Emily's New Literacy Reflection

When I first began this class, I knew deep down that literacy was more than just reading out of a book and writing with paper and pencil. However, I did not know how extensive the definition of literacy really is. When I thought about literacy class, I thought about reading books silently, in groups or teacher read aloud and having discussions about a given book, poem or article. I also thought about writing in response to prompts or writing a book report or even answering questions from books in all subjects. As the semester progressed, reading the articles, Gibbons and Tompkins started to open the creative literacy box in my brain.
This project, however, has been a real turning point for me. I am a visual learner so when I saw the list of different types of literacy a light bulb went on. Just seeing the words gave me a mental image of all the types of literacy’s and the possibilities they elicit. I realized that there was numerous ways literacy can be classified besides merely ‘literacy.’ These types include cultural, digital, emotional, environmental, print, social and visual. I immediately was drawn to digital literacy just because I enjoy technology and know that children are fascinated with technology as well. I went to the Technology Conference this past fall here at MSU and was introduced briefly to ePals. I knew I wanted to learn more about the website, but I had not sat down and taken the time to learn about it, until now. This project was a great excuse to dive right in and get my feet wet with ePals. This technology has really showed me that even under the umbrella of digital literacy, there are countless ways to use digital literacy in a classroom. Even with ePals you can use emails, blogs, papers, research projects, etc that is all done online in some form.
I would use this technology without hesitation in my classroom. I think it is especially great for middle elementary grades, middle school and high school. I am not saying I would not use it with lower elementary grades, but I think they will need a lot more support than higher-level grades. I think they can still benefit from the experience though by learning about other cultures through interaction with peers their own age in another part of the world via email. The teacher would probably need to spend at least one lesson getting the students acquainted with the website and how to navigate it. The students would each get their own email but share a class password. I think the most sufficient and efficient way to teach students is to use a computer lab where each student has a computer to work with or at least in partners. I would also do this because if a student has a computer in front of them that they can follow along the steps as the teacher does them it seems they will have a better understanding of what they are doing. If I were working with the older grades, I would most definitely contact a classroom from another country to correspond with. I would collaborate with that teacher and discuss how we can develop a cultural project for our students. I learned that ePals will automatically translate emails into English if we are conversing with a non English speaking classroom. Another possibility is to use ePals to learn another language. Students can practice writing in another language through emails. The ideas are endless!
I remember writing to pen pals in elementary school and it would take several weeks to hear a response from them. ePals introduced me to the virtual world of pen pals. I think it is fantastic because students can interact more frequently with their ePal because it takes a matter of seconds to send an email halfway across the world. This technology allows all types all learners to have access to literacy in some form. Some students would rather type on the keyboard than write on paper while some students prefer to write to an audience member compared to writing research or answering questions. ePals also teaches students how to compose and edit an email, which is a highly used form of communication. All students, in my opinion, should be knowledgeable and familiar with emailing. I personally was very impressed with ePals and literacy possibilities it possesses for all learners. It is a true demonstration of not only digital literacy but literacy in general.

Liz's New Literacy Project Reflection

At the beginning of this class, I thought of Literacy in terms of reading and writing. I expected to have a long list of texts to purchase for this class and expected to use those texts to discuss ways we could implement them in the classroom. Using the book Shades of Gray to organize a Book Club was exactly what I thought the whole class would be modeled after. As we began the New Literacies project, I realized that my idea of Literacy was very limited. The presentations from my peers really opened my eyes to the ways technology can be used to enhance literacy learning in the classroom.
For our New Literacies Project, Kailey, Tara, and I chose to do a digital story about England because Kailey and Tara are studying abroad in England this summer. To tell our digital story, we used iMovie on Kailey's iMac computer. The three of us had never used iMovie before so it was completely new to us. We found that the format was easy to use after watching the tutorial. We were able to add pictures, music, text, and transitions to enhance the entertainment of our story and to capture the attention of our viewers. We found pictures on Googles Images and used The Beatles "Yellow Submarine" as our background music. I think the iMovie turned out really well and I would use iMovie or a similar program (such as Windows Movie Maker) to teach lessons in any grade. Additionally, iMovie could be introduced as early as second or third grade for the students to do presentations. iMovie is a new way to showcase work in an entertaining way and I think students would have fun with an assignment that they are able to do creatively with iMovie.
Using iMovie was a new spin on an old idea, in my opinion. The idea of presenting a topic by using research was still the same, but the presentation in general was different. The organization was still an important aspect, but was made easier by using iMovie to switch around slides and add captions. Using iMoving is a great way to give the presenters creative control over their research and a way for the viewers to enjoy the presentation.
The grade level I am planning my literacy instruction for is Kindergarten so iMovie would be best used to enhance my instruction as opposed to having the students creative an iMovie of their own. A great way for me to do this would be to use Brittany's idea of compiling the students' work (like drawings) into a movie in order for the teacher, students, and parents to enjoy. I plan on doing this for a part of my lesson so the students could enjoy their hard work and the parents could get a peek into what their child has been doing, as well as what my role in their child's classroom has been.
After viewing the presentations of my peers, I can see that technology is important in the classroom. I feel like if technology is introduced to students beginning from Kindergarten (for example, the Kindergarteners at my field placement used a SmartBoard in library) and continually used throughout the rest of their academic career, then they would be very strong in terms of technologically literate. As the students move through their elementary career, their capacity for learning more literacies through technology will grow. Using these technologies to make literacy more challenging and exciting will give students motivation to keep trying new things. I also believe these students will continue to want to learn more.
Academic support could be necessary for E.L.L. students but they too would find excitement in the creativity allowed through technology. With the support, I feel as if they would flourish with their English language learning.

Sarah's New Literacies Entry

For my project Katie, Nikki, and I decided to use interactive maps to explore cultural literacy.  We used google maps and I learned how to create a map of the and how to drops pins and label the map.  The map was fairly easy to navigate and it was not too hard to enter in information.  We created a map of beginning teacher's salaries in some major states and cities in the US.  For the different states on our map we made sure to include teacher shortages such as math, science, or special education.  On our map we also included a little bit about each city we mapped and what attractions they offer for residents.   We also stated any interesting cultural attractions we discovered that these cities have to offer.  We felt that this topic would be interesting for not only us but for our classmates as well since we will soon be looking for teaching jobs and moving to new cities.  Overall, I thought this project was very beneficial since it allowed me to learn how to use a new technology in a creative way in order to make cultural literacy more interesting and interactive for students.  In the future I hope to have the chance to explore other technologies and implement them in the classroom.