http://www.literacyconversation.org/ literacyconversation.org » Recent Posts en Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:07:03 +0000 http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=8#post-63 Sun, 17 May 2009 21:13:35 +0000 Doug Belshaw 63@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I've just posted what I think is a very apt quotation from Allan Martin on my blog [url=http://dougbelshaw.com/blog/2009/05/17/digital-literacy-and-the-digital-society/]here[/url]. I'd be very interested to hear what people think of it - especially his comments about identity formation through the consumption of media. :D </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-62 Wed, 15 Apr 2009 21:48:12 +0000 Ben Grey 62@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Wow, this article actually qualifies literacy even more traditionally than I do. The problem here is that the entire article bases literacy solely on the ability to read and write. Reading and writing are a process of generating and gathering meaning through communication. If we accept that, then the article goes quite far to support the point I've been trying to make (pretty inadequately, to be honest) that at this point, there hasn't been a new mode of literacy created since the advent of reading and writing. </p> <p>Again, I would maintain that what happens online in what so many are calling "Digital Literacy" is merely an extension of what we've been doing all along with showing, viewing, speaking, listening, reading and writing. The rich history in this article goes quite far to support that.</p> <p>That's my take on it. Great article, Kerry. Thanks for posting. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=7#post-61 Wed, 15 Apr 2009 09:54:42 +0000 josepicardo 61@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I tend to follow conversations about [i]literacy[/i] but I usually don't participate, as you guys are far more knowledgeable about the topic than I am. You have given this topic much more thought and I am happy to learn.</p> <p>So think of me as the kid who means well, isn't very bright and asks the question with the obvious answer :-)</p> <p>It would appear to me that you are struggling with lexical ambiguity as regards the use of the word [i]literacy[/i], as Ben rightly points out in my view.</p> <p>We are having to resort to distinguish between [i]classical [/i]and more [i]modern[/i] definitions of literacy. Perhaps there is a better word for what we struggle to define as literacy nowadays.</p> <p>We would probably agree that, in the modern take, literacy is:</p> <p>[quote]"The scope of a person's knowledge or abilities. Aptitude or capacity to carry out a task successfully."[/quote]</p> <p>The problem here being that, according to the dictionary, that defines [i]competence[/i], and not [i]literacy[/i].</p> <p>Apologies if I have succeeded in demonstrating how little I know about this subject, rather than how much. And apologies for the over-use of italics! :D </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=7#post-60 Tue, 14 Apr 2009 23:50:09 +0000 Ben Grey 60@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I think for me, I see two fundamental definitions for literacy being used. The first being the way we draw meaning through communication. The second is evidenced in the "knowledgeable and educated in one or several fields" definition above. This is the definition E.D. Hirsch uses. It's this definition that bears the multiple literacies frame of mind. </p> <p>The second definition, in my honest opinion, is a misrepresentation of literacy. I believe that definition is being used instead of proficiency or skill. If I am knowledgeable and educated in athletics, do I have athletic literacy? Somewhere along the way proficiency, and even to some extent, the word "ability" got replaced with literacy.</p> <p>When you look at the majority of the definitions you posted, you see read and write as you noted, and I would say those are not the exclusive construct of literacy. They are major tenets of how we communicate, but we also use speaking, listening, viewing and showing. All of your consequent discussions and examples are extensions of these foundations. </p> <p>Yes, we certainly read text in a digital format, what we're doing now, but again, we're reading. </p> <p>That, for me, is the starting point. I think what you are exploring with a digital application of literacy is extremely important and imperative for teachers to explore when teaching students who will read and write more digitally than through an analog medium, but I don't think that means because it is digital it means we aren't reading. Or because we're watching a moving picture that somehow means we aren't viewing. The specific application will evolve, but it still remains what it is...the construction of meaning through communication. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=7#post-59 Tue, 14 Apr 2009 21:38:39 +0000 Doug Belshaw 59@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>The problem is - and I think this is probably what you're probably trying to get at, Ben - that the definition of 'literacy' comes from a pre-Internet age. However much it seems to be predicated upon 'reading and writing', a 'definition' is only what a panel of experts believe to be the case.</p> <p>Here's what you get when you use Google's 'define:' function for the search term 'literacy':</p> <p>[img]http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3308/3442196367_f11504d172.jpg[/img]</p> <p>They all talk of 'reading' and 'writing', but it's the extent to which other, more high-order skills are introduced that's contentious, isn't it? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=7#post-58 Tue, 14 Apr 2009 21:01:20 +0000 Ben Grey 58@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I almost think we need to take one step back. We've delved quite deeply into specifics about literacy, and the possibility that there are such things as literacies, but I don't think we've established a base from which to work. I know this might seem like a minor step backward, but I absolutely think it's imperative to start from the beginning. And I apologize for not starting there with my initial post.</p> <p>The question I would have is, what is literacy? If you were to create the definition for the term, what would it be? I'm thinking specifically of the singular form, foundational term literacy. How would you define it? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-57 Tue, 14 Apr 2009 19:56:55 +0000 willrich45 57@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I've been thinking off an on about this conversation for a while now...hesitant to jump in, because it's all a slippery slope. But figured, what the heck.</p> <p>I think I fall on the side of the fence where there are multiple literacies, maybe all build on reading and writing, but named more specifically as a way of identifying nuance. And, I do think there are some fundamental unlearning and new learning we have to do about reading and writing in a world where connection is almost as important as communication. </p> <p>We can look at this two ways, one a la Ben who sees multiple literacies as a dilution of an important naming convention that we've had for a long, long time, or the other a la me (maybe) who sees it as a way to distinguish the complex understandings that we may be required to own in order to function in a digital, social environment. When we talk about information literacy, for example, I think we talk about something different from cultural literacy, or, if you will, network literacy. Again, at their crux, these literacies require the application of a complex reading (and in some cases writing) literacy that has some overlap but also has, I believe some discrete parts in each. That and there is already widespread acceptance of multiple literacies. It has become a part of the language.</p> <p>Anyway, just a quick thought dump... </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-56 Sun, 12 Apr 2009 17:32:12 +0000 Doug Belshaw 56@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>[b]@kerryturner:[/b] You said:</p> <p>[i]"I used to teach History. Besides telling the story in overview, I like the way sources are used and analysed to look more deeply at the event. The sources used are however, varied, and contribute to building up the picture.<br /> I'd like to see us do more work on information from blogs, forums, reviews and websites, in order to develop a thinking student."[/i]</p> <p>I also teach History. I like your analogy in the way that you have to scaffold especially younger students in History to be able to critically analyze sources of information. We need to develop ways and practices for doing the same with online sources of information in [i]all[/i] subjects!</p> <p>[b]@cathycrea:[/b] Thanks for the [url=http://www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/070312ruel/]link[/url]! I've edited it in your post as it wasn't quite working properly. :-) </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-55 Sun, 12 Apr 2009 17:27:30 +0000 Doug Belshaw 55@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>[i]"I think that grasping the way that language is just one form of social practice that functions in the same way as other social practices is part of 'the literacy scale' but of course it feels like a very different sort of thing than 'just' reading a poem to write about it in an exam, and it has potentially far reaching consequences beyond the confines of the classroom, so in another sense it is moving them into 'a different realm'."[/i]</p> <p>You raise an important point here, Ant. Literacy definitely 'feels' different in relation to the digital realm, but the extent to which it is in any real sense is still really yet to be described and (more importantly) agreed upon. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-54 Sun, 12 Apr 2009 17:25:32 +0000 Doug Belshaw 54@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>[i]"...I have to teach my students to be more aware, critically, of the source of the information. It's an issue with print, to be sure, but online it's so much more important, because anyone can publish anything online. My students don't necessarily realize this."[/i]</p> <p>That's a really important point, well put. It's not that people are [i]choosing[/i] to [i]add[/i] to a definition on 'literacy' for the sake of it, but rather that the nature of the publishing world has changed, and therefore the skills needed to deal with it have changed too. Whereas before (with printed matter) you could be reasonably certain it had been seen by at least an editor before being published, now with instant publishing on the Internet, often the only pair of eyes who have seen the work before being it being published are the authors'! </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-53 Sun, 12 Apr 2009 01:23:00 +0000 cathycrea 53@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Kerry, your post got me curious about Jakob Nielsen's work and found [url=http://www.ojr.org/ojr/stories/070312ruel/]this article[/url].</p> <p>One problem my students have is that they have difficulty reading and making meaning from connected text. I think it's important for me in my classes to make sure they are getting plenty of practice. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-52 Sun, 12 Apr 2009 01:12:33 +0000 cathycrea 52@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Doug--</p> <p>re: Has the narrative changed in the 21st century? I'm not sure that it has.... but let me mull that over for a while. Anyone else have thoughts on this one? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-51 Sun, 12 Apr 2009 01:03:28 +0000 cathycrea 51@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I'm finding that with digital literacy, I have to teach my students to be more aware, critically, of the source of the information. It's an issue with print, to be sure, but online it's so much more important, because anyone can publish anything online. My students don't necessarily realize this. </p> <p>Teaching students to think critically about what they are reading is a good thing, though, because it carries over into so many other aspects of learning. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-50 Thu, 09 Apr 2009 16:09:48 +0000 kerryturner 50@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I agree with @cathycrea regarding students' weakness in assigning meaning to text. They've become good at skimming digital text, observing and blindly selecting familiar key words, then copying and pasting these into a document as their own written piece. The text hasn't been assimilated at all. I see this as one of the biggest challenges for teachers. </p> <p>And it is a digital literacy problem. Students are faced with vast quantities of information, very often repetitious in their points of view, and summaries of the narrative or content often appear in a similar format. The 'skimmer' sees this as the accepted point of view and ascertains that he no longer has to think, nor judge what is there. He can simply repeat it.</p> <p>I used to teach History. Besides telling the story in overview, I like the way sources are used and analysed to look more deeply at the event. The sources used are however, varied, and contribute to building up the picture.<br /> I'd like to see us do more work on information from blogs, forums, reviews and websites, in order to develop a thinking student. This would go hand in hand with explaining to learners how our eyes scan digital material (according to Jakob Nielson, in an F or E pattern)so that they become aware that they are scanning, and that very often they stop there, instead of extending that process to reading and assimilating. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-49 Thu, 09 Apr 2009 12:32:53 +0000 Illendil 49@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Digital literacy is quite an easy definition. I think it closely relates to literacy in the subject of English. Where it is not just competence but also the ability to use your literacy skills to create pieces, that is the key difference to just being competent.</p> <p>For ICT skills it is whether students are willing to mix their ICT skills to come up with creative solutions to the problems. For example whereas a lot of students would solve a problem by writing it out in a wordprocessor, correctly spelled and presented. Someone with digital literacy skills would approach this in a more imaginative manner - ie producing an animation, or a movie, or a piece of music linked to video. This means that they are comfortable in their use of ICT and can use it like words in literacy skills to produce work of a quality that makes you stop and think. </p> <p>On the Twitter area, students who are embracing the digital world can be seen and viewed, these are the digital literate students of the age. We may class these students as the wordsmiths or poets of their era. </p> <p>I hope that helps?</p> <p>This is why most school qualifications in ICT does not really show digital literacy, but competence, grammar and fluency in the use of ICT. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-48 Thu, 09 Apr 2009 09:03:36 +0000 Ant Heald 48@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Bah! Where's the technology that would allow the brilliant [;-)]thoughts I've just had while making breakfast to appear directly in this box without the awkward intervention of my fingers?</p> <p>I feel I'd need to delve deeper than I have done into research on language acquisition &#38; cognitive development to answer the first question. Instinctively, I suppose I feel that since I'm thinking of meta-literacy as part-of literacy rather than the 'ineffable force' you mentioned previously, that it begins to develop along with acquiring one's first language. </p> <p>Shades of grey or different realm? Both, depending on how you're looking at it. The different colours of the spectrum (and radio waves, microwaves etc) are all just part of the same continuum. Yet for practical purposes it makes sense to divide the spectrum up into different colours and 'types' of radiation: they're only arbitrary labels, but they do relate to the physical reality of the electromagnetic wavelength. Similarly, I think that grasping the way that language is just one form of social practice that functions in the same way as other social practices is part of 'the literacy scale' but of course it feels like a very different sort of thing than 'just' reading a poem to write about it in an exam, and it has potentially far reaching consequences beyond the confines of the classroom, so in another sense it is moving them into 'a different realm'. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-47 Thu, 09 Apr 2009 06:47:16 +0000 Doug Belshaw 47@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>[b]@cathycrea:[/b] That's a good question. I'm still struggling to separate out digital literacy, competence, grammar and fluency (if they are, in fact, separate concepts!) :o </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-46 Thu, 09 Apr 2009 06:45:47 +0000 Doug Belshaw 46@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>[b]@cathycrea:[/b] Do you believe that the narrative - and therefore the literacy - has changed in the 21st century? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-45 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 22:48:24 +0000 cathycrea 45@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I think literacy education has tended to focus more on narratives, and many of us are recognizing that literacy has to encompass more than that. However, I think the narrative format is very powerful and will endure in whatever forms of media that emerge.</p> <p>Federman's point that we need to learn to think is an important one for me and my students. My students can read, but tend to imagine reading as running their eyes over the words and recognizing the words. (No wonder it seems like a stupid, pointless activity to so many of them.) My job is to get students to THINK about what they are reading, and recognize that as readers, they have to construct meaning from the text. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-44 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 22:36:52 +0000 cathycrea 44@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I agree with you, Doug, and Ant, your examples are an excellent illustration that these so-called "digital natives" may not be all they're purported to be. </p> <p>What do you think are the essential aspects of digital literacy that we should make sure students have? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-43 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 22:00:12 +0000 Doug Belshaw 43@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Glad I'm making you work hard! :wink:</p> <p>You mention 'critical reflectiveness' and 'social action'. Do you believe these are part of 'meta-literacy', and if so is this meta-literacy acquired pre or post acquiring one's first language? It's an interesting concept and I"m trying to tease out it's implications and consequences!</p> <p>When you 'go beyond fluency' with your A Level students, do you believe that you are still on the same 'literacy scale' as it were (in terms of shades of grey) or moving them into a different realm? :-) </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-42 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:01:04 +0000 Ant Heald 42@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>That link was one of the first that popped up when I googled 'meta-literacy' and although it isn't as rigorous as it might be, I think it goes further than just using it as an umbrella term for different forms of practice. What caught my eye was the key idea of critical reflectiveness, and the link to social action.</p> <p>I suppose I see it in similar terms to the way I talk about language knowledge to my A level students. They're all 'experts' in English already, having acquired fluency in the language, but I want more for them than just 'better competency'. I want them to understand the mechanics of the language, and to understand how those mechanisms are used (both deliberately and inadvertantly) to maintain or challenge ideological positions. I believe that gaining that kind of knowledge both takes them to a new level of 'critical literacy' while at the same time allowing them to be more competent users of language - ie. having increased practical literacy.</p> <p>Boy, you're making me work hard here! Fortunately my little girl has just come to drag me away to play MarioKart wii, so I'll leave it there for now. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-41 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 19:00:46 +0000 Illendil 41@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Doug you are on fire here, trying to cover all aspects of ICT in schools? Good job too. </p> <p>There are two main types of student user out there, and this can be classified by the ICT qualifications and part of my work for the BCS Glossary on Computing and ICT. </p> <p>[b]Practitioner[/b] and [b]user[/b]</p> <p>[b]Practitioner[/b] - someone who has skills to both use but also to create using ICT. e.g. technician types, your student who it twittering, has a digital lifestyle and is totally at home on computers, creating their own web pages, playing with digital video (youtube etc).</p> <p>[b]Users[/b] - someone who has skills to use computers but not be creative e.g. your average student who has been taught ICT since the age of 4 but can get by with basic things but when it comes to being creative with a computer or use advanced aspects of software tend to struggle - hence the search problem mentioned by Ant. However users are quite capable of demonstrating 'advanced' skills -but these are picked up from friends who have found out how to do these things. </p> <p>The problem is that the ICT qualifications tend to concentrate on the ability of the student to communicate their ideas on paper via very long and tedious project folders, when they should be spent developing their ICT skills in playing with the software that they were supposed to be writing a project report for. </p> <p>An example of when an ICT qualification can be taught for today's students is the Digital Cre8or course from the BCS. Everything is online, there is no need to write essays, students reflect on their work through blogs, their work is uploaded and checked by the assessor. It also covers all aspects of digital media including creating and also distributing their work. No databases or spreadsheets in sight! </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=2#post-40 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 18:50:36 +0000 Illendil 40@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Teachers need to think about how technology can help them in the classroom rather than hinder them. I personally feel that using technology is a great leveler in the classroom as less bright students with a good grasp of the technology can appear on the same level as their more bright peers. I always encouraged my bottom sets to embrace technology particularly in their literacy skills as it helps immensely, particularly getting the basics right - spelling, grammar, organisation etc.</p> <p>It is a shame that we are not encouraged to set up facebook pages within schools for teachers and students to discuss issues relating to education. I do have a bebo page which I was asked to set up by my class and I was promptly complained about as being a 'perv' by someone esle, fortunately my class defended me, but this is one of the pitfalls that we need to be aware.</p> <p>My colleague and I have plenty of ideas to implement in the classrrom, the trouble is each department needs an IT expert (whether in-house or brought in) to help alleviate staff fears. A good cross curricular ICT coordinator is one such person, but it is a full time job to support these initiatives. </p> <p>Ant I feel that this is the reason for the lack of change, a lack of confidence and a lack of support. I also feel there needs to be some killer applications out there, Kar2ouche is one, twitter is another, there has been good work with emailing parts of texts to students. There is loads out there, but that is the problem, too many little things no one BIG idea that can be grasped. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=6#post-39 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 16:10:09 +0000 Doug Belshaw 39@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I've posted a draft, proto-version of my Ed.D. thesis Literature Review in a blog post entitled [url=http://dougbelshaw.com/blog/2009/04/08/edd-thesis-literature-review-a-start-has-been-made/]Ed.D. thesis Literature Review: a start has been made![/url]</p> <p>In it, I (unsurprisingly!) review some of the existing literature in the field of literacy studies, focusing especially on the distinction between 'unitary' and 'pluralist' views of literacy.</p> <p>I'd welcome your feedback, either here or in the comments section on my blog! :D </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-38 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 16:06:44 +0000 Doug Belshaw 38@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Ant,</p> <p>Thanks for the response. I see that you're what is termed in the literature a 'Pluralist' when it comes to literacy - you deny that there's a single referent for 'literacy'. I agree!</p> <p>The concept of 'digital grammar' that you raise in the second point is interesting. Knowledge does have some relation to literacy, but is it more of a [i]competency[/i]?</p> <p>Finally, the page to which you link seems to describe meta-literacy as an 'umbrella term', whereas I thought you were going for meta-literacy as some type of ineffable knowledge or force by which you could engage in literacy practices. I'm confused! :? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-37 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 15:11:10 +0000 Ant Heald 37@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>In reverse order:</p> <p>I've only studied bits of philosophy as part of a course in 'Language &#38; Philosophy of Criticism' two decades ago. Oh, and I've read "Sophie's World"!</p> <p>3. I see 'poetic literacy' etc as subsets of 'literacy' (or perhaps it might be more appropriate to regard them as extensions rather than subsets?). </p> <p>2. I think here we are getting towards the nub of the distinction I [i]think [/i]you're trying to make between 'procedural issues' and some broader (?) more 'abstract'(?)concept of literacy. I don't think not understanding hyperlinks is merely a 'procedural issue' in the same way that knowing how to turn the computer on or open the web-browser are - it's the absence of knowledge of a fairly fundamental part of what we might call the 'grammar of the internet' &lt;opens new can of worms&gt; so I think it [i]is [/i]part of literacy. </p> <p>1. The term 'meta-literacy' is one I made up as I was thinking this through, though unsurprisingly I see it's been used elsewhere. The summary [url=http://www.nald.ca/library/research/village/19.htm]here [/url]defines the term in pretty much the way I intended it to be understood. You ask: "In what sense is it anything to do with reading and writing. Isn't it more to do with behaviour and action?" to which I guess I would respond that reading and writing IS behaviour and action. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-36 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 11:53:06 +0000 Doug Belshaw 36@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>That's an interesting angle, Kerry - whether changes in literacy mean that the [i]texts[/i] that we produce should change. What does everyone else think? :D </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=5#post-35 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 11:19:42 +0000 kerryturner 35@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I thought it was time that someone less *clever* stepped into this forum. Although several years old now, Mark Federman’s talk is still interesting reading. <a href="http://tinyurl.com/2dlvcb" rel="nofollow">http://tinyurl.com/2dlvcb</a> It’s not a new concept, but are the traditional texts we use for creating students who can analyse, summarise, synthesise and become more discerning, still relevant these days? Should we read a novel like ‘Holes’ from cover to cover, or simply pull together all the relevant pieces from a connected world? History teachers use sources and this approach can work quite well. An extract from his final paragraph:</p> <p>[i]‘Have no fear – Johnny and Janey will, in all probability, learn to read, just as they learned to speak. But orality has not structured society since ancient Greece, and literacy no longer structures society<br /> today. The challenge for all … is to recognize that the exclusive focus and predominance given to the pedagogical artefacts of a literate world is inconsistent with the skills necessary to participate in the discovery and production of knowledge in a ubiquitously connected and pervasively proximate world. … what is valued as knowledge comprises a vastly greater domain than that in a world structured by literacy. In a UCaPP world … we must now all learn to think for ourselves, a pedagogical objective far more important and more critical than merely learning to read.’[/i] </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-34 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:53:04 +0000 Doug Belshaw 34@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Ant, </p> <p>Three points related to your post above:</p> <p>1. I'm not sure if the reflective self-awareness that you mention can be called 'meta-literacy'. In what sense is it anything to do with reading and writing. Isn't it more to do with behaviour and action?</p> <p>2. I really like your example of changes in voice in English as compared to Chinese and the problems it can cause. I'm not so sure how this backs up your idea of 'meta-literacy', though. To what extent are procedural issues - similar to your colleague not understanding hyperlinks - part of literacy?</p> <p>3. You mention 'narrative literacy', 'poetic literacy', etc. Do you think these exist separately to 'literacy', or do you see them as subsets?</p> <p>Good to be talking to another person who's studied Philosophy! :wink: </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-33 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 10:46:55 +0000 Doug Belshaw 33@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>So 'digital literacy' (or whatever you want to call it) is more than a set of 'procedural skills' such as how to get around Internet filters? What do you think [b][i]is[/i][/b] involved in digital literacy, then? </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-32 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 09:39:25 +0000 Ant Heald 32@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I'm right with you on this one. Examples:</p> <p>I've lost count of the number of times that a student has come back to me claiming that there's "nothing on 'x'" on the internet, only to sit down with them and find dozens of useful resources within a minute or two.</p> <p>When chasing up work from students claiming they 'can't send'their work, I've had occasion to crash their MSN session to talk them through the process of attaching a file to an email.</p> <p>Recently I decided to try using Posterous with a Y11 class as a way collating and commenting on their coursework. I thought it would be the simplest method as posting involves just sending an email attachment. I had to show some of them how to access their email account (Y11!). Then I found myself having to tell some of them the difference between an email address and a URL, as they were trying to access their posterous by putting their email address in the browser window. And these were all kids who knew how to use a proxy site to get onto blocked flash-games sites. </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=3#post-31 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 09:23:43 +0000 Ant Heald 31@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Looks like I'm going to have to dust-off my ancient philosophy notes!</p> <p>Doug - it looks to me as though there's no real disagreement: I'm no longer used to this kind of debate and therefore maybe not choosing my words as carefully as I should (or making my intent clear enough). When I claimed that literacy was not dependent on particular forms, I wasn't suggesting that it's something that can exist without particular forms and therefore can't be affected by changes in the medium. I was merely suggesting that once literacy is acquired in some form (eg. English) then the cognitive skills involved can be applied elsewhere, especially if you have developed a conscious awareness of what your English literacy involves (what I termed a meta-literacy eg. understanding concepts such as tense, person and number etc) Sure, without learning chinese symbols etc you are not literate in chinese at all, as you said - but you now understand something of what it [i]is [/i]to be literate in chinese, and that is likely to assist in becoming actually able to communicate in chinese (to be literate in chinese, in other words).</p> <p>What I think is absolutely relevant to the discussion here, is that if you are literate in English [i]without [/i] the meta-literacy, it is likely that your knowledge of English will 'interfere' with your ability to acquire chinese adequately. For example in English, variations in tone of voice are supra-segmental features that convey emotion, irony etc. In chinese, tonal variations are part of the phonology of the language so that pronouncing the same sounds with a different tone means that you are actually saying a different word. Therefore deeply rooted habits of intonation in English intended to convey subtle nuances can intefere with the communication of basic semantic content in chinese.</p> <p>Something similar is true with what we are calling 'digital literacy': deeply ingrained habits from conventional literacy can cause failure to acquire, or misinterpretation of the particular forms and possibilities of digital communication. A simple example is the colleague who was reading something next to me on a staffroom computer and was getting irritated at the way that some words were emphasised for no obvious reason. I had to explain about hyperlinks. That may sound like a joke, but it really happened.</p> <p>So yes, I agree with you. In practical terms there are things that need to be taught to enable people to understand and use digital communication effectively. I am more than happy to call that 'digital literacy' (and in a nod back to Ben's post that started this, as an English &#38; Film teacher I also do think in terms of 'narrative literacy', 'poetic literacy', 'media literacy', 'film literacy' etc). </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=4#post-30 Wed, 08 Apr 2009 06:54:48 +0000 Doug Belshaw 30@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>I'm not a believer in Prensky's 'digital natives' vs. 'digital immigrants' dichotomy and have outlined my position a [url=http://teaching.mrbelshaw.co.uk/index.php/2006/11/23/digital-natives-mountain-men-and-pioneers/]few times[/url] (also [url=http://dougbelshaw.com/blog/?s=%22digital+natives%22&#38;x=11&#38;y=16]here[/url]). The following is taken from an article by Bennett, Maton &#38; Kervin (2008) after they question whether all young people should be given the same label:</p> <p>[i]Furthermore, questions must be asked about the relevance to education of the everyday ICTs skills possessed by technically adept young people. For example, it cannot be assumed that knowing how to look up ‘cheats’ for computer games on the Internet bears any relation to the skills required to assess a website’s relevance for a school project. Indeed, existing research suggests otherwise. When observing students interacting with text obtained from an Internet search, Sutherland-Smith (2002) reported that many were easily frustrated when not instantly gratified in their search for immediate answers and appeared to adopt a ‘snatch and grab philosophy’ (p. 664). Similarly, Eagleton, Guinee and Langlais (2003) observed middle-school students often making ‘hasty, random choices with little thought and evaluation’ (p. 30).[/i]</p> <p>Is this something you've observed? What is the relationship between 'new literacies' and the concept of 'digital natives'? :-) </p> http://www.literacyconversation.org/topic.php?id=2#post-29 Tue, 07 Apr 2009 21:37:02 +0000 Ant Heald 29@http://www.literacyconversation.org/ <p>Doug - I was referring more specifically to the shift in take-up of digital tools by teachers rather than a more generic shift in literacy.</p> <p>As an English teacher I don't see much evidence of a lot of change, as it happens, though. Curriculum documents nod towards 'multi-modal' texts and composition on screen as well as on paper, but there's no sense of it being embedded. Where digital communication is discussed among colleagues it tends often to be seen as a problem (use of text language, kids not reading books - Susan Greenfield stuff) rather than an opportunity. </p>