Grant I worked A LOT on, and am crossing my fingers for!! VLERT is …the Virtual Learning Environment Research Team–Our hope is
bring students’ learning past the skin of new media technologies, exposing the deeper structures and flexibilities of computer programming, the muscle powering these new media technologies. We need to use the rich knowledge these kids already have taught themselves, to empower them, not take it away! Jenkins talks about the artistic bar being lowered, so more kids are creating their own expressive media (outside of school, of course!) I propose that they are intrinsically motivated to do this because it satisfies their basic psychological desires of feeling competent, autonomous, and related to others. If we offer them more tools and a virtual gallery, will they dig even deeper?