Thank you for taking the time to visit my brand new blog space. I have never kept a journal or wrote in an informal manner for a class/job before so this is a new and exciting opportunity for me! I'd like to start by introducing myself; I'm Kyle, a 32 year old father of two. I have been married to my best friend for 9 years and we have a six year old daughter - Lily and a 15 month old daughter - Harper. I suppose any discussion about why I am in school should start with these three people.
I have an AS in Human-Centered Technology, a BS in Informatics and am now pursuing my MS in Human-Computer Interaction. I was able to get an internship with the Department of Veteran Affairs Veteran Engineering Resource Center (VERC) and was hired to a Human-Factors Engineering position from there. My job consists of going into the field to gather user requirements to inform product (usually interface) design, I critically review and propose product (interface) redesigns and I investigate medical devices for safety concerns related to usability.
I am taking this course because of my daughters and my interest in technology. I am constantly impressed with how my children (probably all kids I'm sure), regardless of their age at the time, are able to pick up mobile, touch-based devices and navigate through the various menus to find content they want. This led to the insight that kids are excited to interact with and learn from technology. So that insight led me to take this course as one of my two electives.
My experience with technology is interesting. I love gadgets and devices of all kinds. I have console gaming systems, laptops, mobile devices (3 tablets at our house!), mobile phones, on and on. But I find that I tend to be a late-adopter when it comes to new technology. This isn't because I don't want the newest thing necissarily, it's just that with my current family/work/school/military reserve dynamics I really don't have a lot of time to follow a lot of shows, play a lot of video games, or watch a lot of youtube. I find that most of my free time is spent playing with my kids, whether its reading books or drawing or it could be playing Nintendo Wii U or a game on a tablet.
I picked 'Creativity Inc.' and 'A New Culture of Learning' for my two course books for similar reasons to why I selected this course in the first place. They align with my professional and personal interests and I believe that they give me the best opportunity to take away insights I can directly apply to my life (of the books offered, I'm sure we'll learn tons of important stuff in this course)
Kyle - Looks and sounds like you have a lot of fun with your family. They are at really fun ages.
ReplyDeleteSounds like you have quite the computer expertise! I'm sure I'll learn so much about technology from you. Looking forward to the class!
Kyle,
ReplyDeleteYour family is beautiful--thanks for sharing those pics. I think your job sounds very interesting. I had a chance to take a course from a professor named Marty Siegel while I was doing my doctoral work at IU. In that class, we were required to read a book called The Design of Everyday Things. Here's the Amazon link to that book (https://goo.gl/42T5i4). It is a fun read for anyone but if you haven't read it, I would highly recommend it. It will change the way you think about design and give you a bit of a framework for critically evaluating design.
Kyle nice to meet you I am looking forward to reading your posts and getting the perspective of someone who is not a school teacher. I also have young children (9, 7, and 5) and I am also finding that learning all I can about technology is very helpful to raising kids today!
ReplyDelete