Introduction
Through the interview I realized just how much conflict opposing digital literacy practices such as personal and school/work can be. This was brought to my attention via. the answers to my questions about contrasting and comparing Jo Fletcher’s literacy practices. The answers helped me to gauge what may help bridge the gap between these practices and help students become more interested in school literacy practices.
To begin, the interview started with a simple question about her in order to get to better know her likes, hobbies, daily routine, etc. Then getting to the deeper questions which got into similar topics to that of Jo’s discussion posts about her literacy practices. While these weren’t outright mentioned it was implied through the questions and the ways of which they were asked.
Within the interview I tried to gauge what exactly her personal and school digital literacy practices compared and contrasted. Starting out with a simple question of what she had thought of digital literacy before taking the class this fall. That gave me an idea of where she had started this course with the knowledge of better informing me of where she stood. The later questions helped me to understand where she now stands on the matter of what digital literacy is to her.
Through these questions conflicts between her digital literacy practices were found. I used most of my questions to compare and contrast her digital literacy skills which helped in this portion greatly. It became quite noticeable that she had troubles balancing her school and personal digital literacy practices. It was interesting because this is something people can be helped to understand why they also have these conflicts between their own practices. Jo mentioned how she found it hard to keep concentrated on schoolwork when it is all on the computer like now during these unprecedented times of the Covid 19 pandemic. She also stated how it was harder for her to do school literacy practices due to them not being as interesting or fun as using social media and or watching a film or a simple short YouTube video. One of her digital literacy practices is finding recipes online via. apps or a quick online search. Jo mentioned this in one of her digital literacy journal posts as something that she does quite a lot. The trend seems to be that more interesting and fun literacy practices seemed to be more of a priority in some senses than actual work despite her acknowledging this and hoping to rectify it.
Jo also mentioned that she procrastinates when on her computer. This only pertains to school and not her personal digital literacy practices. She still finds herself thinking that doing schoolwork on a 
computer should be easier but her procrastination on her work shows otherwise. She explains that,
“I feel like sometimes it gets in the way of being productive with school cause I’ll procrastinate pretty hard on my computer. But I’ll still feel on my computer like “okay I can easily do my schoolwork now”.
And I think it prohibits me from completing assignments. I’m on my computer thinking I want to do schoolwork but I’m not doing schoolwork. Instead I’m browsing the internet, shopping online, and watching videos.”
Jo showed that multimodality is a big part of her digital literacy practices. This was shown throughout the interview when she brought up the fact she would write about movies or shows that she had watched. Jo used many modes within her literacy practices. She also mentioned that,
“it was really funny when one of my Italian friends would send me a voice memo and I’d be like I’d rather you just type it in Italian so I could just copy it and translate it. But they were really into that. So if I’m in a funny conversation then I’ll add a funny voice memo to the text. Um, I also enjoy listening to podcasts and I’m a big movie watcher. If I have nothing else going on if I’m just chilling out I know I’ll watch a movie with my roommates or a TV show. That’s about it.”
Other important questions pertained to how Jo’s digital literacy practices changed throughout her life as well as how decent she thought she was at her specific digital literacy practices. Again these all correlate to her digital literacy practices and how they cause conflict with one another as even when she was younger she struggled with such things as monitoring her personal and school uses of digital literacy by preferring the fun relaxing personal practices over the far more boring school practices.
Finally Jo was asked whether she was dependent upon technology and digital literacy. While she stated that digital literacy practices have a big impact and presence in her life she thought she was dependent but not dependent upon it all the time. Jo mentioned that sometimes she could go a whole day without even checking her phone if she was going out with some friends. Her reply was,
“Hm. Obviously yes. Well kind of now yeah because the main people I intake information and knowledge from are my professors and I’m still doing that through online. But there are times I’m not even concerned with the internet or the apps on my phone. There will be days where I’ll be so busy I won’t even think about the internet. Especially if I’ve completed all my assignments and I don’t have to get on my computer or get on my phone. I live with my friends so if we go do something then I don’t really have to be in contact or learn digital literacy. So in a way yes but also in a way no. Am I dependent? I would say so yes. But am I dependent all the time? Possibly? I would like to think not. But I could be.”
This made it clear that while she may not be fully dependent upon such technologies, she is dependent upon them to an extent, especially this year due to the pandemic and most things being formatted for online consumption when it comes to classes.
The information which was provided from this conducted interview was incredibly helpful in finding Jo’s roots in digital literacy practices as well as the conflicts between them. These conflicts became increasingly more noticeable as the interview progressed. Her digital literacy practices seemed to point towards liking personal literacy practices over school literacy practices. It seems that perhaps making the work more enjoyable or eye catching may help students to be more involved in classes and the work assigned. Or even to assign more skimming instead of large bodies of text to read to help those with attention problems. That being said it is highly important to learn how to prioritize school over free time activity.
Digital Literacy
KP: What was your initial idea of digital literacy before taking this course?
JF: I don’t think I ever came across the phrase digital literacy before taking the course and I think that if somebody asked me what I thought about it before taking this class I would have said it would have to do with the way you think when you’re online or the way you write online. Um, yeah probably that. Bare minimum, probably very simple.
KP: What are some of your other digital literacy practices?
JF: I would say now it’s like zoom. I’d say I go on zoom and I think I send a lot more emails now. And I’m a horrible texter. Or I’ll send a voice memo. I think now after going because I was abroad, I’m a senior. I went abroad last semester my second semester. And there they all do whatsapp. So it was really funny when one of my Italian friends would send me a voice memo and I’d be like I’d rather you just type it in Italian so I could just copy it and translate it. But they were really into that. So if I’m in a funny conversation then I’ll add a funny voice memo to the text. Um, I also enjoy listening to podcasts and I’m a big movie watcher. If I have nothing else going on if I’m just chilling out I know I’ll watch a movie with my roommates or a TV show. That’s about it.
I’ve been actually wanting to make little videos of our weeks. Because we’re in quarantine and we’re doing like I feel like everything’s different. So I’ve been recording certain moments that I think are cute or that we could look back on and feel nostalgic over. So I’ve been putting videos together. That’s about it aside from journaling and writing stuff down. But that’s like an emotional side of me that feels the need to write things for the possibility that people could read it. But that’s about it.
Conflicts
KP: How would you compare your school and non-school related digital literacy practices?
JF: How would I relate school to my personal? I think that hmm. Well one it’s kind of hard for me now to be constantly on my computer knowing that I have to do school work and it’s just so easy to transition over and get distracted and watch a youtube video and do that kind of stuff. But I do think that a lot of my professors are toning it down and not being as strict or there’s a lot of leeway. I think this in ways that online is harder, I think the teachers are being more lenient with things.
KP: Conversely, how would you contrast your school and non-school related literacy practices?
JF: I think I enjoy non-school more than school unfortunately as sad as that is. I think in order for me to retain and remember information I have to enjoy it. That sucks because I’ll remember something that I read five years ago that might come up in a conversation but I don’t remember every assignment that’s due even after I’ve gone over my schedule. I think it’s because I’ve never been one who enjoys school all that much. It sucks I wish I did. I wish I had a passion for learning and doing work and being studious but I don’t.
KP: Do you think you are quite decent at these practices or that you may need to hone them? What makes you think that?
JF: I think that there’s always room for improvement. I would love to…it’d be cool to learn how to code you know? There’s so many things that I don’t know and I think when I read one of your journal entries you said you were really naive about basically online until the whole world went online. Then you saw the endless things that are online I guess and that could be performed online. I also think that way and how they say ignorance is bliss. I wish I knew a lot more and I wish I read more books or listened to more podcasts or found interesting things that build the mind and learning. Because I can watch movies and YouTube videos because I enjoy it. So I wish I could find more things that were educational that I enjoy. Like with the whole election now that’s really interesting to make sure I’m spruced up on because I think that’s important.
Other than that I definitely think there’s a whole world out there that I need to really get in touch with to learn more things. Like I’ll read the New York Times and I’ll be like “cool” and I’ll read the Tribune and I’ll be like “cool”. I love Refinery 29. It’s like a beauty article website type deal. I like buzzfeed, that kind of stuff. I just wish there were more like passionate hobbies for that. So I think my digital literacy can improve on what I spend my time doing and how I do it.
I wish that I had better…use my time wisely on the internet so I could find things that suit my interests so that I could learn and so yadda yadda yadda and x, y, and z. But with quarantine I was just so used to doing things that weren’t online as much. Like paint and shit like that so. I definitely need to get more in touch with certain things. It’s crazy.
KP: How would you say your digital practices affect your day to day life?
JF: I almost think it consumes me in some ways because I have to be on my computer to do school work. But if I want to be on my computer to watch a video or read something. My moms hooked on sending me little clips of books or she’ll always wanna buy me a kindle app on my mac. She’ll always be like “you should read this book”. I feel like sometimes it gets in the way of being productive with school cause I’ll procrastinate pretty hard on my computer. But I’ll still feel on my computer like “okay I can easily do my schoolwork now”.
And I think it prohibits me from completing assignments. I’m on my computer thinking I want to do schoolwork but I’m not doing schoolwork. Instead I’m browsing the internet, shopping online, and watching videos. I think that prohibits me from then going out to dinner with my friends or spending quality time with somebody who hasn’t seen me in awhile. So I definitely think I need to…time management and such. I think that I’m someone who’s just addicted to scrolling. If I’m feeling anxious I’ll scroll on instagram and I won’t even take in anything. Or if I’m having a serious talk with somebody and get really anxious I’ll just scroll on amazon. It’s very bizarre.
So I think it’s just like a…it’s almost like a coping mechanism to mindlessly be on the internet and see what I can get into and not learn anything, not do my schoolwork. So I have a lot of digital literacy improvements to make.
Dependency
KP: Would you say you are dependent on technology usage in your day to day life based on what you know digital literacy to be now?
JF: Hm. Obviously yes. Well kind of now yeah because the main people I intake information and knowledge from are my professors and I’m still doing that through online. But there are times I’m not even concerned with the internet or the apps on my phone. There will be days where I’ll be so busy I won’t even think about the internet. Especially if I’ve completed all my assignments and I don’t have to get on my computer or get on my phone. I live with my friends so if we go do something then I don’t really have to be in contact or learn digital literacy. So in a way yes but also in a way no. Am I dependent? I would say so yes. But am I dependent all the time? Possibly? I would like to think not. But I could be.
Especially on days where I have nothing planned. I’ll get some ideas from pinterest to make some art projects, you know?