey. I can’t say I really prefer one method over the other- I think it’s important to take context into consideration. Typing works better for me when writing formally, when I need to proofread and ensure that language, tone and spelling and grammar are all correct. But when I’m just working through my thoughts, I prefer to write by hand. Seeing the piece come together slowly is pretty rewarding, and I often feel a sense of clarity when finished. That said, I rarely go back and read the words I’ve written- I find the act of writing is enough in and of itself.

For this task, I chose to talk a little bit about my career as an educator and how I became interested in the MET program at UBC. To begin, here is the full text of my short (4-5 min) story, which was recorded using speechnotes.co

Okay good evening I’ve given it some thought over the the past few days and I’ve been trying to think of a good story to tell. And to be perfectly honest I can really think of a of a great story for my life at least Teresa would for sure be may be appropriate for infants in in the the context of the so what I thought I would do instead it’s just talked a little bit about the work that I do in education in my career progression up to this point I’m kind of how I found myself in the m e t program as per the instructions of the assignments I haven’t done any preparation talk haven’t written anything out so I am just watching the clock here I’ve been told that I ramble before which I think is not necessarily a great quality but maybe we’ll actually serve me well for this assignment and help me fill up a few minutes here. Edmonton Alberta and I attended University at the University of Alberta where did my undergraduate in Psychology when I finished my psychology degree I found that I enjoyed the university experience so much that I just didn’t want to to leave by the university environment so it seemed like a natural fit to just start working at the school so I had a background in in kind of retail sales commission sale so I started working a little bit in student recruitment in entry-level role futon into are the admissions department and then into registrations of filling a few different roles in in the registrar’s office for several years and as I approached the age of 30 I was ready for some changes in my life there is nothing really time me down then I went to my whole life and I thought hey I think it would be great if I could pursue this line of work just in a different city so I looked around and I applied for jobs all over the country. Miguel and UBC I was interviewed I did a Skype interview for her role in the Enrollment Services at UBC and I got the job and over the next couple weeks I gave away all of my possessions on Craigslist I packed what I had left in my Honda Civic and I drove across the country and this was in 2013 and then I arrived at at UBC and in Vancouver City that I had really never actually even been to before and it worked out well I’m really glad that I took that risk I took that chance on myself because it ended up being on a fantastic. I moved into a new role in Enrollment Services at UBC and I was in that role for about six and a half years and I learned so much working really closely with students are particularly accessibility challenges financial challenges you do kind of emergency funding helping them with student loans in a lot of other things as well and I really just enjoyed the work and I enjoyed the atmosphere and it worked out pretty well so a few years into that job I decided hey you know I think it’s pretty much settled now I work in education in education so I should be pursuing a master’s degree that’s when I applied to and was admitted to the the masters of educational shortly after covid started just a couple years ago in early 2020 at a very inconvenient I’m an excellent opportunity i’m where I was offered a role as the associate register our registration and student Information Services here at the cath lab do you once again this was a big risk because it was very uncertain time I think it’s we all knew and it really big career opportunity a big promotion a lot more responsibilities taking on a roller and manage a team and I’m really over seeing entire unit really challenging so kind of me managing team we just kind of from my my kitchen counter which at the time a couple years very strange experience once again and you know I’m kind of happy to say the risk paid pretty well because I’ve been in that role for a couple years now and and I’ve really gotten a lot of experience has been very challenging keep saying challenging but it’s true throughout this time it again ghetto training 4 G’s relationships with with my staff and with other people in the institution you know doing it all through email and your team’s chats and enter screen and things like that and certainly a different world working the smaller institution very different from the UBC in the U of A where I came from a very large well-established is quite small has a lot of different challenges in terms of like funding recruitment and Retention but I really enjoyed kind of i’m going to learning about that stuff and and growing more in my role here so I’m now in the knights course of Miami TV program meeting I’ve got one more to go taking next September and then I’m done so by the end of the calendar year I’ll no have three years experience as a you know as a unit manager and in this industry disagree and I think I’ll have a lot more career opportunities coming into a 2023 and that I’m really excited to see where that takes me so that’s a brief overview that’s my story I guess we’re at about 5 minutes or so thanks and mmm that’s it have a good night

How does the text deviate from conventions of written English?

Most notably, there is no punctuation, which gives the text a “stream of consciousness” type feel, which I actually think is appropriate given the content- I was after all just speaking off the top of my head. It also includes text of audible pauses- “mmm” and “uh”, etc. Generally speaking, you would not see this in a formal written text, although you certainly do when reading dialogue in fiction.

What is “wrong” in the text? What is “right”?

There’s a great deal wrong with the text. In many cases, the technology misrepresented what I was saying. Many words, (i.e. “Teresa”, “infants”, “cath lab”,  “Miami tv”) were not actually what I said and make no sense in the context of the speech.

Interestingly, one thing the text seems to get right is recognizing proper nouns, which in most cases are capitalized. Words like UofA, UBC, Craigslist, Vancouver, etc. Also, while the many errors make the story sounds goofy and difficult to follow, I do think that overall it’s accurate enough to get a general idea of what I was trying to communicate.

What are the most common “mistakes” in the text and why do you consider them “mistakes”?

The most common mistakes are surely the presence of words I did not actually say. I would consider them mistakes because they really do change the overall message that is being communicated, and if taken literally, they make things pretty confusing. The text also doesn’t include any periods, commas, questions marks or exclamation points. I don’t know if I would consider this a mistake per se- it’s more a limitation of the technology. While the absence of punctuation does make the text more difficult to read, it also lends itself well to the stream of consciousness style of the text, which is appropriate in this context.

What if you had “scripted” the story? What difference might that have made?

I think that if I had scripted the story, I likely would have enunciated the words more clearly, spoken more slowly which would in turn have lead to fewer errors in the final product. It also would have mean fewer audible pauses. As a result, the final text would have likely looked a lot more like something that was actually written by a human being, not a speech to text application.

In what ways does oral storytelling differ from written storytelling? 

This is a great question, and I think it’s of particular interest as so many cultures place an emphasis on oral traditions. I think oral storytelling leaves itself more open to interpretation than it’s written counterpart. There are so many verbal cues- tone of voice, volume, cadence, etc. that can completely change the feel of the story. In my opinion, anything written inevitable feels more rigid and formal. Given that I was just spinning a yarn, it’s sort of odd to see my words recorded in written format- it feels far more serious when reading that it sounded when I was speaking.

I think the gap between oral and written storytelling is something worth exploring in greater detail. There’s so much knowledge to be gained by respecting oral storytelling traditions and studying them as we do with written stories. For example, I think if we had the ability to actually go back in time and see a live production of one of Shakespeare’s plays, we could learn so much about the meaning of the piece, even if scholars have studied the written text for centuries.