Skip to main content

Chapter 25! "Wish Johnnie Allen Jr. M.S.Ed. a happy birthday (May 31)"

 



On Wednesday, May 31st, I celebrated my 25th birthday! I am sharing this not for birthday praise (however, I am accepting birthday wishes all year long😊!) but because it is tied to my journey with this course. I have started to rely heavily on birthday reminders from various digital and social media sites. I have difficulty remembering some of my close friends and other people's birthdays, and I never want to entirely miss sharing some birthday love with them on their special day. Social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and even LinkedIn offer daily notification reminders of "today's birthdays." I noticed on my LinkedIn page that it is displayed as "Wish Johnnie Allen Jr. M.S.Ed. a happy birthday (May 31)". I find this helpful and a clear example of using digital sites to our advantage to keep building community and networks through professional and social relationships. Many of the events in our lives are now far more public than private due to the reliance on social media sites and their usage in our daily lives. I noticed this year that many individuals I have met across my K-20 education journey have become pivotal to aspects of my birthday celebration. I have met many people through conferences and networks who join my social media communities and offer their celebratory sentiments on various topics I share. Marta Dabrowska shared, "what used to be approached, discussed, dealt with, and celebrated within a small circle of family and friends has now become in many was a public event" (p.87). I agree that birthdays have adopted to be largely announced on digital and social media sites. This may be great for someone like myself whose number one love language is words of affirmation. However, birthdays may not feel that way for everyone. Some may avoid social media on that particular day because it may be difficult for them for various reasons. We have talked a lot in this course lately about "what is truly private on social media." Sometimes private is not entirely up to us as others may make information more public and might do so without thinking about the impact this could have on someone. 

Embedding birthday notifications into social media sites can present some advantages and challenges. Could this be considered an aspect of one's professional learning network? How do digital natives vs. digital immigrants view birthday notifications on social media? What are your thoughts on these types of notifications? 

Reference: 


Marta, D. (2019). Birthday, Culture, and Social Media. Armenian Folia Anglistika, 15(2 (20)), 86-123. https://cyberleninka.ru/article/n/birthday-culture-and-social-media


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Reflections on Slack

  I remember the first time I learned about Slack; it was my first year as a Graduate Supervisor in Residential Life at Indiana University. I worked alongside my direct supervisor in co-supervising an undergraduate staff of nine resident assistants (RA's). At the time of staff training, we decided on a platform that could serve as mass communication for the team. We agreed on Slack because there was the option to have multiple channels to engage in different topics. However, this felt far more complicated than a GroupMe chat. After a few failed attempts with Slack, we decided to move forward and not use it as our primary communication forum. I had mixed feelings about Slack. I did not understand any of the other features, so I did not feel I would return to using Slack. We were introduced to Slack in our week 9 module, and I considered giving Slack another try. I checked Slack's website to see if there were any changes, but I did not see any new features or changes. I chose to ...
Post a Comment
Read more

"New Look, Who Dis" Blog Makeover

What a perfect challenge to engage in! It is time for a CHANGE. Change is good. Change is scary. Change is important. I was curious to know how I wanted my blogger site to look when we were tasked with creating our blogger account. I went with something that felt "safe" or comfortable to my liking. I wanted to represent myself, given the headshot. I added something representing my fraternity, and then the overall color with the orange sunset vibe felt like something I would enjoy. I went with some standard or default choices regarding my fonts, backgrounds, and gadgets. The options were endless; I was correct! My blogger design worked for me, and I did not feel like it was something I would grow to hate or dislike. Due to the blog makeover challenge, I am open to embracing this new change! I changed parts of the layout; I chose a different color and switched some fonts to provide a more contemporary feel, look, and vibe. Any suggestions? Thoughts?   I am willing to continue t...
2 comments
Read more

Keeping up With Technology—Digital Natives vs. Digital Immigrants

       Before this week's readings, I only partially thought about generational differences when it comes to technology. Yes, I know there have been distinct differences between how I grew up as a child compared to my parents and now my nieces and nephew with using technology. I did not always have the latest technology growing up, but when I did, it felt like I "had" to have it to stay connected to what my peers were experiencing. My nieces and nephew are now growing up with all types of technology (tablets, school laptops, YouTube, TikTok, etc.) because it is so prevalent in their experiences and upbringing. While reflecting on the readings, the part that shocked me the most would have to be the terms digital natives and digital immigrants (Prensky, 2001). I knew that these specific "identities" regarding technology usage existed, but I did not know there was a term that classified it all together until the Prensky (2001) article. As described in the article, ...
Post a Comment
Read more