Journal Post 2 1.29.23

 

Literacy is ever changing and evolving.  I think what counts as literacy is a personal decision that is made by the reader and how he or she is using it to make meaning withing their lives. Literacy can be determined in many ways.  If we think in general terms that literacy is one’s ability to read and write, we cannot discount the options that are available currently to do so.  Literacy was once dominated by publishing and printing technologies.  (Durrant and Green, 2000, n. pag.) According to Durrant and Green (2000) “there are more and different technologies available.” (n. pag.) Hence, they explain to us “account needs to be taken of a profound media shift in literacy, schooling, and society-a broad-based shift from print to digital electronics as the organizing context for literate-textual practice and for learning and teaching.” (Durrant and Green, 2000, n. pag.)

Literacy changes in response to new media by adapting.  Durran and Green (2000, n. pag.) write,“print takes a new place within a reconceptualized understanding of literacy, schooling, and technology practice, one which is likely to be beneficial in moving us and our children in the new millennium.”  Students can now interact with platforms such as Epic.com or MyOn. These allow students to select various stories, both fiction and nonfiction, to read. Epic provides certain books that have read aloud options. MyOn allows a “read to” option for students for all books which affords all levels of readers to engage with various text levels. In addition, it provides options for students to read at home if they have a limited number of paper books, thus making literacy equitable. Other platforms such as Lexia and IReady provided differentiated lessons and activities for students to engage in. Math platforms such as IReady and Zern provide students with the opportunity to practice math skills.  ZSpace which is available in my district for 7^th and 8^th graders, allows them to experience more realistic applications in Science, such as looking at cells, dissecting animals and much more. My daughter in both 5^th grade and 6^th used Minecraft to build a colonial village and Mesopotamia Village for Social Studies.  Furthermore, many of these platforms provide immediate data for teachers that can be used to create small groups and to make other instructional decisions. Teachers and students can work collaboratively via Google Classroom, Jamboard, OneDrive, Zoom, Microsoft Teams, Google Meet and Google Drive. During one of my classes in the M.Ed program I worked collaboratively with two other classmates to create a Unit that spanned elementary, middle, and high school aged students. 

These new forms of communication need to be valued as ways and strategies to engage students as well as prepare them to be productive citizens in a quickly changing world. According to Rich (2008, n. pag.) “some literacy experts say that online reading skills with help children fare better when they begin looking for digital-age jobs.”  We do not need to treat digital literacies and traditional literacies as separate entities from one another. When we view them as working in conjunction with one another, it places value on the contribution to each.  Gillen and Barton (2010) claim that “digital literacies are not independent of other literacies, there is a relationship between traditional literacy.”

References

Durrant, C. and Green, B. (2000) Literacy and the new technologies in school education: Meeting the l(IT)eracy challenge? The Free Library. (2014). Retrieved Jan 18, 2023 from https://www.thefreelibrary.com

Gillen, J. and Barton, D. (2010). Digital literacies: A research briefing by the Technology Enhanced Learning phase of the Teaching and Learning Research Program.

Rich, M. (2008). Literacy debate: Online, r u really reading? Retrieved January 22,2023.