Task 8: Golden Record

I had never heard of the Golden Record so I found it very intriguing when I read a little more about it and heard some of the background behind it in the podcast. It was interesting to hear the sampling of miscellaneous sounds they deemed representative of earth – whales, tools, a heartbeat, “hello” in various languages etc. They were limited in how they formatted the record in order to make it sustainable overtime as well as include a complete sampling of work. More is not necessarily better, but they focused on thoughtfulness to create a “work of art”. The songs aren’t considered “classics” for the most part, but more of a sampling around the world of different types of sounds. It would be overwhelming to be inclusive in creating a representation of the human species as a whole while curating different types of sounds as well as trying to figure out what “message” we want to send in case of extraterrestrial life and how they may interpret them.

I was drawn to the less obscure sounds for the most part, prioritizing sounds/songs that were familiar to me but also new sounds that I enjoyed or elicited some sort of emotion or memory. Here are my top 10 from the “Music from Earth” playlist with a few of my initial impressions.

Track 1
Bach, Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in F. First Movement, Munich Bach Orchestra, Karl Richter, conductor.
- I enjoyed this classical sound as well as their reasoning behind including it, I have never really thought about mathematical relationships within the music and wonder how we can analyze other music mathematically.
Track 3
Senegal, percussion, recorded by Charles Duvelle.
- I enjoyed the African percussion, seemed upbeat and I could picture it being played at a celebration.
Track 6
Mexico, “El Cascabel,” performed by Lorenzo Barcelata and the Mariachi México.
- Somewhat of a “classic” sound of Mexico with the Mariachi music and reminded me of my honeymoon in Mexico.
Track 7
“Johnny B. Goode,” written and performed by Chuck Berry.
- The one classic rock song, plus it is a catchy tune most people would recognize and be able to sing along to.
Track 14
“Melancholy Blues,” performed by Louis Armstrong and his Hot Seven.
- Another more classic song, I like the trumpet and the “soul” that you can feel within the song.
Track 18
Beethoven, Fifth Symphony, First Movement, the Philharmonia Orchestra, Otto Klemperer, conductor.
- Even before they called it an epic track I thought to myself this is an “epic sound” – it was also cool hearing the difference between the high and low frequencies when they isolated the sounds.
Track 19
Bulgaria, “Izlel je Delyo Hagdutin,” sung by Valya Balkanska.
- I chose this one more for the story behind it, it is about an unkillable rebel hero, and would someone (or something) take this as a threat?
Track 20
Navajo Indians, Night Chant, recorded by Willard Rhodes.
- Almost reminded me of more modern indie music at times.
Track 23
Peru, wedding song, recorded by John Cohen.
- Had a bit of a haunting melody, another song that I liked the story behind it.
Track 26
“Dark Was the Night,” written and performed by Blind Willie Johnson.
- Southern sounds, another recognizable song and made me think of a movie although I couldn’t put my finger on which one.

Task 7: Mode Bending

To start off for this task I was pretty blocked creatively. I didn’t want to just do something standard like verbally list the contents of my bag but I also was drawing a blank on how I wanted to give a “voice” to my bag.

In my brainstorming I found it is hard to isolate only one mode, often things naturally are multimodal, so for this task, I went with it and tried not to force myself into only one “box”. I started off thinking about doing an animation or an interactive photo giving the items sound effects but I found I was spending more time on the visual component than the sound so I scraped it and decided to go with a song/rap.

For some reason, the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air song came to mind to try to remix. It was definitely harder than I thought to change the words but keep the flow and rhythm of the song. As my original “What’s in your bag” photo was based on my diaper bag I wanted to center it around that and what I really use it for.

I utilized an online audio recorder on my computer and had the instrumental music playing off my phone. I had to practice a few times to get the beat and timing right – listen below.

Lyrics

To the intro song of “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air“

Now this is a story all about how
My life got flipped turned upside down
And I’d like to take a minute, just sit right there
I’ll tell you how my bag became an essential of care

In West Canada born and raised
In Penticton is where I spent most of my days
Chillin’ out, maxin’, relaxin’ all cool
Meetin my husband outside of school
A couple years later at the alter we stood
Started makin’ plans for the baby that would
Then came a blue-eyed girl which we shared
We often like to take her out for fresh air

We went for a walk, at the lake that’s near
We started out fresh or so it would appear
A rumbling happened that gave us a scare
So I thought “Grab the bag – the essential of care”

I pulled out the bag, grabbed a wipe or two
Cleaned her up while she let out a coo
Rolled up the diaper and said “smell ya later”
Looked at my girl, my little tater
Thanks to the bag – the essential of care
Simply a day in the life, I’ll leave it there

Task 6: An Emoji Story

Emojis help to convey emotion through text. Where there can often be misinterpretation over written text due to a lack of facial expressions, tone of voice etc. emojis serve to fill the gap. However, they are not foolproof, people can often misinterpret the meaning of an emoji, two hands placed together may look like “prayer hands” to some, while to someone else it looks like a high five. Another issue could be that someone does not have the same type of phone as you and therefore the emoji may appear differently or they may not be able to see it at all.

An interesting feature of this task is that is not language-specific, so it does not require you to be an English speaker to try to figure out what it means. I find it quite hard to discuss my process without any spoilers in regards to my emoji story, but I quite enjoyed this week’s task. Leading up to it, I created an emoji guessing game with my sister sending movie/tv titles back and forth which helped in the brainstorming process. In trying to determine what piece of work I was going to choose I went through my emojis so that I could be inspired and an idea would potentially jump out. I would think of a movie/story that I know well and then scroll through the emojis to see if I would be able to explain the plot. I went with big ideas and utilized different lines for different scenes. However, one unforeseen downside of this task was that it ruined my algorithm of recently/most used emojis in my phone.

My emoji story is a movie.

Can you guess it?

Task 5: Twine

Twine reminded me of the Goosebumps books I used to read as a child. It was always exciting to be able to “choose your own adventure” and see what different endings you could have. It is definitely harder than I thought to actually create your own. I enjoyed the combination of storyboarding and coding and definitely see myself trying this with my students. The hardest part was thinking about what to do the “game” about, but since it is almost Halloween (and continuing the Goosebumps idea) I decided to go for a bit of a spooky feel. My husband and I bounced ideas off each other in regards to the plot of the story and what I wanted to happen. There were a few main things I noticed in the process:

There was no option to “undo” something. I found this to be a bit of a challenge, I would test something that didn’t work and am so used to being able to just hit undo but instead I had to go back in and edit whatever I had done.
I would search for tutorials or “how to” as I went when I wanted to do something, for example – how to add a photo. I learned the code <img src=”LINK” /> which enabled me to do so. I thought it helped to add to the story to add some images to set the scene.
I found that learning the keyboard shortcuts was easier, for example adding links to just use the square brackets instead of utilizing the “link” button.
I tried some of the other story formats but noted that some of them were definitely more advanced than my understanding so I stuck with the standard one.
The main frustration I had was trying to figure out how to create a link that went to another option within my story. For example, when you went through the green door you ended up in the foyer but I also wanted to have the path from the front door join up. I never was able to find out how to make these connections but in the process of trying, I discovered other features such as text animation.

Overall it was a fun process and I could see how it could quickly snowball into quite an involved adventure so I tried not to get too big too quick. I hope you enjoy it and good luck!

Rickly’s Manor

Task 4: Potato Printing

For this task, I chose to use my own name for my potato stamp – Katie. I utilized capital letters in order to create straight lines as much as possible because I knew that trying to do a lower case ‘a’ and ‘e’ would be difficult to get a smooth round edge. I lucked out that all my letters in uppercase had straight edges (no ‘O’ or ‘S’ for example), however, the ‘A’ provided a little more difficulty in cutting out the inside piece. I thankfully caught myself before I made my template by realizing it had to be a mirror image in order for it to print the word properly on the paper. This added a bit more difficulty because I had to visualize each letter to ensure I was flipping it properly. I created this stamp with a russet potato due to its more oval shape in order to provide me with more space for my letters. I had to try to plan out my spacing in order to fit all my letters on the potato. I used a sharpie to try to make a template, however, the ink didn’t really work so I kind of carved them out instead. I was unsure if it was better to make individual letter stamps from separate chunks of potatoes but in the end, decided to do the whole word on one so that it would be easier to create a duplicated print. It was also difficult to cut out the pieces between the letters without snapping off unwanted chunks of the letters.

I created a timelapse of me creating my potato stamp.

I used an acrylic craft paint in black that I applied with a paintbrush in order to try to consistently apply the paint so that I could try to replicate my “word.” I tried using a fairly heavy coat of paint each time I applied it to the stamp in order to make a more consistent print. I used cardboard to apply my stamp which in hindsight wasn’t the best because it isn’t a smooth surface and some of the cracks resulted in ‘blank space’ from the stamp. It took me 5 prints to get two stamps that I felt were close enough to be identical. Once I starting trying to make my print I also realized that it was essential the letters were level or it wouldn’t show up on my print, part of the E for example seemed a little sloped which resulted in a less crisp print.

It took me 7.5 minutes to create my word and then another 8 minutes or so to get close to identical stamps. I felt the two bottom prints were the most consistent. If I were to consider this in terms of words per minute it would work out to 0.67 wpm. This is incredibly inefficient In comparison to the 80-90 wpm I can type or what I can write by hand. The mechanization of writing was a way to increase the efficiency of creating text. If you think of how long it would’ve taken to make a book by hand vs after the printing press and then now with digital printers we have been able to become faster and more efficient at creating text and on a larger scale. Instead of the ~15 minutes, it took to create 5 stamps, I could’ve probably printed 3000 “stamps” (considering 5 stamps per page, with a printer with a speed of 40 ppm). Along with efficiency thanks to mechanization is consistency. Having to create this stamp by hand had a lot of variability between the letter spacing, size, and alignment. Applying the paint or “ink” by hand also resulted in variability in my prints – something mechanization would also improve. They say time is money and in the world of printing, the mechanization of writing has allowed for greater output in little time.

Task 3: Voice to Text

Talk to text is something I occasionally use while driving as well as if I am going to tell a story to someone over text because it is faster and easier than trying to type it out on my phone. When I was trying to think about what I would talk about during my 5-minute story, and after looking at the article about the new Indigenous language app, I decided to utilize a prompt that we did in a talking circle at a staff meeting while learning about the Okanagan protocols of talking circles. The question was “who do you come from?” – The people, the places, the experiences where you came from. I utilized this to tell a little bit about my history. Below is my unedited, unscripted, 5-minute voice-to-text story:

Who do you come from?

I decided to follow the prompt of who do you come from? It is a promise that I have used in a indigenous talking Circle and it basically considers where you come from in regards to the land the people and your experiences. I grew up in kaleden BC which is in the Okanagan and I came from my parents Nicole and gored reham I have a sister named Brittany and over the years we have had various pets. I lived in this house until I was 11 where we moved to priddis Alberta which is outside of Calgary. I lived here while I went to Junior High grades 7 to 9 and then when I got to grade 10 we moved to Okotoks Alberta. Is also outside of Calgary. I played a lot of sports and because my bus ride from the country where we lived was an hour and a half each way it was one of the reasons we moved to Okotoks so that it was easier on my parents when they needed to pick me up from my sports and I didn’t have to spend three hours a day on the bus on a day where I didn’t have any sports. After I graduated I went to University of Victoria and I completed my Bachelors of Science in biology and psychology. I lived in Victoria for the four years during and stayed for an extra year after. I really enjoyed being back in BC and wanted to go back to where I came from as that is where most of my family is currently. I moved back to Kelowna and completed my Bachelor’s of Education ubco and after I finish the program I came back to Penticton. My parents and my sister have all come back to contact in as well from Alberta. And now I live here with my husband Graham and my daughter Remy. I work at a middle school just down the road, however this year I am on maternity leave and am home with my daughter.

When I compare my text above to something I may have typed, it deviates mostly with the grammar and spelling. There is no grammar unless you say it – “period” “comma” etc. I made sure as much as possible while I was telling my story to include grammar, but it was also hard to remember to include grammar as I was thinking of what to say. Spelling isn’t something you can adjust on the fly, you would have to edit it after the fact. I used the website Speechnotes to record my story and tried not to look at what it was recording as I was saying it, otherwise, my perfectionism would’ve kicked in when I saw it misspelling or misrecording what I was trying to say. Typically I find the main spelling errors are locations or personal details, such as names. On my phone I have more trouble with locations such as Kelowna will be spelled as Kelona, however, this website did a pretty good job of spelling the places correctly (minus some capitals). The website still struggled with names however, my husband’s name typically comes up as “Graham” instead of the proper spelling Graeme, my sister “Brittany” should’ve been Brittney and my Dad’s name “gored reham” should have been Gord Reum. I think of my Mother-in-law who frequently utilizes this tool because she can’t see the text on her phone without her glasses. This means she doesn’t proofread before she sends her messages and often there is straight-up gibberish. In some cases where I may not have annunciated, it resulted in broken English or total mistakes such as “contact in” was Penticton.

If I had scripted the story I think there would be more flow and less “thinking” while I was speaking. I was surprised that I didn’t have fillers such as “um or like” which can typically happen when you’re trying to think as you speak. It would also take me much less time to read my story if it was prewritten as opposed to trying to think of what I wanted to say as I spoke. I could have edited it in advance to make sure I included all the details I wanted to because when you are speaking you can’t go back and add a detail to the beginning for example.

Sometimes when I write, am brainstorming or just trying to get my thoughts out I will also utilize this feature, so I can quickly get what’s in my head onto paper and later go in to edit it. It is a useful tool for students who struggle with written language, a way to get their thoughts down without having to worry about the actual writing or even typing.

Oral storytelling is very different from written storytelling. If you have ever heard a story from a great storyteller you’d agree. A good story is told in a way that draws you in and engages you, the tone and tempo varies in order to set the scene or elicit emotion. Although descriptive writing can do similar things, it doesn’t compare to an oral story.

Task 1: What’s in your bag?

What’s in “Our” bag?

This year my day-to-day bag looks a little different than it did in the past. I typically carry a school/work bag and rarely used a purse, usually just my wallet if I was running around on the weekend. However, I am not working in my usual role as a teacher this year, I now have a new role, as of this summer, which is a Mom. In many ways this has shifted my life, including what’s in my bag. No longer does leaving the house include just grabbing my wallet and keys, a lot of extra baggage is required for my little sidekick. So below is what’s in OUR bag.

This bag contains mostly essentials that we need whenever we leave the house. Along with what’s contained in the bag I always carry water with me, at times it is a cup with a straw so it isn’t actually in the bag, but it is also an essential for me. I typically go through this bag every couple of days to restock things or make sure I haven’t accumulated random items I don’t need.

Bag – I chose a backpack-style diaper bag to be hands-free and for added comfort when carrying things like a cart seat etc. It is also easy to throw in the bottom of my stroller. The green is currently my favourite colour and also matches the accent wall of her nursery. It has lots of pockets on the outside and inside in order to keep things organized.

Essentials – Diapers, wipes, change pad, doggy bags for garbage on the go, these items are pretty self-explanatory

Clothes – An extra shirt for me, two extra outfits for Remy, and a sweater – because spit up and blowouts happen!

Mask – Because we’re living through a pandemic and my province has a mask mandate

Car seat cover – Most days we meet my Mom or a friend for walks down at the beach, I use this so that she can nap and stay out of the direct Okanagan sun.

My “mini” bag – This fanny pack/cross body bag I use if I need to run in somewhere without needing to bring the whole backpack, once again it allows for hands-free. I keep it inside the diaper bag, it contains my wallet, keys (car, house, parents house, library card tag), an extra mask

Airpods – For listening to music, podcasts, talking on the phone etc. They also contain a rainbow sticker that I created using a Cricut which shows my creativity and love of crafting/creating, Remy is also my “rainbow baby”

Health Passport – I carry this for Remy’s doctor appointments and checkups in order to track her measurements, shots etc.

Textiles – swaddle/blanket, burp clothes, face clothes

Extra pacifier in sterilizer case, in case she drops hers that is usually on a pacifier clip attached to her or her car seat

We talk about text being a creation, these items represent the ultimate creation – the new life of a baby. These items serve as text in order to tell a story of a slightly overprepared new Mother and her baby. The contents representing my Type A personality of organized, efficient, and purposeful. Shown also in the way I grouped items together for the photo and neatly put things together – a way I often try to present myself as well.

The main piece of text technology is the piece that is missing from the photo which is my phone. I am obviously using my phone in order to take the photo but it is also usually contained within this bag. Along with this are my AirPods which allow me to communicate with other people, listen to music, audiobooks or podcasts. The library tag on my keychain also serves as a piece of text technology in that it allows me to take out books but also in the way the barcode is coded for my account and allows me to easily check out at the library.

When I think about what this bag may have looked like 15 years ago or even 25 I would’ve been in Kindergarten/Grade 1 and Grade 10. The contents of my bag would’ve 100% been for me vs currently most of these contents are for my baby. In both cases, I would’ve still had a backpack but it would’ve most likely contained duotangs, binders, and a lunch kit. 15 years ago I would’ve also typically carried a duffle bag due to the sports I played.

The presence of not one, but two masks would probably indicate to an archeologist that we were living in a time of a pandemic, or maybe this will be the “norm” going forward and won’t seem odd in the future. They might also guess I am a first-time Mom carrying her health passport around to note every piece of change like her updated weight.

Text Technologies

The Changing Spaces of Reading and Writing