For this specific task, I chose to do Option 1 as I have found that in my daily life, I do not physically write as much anymore. I do write a daily sentence reflection on my day everyday and I do physically write out the things we are doing in my day plan as a teacher but other than that, everything has been digitized for me. Even my planner message and daily schedule are digitized and on projected display for students as they walk in to my classroom. Just the other day, I asked students to do their good copy of a poster project printed and not typed and some were aghast that I was asking this so I have been noticing the lack of printing in my own life and my class’s life as well.

I decided to reflect on a day this past week in my life that I felt a bit overwhelmed and thought it would be a good practice to write out my feelings. Below is my stream of consciousness and thoughts.

Do you normally write by hand or type? Did you find this task difficult or easy? Explain.

As mentioned above, their are a few times a day where I write by hand but most often I type everything of real significance and importance. Especially in a program like MET, everything is completed online so I rarely have an opportunity to write by hand and in an effort to reduce paper waste, going digital has also been helpful in that effort.

I actually found that I enjoyed writing my reflection/diary entry but I think it was because it was also a type of cathartic experience as I did have a difficult day and I found that writing physically helped to clear my mind. I will say that writing by hand consistently would probably frustrate me because I do not like how my printing becomes worse once I write for longer.

What did you do when you made a mistake or wanted to change your writing? How did you edit your work? Did you choice of media play a part in how you edited your work?

When I made a mistake or wanted to change my writing, I decided to embrace it. I crossed out a couple of words on the page and some letters I was able to change if it was a minor mistake. I was writing with my favourite uni-ball gel pen and my writing experience was very smooth and enjoyable but that meant I could not erase any work and would need to cross out or use a white-out for corrections.

What do you feel is the most significant difference between writing by hand and using mechanized forms of writing? Which do you prefer and why?

I would say that I prefer writing on a computer. I am grateful for the neatness and organization of it all but there are certain times when I need to write by hand for my own personal idiosyncrasies. I did this more in in-person university classes because when I take notes by hand I find I memorize the information better than if typing it on a computer so I would often leave my laptop at home for classes but now, in teaching, and trying to reduce unnecessary waste, I limit my time writing by hand.