For me, this week it was all about Doug Hesse and Cindy Selfe. I'll be honest and say that the prospect of sitting in front of my computer for an hour just watching people talk wasn't thrilling. However, the reality of experiencing a webinar for the first time was kind of awesome, even if it was just a recording.

As I just mentioned, I'd never had the opportunity to see a webinar before, so to experience something that in itself was an example of multimodality, to learn about... multimodality, was funny.

To hear Selfe and Hesse (who had technological difficulties with his use of multimodality)speak on what they've been studying for years was enlightening to say the least. What I was able to particularly identify with was the idea that Hesse presented when he asked:

"Do you think the relative inexperience rhetcomp scholars and teachers may have with digital composition causes difficulties for our ability as a field to carry out the conversation...?"

Cindy replied with: "Yes, but that does not excuse inaction. Nor does it slow the pace of change."

What they were basically speaking to here was the fear some instructors of FYC (and I am definitely one of them, in a big way) who are terrified (me) of using technology in the classroom. Cindy asserts that we (other teachers like myself in this position) must learn with the times. Trends --in academia and the job market -- demand something more than learning to write an essay and having alphabetical literacy. The world won't slow down for teachers who can't/ are unwilling to adapt.

This transitions into what Alexander wrote in his article "Gaming, Student Literacies, and the Composition Classroom: Some Possibilities for Transformation." As an instructor I have to be willing to introduce technology into the classroom, but what if my students can't relate, or even navigate something like World of Warcraft, which he suggests using to "transform our approach to literacy" (37). Even if I can't even fathom using WoW in my FYC classroom, it opened my eyes to what could be done with multimodality if we simply move beyond the academic research essay.