In Task #7, I used Microsoft PowerPoint, the camera on my iPhone, a voice recorder, and a voice-changing application (“Voice Changer”) to create a virtual museum that showcased the items in my bag.
Each item in my bag was put on display as an interactive “exhibit” and visitors had the ability to travel to different rooms in the virtual museum and interact with each of the items. As visitors move to different rooms, they are presented with the opportunity to hear each of the items’ origin story, told from the item’s point of view.
How to Access My Virtual Museum
To access my virtual museum, click on the ‘Dropbox’ link below, wait a minute, and download the PowerPoint to your computer. You will require Microsoft PowerPoint to access it.
If you receive the “Protected View” warning message, please make sure to hit “Enable Editing”. You will need to put the slide show into ‘Present’ mode (F5) to be able to properly experience it.
Reflection
Overall, I found this task to be challenging as I created a video walkthrough of my bag in week 1. The video already relied on written-linguistic, audio, and visual semiotic systems. This left me wondering what else I could do to “bend” the semiotic mode of my submission.
After some inspiration from Ernesto during our live session and the ‘Everything is Alive’ podcast he recommended (https://www.everythingisalive.com/), I decided to create a virtual museum showcasing my bag. The virtual museum gives visitors the choice to explore different items (“exhibits”) in my bag and to listen to each item tell its origin story, how I interact with the item daily, and the item’s significance is in my life. To me, the true purpose of this assignment is to help others learn more about me, what tools I need to make it through my day, and the significance of these tools, so what better to do this than to have the objects in my bag tell that story.
The final submission relies on several semiotic systems (as outlined by the New London Group (1996)) including written text, auditory discussions, visual images, and spatial modes, to create a multi-modal experience. I chose to present it in this way to give visitors the ability to “choose their own experience” and focus on objects that most interested them.
Method
To build the virtual museum, I followed the iterative design process outlined in Brennan & Resnick’s (2013) article:
- Imagining – I thought about different ways of presenting the information and how to vary the semiotic modes employed. I started by trying to come up with ideas to target all semiotic modes, before eliminating the ones that were too challenging to achieve, given the deadline.
- Creating – I created the virtual museum.
- Playing – I tested the virtual museum and made sure it worked.
- Sharing – I shared it with my wife and family members to ensure that it was easy to use and navigate.
- Reflecting – I am now reflecting on the experience.
Benefits of Mode-Changing
Upon completion of my submission, I noted a few benefits of mode-changing:
- Prensky (2001) notes that ‘digital natives’ need to be immersed in technological environments. The ability to click through and interact with the virtual museum increases the likelihood that it will be able to engage and motivate these digital learners to explore it.
- Tobin (2014) recommends creating alternative formats as a strategy for incorporating universal design for learning (UDL). By creating a submission that relies on audio, text, and visual images, this will hopefully increase accessibility to a greater number of users.
- My students have come to expect more than one semiotic mode or output from me. Recently, in an undergraduate tax class, students described the text-only textbook as “boring” and unengaging. Multimodalities are required to captive and motivate learners. This multimodal approach achieves this expectation.
Challenges of Engaging in Mode-Changing
- I found it challenging to think of a new creative idea that would employ various semiotic modes. In addition, I found it challenging to figure out a way to employ some of the semiotic modes. For example, I was uncertain how to employ gestural semiotic systems in my virtual museum.
- I found that programming the virtual museum was extremely time-consuming compared to generating a pure text-based submission.
- I found it challenging to not know what tangible, incremental effect adding a new semiotic mode/system had on my final product. What is the incremental benefit of introducing a new audio clip or a new image for the visitor?
- I found it challenging to figure out which semiotic modes were most effective in my situation. I considered whether this depended person-to-person as well. For example, I find it difficult to get through long, written texts but some may find this to be the semiotic mode of choice.
References
Brennan, K., & Resnick, M. (2012). Imagining, creating, playing, sharing, reflecting: How online community supports young people as designers of interactive media. (pp. 253-268). Springer New York. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-4696-5_17
Prensky, M. (2001). Digital natives, digital immigrants part 1. On the Horizon, 9(5), 1-6. https://doi.org/10.1108/10748120110424816
The New London Group. (1996). A pedagogy of multiliteracies: Designing social futures. Harvard Educational Review 66(1), 60-92.
Tobin, T. J. (2014). Increase online student retention with universal design for learning. Quarterly Review of Distance Education, 15(3), 13.
Hi Richard,
The virtual museum was such an interesting idea and I really enjoyed exploring your post. I really like how at the end of your post you talk about the pros and cons of mode bending. I find myself thinking about this in terms of the learners in my class and how mode bending can support their needs.
Thanks
I loved this approach. The virtual museum was really effective, and I can think of a lot of ways this could be used for organising and disseminating information. It’s really interesting how this approach emphasises that it’s an art project.