Helen's EDC blog

I spent some time in other spaces this week, firstly reviewing other’s ethnographies and then starting to look at the results of our algorithmic play. As I start to think about the final assignment, it’s interesting to sees such creative use of a range of tools.

Renée: Screencast-O-Matic
Chenée: Sway
Daniel – SoundCloud
Daniel – Slidely
Cathy – Storify

With the shift in our focus to algorithmic cultures, as I roam in these spaces I have been thinking about the tracks and traces I am leaving and how my experience of the content is necessary entangled with the technologies I am using. As Knox (2015) reflects:

…and…

As I discussed with James last week, the content in my lifestream is impacted by the choices we are making about the spaces we are inhabiting as we learn and explore.

In terms of my play with algorithms, it has been, firstly, lots of fun and provided a new lens through which I observed my own internet use this week. I appear to be ‘rules-orientated’ and found myself feeling slightly transgressive as I explored some of the words on the Google blacklist. Have I subconsciously absorbed an algorithmic blacklist? Or am I attuned to the fact that my interactions are being tracked by algorithms?

My activities this week have been captured here. As we reflected upon in Learning Analytics, the implications of the use of Big Data and the permeation of algorithms into education provide us with much to reflect on. I tried to reflect some of this in my Padlet, with the video about Knewton and the School of One embedded within a cluster of quotes from Knox and Eynon about the educational implications of the use of algorithms.