I had the enormous pleasure of spending the past week (i.e. my spring break) in San Diego and Los Angeles, taking plenty of time away from the computer and gazing at beaches (and even seals!)

Alas, a new quarter has begun and I’m back to reality and gazing instead at that familiar soft glow of the computer screen.

Each quarter, I like to take some time to reflect and consider what I could improve upon both as an instructor and as a student. To be honest, most of these goals have more to do with my personal development in the tech world than it does with my role as an instructor. This imbalance in goal-making is somewhat out of necessity; as a T.A., I don’t have a lot of flexibility about the use of learning management systems or implementing particular technological requirements. My role is primarily one of support. I don’t say this to devalue my role as a T.A.; rather, I have a feeling that I’ll be more interested in setting more pedagogically-based goals once I have full rein over my own classroom!

TL;DR? Mostly professional goals here, not pedagogical goals. Here we go:

1. Continue work with Code Year 

I know, I know. This blog was supposed to be a space to work through my programming lessons. It’s been about six weeks (!!) since I’ve even opened the page for Codeacademy. In order to make the coding work less onerous, I think I just need to set smaller goals for myself. Earlier this year, I intended to finish a lesson at a time and not take a break until I finished each lesson. Alas, each lesson probably takes anywhere between 3-4 hours to complete, which, as a graduate student, is a significant amount of time to be spending at the computer doing work that is not grading, reading, or writing. With that said, I need to assure myself that it’s OK if I only complete one activity in a lesson per day! As long as I’m DOING the work and maintaining the programming vocabulary, I’ll be in good shape. Besides, I’d like to take advantage of some of the social networking integration and share my progress on Facebook to receive some digital pats on the back. No shame.

2. Port this blog to my own domain 

For my UWP 270 class last quarter, our final assignment was to create a webtext. I purchased a domain name for that project, but would like to use it as my website for all of my professional work (including this blog!). I loved the flexibility of WordPress’s software (as opposed to what’s available for use as part of their free domain) and would appreciate the ability to edit the CSS on this blog and tweak the design more to my liking.

Therefore, I need to take the time to figure out how to move the content from my project to another space and link this blog to my own domain name. I’m sure I’ll just need to tinker around to figure this out, but if anyone has any advice on this, I’d greatly appreciate it!

3. Keep up with technology news 

Everyone has their regular rotation of web browsing, I believe. My “regular rotation” primarily includes e-mail, UC Davis’s learning management site, Facebook, Twitter, and a few choice blogs. I’d like to integrate more technology news sites into my rotation, however, to keep myself current on issues that may be relevant to my research and pedagogy later. My short list of sites to start browsing more regularly are the Huffington Post’s Technology page and TechCrunch. Any other suggestions?

4. Maintain theoretical/thematic connections between seemingly unrelated coursework and digital literacy concerns 

OK, this may sound like an obtuse goal, but hear me out. As an English student, it is occasionally difficult to explain the intersections between digital literacy education, educational technology, and the study of literature. The connections are clearly there; digital literacy is shaping the ways in which literature is read. How could it not? However, as much of my coursework will primarily include engagement in critical theory and – well – fiction, I’d like to work towards creating final projects that more closely link my interests, so that I continue to develop my interests in the lens that interests me. I feel pretty confident at this point that I want my research to be ultimately very engaged with digitality in some way; I just don’t know how exactly yet. This is my job as a student now!

5. Keep this blog current! 

Not to get super meta or anything, but I think it’s crucial that I maintain my presence here in order to continue engagement with current digital literacy concerns. I’m somewhat notorious for starting blogs and abandoning them, contributing to the Internet’s considerable amount of cyberjunk and noise. I’d rather not throw more garbage to the ether. It takes discipline to maintain a writing schedule every day, but I intend to post something at least once a week, even if it’s just a link to an article I find or a quick reflection on something I learned in class that’s relevant to the intersections between technology and the humanities.

Cheers! To a new quarter!