While reading, I had a realization about how critical it is to expose students to and empower them with digital tools early and often. Some students come into the classroom with a great deal of experience in using digital tools, while others have had very limited experiences/access outside of school. The sooner we close the gap in basic background knowledge/experience, the more powerfully technology can be used to foster new literacies in all students.
Even though Writer's Workshop and Author's chair usually involve more traditional methods of writing, I noticed that these routines could be a great way to model and practice skills needed for new literacies. For example, as children write for and interact with their peers as an audience, they are generating creative ideas, communicating their ideas through written words, oral expression, and drawings, and and reflecting upon their writing after receiving feedback. These are all important skills that teachers must help students develop so that they can use the same skills with digital technologies both inside and outside the classroom.
Below are some questions I had while reading:
1. What skills, knowledge, processes do you think are most important to equip students with in order for them to develop new literacies? How can we help students develop these abilities through traditional and digital means?
2. How do we encourage students to use digital tools as resources in the
classroom in addition to traditional resources (word wall, classroom
library, reference books)?
3. How do we help students view
digital resources as tools for information, communication, reading, and
writing as opposed to for entertainment such as games, videos, etc.?
Great post Neka! I agree - while I was reading, I was constantly thinking about my classroom and how I could facilitate the use of new literacies for educational purposes. Students need experience with producing and evaluating information via new literacies because this day and age calls for it. My third graders are assessed using digital texts and online testing formats, so my questions regard ways that I can teach literacy skills using new literacies, when I have a limited amount available to my students.
ReplyDeleteAs I reflected on your first question, I began to wonder how we could seamlessly bridge traditional skills and new literacy skills. How can we, as teachers, help students perform at the same level digitally, as they are traditionally? I think that if we model and teach students to be critical when using new literacies, and give them practice in evaluating digital text and media, they'll begin to understand new literacies as tools for connecting to the world. Students need to know how to evaluate webpages and digital games for their value - Is it appropriate? Is it what I need (on topic)? Can I trust the information? Students also need to know how to appropriately use the digital tool in order to produce meaningful work using it. This is where it gets tricky because students will need a lot of practice using the tools before they are considered proficient in them.
In regards to the 2nd question, I think that simply making the new literacy available and teaching students how to use it will be enough to encourage them to utilize the resource. In the readings, one of the authors said that new literacy tools are exciting and new to most students, so they are usually very motivated to use them. Making them available, and then showing students ways to use them for education, will be enough encouragement, I think. What new literacy tools, specifically, could we begin incorporating into our classrooms?
I agree it is important to help children be critical and conscious consumers of digital materials.
DeleteOne tool I have used is pebblego.com. It is an online reference database for k-2 that has audio, videos, pictures, and text. Pebblegonext is the grades 3-6 equivalent. It is super expensive without a school/district subscription, though. The closest, free alternative I can find is kids.britannica.com.
Hey Breanna! I did not even think about digital tools being used for assessment. That is just another reason why we need to be teaching our students how to use and be comfortable with using technology so it will not interfere with their assessment score.
DeleteOne tool I am excited to use in my classroom is an iPad system called Osmo. (playosmo.com) One of the different activities that you can do with Osmo is a word game. Students are shown a picture on the iPad and the students have to play a "hangman" type game with letters to figure out the appropriate word and spelling. It is very interactive and is a self-check game so it is perfect for a station.
I also have the issue of a lack of access to technology. Our laptop carts are certainly hard to get a hold of, haha. You might try something like what one of my colleagues does. She has an iPad that she got through a grant, and she does stations/centers and has one of the stations be focused on using the iPad for educational purposes, whether it be researching online, using an app, or creating a digital text of some sort. Other students work at other stations while a few engage with the digital tasks.
DeleteYour response to the 2nd question has made me realize that I have a new goal for myself as a teacher. I find sometimes that when I have students using technology for educational purposes, sometimes they complain that they can't use the laptop/phone/etc. for what *they* want to use it for (texting, social media, etc.). Occasionally I have students who complain about having an educational purpose rather than being allowed to have "free time" on their technology of choice. Perhaps that has to do with the fact that other teachers do let them use technology for non-educational purposes in class, or perhaps I am lacking the engagement element. Anyway, my new personal goal is to figure out how to make technology motivating even for those students who would rather play Candy Crush than use an educational app, do research online, analyze a website, tweet a literary response, etc. I'm very open to suggestions for anyone who knows of strategies or tools that could motivate them on a high school level!
I am definitely going to check out those websites/apps guys - thanks!
DeleteYes our laptop cart is super hard to get ahold of too, Angela! OKCPS has very strict wifi protection policies, so I'd have to just check first that they'd allow the iPad(s) to get onto the wifi - if so, though, I think that's a brilliant idea! I would love to have a few for my students to use during center rotations.
I bet that it's difficult to get them motivated to use the tools for educational purposes at the secondary level. Hopefully we can come up with some apps/strategies to help you out with that! Luckily, just using a laptop or iPad is enough of a draw for my younger students. It definitely gets tougher as they become older!
Neka, you had some great thoughts and questions about the readings! I agree that we need to expose children to new literacies early and often. But honestly, I think this exposure will happen naturally for many students. Kids today are growing up in a time that they have never known a time period without computers or iPads. Many students grow up with these tools in their homes. It should be natural that we should integrate these technologies into our classroom.
ReplyDelete. What skills, knowledge, processes do you think are most important to equip students with in order for them to develop new literacies? How can we help students develop these abilities through traditional and digital means?
We want students to be exposed to ALL types of literacy. I think we need to do our best to keep all kinds of literacy tools in the classroom, and let the students use them often! The smartboard should not just be for teacher use - let the kids write their spelling words on it or play a word game! Computers or iPads should be available to be able to listen and interact with digital texts or look up words while reading. Students should know that these tools are for them and they should know how they can use them in valuable ways. But, the same way, we want students to be able to interact with physical texts and also practice handwriting and spelling. We need to have writing stations where kids can write letters and stories. Also, we should have a large classroom library with plenty of different genres represented. In all, we should just try to make our classroom a welcome environment that promotes literacy.
How do we encourage students to use digital tools as resources in the classroom in addition to traditional resources (word wall, classroom library, reference books)?
I think the most important thing is juts teaching students HOW to use the digital tools. We need to teach them certain sites that they can go to and about internet safety. Te internet can be a wonderful learning tool but it can also be dangerous. We need to teach kids about those dangers and the consequences. Students should know that using technology is a privilege.
How do we help students view digital resources as tools for information, communication, reading, and writing as opposed to for entertainment such as games, videos, etc.?
I think we need to use a mix of both! We need to allow our students to play educational games sometimes because it is engaging and fun. But we also need to allow students to do research projects and things that will let them see how we can use the internet in other ways. One thing I have done with students before is a WebQuest. The students are directed to a certain part of a website and have to read to find the answer to a particular question. Students get to learn and also experience the website. This is also something that can be tailored to fit almost any grade level.
How did you usually use WebQuest when you used it? I decided to look through a few that other teachers had set up, and it looks very Web 1.0. Teachers, at least for the high school language arts WebQuests that I'm finding, are just writing instructions for class activities that could have been printed out. Do teachers use the website to facilitate online research? It seems like most of the ones I'm finding aren't, which is such a shame if you ask me. If it's possible, I would LOVE to use that to help guide my students' online research or to help them look at a set of websites and evaluate them critically. How did you set yours up? Do you still have a link to it?
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DeleteI agree that it happens naturally for a lot of students and adolescents. However, many of my kids, growing up in a low-income community do not have access to computers, tablets, or even smartphones with internet access outside of school. And to be honest, it is a struggle sometimes to get them using the tools inside of school consistently as well. When we do get to use them in class, or when they are taught something new in tech, though, they pick up on how to navigate and utilize the tools so QUICKLY! So I am wondering how I can bridge that gap between my more literate students (who get more exposure and practice), and my students who struggle to utilize new literacies fluently? I feel like this will be something that I try to unravel and remedy throughout the school year for my kids.
DeleteHi Angela! I tried to find the link to the WebQuest and was unsuccessful. However, I do remember that we created it through QuestGarden. There is also a database through that site that you can search for a specific Quest for your grade level or content area/subject. So, you do not have to necessarily create your own quest! There are SO many different types of Quests out there! There are also other sites on the web that you can create a Quest from, TeacherWeb being one of them. I think that your high schoolers would really love it!
DeleteBreanna, that is a very good point. Not all students are going to have the same access to technology. Another thing that I thought of is ELLs. Some students may immigrate to the US from a country that doesn't have access to the same technology we do. I like your question of how we should bridge the gap between the students who use and understand new literacies, and those who may be unfamiliar or uncomfortable with using them. I think it is going to be a constant question that we will have to keep going back to this semester, because it is an important one!
DeleteThanks for this interesting beginning discussion. I look forward to the continuation of it.
ReplyDeleteYour first question is really important to consider, especially if you're surrounded by teachers who think that we're being encouraged to use technology and teach new literacies just for the sake of technology use. I've read the Reading the Visual book mentioned in the Reading Today article, and it helped me look at new literacies differently than I had before. Like the Reading Today article mentions, we can teach them how to "decode" different aspects of the visual parts of multimodal texts. As a high school teacher, I think it is most practically valuable for them to learn how to analyze the structural aspects of texts with new literacies. I have many students in high school who are very familiar with technology and use it like an extension of their arm, but they don't know how to think about the creator's purpose or the reasons for why various apps, websites, and tools are made the way they are. If we teach them how to analyze the structural aspects of the visual, they will be better critical thinkers and will be more equipped to "read" new literacies texts purposefully.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to preparing our students to read digital texts, I think it's important that we realize that we can teach the same skills with these texts, which BABR touched on. Students are able to explore author's purpose, audience, comparisons among texts, etc. All of these educational standards can be addressed with traditional texts, but I think that using a combination of media (books, articles, websites, apps, etc.) allows students opportunities to learn these skills within more authentic contexts. Never do I go a day without engaging in creating or interpreting forms of new literacies, nor do I go a day without reading or writing traditional texts. In real life situations, I use both traditional texts and multimodal or digital texts to accomplish a variety of purposes both in my personal and professional life. Doing so in the classroom helps students gain these skills in the contexts in which they will be most likely to come up in their actual lives.
Do you focus more on teaching students how to read digital texts, or do you focus more on teaching other standards through the use of technology? I find that I do the latter more often, but I wonder if that's because I teach high school. I'm curious about what your experiences at different levels are like.
Great question, Angela! In 2nd, I used digital texts to teach standards/units. We would do a KWL at the beginning of a unit and/or do an informal oral KWL at the beginning of a lesson, and then use new literacies (in addition to print text) to answer our questions. For example, we would use a PebbleGo as shared reading, practice reading fluency, and then discuss new information. Another activity we did was watch an informational video and write down key/new facts.
DeleteI agree that I find myself using the technology to teach standards, but I really want to begin teaching them how to read and comprehend digital texts. One resource that I love to use is Discovery Education, and this year we just gained access to the entire teacher hub, so I can create web-based quizzes for my students to take after we've researched and investigated a topic - I'm so excited to try this out! I think doing this will begin to help me teach students to read digital text for various purposes because I can create the quizzes from scratch, and include a number of question types. I'll definitely let you guys know how it goes!
DeleteIn the time I have experienced in the classroom, digital texts have always been used with a standard in mind but I feel that most teachers probably need to do more to make sure students can comprehend digital texts. (Is there a standard to teach kids about how to use digital texts? I am not familiar with one.) It is natural to forget that the process reading on an iPad is different from the process of reading a physical book. In kindergarten, teachers do a lot of teaching of Concepts about Print. Reading Left to Right, Title Page, Book Direction, etc. I feel that we need to do the same with digital texts that we introduce to make sure our kiddos know exactly how to use them, because sometimes digital texts are more difficult to navigate.
DeleteThanks ladies for your discussion. Remember that you need to include the ideas in the texts in your discussions and to make the connections you are making from practice to those ideas in the texts.
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