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Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

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Page 1: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Literacy in the Information Age

Bonnie BraceyMECAThe George Lucas Educational Foundation

Page 2: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

This presentation will

• Be a short history walk through school as we practice it.

• Confront some of the problems in teaching and learning

• Introduce some ideational scaffolding

• Question some practices

• Establish time to think , what is literacy?

Page 3: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

The Mindset of Schools

• Today‘s public education system was created over a century ago in a time before computers, before television, before airplanes, before automobiles, before radios, before telephones, before satellites, before computers, and entirely before electricity was available in anyone's home. Does it fit now? Is it relevant?

Page 4: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

That was Then….

In fact, today's public education system was designed in an era when more than 90% of young people still lived on farms or in rural areas. Consequently, education was institutionalized and legalized as a seasonal enterprise.

Page 5: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Schools adopted the six-hour day and the nine-month calendar to accommodate farm life. Summers were reserved for harvesting crops and other agricultural activities.

Schools were designed to serve the needs of a slower-paced, far less technological world - an era called the Agricultural Age.

Prisoners of Time…. http://www.ed.gov/pubs/PrisonersOfTime/

Page 6: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

At the end of the 19th century, with the beginning of mechanization and urbanization, the Agricultural Age began to give way to a new way of thinking as the Industrial Age swept across America.

Industry has changed. Small family farms are now combined into cooperatives and agribusinesses.

Page 7: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Schools Entered the Industry Age

Regimentation was in….

Page 8: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Schools were modeled after the assembly line factories of the early 20th century, with teachers seen as the workers, students as the products they produced, and schools as the production line.

Schools tried to make students regimented "learning machines" so that they would be equipped to play efficient roles on the assembly lines of the day, doing precisely defined tasks over and over accurately as rapidly as possible.

Page 9: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

?????

Many speakers reference the fact that a teacher from a hundred years ago could function, fairly easily , in today’s teaching and learning environment.

Page 10: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Some Changes, Some Problems

But Basics are in….

Reading, Writing , Math

Is the new literacy testing?

Page 11: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Have We Established New Literacies?

Make a mental or an actual list of the changes you believe have happened in the schools because of the use of

new kinds of literacies?

Page 12: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

What Kind of Schools Fits Today’s America?

Page 13: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

How have literacy practices changed over time, and responded to new technologies? What is the agent of change for new practices?

Page 14: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

SputnikFor a brief period of time we reacted to, and met the challenge of new space learning and technology. We encouraged constructivist and hands on learning. Some kinds of Science and Math were in. We wanted students to construct knowledge.

Page 15: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

New Literacies Come and Go

• But the concern with Nation at Risk is that we were not doing well in meeting our goals, and that standards were not established. Evaluation , and meeting the goals was seen as a need. So we entered the age of Standards..

• National Standards, State Standards, Curriculum Standards, Local objectives, school needs, and ALL of this is ,subject to testing and evaluation of a sort.

Page 16: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Teachers are Swimming in a Sea of Standards

Without the use of technology , it is almost impossible to even know the tasks and standards that elementary

teachers must react to!

Page 17: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Do We Have Testing? You Bet

Page 18: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Testing is the Mantra of Our Age

But is it evaluation, in a reality base?

Page 19: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

• Conceptual Framework ?

Page 20: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Schools, Libraries, and Community Centers

• The use of technology , and the dissemination to the general public

was decided to be through these

places.

Page 21: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

What do you think?

• How do technological, linguistic, political, and economic forces shape literacy practices today?

Page 22: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

• How is meaning constructed in both personal and social terms?

• How are ethical and policy issues shaped by the changes in literacy?

Page 23: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Creating the Possibilities for Change

• How can we understand and facilitate learning through new technologies?

Page 24: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Improving Technological Literacy Needs National Effort;

Potential Benefits Are Many, Report Says

Most Americans know little about the world of technology, yet from day to day they must make critical decisions that are technologically based, such as whether to buy genetically engineered foods or transmit personal data over the Internet.

Page 25: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Technology

• The use of technology as a learning tool in the classroom is often confused with the broader concept of being technologically literate -- knowing something of the nature and history of technology, as well as having a certain level of skill in using technologies and thinking critically about them.

Page 26: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

• Neither the educational system nor the policy-making apparatus in the United States has recognized the importance of this more comprehensive view of technological literacy, says a new report from the National Academies' National Academy of Engineering and National Research Council. http://www4.nas.edu/news.nsf/isbn/0309082625?OpenDocument

Page 27: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Informed Decisions

It calls for a broad-based effort to increase the technological literacy of all Americans, a goal that will have many benefits including more informed decision-making by citizens and business and government leaders about the development and use of technology, and a more erudite population that will be better prepared for the demands of today's high-tech work environment.

Page 28: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Defining Technological Literacy • One useful way to think about technological

literacy is as a component of the more general, or "cultural," literacy popularized by educational theorist E.D. Hirsch, Jr.

Page 29: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Defining Technological Literacy • Hirsch pointed out that literate people in

every society and every culture share a body of knowledge that enables them to communicate with each other and make sense of the world around them.

• The kinds of things a literate person knows will vary from society to society and from era to era; so there is no absolute definition of literacy. In the early twenty-first century, however, cultural literacy must have a large technological component.

Page 30: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

We Will Explore

• How the nature of texts is changing as they are re-presented through online communities, web sites, video, hypermedia, virtual reality, robotics, and other new technologies.

It is not just about a book!

Page 31: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Where Are We Going?

• The literature of science fiction provides us with vivid images of life in the future. To understand that new realm, we look for a computer like HAL from 2001: A Space Odyssey to guide us as we work and play with robots, explore strange lands and times through holodecks, or transport our bodies on rocket ships.

Page 32: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Are You Ready?

As different, or fanciful as these notions may be, they often pale in comparison with the latest news items about cloning, virtual reality, and microbots. Ubiquitous computing, parallel computing and virtual reality are new too.

Page 33: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

What Personal Technologiesdo you own?

The Future Is Now!

Page 34: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Count Them…..

• Often we sleep, awakened by an alarm, we scoot out of bed and dress for school. Some of us put on shoes that were designed for the space program, zap some coffee in the microwave, and you may have used a number of personal devices.. Shaver, hairdryer, electric toothbrush, lint brush, ( if you have a dog or cat), and then get into a car, which has smart dust and motes as a part of the infrastructure. We reach for a cell phone, or headphones, and make sure we have our credit cards and or pagers.. Did I miss some things?

Page 35: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

• Microwave• Electric Blanket• Coffee maker• Toaster• Cell phone• Athletic shoes as in Nike• Pager• Watch• Television• Cable• Fax Machine• Xerox Machine

Page 36: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

We Are Living in the Future

Last Year This Time Did You Think..Of Ubiquitous

Computing?

Ubiquitous computing arrived early and with stealth.

Smart rooms and campuses are taking shape.

Are you ready for it?

Page 37: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation
Page 38: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

What Intrigues Us About New Media? What Next?

We can easily be enthralled by the possibilities of new media.

What possibilities have you considered?

What new media might be aimed at you?

What new practices insert themselves into your daily practices?

Page 39: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

New Trends

We realize that being able to take a digital photo and send it instantly to a far-away friend, to build an online community of people with similar interests, or to study online from a distant university, are just harbingers of what may be coming.

Page 40: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

 How do we help learners as we all become immersed in a new information age?

Page 41: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

We need a way to engage critically with students—to understand the promises as well as the perils. Doing so would mean applying what Walter Kaufman (1977) calls dialectical reading to the evolving new media culture.

This means that as we attempt to understand and engage with the changes before us, we neither embrace nor reject them, but rather enter into a kind of dialogue with them, asking what they mean and what they could be, and how our interactions with them can lead to useful reflection on who we are.

Page 42: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

How Do We Prepare Teachers?

There are calls now for computer training as a core component of literacy and worries about issues such as web site content and the need for new literacy skills.

In this context, teachers worry about how they can teach the technical skills that are sometimes more foreign to them than they are to their students.

Page 43: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

What Shapes Media Use?

• What media are emerging in our literacy practices?

Page 44: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Is It Just About Technology? • Shedroff does not cite the need for

more technical skills, even though he probably feels that need at times, but rather, a desire to be have learned how to be more fully human in his interactions with others. His work recalls Murnane and Levy’s (1996) argument that the new basic skills are not only the hard skills of minimal reading, writing, and computation, but the soft skills.

Page 45: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Soft Skills

such as : the ability to to communicate effectively both orally and in writing, and the ability to work productively with people from different backgrounds. Understanding the perspective of others, being able to work with complex, messy situations, and learning how to learn may become more crucial than ever.

Page 46: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

How Does Your Staff Development Help

You?Does it…

Have the goal of improving student learning at the heart of every school endeavor ?

Help teachers and other school staff meet the needs of students who learn in different ways and who come from diverse cultural, linguistic, and socioeconomic backgrounds ?

Page 47: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Is mentoring an important part of the normal working day of all public school educators ?

Is it rigorous, sustained, and adequate to the long-term change of practice ?

Is it directed toward teachers' intellectual development and leadership ?

Or is it sit and get?

Page 48: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Mentors Is it directed toward teachers' intellectual

development and leadership ? Does it foster a deepening of subject-matter

knowledge, a greater understanding of learning, and a greater appreciation of students' needs ?

Is it designed and directed by teachers, to incorporates the best principles of adult learning, and involves shared decisions to improve the school ?

Page 49: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Professional Development

Does it address personal and district needs and advances the profession as a whole ?Does it makes best use of new technologies?

Is it site-based and supportive of a clearly articulated vision for students?

Page 50: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Interactive Study

We must look at how students make meaning as they both respond to and create texts;

How cultural meanings are re-created within the new media. Students read and discuss changing notions of literacy; They study new literacy practices through a research project; And they learn from each other through discussions about current events and personal experiences with new information and communication technologies.

Page 51: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation
Page 52: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

What Will Prepare Us?

Educators today feel both the excitement of this emerging world and the challenge of preparing young people to live productively within it.

They rightly wonder how to assess the changes they see in the new information age and how to decide what learning experiences can best prepare students for it.

Page 53: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Bonnie [email protected]

Teacher agent of change…

Page 54: Literacy in the Information Age Bonnie Bracey MECA The George Lucas Educational Foundation

Content: Bertram C. BruceUIUC

Presentation constructed from research, books, and papers