What I Have Learned About New Literacies

I have thoroughly enjoyed working on this New Literacy project. I feel like I have gained so much knowledge about the concept of literacy itself as well as exposure to a variety of technology that I can use within my classroom to create a well-rounded literate environment. In the beginning of the semester, I found a definition of literacy that I mostly agreed with; it stated: To be literate in the 21st century one must have “the flexible and sustainable mastery of a repertoire of practices with the texts of traditional and new communications technologies via spoken language, print, and multimedia, and the ability to use these practices in various social contexts” [Anstey, M. (2002) Literate Futures: Reading p.15. Adapted from Literate Futures: Report, p.9]. Now that I have had time to explore my own literacy (numeracy) and my classmates’ as well, I realize the definition of literacy is more extensive than I could have ever imagined before. While most people would think literacy only relates to reading and writing, the term encompasses several aspects, including numeracy, emotional, cultural, visual, environmental, social, and political literacy. While thinking of all the components that go into literacy, it is easy to be overwhelmed thinking of how I can contribute to the establishment of a well-rounded literate classroom for my future students. However, after viewing the projects of my peers, I feel more prepared to tackle this challenge and be able to create a learning environment conducive to my students’ wide variety of needs. Luckily, now that I have been exposed to new technologies, I have seemingly unlimited opportunities with which to reach my students to develop literacy. With younger generations growing up with vast amounts of technology at their fingertips, I can stay one step ahead and utilize their background experiences to create the best opportunity for my students to become literate citizens in a global environment.

Effective literacy instruction can be achieved in several different ways in order to reach a variety of diverse students. The most important (and challenging) aspect of this has to be incorporating the vast amounts of topics that make up literacy. As I discussed above, my future students will be well-rehearsed in using technology on a daily basis; as a result, I will need to be an active “digital denizen” in order to use technology to teach my students to become well-rounded literate learners. Part of teaching students about technology is not just about using it, but how to use it effectively with purpose. This was one aspect of the New Literacy project that I thought was most beneficial. Not only did we choose to use a Prezi to explain numeracy, but we also gave an example of how teachers or students can use technology to aid in the presentation and understanding of mathematical information (and any other concept for that matter). Since children are constantly surrounded with new technology and interactive learning techniques, why not utilize that to make students more involved in the literacy learning process. An important aspect of having effective literacy instruction that uses technology is the actually teaching aspect- showing students how to use these digital media tools to aid in their learning and reflect their understanding (through presentations they create). If I were planning on using a Prezi to explain numeracy to my students, I think they would need a lot of scaffolding before they could begin. For numeracy, one of the aspects is being able to verbalize and explain your reasoning of mathematical concept; the students in my classroom, however, are not accustomed to a more social-oriented environment where they share ideas with peers about their personal understanding of a concept. Being able to transfer that understanding to the Prezi would require a lot of practice putting mathematical concepts into words. However, since my students do have experience working in groups on group projects, it would be easy to incorporate that cooperation onto the Prezi since multiple users can be on it one time. With that said, more scaffolding would be needed here involving planning their project out first since the Prezi is a very unique technology that has many different components and opportunities to present information.

While my group partially gave an example of using a Prezi to show mathematical literacy with fractions, I wanted to think of another instance where this technology could be used to teach or introduce another concept in math, while simultaneously having the students explore all the opportunities that the Prezi has to offer. That is why I am choosing to create a numeracy based Prezi where students will be introduced to the idea of how fractions, percents, and decimals are all related. While this first lesson will be more of an introduction to the Prezi in math class, students will later be responsible for showing step-by-step instructions of how to move from one to the other (ie. Show the steps of how to move from decimals to percents and vice versa).

Target area and rationale: Why/how would this area be needed for your learners to learn to use the technology to teach peers about the new literacy?

             Since my students will not have had experience with Prezi before this occasion, I thought it would be important to have an example to show them first. This lesson will be a way that they can first be exposed to the new technology in a way that reinforces ideas of numeracy, even if the students do not realize this at first. This will give the students an idea of what a Prezi can do, since they later will be asked to make one in a small group.

List your objective(s):           

Students will explore the relationship between fractions, decimals, and percents on a Prezi.

Working in groups, students will explore the introduction of the topic and then research their assigned process and decide how it should be presented on their own Prezi.

List the materials and supplies needed:

One computer per group.

Math textbook or materials that explain the process of changing decimals to percents to fractions and vice versa.

Outline of key events (use bullets):

·      Students will be shown how to access the Prezi.

·      Then they will have time to explore the presentation that I have put together that explain some of the basic concepts related to the big ideas (relationship between fractions, decimals, and percents).

·      Each group will then be assigned their specific goal with which they will be presenting via a Prezi.

o   For example, one group will have to create a Prezi that shows the steps involved in changing a fraction into a decimal and a decimal into a fraction.

o   Another group will show how to change a decimal into a percent and a percent into a decimal.

o   Lastly, they will show how to change a percent into a fraction and a fraction into a percent.

·      Students will need to also be able to explain their Prezi to their peers as they present, thus encouraging the social aspect of numeracy.

Closing summary:

All groups will be able to share their findings to the rest of the class and I will once again emphasize how all of these concepts are interrelated and it is important to know how they can easily switch between these three types of mathematical representations.

Ongoing assessment:

            Students will continue to work with Prezis. I think they will be especially useful when they can be used to show some sort of process within a unit or illustrate their understanding at the end of a unit. They will work together as that promotes social numeracy, with which students become more comfortable talking and discussing mathematical concepts out loud in hopes that they ideas will be further cemented in their minds.