Almost Published

Internet Archive:
To upload our ebook to the Internet Archive, we simply need to select the file and then fill in some simple metadata.  I don't think there is anything too complicated here. I am assuming that we can simply upload our book in the epub format.  I can't find where it says otherwise...

Feedbooks:
If we want to upload our book to Feedbooks, we're going to have to practically recreate the whole book.  They don't allow to upload a book that has already been created.  I don't know if it is going to be worth doing this since we've worked so hard already on creating great formatting.

Scribd:
We could totally publish our book on Scribd!  It's simple--just upload the epub format and that's that!


Kindle:
See my previous post for a more in-depth look at Kindle publishing.

Becoming Digiliterate: Marketing Our Ebook

Sad sad SAD, I am so sorry that we never got around to advertising this bad boy!  That's one of my fave things to do, and with my job, I kind of know how to go about marketing.  Here are a few ideas of social media marketing strategies that I hope are helpful, and who knows?  Maybe this thing will make it big!

• Facebook.
• Your best friend.  Create a page for the ebook, and list it under the "book" category.  Make the cover the profile picture, but then be sure to make the cover picture something with PEOPLE in it, preferably a group picture of the class or something.  This will make the page seem less like an advertisement and something that people who know class members will want to know more about. 
• Remember, a picture is worth a thousand words...and people like them way more than a thousand words.  Document the progress of your ebook with pictures and post them as it progresses.  This will create anticipation for the final project and people will be more likely to check it out once it's done.  Maybe they'll even ask you guys about it!
• Invite EVERYONE to be a part of the group or to like the page.  They probably will.  Then once they do, they'll receive all of your updates.  Be sure to invite author pages or people who will have an interest in the project to like the page.  (Like, if the Provo Library has a Facebook page, invite them.)
• Post like, 2 or 3 times a week.  Post questions, polls, etc. (things that generate participation).  
• Like other people's stuff and comment AS THE PAGE (this will be better if everyone in the class is made an administrator/contributor.) Be sure that you only comment or like things that you WANT the ebook to be associated with.  For example, like and comment on BYU's page, or write on their wall or something.  But don't go liking offensive images or things like that, especially when you're on as the ebook.
• Instagram
• You can use Instagram to post to Facebook.  Create an Insta account that the class has the username and password to so that they can post related images and gain a good following from their personal friends.  
• Instagram makes pictures cool and also incorporates hashtags really well, so use hashtags like #literacy, #byu, #english, #digiliteracy, etc.  and your posts will come up whenever anyone searches one of those.
• Use apps like Like4Likes or other apps that you can download.  These basically just get random people to like your pictures, but the pics with the more likes show up the most on Instagram when people click on the little magnifying glass.  Also, it'll get you a lot more followers.  Since this book is something that is easily downloadable, it can get popular wherever and isn't confined to a nearby audience, like a local business or something would be.
• Put a link in your bio.  Either to the Facebook page or where it's available for download or the class blog.  There are no hyperlinks on individual posts, so say "Link in bio" after a post if you want to direct your audience somewhere else.
• Twitter
• Start a Twitter account under Becoming Digiliterate or something and USE THOSE HASHTAGS.  
• Follow a lot of people and they will follow you back
• Post questions and stuff to start discussions, but also the occasional funny meme or something.  People like humor.
• LinkedIn
• I'm not super familiar with this one, but it's great for finding professionals.  Most authors probably have a LinkedIn account, so get the students to make accounts and get in touch with them there.  
• Have them ask authors, professors, etc., to review the book and give their opinions.
• Goodreads
• Start a Goodreads page for the group!  Invite your friends and start discussions on the wall.  Give links to the Facebook page and where the book is available.  Participate in other discussions and  MAKE REFERENCES TO THE EBOOK. 
• Use Goodreads to post on Facebook
• Amazon
• Get people to review this thing on Amazon.  We know that the higher people rate it, the more it will be suggested.  Ask through all other media outlets for people to write reviews and rate your ebook.  ADVERTISE THAT IT IS FREE. People LOVE free stuff, no matter what it is.
• BYU
• Post flyers on the boards around campus for the social media accounts.  Tell them which hashtags to search.  Put them on the corkboards around the JKB, JFSB, the Wilk, wherever you want
• Use The Scoop.  Ask Tess Hauglid to put a plug in for the ebook in the Humanities newsletter that goes out once a week.
• Ask your professors and classmates to download and review the book.  Be proud of your work and they'll be impressed!
• Piggyback
• Reading in the Digital Age had quite a lot of downloads.  I'm not sure how to do this, but I bet it's possible to find out where those downloads came from.  Advertise Becoming Digiliterate as a sequel and available for free download.  You've already got an audience, so don't lose them!  They can be a really great place to advertise and will most likely read book 2.
• On the class blog
• I don't know if anyone really followed our blog, but there are ways to put "widgets" on the blog, or little pictures of the Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter logos that you can click on and they'll direct you to the respective pages.  Super helpful!  
• Put down contact info if people have questions.  Since the rest of the class will be leaving, this should be optional for them, but Dr. Burton should have his email or some way that readers can get in touch with him for more information.

It Was the Best of Times, It Was... Also Kind of Rough

So my Entry to English Studies class spent the majority of the semester collaborating to create an e-book about the movement of reading and literary study to platforms like Amazon, Goodreads, and the Kindle. If you are about to embark on a similar journey, here are a few tips based off my personal experience:

1. Our process was to first study these platforms through personal use, then choose a meaningful novel in our lives, and then use the novel to discuss a certain point about our e-book's subject matter. If I could do it over, I would have formed a table of contents for our book as a class before we ventured out on our own to find topics. I felt stressed not really knowing which points I should address for the good of our book, and forming the table of contents after having chapters formed is an awkward process. I also would pick your subject matter before you pick your novel (if going this route), and would match your novel of choice to the things that the book as a whole require you include in your chapter.

2. Trust your peers. I learned a lot from reading my classmate's chapters.

3. I don't know how to exactly avoid this, but try your hardest to divide the work load evenly. Also, I hate Calibre with a fiery passion, so I personally would not suggest using that platform to create the e-book. Though, I only had this assignment once, and am told that it was harder because I was using a Mac. It took 10+ hours to create a version of the e-book that we only looked at once before creating the next build. I don't think it's necessary to create a new build with each new round of chapters, so I would also suggest creating one build every two, three, or even four weeks. That being said, it could be tempting to just create an iBook because it is so easy, but I think it is really worth it to create an e-book that can be read on the Kindle.

Overall, I think collaborative learning has its benefits. The fact that we created an e-book as a class of eight and a professor that can now be published is incredible. I will continue to reference our book for many years, and am overall very grateful for the experience.

Learning From Experience

When I learned on the first day of class that we would be curating an ebook and then actually publishing I almost could not believe it. But Dr. Burton our English professor had proof that the impossible had been done by a previous class in their ebook, Writing About Literature in the Digital Age. So from their example we began our own process to publishing our own ebook Becoming Digiliterate.

We had a prompt to write about a piece of literature and relating it to what we find on three digital literature platforms: the Kindle, Goodreads, and Amazon. We blogged about those ideas that we had, and then we each individually further developed the best ideas into chapters.

Then came one of the harder parts, putting all of our ideas into a working table of contents through this blog. This was useful for ideas, but eventually during class we were able too discuss our two chapters and decide on which part of the book it fit in: Find, Read, Connect, and Create. This seemed to be most effective.

At first we were doing most of the writing and blogging from our own separate homes and other than the blog we had no communication amongst us until class time. We all downloaded the WhatsApp app, and we were able to send text messages to a group text. We also had been using the Google docs and been sharing those files under folders as one of our classmates compiles the ebook. Google drive
was mostly effective, but there were some glitches in sharing.

Overall I would say that the ebook is worth the price. Through the writing process I was able to learn so much more about the three platforms we wrote about, and also To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee that was my focus of my two chapters. My whole opinion on digital literature has changed, and our ebook can also help other students and avid readers feel the same.

Our Self-Publishing Experiment

Ever heard that old adage about “too many cooks in the kitchen?”  I definitely thought about that when Dr. Burton proposed the idea to create a class ebook to us.  How were nine very different people supposed to create an ebook that was cohesive, informative, and would be effective?  Well…I learned!  This project has been challenging for all us, and there have been both good and bad aspects of it. 

First, the good.  I learned SO MUCH about self-publishing that I had never known.  I loved being able to use current social sources, not only stuffy scholarly articles that used big words and doctorate degrees to prove their points.  I liked that the Average Joe can contribute and be a valuable voice today.  It also helped me feel like all the time I spend on social media is not wasted; it’s research!  So that was good for my conscience.  I liked how many times we had to edit our individual chapters, and the great feedback that we were able to give each other.  I’m someone who likes to write and considers everything perfect after the first draft, so while it was a blow to my ego to have to go through my own stuff so many times, it was good for me!  I also found myself invested in the chapters of my fellow classmates.  This was a project that affected all of us, and I wanted them to succeed just as much as I wanted to do well myself! 

Then there were struggles.  I don’t think that the work was divided up fairly with this project.  Some people had to spend long hours compiling and editing everything, while others had nothing to worry about over the weekend.  I also think that if we had been editing each others’ work from the very beginning, there wouldn’t have been a need for so many drafts and different versions.  Everyone was also on different schedules with a million activities going on in their lives, so getting all the chapters in to be edited by their due dates was hard as well.  That’s just something that collaborative efforts have to deal with though.

Overall, this project was good for me.  I think that our book, Becoming Digiliterate, was a worthwhile effort and I liked putting the things into practice that we learned in the classroom.  I think that other classes should do this project as well!  Maybe start it a bit sooner so there isn’t such a time crunch at the end, but experience is the best teacher!

The Worth of a Project

Group projects are hard.

I think that at some point in every person’s life, they’ve had one of those group projects that make them never want to work with another person ever again. When I was told at the beginning of this semester that I would be working with the rest of my nine-person class to create an ebook about digital literature together, I agreed on the outside, but on the inside I was cringing.

A whole semester for a group project… I was definitely prepared for the worst.

At first I think it was difficult, everyone had their own ideas of what should and shouldn’t be included, how it should be formatted, who was in charge of what, as well as so many other issues. But as we began to actually communicate with each other and realize the importance of (the dreaded) peer editing process, we began to learn and grow together as a class instead of trying to learn individually, which would have failed. While it stretched us all, the fact that we had to rely on and help each other ultimately created unison throughout our ebook while still maintaining each individual identity and opinions. The work wasn't always evenly distributed, and this did cause some issues, but we had some kick butt people who really took their work into stride even when they were overwhelmed. This project never would have worked though if each of us hadn't buckled down and opened ourselves up to criticism and critique from our professor but also each other.

My class' whole purpose was to create an ebook about studying literature in the digital age. In some ways our project helped me with this concept, and in other ways I felt it took away from it. While our ebook as a whole definitely shows ways that digital literary study can be furthered, I did feel as though we focused so much on individual aspects of this concept that I barely actually got to put these theories into use. But I do believe that this ebook will be able to help me, as well as others, as we make the transition from classic literary studies to digital literary studies. And I don’t believe that it’s a “one or the other” situation, I think it is possible that both digital and classic can work hand in hand if we let them.

For myself, this project taught me the value of letting others read my work. I hate sharing my work before I believe it's perfect, and this forced me to. I learned that some situations require me to work with others, and this made me take interest in their works as well. And I also learned that my opinion can matter out there with this new turn of the digital age.

So what began as a social nightmare in my eyes, ended as a project well worth my time that taught me not only about digiliteracy, but also the value of a group project done well.

Evaluating the class, and the project, and the everything.

How does one begin to evaluate a group project honestly, in a place where the entire group can see it and know exactly who said it? Perhaps timidly, or with only praise. It can be difficult to be honest when your anonymity is taken from you. It is as Oscar Wilde said, "Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth."

So with that in mind, when it comes to this project I will say what Slaughterhouse Five's protagonist, Billy Pilgrim, desired to have on his Tombstone: 

Pleasantly Surprised

This semester in our Entry to English Studies course -- an entry course like no other -- we used digital platforms to enhance our study of literature. I'll say it right now: this course proved me wrong in a myriad of ways. Kind of a negative overarching theme, right? I actually don't think so. In this blog post, I want to illustrate the ways that my personal literary identity changed, or rather, expanded in order to let the digital age (and other things that used to bore me) in. I will explore my progress in terms of traditional ways to understand literature and in terms of the future of literary studies. 

Traditional Literature Studies

The main change I see in myself in reference to traditional literary study is being more open to subject matter and genres that I used to think didn't hold much relevance in my personal life. A great example of this is my personal study of the novel Heart of Darkness. I was not initially thrilled to learn that we would be studying Heart of Darkness, because the first time I read that novel, I just wasn't impressed. I was a senior in AP Literature, I was stressed about college applications, and I absolutely loathed the movie Apocalypse Now. However, this semester, as we studied the novel while also studying different literary theories, and reading other students' interpretations of the novel based on Marxism, reader response theory, cultural studies, etc. spiked my interest, and I began to see the novel as more of a vehicle for Joseph Conrad to make many different statements about society, etc. It was fascinating for me to see all of the different lenses by which we could interpret Heart of Darkness, and I realized that the novel was quite interesting to me when I read it through the lens of feminist literary criticism. Reading about different literary theories opened my eyes to the critical conversations that are already going on about novels, epic poems, and more. Critics are constantly finding more things to be said about books and poems that were written years ago, and they, along with their theories, help me to see how these things are relevant in my own life. Just because I don't personally enjoy a certain author's style doesn't mean that his or her work doesn't deserve my attention. More examples of this kind of enlightenment occurred when we analyzed the York Mystery Plays, wrote our own sonnets, and more. 

Digiliterate in Project Based Learning

My high school was completely based around the idea of Project Based Learning, which is essentially what we did here for this ebook project.  So, I have had a lot of experience with doing personal projects and team projects in lieu of a traditional curriculum.  Doing project based learning encourages students to be more involved in the learning process.  I also thing the tools that we used to create our ideas (Goodreads, Twitter, Blogging, etc.) were particularly helpful and they really kept me interested in the learning process.  I had a lot more fun learning and I know that I gained more long-term knowledge like this as opposed to learning through the lecture-then-test format.

I think that overall, our ebook project was successful.  I was concerned to begin with that our writing wouldn't have been professional enough, but I am very impressed with how things turned out.  I think we learned a lot about publishing and creating and how we can use free, digital tools to express our ideas.  I was impressed that we were all able to complete two chapters because our class was small.

I think the biggest issue with group project based learning is the division of time.  I feel really bad for the students who dedicated more time to their assigned job.  I don't think students did more work than others because some were lazy.  I just think that the assigned jobs were awkwardly divided and kind of a one-person-only job.  Maybe in the future students could work with an easier publishing tool.  I

I don't feel like the ebook project removed us from the core of literary study.  I believe that instead of consuming literary study, we created our own literary study, which is more awesome.  I know that I am certainly more confident in my writing abilities and by abilities to publish and analyze literature because my work is being published as an ebook.  However, I feel like the focus needs to be more on the literature analyzed instead of a digital medium such as Goodreads.  I feel like we focused too much on what Goodreads and other things were as opposed to incorporating traditional literary elements into our chapters.

I do think that PBL is worth it.  Like any new thing, there are a lot of kinks that need to be worked out.  Overall, I feel as if PBL contributes much more (in lengths and bounds) to a student's overall learning.  Instead of memorizing flash cards, PBL allows students to retain more long-term memory.  I really wish there were more classes that used the PBL approach.

The Digital Wake Up Call

At the beginning of this English course I felt completely out of place and slightly incompetent. I had just returned from an 18-month mission for my church, and had immersed myself in a foreign language during that time. I was unsure if I could even write anything coherent in English.

Registering for this class I knew it would be a challenge, but I have always loved literature. I kept telling myself that anything worth it is difficult, and so I plunged into this new world. I was able to discover the diverse world of literature all on the digital platform the Kindle; a device I was completely unfamiliar with. I remember ordering it off of Amazon and to my surprise receiving it only 3 days later because of Amazon Prime membership, but that wasn’t the biggest surprise. I opened the Kindle and was amazed by its appearance as a printed book. I had never seen the screen of a Kindle, and in that moment it changed my opinion of the device almost instantaneously. (Check out chapter one of our class ebook, Becoming Digiliterate to learn more about the Kindle.)

Through reading Heart of Darkness by Joseph Conrad I began to see that the Kindle models traditional literary study; notes can still be taken, highlighting can be done, bookmarks may be placed and much more. It resembled a printed book, but it also enhanced note taking, highlighting, and bookmarking. Instead of tediously flipping through pages of the book I could see on one page all highlights, notes, or bookmarks I may have placed. This was very beneficial as my class collectively authored this blog and we all wrote several posts about Heart of Darkness.

Twice a week my classmates and I wrote in our class blog, ranging from blog posts about books that had impacted us to writing our own sonnets. I had read fashion blogs before, but had never actually desired to start to author my own blog. At first, it was such a stressful homework assignment that I would spend most of the day just brainstorming what to write about; it made me so nervous to post any of my personal thoughts about literature online. Literature was supposed to be something private right? Not anymore… If that wasn’t social enough my class was also assigned to have a Goodreads account.

The first time I was on Goodreads I probably spent the rest of my evening finding books I had read, and also adding some to my to-read list. I was surprised that many of my friends already had a Goodreads account as well, and I was able to see what books we had both read. I no longer had to rely on what a librarian insisted that I read, but Goodreads could recommend books based on what I had read and rated.

Through all these mediums my literary study has been enhanced. It goes deeper than just the sparknote study that I was used to, but into social sites such as twitter and youtube. This class has helped to see that traditional literary study has been changing since it begun from just an oral medium and it will continue to do so. The Kindle and any other form of digital literature are becoming just as much traditional as a printed book.

Putting Knowledge to Use

English 251 was the first class that I’ve taken as an English major.  The jump from being a Music major to English was pretty drastic, and I entered this class unsure of what to expect.  I admit without hesitation that I was a novice to the world of literature and more than a little apprehensive when I imagined spending my semester reading long texts and painstakingly analyzing every nuance and hidden meaning that could possibly be included.

My expectations were wrong, luckily.  This class provided a hands-on experience to literature that made quite a difference for me.  First off, the fact that we used a blog to turn in assignments was incredibly beneficial.   I’m someone who has always been outgoing, but putting my writing out for others to see has definitely been a struggle.  The constant feedback and advice from my peers was helpful and made me look outside of my own views and analyze the work I had done for flaws that I’d probably overlooked.  I also really enjoyed getting to read the work of my classmates.  I gained insights into their personalities, recognize their writing, and was able to learn more about them than I would for any other class. 

Here, the classic works that we analyzed were also brought to life.  Instead of just reading poetry, we listened to it.  Instead of analyzing the words of a play on a page, we watched videos of them.  We were able to see what a difference it makes when personalities are incorporated into the work and audiences are considered.  To me, this really made all the difference.

Over the semester, I was able to figure out a lot not only about literature, but about what I wanted to do with my own future.  I went into this major not really sure of what I wanted to do with it, but after completing the various assignments, especially our last project, I found my aim.  This course was extremely practical and helped me look into more about writing, self-publishing, and techniques to market books to be read.  I learned the value of editing, and especially of honest feedback.  This class helped me to not only better analyze classic literature, but prepare for my own future work to be analyzed and improved as well.

Once, during a slide presentation, Dr. Burton talked about sending out feelers for projects before actually doing any work on them to see what the prospective audiences would be like.   At this time, I was working on creating videos for a website that I was creating.  I knew that the concept was good, but I had no idea how to create the videos or how to help them be successfully viewed.  After this lecture and talking to Dr. Burton, I got a group of my peers together and sent out one of the first videos to them for some feedback.  It was brutal.  But you know what?  It was SO GREAT because from their opinions, I was able to re-focus the project and make it into something much more productive. 

In this class, I did not spend months reading thousands of books and I did not break my cranium worrying about author intent.  I did not read everything that Shakespeare ever wrote, nor did I become a professional lit critic.  However, this class taught me the practicalities for literature in today’s society and how to be not only a knowledgeable consumer, but also an effective contributor, which is the most important thing of all!

One and the Same.

My semester of literary studies is quickly coming to an end. My class has studied everything from poetry, to plays, to literature online, and everything in between. We’ve sort of gone through everything in our quest to learn about the importance of literature both classically and digitally. This class was my first class I’ve taken that is actually required for being an English major, and some days it really made me question my life decisions concerning being in this major.

The beginning of the class started with jumping from different forms of literature each week. Nonfiction, fiction, poetry, plays, etc.. – you name it, we did it. And all the while we were beginning our journey into using and finding this literature online. There were two big pieces of work that really stood out to me. The really big one was when we read Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness. We spent a lot of time on this one, and I think it sticks out to me so much because of the amount of time I personally spent with it. I had to fully read and analyze this book, and it was very difficult for me to get into. This was sort of my gateway book into online literature though, as the difficulty of it and the analysis I had to make of it took me right into the heart of the Internet for help. It was during my studies of this book that I first really entered into Goodreads and discovered how reviews work and how a book can connect me with other people. In fact, there was a particular review that really stood out to me and helped me understand why this book matters. When I read that review, I decided to follow the man who wrote it, and since I’ve become so enraptured by his other reviews and have become in new books simply because of his high opinions of them. It was because of this section that my ideas began to form for my chapters about both reviews and Goodreads for my class’ semester ebook we would soon be writing.

My other big work of literature that really stood out to me during this class was during our poetry unit. This was in the beginning of the semester before we had really delved into the online world. So while I was finding and reading poetry online, I was also focusing on the more traditional poetry such as Ozymandias by Percy Bysshe Shelley. This poem showed me the ways of traditional literature analyses and how to compare the ways in which an analysis must be made. This was quite a challenge for me as I hadn’t before done a formal analysis in this way. We also had to write our own sonnet during this portion of our studies. While struggling with my rhythm and wording of my own poem, I began to feel a connection with these other poems I had been trying so hard to understand. I found beauty in them that before I hadn’t seen, and I developed a deeper appreciation for the authors and the pains they went through to bring us their words.

I could probably go on forever about what works I used and how they helped and frustrated me, but that would get old quite fast. This semester and the class ebook project have taught me so much about the importance of classic literature as well as its introduction into the digital age. Classic literary analysis is still valid, and I would hate to ever lose that part of literature or understanding. But after this semester, I do believe that working with the more social and online aspects of literature are now becoming just as important as the classic. It opens more doors and ideas than before, and allows people to actually connect to these books and people and authors in ways that have never been seen before. It's becoming almost impossible to have literature without including the digital in some way. They're becoming one and the same.

Literature is changing. And to keep it alive it must be allowed to change and grow as the world continues to change and grow.

Literary Nostalgia

This semester, our English 251 class at BYU has sampled probably every type of literary criticism and literary study imaginable, but with a twist.  We've combined the traditional ways in which to study literature with the new ways to study literature, and personally, I feel like I have benefited more from this practice than I would have, had I geared my literary study towards either one or the other.

Being an English Teaching major, I have always been exceptionally fond of literature.  That being said, I've found excessive literary study, i.e. "beating the book to death," exceptionally boring.  It always seems so removed, and just super, super dry.  Aside from the technology, blogging, and publishing that we participated in during the semester, we focused a lot on traditional ways to look at literature.  One thing that I found particularly unique and helpful was the "personal" look we were encouraged to take in regarding a poem or a novel.  From the very get-go, we were asked to analyze sentence structure and so forth, but we were also encouraged to put our personal thoughts into things.  Doing so greatly helped me, especially when reading a pretty difficult book, such as Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness. 

I also felt like the resources and textbooks we were required to obtain breathed "a new life" into traditional literary study.  All the books that we read were definitely academic, but I feel that none of them were archaic. Overall, I feel like the biggest thing I learned regarding traditional literary study in this course is the fact that literary study doesn't have to be dry and boring.  


This class has been able to turn my ideas about the effectiveness of technology in a new direction by introducing the blogging process. Although we often discussed aspects of traditional literary study in our blogs, it was nice to be able to do so in a new medium.  Blogging brought new life into boring things and made me appreciate traditional things such as "analyzing the sentence structure of a poem" because the medium was so different. My ideas about analyzing a piece of literature might have been the same had they been written on paper, but translating them into blog form made homework more fun.

 I was pretty apprehensive about blogging at first because I'm a pretty quiet person and more of a "listener" than a "teller."  I was honestly nervous to post my writings online--not only would my fellow students see them, but anyone who typed in the right keywords online would be able to see what I wrote.  Instead, I found that it's actually great to post my own writings online.  I found that getting feedback from my fellow students was really helpful and encouraged me to read, write, and review my work more fully.  We also explored Goodreads and Amazon like there was no tomorrow.  Similar to my experience with sharing my thoughts while blogging, browsing sites and being encouraged to comment on them encouraged me to be more comfortable with the online world.  It was neat to be assigned comment on discussion boards.  I've come to see that introducing commonly-used secondary media into a curriculum can increase a student's desire to participate in the learning process.     

As I am pursuing a teaching degree, I hope I will be able to remember what I have learned in this class.  I hope to remember that a student can come to appreciate literary study of a novel such as Heart of Darkness by looking at it in a different light.  I also hope I can remember that Facebook and Twitter can be very effective tools if used appropriately.  Overall, I am very thankful for everything that I have learned in this class, and that they will truly be applicable to my future life and my future study of literature.  

Digiliterary Analysis

This semester our Analyzing Literature english class has been working together to publish an ebook about becoming"digiliterate" (a term that we thought we coined, only to find that #digiliterate was already trending on Twitter).

The idea behind digiliteracy is that reading as an experience has fundamentally changed due to the influence of technology and the internet. Readers don't read in isolation any more, there is an interconnectedness that cannot be avoided. Our experience with books has changed, from how we find the books we read, how we actually read the content, how we connect with others about the content, and how content itself is produced.

This project became a huge focus of our class and there were of course, various successes and failures. For other educators and students who are considering undertaking a similar project I would share the following from my experience:

Failures:

• The work load fell heavily on some individuals. 
• We weren't able to spend as much time analyzing literature. 

Successes:

• We were forced to perform quality research because we knew we were working towards publication. We learned about new avenues for research that will shape how we do it in the future. 
• We learned about the subject (digital literacy) by DOING it. We were actually engaged in it through the production of our book, which gave us more authority in our writing. 
• We had to be accountable for our own work and progress because when we got behind we influenced the group. This is a valuable experience for life after school.

We hope that there will be long-term effects from our ebook. I anticipate that the effects might be most profound for us involved. I think what we learned about research, team-work, and accountability will influence us more than any other aspect of this project.

Flashbacks: Not just for TV shows

My, my. What a semester it has been! This class has come a long way, dear internet, and you've been along for the ride with us. It's been quite the journey, getting here. We started small. Back in the first week of January, we talked about some of the books that most impacted us. Mine was Ender's Game by Orson Scott Card. I look back at that post and see a version of myself with little experience writing for blogs. It was the first time I had ever written a blog post that was intended to be read by the entire internet. I'm sure it hasn't been read by the entire internet or else I'd have heard about it, but it was the intention that counted.

From there we began to explore various kinds of literature. We began with Poetry. We analyzed some of our favorite works of poetry and even song. We wrote a little bit of poetry ourselves, including my own sonnet written about Warhammer 40k, considered one of the "Four Pillars of Nerdhood." Even that early on, we were exploring the ways that the internet influenced us and our understanding of literature. We were discussing how the internet served to bring new literary works to our attention, and allowed us easy access to works that we had not even heard of only a few days previous. The groundwork for our eBook was already being laid, even back then.

Me, Literature, and my Bishop

In the midst of finals, work, and summer plans our English 251 class has itself at the end of our time together! We have had a very unique experience together and I have learned a lot of things that I was not anticipating when I signed up for a class on analyzing literature.

When I initially registered for this class to fulfill a university requirement I had a very specific idea of what I thought I was going to get out of the class. I have always been intimidated a little bit by literature. It always seemed like something for people who were more cultured and educated than me. I was hoping that by taking this class I would never have another experience like one I had when I was having dinner once with one of my ecclesiastical leaders (In my faith his position is called a "Bishop") and I could not tell him what my opinion of Anna Karenina was, or any of the other titles he quizzed me on.

It turns out that I still don't know much about Tolstoy, but through this class I have learned something about what my experience with literature can be in the future. Our class had a specific focus on digital learning. We explored different avenues and resources that are available for us through the internet and technology that make it possible for us to become "life-long learners" (which is one of the objectives of our university, BYU). The techniques that I have learned in this class will enable me to take greater control over my own learning and will help me to do so without feeling intimidated.

One of our experiences that we had with literature was with the novella Heart of Darkness. Now this novel exactly the sort of thing that would have scared me to death before this class. But as a class we took advantage of sites such as Goodreads and Amazon to learn more about how people interpret the novel through resources such as reviews and forums. I found that I was not alone in my confusion! And I also found insights that helped me formulate my own analyzation of the text. This means that I could become an active participant in literary criticism and not just another student that summarizes the content found on "Sparknotes" or "Cliffnotes."

Another experience that I had, another "aha" moment was when I was trying to conduct research on the subject of borrowing ebooks from local libraries. Dr. Burton had taught us about the value of "social" research. The idea behind social research is that we don't have to be restricted to only looking for information through books or websites, that we can gain valuable information from real people. One way that we did this was through a Facebook post. Dr. Burton simply asked people about their experience with elending and we had a huge response! I was able to gain valuable information through this and my vision for how we can conduct research was expanded. Another experience I had with this was that I was able to reach out to local librarians via email and learn about their experience. These new techniques will help me in my future schooling and learning.

Although my experience was not what I anticipated, I feel like I am now better equipped to become the kind of reader that I want to be. I now know how to function more completely as a modern reader of literature and that will shape my future experience. Bishop Ashton and Tolstoy won't know what hit 'em.

Looking Back and Forward

As my students conclude a semester of being introduced to literary studies, capped by the major project of us producing an ebook together, Becoming Digiliterate, it's time to take a look at our path here, and our future path as individuals and as co-creators of our ebook.

I'd like each of my students to write two final blog posts.

"Literature and Me"
The first post should be a retrospective personal narrative, one that traces their own progress of coming to understand the nature of literature from this semester in two ways: in terms of traditional ways to understand and study literature; and in terms of the future of literary studies as we have emphasized in our ebook.

I do not want students to recap our calendar or assignments, but instead to talk about their personal literary identity and how this is evolving based on their reading, research, writing, and publishing for this course. They should review their prior blog posts and scan those of fellow students to be reminded of what we have studied and the realizations that we have come to. What was literature to you before? How has this view developed? How will what we have studied and done in this course affect your future literary life?

I want students to focus on a few "aha" moments they have experienced, and tell an interesting story about their learning this semester which also shows they have reflected on the course content and activities across the whole semester, not just during our final project. At the same time, I hope that the project has been part of that "aha" experience. (Please note, this post should not be used to evaluate the success of the project - that's for the second post. In this one, I'd like to hear a more personal perspective on how doing the project has affected one's personal views of reading and literary study, whether in school or beyond).

As with all good literary writing, this short narrative should be supported with reference to specifics. In this case, that should include books read, class and online discussions, and assignments. Shoot for around 500 words, and be sure that you are not addressing this post to fellow classmates or just the teacher. Inform the broader blog world about your experience.

Evaluating Becoming Digiliterate
I'd like my students to write a second final post that is focused on the experience of creating an ebook together. This should be addressed to future students or to people in education generally. What exactly was the process, and how did doing this project differ from a typical course in literature? Obviously this project had successes and failures. Evaluate these honestly, but constructively. Where did things go better than expected? What problems could be addressed if future students do a similar project? Is collaborative learning or project-based learning a chaotic mess, or is it worth the price? Does doing a project like this ebook remove us from the core of literary study, or does it make literary experience better in some ways? What will be the long term effects, if any, from doing this project?

This can be about 200-300 words in length.

Fourth Time's the Charm? Not Quite.

Our class has just put forth the fourth (Ha!) draft of our eBook about the changes in reading in the digital age. We've come pretty far from where we were, but we've still got a lot of things to work on. For my class members, I've included below a few notes that I took while reading this build.

Before I go into individual chapters, the over-arching problem I've seen is that we need to do some editing! I noticed a lot of errors in this build. As we haven't yet had the copy editor go through the chapters, this is understandable, but I do think this should be our next step. I also agree with Shelby's post about it being a good idea for us to take one or two chapters and look at those alone so that we can do a sort of peer-edit. 

Class, I've numbered the notes 1 and 2 based on the order your chapter lies in the book, not on the order you may have written the chapters. Hopefully, I don't offend anyone. I just took quick notes so, as a general rule, just know that I thought all of the chapters really were well done! :)

Emily: 

1. I love the personal nature of this chapter. I really enjoyed reading it! 

2. I think this chapter needs a little bit more development or worded a little bit differently? I understood your stance but that could be because I know what we're aiming for, but I think you might need to clarify your argument. Again, I think the peer-edit might help this more because you'd have actual notes about what might need changed and so forth.

Saren: 

1. My immediate thoughts when reading your chapter were, "Sooooo good!" Haha. I really loved how you applied your analogy to Harry Potter.

2. I noticed in this one that you talked more about Amazon and I think you could find a way to plug in Dr. Burton's chapter about Amazon. Just a thought!

Lauren:

1. I think this is the perfect chapter to begin the Find section, but I think it would be good if you are more direct about it being a finding chapter in the beginning. Does that make sense?

2. I didn't get your second chapter!

Evaluating Round 4

The fourth draft of our class's eBook has just been published, and it's looking good!  To be honest, I don't feel like a ton has changed since the last draft came out.  There are a lot of really great things going on.  I like the length of the chapters a lot.  The writing is generally pretty good too!  I think that it would be beneficial for us to each trade chapters with someone else and just have them critique it hard core.  The content is good, but there really is a need for serious editing.  

As far as the layout goes, I think the sections go well together.  Is the content all on there now?  Is it all completely finished?  I'm excited that this is going well and have been coming up with ideas of how to market it on social media sites.  What are the issues that are preventing us from getting it published by like....Wednesday?  

That's just my take on things.  Happy Conference Weekend!