Reading and writing have always been very influential parts of my life, and various forms of media and technology have played important roles in shaping the development of my literacy. I started learning how to read using the Hooked on Phonics program, which uses board games, card games, and videos to increase vocabulary and make learning to read fun. When my younger brother got old enough, he and I would play with Hooked on Phonics every day. Our favorite game was learning how to read. Our competition continued with computer games that were centered around puzzles and challenges related to reading, grammar, and sentence structure. My love of storytelling caught flame when I picked up a copy of Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone.

In middle school I discovered a love for writing and explored it in every way I found possible. In sixth grade I started a newspaper for homeroom called “The Hazard Headlines” using the Pages program on my home computer. Journaling about my day-to-day life became an essential part of my weekly routine. At the end of eighth grade, I got to write a story about a third-grade student from my school and give it to her as a gift. This project, written on my Mac desktop at home, was my longest work of writing I had ever done at the time. It was very exciting to see my story be published and read by a younger student.

In high school I continued to find new ways to tell stories and work with different kinds of media. Through my high school’s video production program, I got to write and direct short films. Most of my projects, including “Doodle” and “Ursula,” were written on a script-formatting software called Celtx, shot on Sony cameras, and edited using either Final Cut Pro 7 or X. Some, like “Alex Hanson…In the Form of a Personal Essay” or “Creative People Are Drawn to Creative People: A Proof” were documentary style movies that didn’t utilize a script, but still involved forms of writing in the production. My personal essay was structured by a voiceover compiled of journal entries from my middle and high school journals. “Creative People” showcased the artistic endeavors of my friends, including their scripts and poetry, but was also accompanied by a related Storehouse blog made up of text, pictures, and short video clips from the documentary.

In addition to video production, I sought out more forms of writing and sharing my work. I continued journaling and started doing more creative writing outside of class. Each year of high school my writing and art was published in my school’s literary magazine, “Reflections.” In my senior year I became a co-editor-in-chief and utilized InDesign, Photoshop, and GoogleDocs to put together the publication. The summer before my junior year, I interned at Tone It Up!, a company that promotes women’s health and fitness through workout and nutrition programs. During my time there I got to see how media and business work together by managing Twitter feeds, Facebook pages, and blog posts to connect with the company’s large consumer base. I put those skills and my creative writing together when I started my own personal blog the summer before my senior year of high school. Alex in Wonderland is a Blogger site where I post my short stories, poetry, art, short movies, and ideas. All of this experience with reading, writing, and media came to be incredibly useful when I applied to colleges in the winter of my senior year. College applications, submitted through online application portals, require not only a significant amount of writing experience to speak of, but a tone that emits both personality and intelligence, which only comes by practicing often.

I found a love of poetry through Poetry Out Loud, a national recitation contest in which contestants choose poems from an online data base and memorize them for recitation contests at their schools. I participated in this program my sophomore through senior year. At the tail end of my senior year I participated in open mic nights to practice my recitations and share my work.

Whether it be through VHS tapes, paperback books, handwritten journals, blogging platforms, or pure memorization, the technology that has influenced my relationship with reading and writing has varied throughout the years. Creating this timeline has been eye-opening to the wide variety of forms of reading writing I have experienced in my lifetime so far, and leaves me excited to see how technology will shape my applications of writing in the future. My digital literacy timeline showcases these important elements of my life, how they affected me, and the tools used to build and interact with them. Where applicable, the events include links to the short films, blogs, poems, and websites I refer to in my timeline.

http://www.tiki-toki.com/timeline/entry/336098/Alex-Hanson-A-Digital-Literacy-Timeline/