New Literacies Reflection Noteblog

1) At the beginning of our class, I thought of the well-known definition of literacy as being able to “read and write.” I knew that there was much more to this definition, but I wasn’t really sure what that was until we began this project of exploring new literacies. My group and I chose to research “Social Literacy,” which opened my eyes on how important the communication aspect of literacy truly is. Together, we decided that social literacy was, “Having the competence to interact appropriately in society during face to face communication and also through various technological mediums.” Because our world is indeed changing, we are doing most of our communication through a computer, a phone, or some other type of technology. It is important to understand the rules of interaction and communication on a face-to-face basis as well as through technology. For example: one might need to understand the norms/expectations in a social setting when meeting someone new. You often hug, shake hands, smile, and you might even say something like: Hi, I’m Kelly. It’s nice to meet you. However, it is equally important to be tech savvy when it comes to online communication such as having a “clean” facebook, or how to construct an appropriate email to a professor. Exploring this new literacy has really opened my eyes to what it means to be “literate” within the classroom, and that there is so much more to focus on that just reading and writing. After completing our New Literacies Project and seeing what others have created, I am now open to new ways of teaching literacy. I was so intrigued by the youtube videos, wikis, blogs, facebooks and scrapblogging that I saw in my peers’ projects, and I was getting excited to use these new technological ways of presenting literacy in my future classroom. I realize now that we have a responsibility to teach our students about how to read, write, act in a social setting, view things differently, stay active in the community and environment and stay aware of their feelings and emotions. These are all important! It’s honestly hard to pick out which one might be “better” to teach in a classroom, because I think they are all necessary to educate our students and help mold them into educated, informed and involved citizens of the community.

2) To me, being able to provide effective literacy instruction is not just teaching your students how to read and write – it is so much more than that! Just by being in my 1^st grade placement, it is easy to see that we all learn in different ways. I have some students that love to act things out when they get the chance. I have some students who absolutely need to see the pictures in a story or they won’t pay attention or understand, and I have students that can just sit quietly during instruction and soak up everything with just their ears (which I find amazing). However, learning about these new literacies and technologies has really opened my eyes on how I would use literacy instruction in my classroom in order to reach all of my diverse learners. Although I have been using “Facebook” for about 4-5 years now, I have never really put together an “event” or “group” on the website. Doing this made me realize how we might be able to incorporate students, parents and teachers into a working facebook community and really strengthen our communication skills together. The 1^st grade GLCE’s ask teachers to help their students develop reading, writing, listening, speaking, reasoning skills, etc. and this can all be done through technology (as well as the traditional form that we are used to). However, our students are indeed in a virtual generation, and we need to educate ourselves on how to HELP them succeed. They are obviously interested in the internet, videos, games, etc. so why not cater to them and develop our lesson plans around those things?

If I were going to develop a lesson around Facebook and Social Literacy, my students would need to know how to work facebook, and they would need to know how to read words and type on the computer. These skills would allow my students to begin a lesson on social literacy/facebook use. However, my students are in 1^st grade, and I do not know how I would be able to use Facebook with them. Right now, my students know how to read simple words, but do not know how to type, so this would be a difficult lesson to teach. Dominic taught us about a program called “WeeWorld” that is similar to facebook, only it is a kid-friendly version, so I would be able to use this with them. Using WeeWorld would allow my students to develop their social literacy by communicating and also learn a new type of technology at the same time.

3) BRIEF LESSON OUTLINE:

Target area/Rationale: By using the photo technology of “Flickr” my students will be able to create a photo slideshow to talk about the importance of planting new trees. By doing this, they will be able to learn about a new form of technology, educate themselves on environmental literacy and also educate others.

Objectives: My students will put together a slide show of pictures by using Flickr about how to plant a new tree and the steps it takes.

Materials:

- book on planting trees

- computers in the classroom

- pictures/clip art of the process

Outline of Key Events:

1) First, we would read a book together on the environment and how important it is to plant trees once we cut them down.

2) We will talk together about steps we might want to show people on what to do once you know a tree has been cut down. (Buy a seed, dig a hole, place seed in the ground, bury seed, water/sunshine)

3) Together, we will take pictures or look for them on the internet and upload them to the “Flickr” account

4) We will put together the slideshow of pictures with a few words underneath each one

5) Once we are done, we will present our slideshow to other classrooms to teach them about environmental literacy and the new technology we are using together!

Summary: Because my students are only in 1^st grade, it would be necessary for us to do this lesson together for the most part. I would hope that my students would develop an understanding about their environment, be able to educate other classrooms, and also learn a new way to use technology.

Ongoing Assessment: Throughout the year, I believe that we could try this “Flickr” program to upload pictures on all kinds of literacy and use it with every subject. We would be able to put together slide shows for science, math, literacy and social studies and continue sharing them with others.

At the beginning of this class, I knew that literacy was more than just being able to read and write. I knew that speaking and listening were also a large part of literacy and I was understanding how interpretation and the way in which students make meaning and connections, either text-to-text, text-to-self or text-to-world, is also a part of literacy. Separately, I understood the concept of “computer/digital literacy”. I knew that students needed to have an understanding of how to use a computer and of the different technological tools at their disposal, but I never joined those two literacies into one comprehensive idea. This idea of teaching the subject of English language arts and including all of the different literacies and technology within it is new to me. I had thought that students would learn about the computer in their computer class, not in ELA. However, this new realization is very exciting to me! All of a sudden, ELA became a new territory that I’m still discovering. For awhile, I thought I had known all there was about teaching ELA – I knew books, how to read and discuss them traditionally and I’ve been writing for years. The idea of teaching ELA in that traditional way was starting to seem a little boring to me. Now I realize that there are hundreds of different technological tools that I can use within my ELA lessons to make them more engaging and meaningful to the students. By incorporating these technologies and literacies, and also giving the students time to explore the technologies and literacies, I will creat well-rounded ELA learners.

Within my group, we focused specifically on social literacy. As we were working on this project and trying to create our own definition of social literacy, we started to see its great importance in both our lives and the lives of our students. We came to the realization that being a literate social learner may mean more than we had believed. My first idea of social literacy was that it meant how to properly use social networking sites, such as Facebook. While that is a part of it, social literacy is much broader than that. Our group came up with this definition of social literacy: Having the competence to interact appropriately in society during face to face communication and also through various technological mediums. So basically, social literacy is having the ability to communicate effectively and appropriately with those around you. By creating this definition, I also came to the realization that by having this form of literacy, it increases your learning potential. Here is an example that I thought about as we were doing this project: If I were to send an email to a professor asking for help, but I didn’t follow the proper conventions and rules for that type of an email, then the professor might think that I’m either not serious about the assignment or not capable of producing one of very high quality, so he/she might not help me as thoroughly as someone who sent the email with the proper conventions. Even though the professor could have been wrong in their judgment of the student, that student still suffers because the email that was sent wasn’t socially appropriate for that setting. This is just one example, but it shows the importance of students learning about social literacy and gaining competence, both with face to face communication and with technological forms of communication.

I feel like I should take a minute to say that even though I realize the importance of incorporating new technologies and literacies into my ELA teaching, it still makes me a little nervous. While I am becoming more and more technologically savvy, it takes me awhile to feel comfortable with a new technology and to discover all that it can do. While I’m not too nervous to incorporate these into my classroom, it does frighten me a bit. However, this semester has taught me that yes, there can be problems when bringing new technology into the classroom, but as a class you have to just work through the problems. It may be confusing at times, but it is beneficial to everyone to grasp the new ideas. Also, this project has made me see how useful those technologies can be, and if I want to produce well-rounded students I need to increase their competence with the different literacies and technologies. Even though I still may be nervous, this project has given me some assurance that I will overcome my fears.

Effective literacy instruction means introducing the students to all of the different literacies (traditional as well as the ones discussed in the project) and then giving them the tools (can be technological tools) for them to create their own definitions and make their own personal meanings of the topics at hand. While guided by the teacher, students should be able to express their own creativity and understanding of the different literacies. I say this because I know that I learn more when I can come up with a definition by myself or with a group rather than just being told the definition. For example, even though I did a little bit of exploration about social literacy before beginning the NLP, it wasn’t until I actually sat down and tried to create a definition that I realized I didn’t know enough about it. Then I was able to conduct my own research to find a definition that made sense to me. Since I created the definition myself, it is much more meaningful and will stay in my memory much longer than a definition that was just given to me.

My placement this year is in a 1st and 2nd grade classroom. While I think that using Facebook would be too advanced for some of them, learning about social literacy is not. In order to adapt this so it is age appropriate, I think I would feel more comfortable using WeeWorld instead of Facebook. WeeWorld is kind of like the Facebook for children. The students would create an Avatar and can still communicate with one another. In order to do this, the students would have to understand how to properly communicate with their peers online, or have social literacy. They need to know what is appropriate to say and what is not. The students will also have to have visual literacy. It’s possible that some of the students would not have used WeeWorld before, so they would have to be able to look at the computer screen and make sense of it and learn how to use it by exploring it visually. So the students would be using the technology of WeeWorld to show their competence in social literacy. If they were supposed to be learning about a new form of literacy, for example environmental literacy, the students could talk to each other through their avatars to share facts that they know about the environment. As an example, a student could say that he/she recycled pop cans with their parents at Meijer the other night. This way the students would be socially interacting via the internet about environmental literacy. The students could even use the internet to find out different facts about the environment and then share those facts through WeeWorld. In order for this to work though, the students will need to be able to read and type well enough to understand what is being said to them and they are saying to others.

Brief Lesson Outline:

Target Area/Rationale: By learning how to use PhotoPeach, the students will be able to create a slideshow or digital story about how they have helped the environment, and will teach others new ways to keep our planet clean and inform the class about environmental literacy.

Objectives: Students will be able to provide ideas about how to keep our planet clean by creating a digital story, using PhotoPeach, of one of their personal experiences keeping our planet clean and share that story with the class.

Materials: Computer for each student, access to internet, digital pictures (from internet or saved files on computer)

Outline of Key Events:
• After the students have learned about ways to keep the Earth clean and have brainstormed ways that they have helped to clean up our planet, have them choose one way that they will present to the class.
• In their heads or on paper, the students should come up with ideas of different images that they can use to tell their story. They can actually take these pictures and bring then in to class or find them on the computer, but they should organize their story.
• At the computer lab, give a brief overview of how to use PhotoPeach (it’s very user-friendly). Model to the students the digital story you made about how you helped to keep the Earth clean.
• Give the students time to create their own digital stories.

Summary: That would be all that the students do on that specific day. Since the lesson is drawn out over a few days, the students would then share their digital stories to the entire class. Each student would have time to show their story and answer any questions. By sharing their ideas digitally, it increases the students’ digital knowledge while also increasing their environmental literacy.

Ongoing Assessment: From the ideas from their classmates, the students can think of ways that they can continue to keep the Earth clean. The teacher can talk about how using the computer can save paper, so maybe a goal for the teacher would be to have the turn in assignments via email. As a class, they can discuss how that would work and its pros and cons.

Noteblog Post

#1

This project was interesting, due to the fact that I learned a lot about social literacy, in particular how it is such an integral part of our life. What came forth during our discussion (with my group) and creating the actual project was a lot of new insights into how our "social literacy" is established. My group was discussing how we learn(ed) to text (mobile messaging as an example of social literacy), and I was surprised how much I have taken for granted, all that I have acquired over the years (through social interaction). One area which I feel I have grown significantly in is being able to recognize the varying forms of social literacy and the way that we draw upon our skills of being socially literate, in order to successfully navigate the many social structures/institutions in place. Recognizing this made me really appreciate and recognize our intellectual talents as human beings.

We created a definition for social literacy as "Having the competence to interact appropriately in society during face to face communication and also through various technological mediums". I really liked this definition, because I realized that our ability to be socially literate has a lot to do with our culture and the varying components that make up our identity. Having grown up with a parent as a teacher and now taking college courses, I recognize that a lot of my written work draws upon my exposure to an academic culture. This is part of my identity. Now, I am also in the current trend/culture of social networks (such as Facebook and Twitter). I recognize that a lot of my friends (who are literate), have a tendency to use a different form of literacy then that of my own (meaning words are shortened/slan/etc.). I do not know how they would write or create sentences in a more academic setting, but my voice on social networks is more academic. I know when people speak two different languages it's referred to “code switching” when they go back and forth from native to second language while speaking. I have the ability to "code switch" to speak while engaging in discourse on social networks. This is the social competence that we referred to in the definition. But I also recognize that a lot of young men that I work with in the Lansing area do not have these skills. They speak like how they "tweet" or "facebook". In a professional setting and they have yet to grow in their social competence, of being able to find certain types of speech as appropriate in certain settings. Now this may be that they do not have the knowledge of how to articulate themselves in an academic setting, or they just choose not to. It makes me think back to my fascination during this process of learning how to text. I was taught or created an understanding through social interaction with people that were able to text. It’s this exposure to things that leads us to an understanding in areas we once did not understand. So I wonder at times if my high school students I work with, if they have been exposed or taught to either speak or write differently in particular settings. It’s something that will continue to peak my curiousity.

Overall I feel like I will have walked away from this project with a deeper understanding and a peaked curiousity, to continue to be aware of things I take for granted (for example being socially literate). I also have such a great appreciation for the capacity of the human mind, to be able to “code switch” while interacting in various social settings. It’s a gift, one that I feel people take for granted.

#2

For my field placement this year I am in a 3^rd grade classroom on the south/western side of Lansing. The location of the school itself is situated outside of two very nice neighborhoods (I actually grew up around the corner). The types of students in the school come from outside the area, so the pendulum of social status swings from lower class to middle class, with each student. One thing I would want to include in my classroom someday (I want to teach 3^rd-5^th) is technology. It is a vital part of our day to day interaction and will only continue to increase into the future. One thing I am also aware of is that a lot of students do not have the economic means, to access a lot of the technological tools that other students and myself have. This is not to say that I would not create an assignment (such as a Facebook), that entitles them to access a computer and internet. There are computer rooms in the school, and students are allowed the opportunity at least some point of the week to use the computer.

For the purposes of doing a project or working inside or outside the classroom on Facebook, students would need to bring to the table an understanding of several literacy’s, such as; cultural, emotional, social, and visual (to name a few). I feel that these four forms of literacy are critical in creating the type of learning community, that could make a Facebook page effective. The social and cultural understanding is going to be a part of what the students are exposed to outside of the classroom (cultural and social norms). As the facilitator of the classroom, it is my job to establish what is socially and culturally accepted. Students may think it is okay to misuse the Facebook wall, by saying obscene things, just because they know of it as being used that way by others. It is important to instill within the students the needed knowledge of how to use Facebook in an academic setting. Students need to also be conscious of other student’s emotions while engaging in discourse on Facebook. Another important aspect of being able to successfully navigate Facebook or the internet is being visually literate (the ability to look at symbols, etc.). I know in my classroom we have a smartboard, so I could model this for students, before sending them out into the computer room, or home, to get on facebook. I personally know a lot of students who do not have the resources at home, and they are not as technology savvy as other students, who can get just jump on the computer right away and whiz right through it.

Teaching students to use Facebook as a new literacy (in an academic since) would be an extended lesson. For instance, I would teach the students visual literacy first, in order to ensure they could navigate the site. Cultural, social, and emotional could all be done in one day, as each one compliments each other. I think these are still some of the most important ones, because it is through these that you are providing them with information that will not only benefit them for the purposes of the activity, but to also provide them with insights that will help in the world outside of the classroom.