What sort of literacy is needed in the digital age?

Similarly to when considering print literacy, although possibly even more so, an emphasis on adaptability is important when thinking about digital literacy.  For example, there are many different technological tools and that are encompassed within the idea of digital literacy, such as computers, tablets, mobile phones (both smart and otherwise), and other electronic devices.  Being able to make effective use of these tools is one vital component of literacy in the digital age.

What are the characteristics of a technologically literate person?

As mentioned above, the characteristics of a technologically literate person are, in my opinion, largely centered around adaptability and accessibility.  As users of technology for literacy practices, we must make sure that the literacy practice we engage in are accessible to and comprehensible for our intended audiences, just as we negotiate meaning in face-to-face communication and utilize standard practices in handwritten communication.  Both the dissemination of information and the consumption of information that we do utilizing technological tools are in some ways more complex than pre-digital age literacy, because of the way that interaction can happen immediately within a technologically-mediated environment.  One specific example that comes to mind is the considerations of accessibility for differently-abled persons, such as using a colorblindness simulator to be sure to present materials on a website that are easily interpreted for someone with colorblindness, such as the one found here: Colorblindness Filter.

How do people’s technology practices shape their literacy?

Rather than literacy being shaped by technology, I see there being a give-and-take relationship between these two realms.  For example, it seems that as babies and children begin to develop their primary discourses, they’re not initially exposed to technology practices.  Technology is introduced later, at various points during their development, and with varying purposes and degrees of use, similar to the way in which print literacy is differently embraced within the primary discourse environment.  As a result, I think that this initial development of the primary discourse necessarily impacts an individual’s technology practices, which then affect their literacy, both in their primary and (multiple) secondary discourses.

Although it’s only observational, I have noticed that students in the courses I teach seem to interact with technology in ways much different from me. For example, in order to keep in touch with friends and family on a daily basis, I primarily use text messaging and Facebook, which exposes me to text-based language and status updates respectively, which can be multimodal, but are heavily text-based, too.  My students on the other hand often use Snapchat and Periscope, which are primarily video-based communication tools.  Their expectations, then, are that they will send and receive images and videos to serve the same social purpose that I do with texts and Facebook.

How can we best teach technological literacy?

What are the greatest problems that technology causes?

What are the greatest benefits of technology?

• What is literacy?
• What is illiteracy?
• What are the characteristics of a literate person?

We agree as a group in general to Gee’s discussion of multiple literacies, as opposed to a single literacy.  Most people are literate to a certain degree when considering ‘being literate’ as a social practice, but those who are multiliterate are able to access and shift between different discourse communities.  This is exemplified in their access to different “identity kits” (Gee, 1991, p. 3).  As an extension of this idea, we would argue then that very few people can be considered entirely illiterate, but most of them have limited access to discourse communities, including those that are privileged or otherwise inaccessible.  By privileged discourse communities, we are primarily considering those favored by certain socioeconomic groups and empowered communities, and reified through the dominant educational system.  In order to be considered literate within the U.S. educational environment, for example, students must write and speak in a coherent manner (as modeled by the dominant discourse community), and demonstrate behavioral competence within that environment.

*Definition by Mellissa Carr, Jack Peterson, and Kris Lowrey

Important Early Reading
Now write about any early picture books you can recall reading or having read to you.

• Who read to you?
• When and where were you read to?
  
• Did you go to the library?
• Did you go to any story hours?
• What’s the first book you remember reading on your own?

My earliest memories of reading are fuzzy, but I can remember sitting on my dad’s lap, at home, on his la-z-boy, and reading books every evening.  Well, he read the books, and I followed along. I’m sure I must have read with my mom too, but I can’t recall that.  I can picture our Old English Sheepdog Sunshine nearby, and sometimes my little sister was there too.  There are a few books that really come to mind… I can’t remember seeing the words on the page, but I can vividly remember the pictures.  We used to read many many books, but some of my favorites were “The Poky Little Puppy,” “Brer Rabbit in the Briar Patch,” a big hardcover book with a golden jacket that had a story about a puffin in it.  I loved to read the puffin story with my dad.

My mom often took us to the library… I vividly remember visiting the Reading Public Library in downtown Reading.  It was a huge stone building; sometimes we’d enter up the front steps and look through the stacks, but most of the time we’d go in the side entrance, down a few steps into the basement which housed the children’s books.  I remember checking out many many books this way to read, but I can’t recall very clearly if we went to any story hours at the library.  Later, we’d visit the bookmobile when it started coming close to our house.

I don’t have very early memories of reading books on my own, but the earliest book I can think of for which I have strong memories is the book “My Brother Sam is Dead.” When I read it, and I can’t remember at what age I did, it made a huge impression on me.  Similarly, I can remember borrowing books from my 5th grade history teacher, Mrs. Shade.  She had this amazing display of short historically-themed texts at the back of the classroom, and I went through them voraciously that year.  All different American history topics were covered, from short biographies of the early presidents, to Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys, to battles and symbolic items, such as the Battle of Ticonderoga and the Star Spangled Banner.  I associate and credit these memories with the start of my interest in history and politics, although it’s just as possible that this interest began earlier.  I was also always taken in by the many stories of the Berenstain bears, but exactly when I read these books, I can’t remember.

In addition to the memories that I have of specific books, I remember very clearly reading programs and events to prom ote reading that I participated in.  For example, I loved participating in “Book It,” and remember being just as excited about having read books as getting my free little personal pizza from Pizza Hut.  I’m sure there’s a lot to be said about the commercialization and the incentivization of reading, but I’m not sure I want to explore such a positive memory in that way.  Similarly, I was amazed at all of the possibilities when the Scholastic book sale rolled into elementary school once a year.  The endless choices were overwhelming, but also thrilling!

Important Early Writing
Now let’s explore your early memories of writing:

• What’s the first thing you remember writing?
• Did you do any writing at home?
• Did you ever keep a diary or journal?
• What’s the first school writing you can remember doing?
• What’s the first graded piece of writing you remember?

My memories of early reading experiences are much more salient than those of writing.  Throughout adolescence I had fitful starts with diaries, but never really got into them.  Before that, I can remember doing a report, in the style of a book with pictures and commentary in 3rd or 4th grade, I think, on Rhode Island.  I know I saved the project and I’m sure my mom has it in the attic with other schoolwork I did.  This Rhode Island projects still conjures up feelings of pride, although I have only fleeting and fuzzy memories of what the report actually looks like, and I can’t honestly say that I remember how much writing I did for it.

• Primary Blog Question
  • When compared, the two film clips help illuminate a key question for this course: How has our relationship to technology changed over time?

The two films, while set in the same time period (1899-1900 to begin), illustrate the discrepant expectations of each film’s target audiences with their releases in 1960 and 2002, respectively.  The first version, released in 1960, stars Rod Taylor in the role of the Time Traveler.  Following the original H.G. Wells text closely, the Time Traveler character is tasked with convincing his colleagues (and through them, the audience) of the existence of the fourth dimension, and spends a great deal of time arguing that time travel is possible.

The second version of the film, released in 2002, features Guy Pearce as the Time Traveler, and moves away from this close adherence to the book’s narrative.  Instead of arguing for the possibility of time travel and the existence of the fourth dimension, this film opens with a heart-wrenching tale in which the Time Traveler, a professor of mechanical engineering, finds himself in a heart-wrenching situation in which he believes time travel will allow him to solve a problem.

What I found most interesting is the fact that these two films illustrate from the very start the Time Traveler’s relationship with technology and raise questions for the audience to consider.  The audience of 1960 is asked to wrestle with conceptualizing dimensions of space-time and concerns about ownership and profit of technological innovations.  The audience of 2002, in contrast, is tasked with considering the possible implications of time travel, including whether or not the past/present can be changed in the future.

• Secondary Blog Questions
  • How has film technology changed?
  • How have we changed as film viewers?
  • How has our understanding of time evolved?
  • How does fiction/science fiction impact our relationship to technology?