PRESENTATION OUTLINE
Themes from Discussions
- What is Literacy?
- Benefits and Criticisms of Digital Media
- What should we do, as educators?
Many of you commented on how we define literacy. Several authors have a broad view of literacy and I imagine these definitions will continue to change as society changes.
Paige: There is “oral literacy,” “visual literacy,” “information literacy,” “media literacy,” “science literacy,” and “emotional literacy” (p. 21). Literacy is also identified as “the notion of being able to communicate or make meaning - as a producer or receiver - using signs, signals, codes, graphic images” (Lankshear & Knobel p. 21). ….New literacies teach children to question, problem solve, and create.
Taylor: Although many educators may define literacy as reading and writing, it is much more than that. These components are just small pieces of the “literacy puzzle” that help students to ultimately understand the world. Therefore, literacy, whether “old” or “new”, consists of skills, knowledge, and authentic practice.
Elizabeth: Gee and Hayes have a way of approaching the topic of language, both oral and written, in a way that both shows how amazing it is that we learn these skills in order to communicate, but also why we struggle with skills that may seem so "easy" because they are a part of who we are and how we communicate effectively.
Danielle: As Gee says, “Readers may say that digital media carry so much more than language. But language itself is and has always been a mixture of sound, words, images created in the mind, and gestures used in contexts full of objects, sounds, actions, and interactions. ...Meaning that literacy has always encompassed many different aspects and today is no different it just has other components than it has in the past.
Jacqueline: The authors write that you cannot separate what is learned from printed text/literacy and what is learned from non printed text/literacy. Literacy is also associated with "doing well in life" (Lankshear, p. 17). James Gee believes that being powerful in literacy is mastering language use in discourse, or ways of being in the world.
Soniya: I believe there are people in every type of socioeconomic area who may qualify as being illiterate, so to project the idea that only low-income communities have people who are illiterate is intrusive and not completely accurate.
Kristen: Literacy is not just about the actual act of reading a piece of material and moving on but rather it is what we do with this knowledge and how we apply the skills we have learned into other areas of our life. Literacy has become and probably always has been a social concept that has adapted just as we have to meet our needs.
2. Benefits and Criticisms of Digital Media
The podcast: There's Just Something About Paper by Manoush Zomorodi along with the video: Everything is a Remix by Kirby Ferguson and other recent articles included in the Twitter feed seemed to call attention to some of the more controversial aspects of digital media. Here are some of your comments on the benefits and criticisms of digital media and new literacies.
Kim: Digital media has provided us with further opportunities for equality as the producers and consumers have increased; in many ways, it is all accepting.
Paige: I think the biggest concern I have when I think about new literacies, is whether or not we are doing enough to develop both parts of the brain to create and develop meaning.
Taylor: Deep reading processes with printed text take time to develop; thus being able to apply comprehension skills when reading from a screen may take even longer. As the podcast states, it’s so much easier for readers to skim, rather than truly apply the process of slow reading, where questioning, inferring, predicting, and making connections with the text are all happening.
Elizabeth: Digital media opens my classroom up past the four walls and into the world. It is a place where I can teach my students but they can teach me as well or explore topics outside of what I teach.
Kim: The question is, does the mind wander because of distractions by the mind (to-do lists, etc), or does the mind wander because of physical distractions that we can see and read (advertisements, chats, etc)?
Kevin: I think children really lose their ability to talk with each other in person or engage in conversation that does not take place over the internet or a device. The spoken word is not going anywhere and the over-reliance on devices has an effect on growing children's ability to converse with each other.
3. What should we do, as educators?
In reflecting on this week’s materials, many of you seemed to ask the question: what can be done to help our students?
Taylor: We, as teachers, cannot simply assign students work, whether digitally or with printed text, and expect them to show interest. Rather, literacy activities should engage students as they apply skills to complex texts and make meaning of these ideas. When students are challenged, their level of engagement is increased.
Paige: Just as we teach students to identify biases, we need to teach students to sort through articles to find truth.
Kevin: I think that we teach a ton about making meaning and learning from texts on paper and not enough time with digital texts.
Danielle: In my school, we have taken time out of our everyday curriculum to focus on close reading and what that looks like when using paper and pencil as well as online. This way students can be just as comfortable reading for deeper meaning online as they are using paper and pencil.
Haley: We have to train our student’s different ways to read and focus when it comes to reading paper or on a tablet.
Kristin: If children are taught to use technology for the greater good and are taught to use it as a tool and not a way of life then I think it is beneficial for students to use it.
Justyna: As teachers, we need to push the boundaries of what literacy is. Our students need to become both readers that can slow down (Mary Anne Wolf) to comprehend and attend to details and skimmers that can jump around (Manoush Zomorodi).
Megan: As educators, it is our job to make sure that our students are prepared to enter the world as literate adults and not just students who can pass from one grade to the next.
And finally, several of you noted...
Thank you all for sharing your insights & thought-provoking reactions to these materials.
