Technology / Literacy & Education
At Inverness Primary we are attempting to expand our notions of contemporary literacy, what it means to be a reader, a processor of information, and communicator in a time when information is increasingly networked, digital, global, and abundant.
The traditional model of education was perfect in every way for me and my generation. I grew up in a no stoplight Iowa farming town, where most of the students I attended school with went right back to the farm, and had every reason to expect to spend the next 35 years working in straight rows, performing repetitive tasks. Farming is an honorable profession in every sense. I only use it as a good anology to an out-moded model of education.
From the time I went to school our lives have already changed dramatically. Change, of course, is nothing new. Change is even expected. What is different is that today we know that our world is changing too fast to predict the environment our children will inherit from us. So what do our children need to know to be ready for an unpredictable future? They must know how to teach themselves.
For the first time in history our job as educators is to prepare our children for a future that we can not clearly describe.
Reading - Riting - Rithmetic
- Literacy as we know it. What happens to the old tried and true 3R's?
Well....nothing happens to them. The 3R's are as important today as they have always been. We are teaching literacy, so that students have the skills to find the information they need, to learn what they need to know, to do what they need to do. One of our principal questions is, what does it mean to be literate in today's world. What does it mean to be a reader, when information is increasingly networked, and we are often accessing content from its author, without editor, publishers, librarians, and other filters?
What’s changed is that we were taught to read what somebody we trusted gave us to read. In that information environment, all you needed to do is read it. But when our children are reading in a global electronic library,Information Literacy that almost anyone can publish to, almost anything they want, and for almost any reason they want, our notions of what it means to be a reader expands. Being a reader in today's information landscape means a reader must find information, decode it, evaluate it critically, and organize it for personal use.
So what happens to arithmetic, when information becomes increasingly digital?
Math is about making numbers tell their story. ..and when the numbers come in the thousands and they are digital, then there are new skills required to make them tell their stories. And what happens when all information today is made of numbers, the ones and zeros that make text, images, sounds, video, and animation. Does the skill to process information by working the digital foundation of that information become part of math? Arithmetic expands into a range of skills involved in employing information to answer questions, solve problems, and accomplish goals.
Does writing go away? Absolutely not. Our opportunities to express ourselves, especially in writing, have expanded enormously, as well as opportunities to earn income from the idea that we share. We’re not producing this astounding capacity to communicate for words and numbers alone. We are producing this capacity to communicate because we know that in the 21st century, we are going to be
communicating with multi-media. When we are overwhelmed by the abundance of information, we must work to select the information we are going to pay attention to, and the info we’re going to ignore. Therefore, information -- our messages -- must compete for attention in order to have an audience and accomplish their goal. This is why it is critical that students also learn to communicate with images, sound, video, and animation.
Reading expands into exposing what is true.
Arithmetic expands into employing information.
Writing expands into expressing ideas compellingly. Conclusion? Stop integrating technology, ...and instead, redefine literacy, and integrate that. When my son thinks about his digital experiences, he isn’t thinking about technology. He’s thinking about the information! For students technology is already transparent. Educators are the only ones that seem to see technology as something to be added to the curriculum, something to be overcome, or in the way. This is where we should be as educators -- thinking less about the technology and more about teaching from today’s digital, networked, and abundant information environment. If we can expand our notions of literacy and integrat that, the technology will come -- but not because we’re convinced that laying our children’s hands on these machines will make them smarter, but because computers and the Internet are the pencil and paper of our time.
We will have achieved real education reform, when no teacher believes that they can teach the same thing, the same way, year after year.
It’s Not just Literacy…
It’s learning-Literacy
It’s Not just Literacy skills…
It’s Literacy Habits
It’s Not just Lifelong Learning…
It’s Learning Lifestyle Habits
At Inverness Primary we are attempting to expand our notions of contemporary literacy, what it means to be a reader, a processor of information, and communicator in a time when information is increasingly networked, digital, global, and abundant.
The traditional model of education was perfect in every way for me and my generation. I grew up in a no stoplight Iowa farming town, where most of the students I attended school with went right back to the farm, and had every reason to expect to spend the next 35 years working in straight rows, performing repetitive tasks. Farming is an honorable profession in every sense. I only use it as a good anology to an out-moded model of education.
From the time I went to school our lives have already changed dramatically. Change, of course, is nothing new. Change is even expected. What is different is that today we know that our world is changing too fast to predict the environment our children will inherit from us. So what do our children need to know to be ready for an unpredictable future? They must know how to teach themselves.
For the first time in history our job as educators is to prepare our children for a future that we can not clearly describe.
Reading - Riting - Rithmetic
-
Literacy as we know it. What happens to the old tried and true 3R's?
Well....nothing happens to them. The 3R's are as important today as they have always been. We are teaching literacy, so that students have the skills to find the information they need, to learn what they need to know, to do what they need to do. One of our principal questions is, what does it mean to be literate in today's world. What does it mean to be a reader, when information is increasingly networked, and we are often accessing content from its author, without editor, publishers, librarians, and other filters?
What’s changed is that we were taught to read what somebody we trusted gave us to read. In that information environment, all you needed to do is read it. But when our children are reading in a global electronic library,Information Literacy that almost anyone can publish to, almost anything they want, and for almost any reason they want, our notions of what it means to be a reader expands. Being a reader in today's information landscape means a reader must find information, decode it, evaluate it critically, and organize it for personal use.
Math is about making numbers tell their story. ..and when the numbers come in the thousands and they are digital, then there are new skills required to make them tell their stories. And what happens when all information today is made of numbers, the ones and zeros that make text, images, sounds, video, and animation. Does the skill to process information by working the digital foundation of that information become part of math? Arithmetic expands into a range of skills involved in employing information to answer questions, solve problems, and accomplish goals.
communicating with multi-media. When we are overwhelmed by the abundance of information, we must work to select the information we are going to pay attention to, and the info we’re going to ignore. Therefore, information -- our messages -- must compete for attention in order to have an audience and accomplish their goal. This is why it is critical that students also learn to communicate with images, sound, video, and animation.
Reading expands into exposing what is true.
Arithmetic expands into employing information.
Writing expands into expressing ideas compellingly.
Conclusion? Stop integrating technology, ...and instead, redefine literacy, and integrate that. When my son thinks about his digital experiences, he isn’t thinking about technology. He’s thinking about the information! For students technology is already transparent. Educators are the only ones that seem to see technology as something to be added to the curriculum, something to be overcome, or in the way. This is where we should be as educators -- thinking less about the technology and more about teaching from today’s digital, networked, and abundant information environment. If we can expand our notions of literacy and integrat that, the technology will come -- but not because we’re convinced that laying our children’s hands on these machines will make them smarter, but because computers and the Internet are the pencil and paper of our time.
We will have achieved real education reform, when no teacher believes that they can teach the same thing, the same way, year after year.
It’s Not just Literacy…
It’s learning-Literacy
It’s Not just Literacy skills…
It’s Literacy Habits
It’s Not just Lifelong Learning…
It’s Learning Lifestyle Habits