Makey Makey

                                         

I invited my daughter, Annie to play Makey Makey with me. We watched a tutorial together and learned to link the circuit board with alligator clips. We decided to play piano with Makey Makey, so we attached paper clips with colors matching the those of alligator clips.  It worked. Annie was amazed and asked how it worked. I explained that a circuit was formed once she touched the paper clips while holding the earth line attached to the board. To which she responded: "Oh, our science teacher says that humans are conductors, like water and metals." I was happy that Makey Makey helped bring her school knowledge back to life. Then she couldn't wait to play one tune after another with these paper clips.

She also played with the circuit sewing project and had a lot of fun too. I think that she has probably been familiarized with the basic concepts of circuit by playing with it. The ideas go embodied when she touches the metal paper clips and when she creatively touches the clips with the alligator clip attached as an earth line. She feels the closing of the circle of electricity. This is the same case with sewing when the she leads the conducting thread with her needle through the fabric, designing for the route of the electricity. I can help thinking that these projects are a stark contrast to the way electricity and circuit was taught when I was young. Teachers at that time simply drew symbols and lines on the black board and we would have to imagine abstractly the flow of electricity with some instructed principles. This comparison brings home to me again the significance of material feminism that advocates to " devise new, practical and ethical acts of engagement which motivate and enact change in the material continuum that constitutes educational practice (p.667)."

While playing with the "electronic piano", Annie was also very cooperative in my video shooting. After watching her videos, she came up with an idea to upload them on her Instagram account. I didn't even know she has an Instagram account. I don't even have one myself. OK, they are the real digital natives who live in and attracted by online communities. This enables me to build a connection of this project with what we read last week: New Opportunities for Interest-driven Arts Learning in the Digital Age. 

In the final chapter of the report, Kylie Peppler delineates the challenges and offers suggestions to invite, engage and sustain youth in interest-driven arts activities. "Another recommendation is to encourage youths to document their practices and support institutions that use portfolios in their admissions and hiring processes." This is because "youths need encouragement and support to collect and share their work over time, and educational institutions need incentive to value portfolio assessments as much as standardized tests of knowledge (p.67)." Today's most social media platforms  are the new tools to allow for "more robust and long-term portfolio development".

Another recommendation which is relevant to our experience in this project, or in many other projects, is the designing of interest-driven arts learning social networks. As so many young adults like my daughter are spending a large portion of their time creating and sharing their works in various  online communities, social networks are a great way to engage youths and cultivate their interests in the arts. Compared to the expensive classes offered by commercial training centers, they are also an embodiment of educational equity, for "at their best, social networks represent the promise of low-cost, widespread dissemination of messages, which benefits both arts organizations wanting to attract youths to their online or physical resources and the youths who can share the art they create using those resources (p.69)."