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Reading the Internet: Challenges and Possibilities for All Readers

presented by Julie Coiro
Featured Speaker Presentation,
International Reading Association Conference
San Antonio, Texas, May, 2005
You can access this website online at www.lite.iwarp.com/ira2005.html

The Internet is a powerful and complex reading environment with the potential to support and engage our weakest readers while also challenging even our most skilled readers.  How can this be?  This session is intended to introduce both aspects of Internet reading to you and explain how to effectively read on the Internet with all students.

Literacy Through The Ages
Literacy is always defined by the forms and functions of the cultural contexts in which they emerge.  Historically, you can see how literacy has changed and evolved, becoming more complex and globally defined. More recently, the changes between one technology and the next occurs quite rapidly.  Each new technology causes us to broaden our understanding of the rapidly changing reading, writing, and communication strategies that will be required to succeed in the future. 

© Julie Coiro (2005)

The Internet presents new dimensions of reading comprehension

It is my belief that important questions about reading comprehension on the Internet need to be addressed if we are to effectively prepare students for their literacy futures.  In this context, four questions become important:

• Is the comprehension process different on the Internet? 
• If so, what new thought processes are required beyond those needed to comprehend conventional print?
• Are these processes extensions of traditional comprehension skills or do Web-based learning environments demand fundamentally different skills? 
• If comprehension is different on the Internet, what implications do these differences have for comprehension instruction, assessment and professional development?

The image below expands the center RAND Heuristic of Reading Comprehension to include different elements of texts, activities, readers, and contexts specifically related to the new literacies required to use and learn from the Internet and other ICT.

© Julie Coiro (2005)

For more information, see:
Coiro, J. (2003).  Reading on the Internet:  Expanding our Understanding of Reading Comprehension to Encompass New Literacies.  The Reading Teacher, 56, 458-464.  Available online at http://www.readingonline.org/electronic/elec_index.asp?HREF=rt/2-03_column/index.html

The Internet presents unique possibilities to support and engage all readers.

A.    Internet texts can support learning while adjusting for differences in reading ability, language, and/or learning style.

• Internet text is nonlinear (reader has ultimate control of direction and meaning)
• Starchild's The Solar System
  
• Internet texts include multiple media forms that support a range of learning styles 
  
• The Rainforest
• New York Virtual Reality
  
• Internet text can be translated into multiple languages
• Alta Vista Babel Fish Translation
• Enchanted Learning and Picture Dictionary
  
• Internet text is interactive (active engagement required, new expectations to inspire learners)
• Unicef Voices of Youth can inspire A Kids' Campaign and IEARN's Fight Against Child Labor
  

B.    The Internet provides a range of resources that support learning while adjusting for differences in reading ability, vision, language, or learning style.

• Online supports for viewing, interacting with, or constructing visual aids that foster comprehension and personal meaning-making.  These supports force us to question the labels many students have been given.
  
  
• Reading, writing, and communicating in the language arts
• CNN Learning Resources
  
• Windows to the Universe
• Create a Graph from the National Center of Educational Statistics
• Read, Write, Think includes many online interactive student learning supports including Alphabet Organizer and Persuasion Map
  
• Making Words Online from Oswego School District in Oswego, NY (and Making Words 2)
  
• Wacky Web Tales (AKA MadLibs) from Houghton Mifflin
• Quia Online Quizzes include 14 different game formats that teachers and/or students can use to create their own learning games to share with others.  Examples include Food Jeopardy, Geometric Terms Flash Games, and Body Parts in Spanish Hangman
  
• Reading, writing, and communicating across the content areas
• Math: National Library of Virtual Manipulatives
• Math: Interactive Maths Dictionary for Kids
• Science: Brain Pop Videos
• Science: Visual Elements Periodic Table Videos
• Social Studies: Escape to Freedom  (Civil War)
  
• Social Studies: Colonial Freedom (Colonial Families and Communities)
  
• Social Studies: FDR Declares War audio files using Alta Vista Audio Search
  

C.    Internet texts can engage disenchanted readers in challenging learning experiences that foster authentic purposes for reading, writing, and communicating.

• Plugged In Enterprises provides inspiration and purpose to inner-city youth
  
• Susan Silverman's Webfolio provides a central spot to explore collaborative Internet projects
  
• Webquests, Cyberguides, Filamentality and Thinkquests
• International Cyberfair joins kids and communities from around the world
  
• Internet Detectives engages students in authentic evaluation tasks to as alternative to filtering
  
• GA Super Readers build on online database of book reviews
• Children's Encylopedia of Women continues to be compiled by 3rd and 4th graders in Pocantico, New York
  

D.   Internet reading promotes the self-efficacy of diverse learners.

• Internet activities recognize the intellectual capital that each learner brings to the learning community
• Interent reading fosters identities as readers and writers
• Internet reading invites social collaboration and the ability to work in groups across networks, languages, and cultures
  
  
• Global Story Train is an illustrated, collaborative storybook with contributions from around the world.
  
• Writer's Window provides space for collaborative writing for older students
• Voices of Youth Discussions about real-life issues take place in multiple languages
  
• KidPROJ is one part of KIDLINK where students join global projects
  

Ironically, the Internet also presents complex skills and strategies that challenge even our most skilled readers.

"The new literacies of the Internet include the skills, strategies, and dispositions necessary to successfully use and adapt to the rapidly changing information and communication technologies and contexts that continuously emerge in our world and influence all areas of our personal and professional lives. These new literacies allow us to use the Internet and other ICT to identify important problems, locate information, evaluate the usefulness of that information, synthesize information to solve problems, and communicate the solutions to others."

Read complete article at:
Leu, D.J., Jr., Kinzer, C.K., Coiro, J., Cammack, D. (2004). Toward a theory of new literacies emerging from the Internet and other information and communication technologies. [Article reprinted from R.B. Ruddell & N. Unrau (Eds.), Theoretical Models and Processes of Reading, Fifth Edition (1568-1611).  International Reading Association: Newark, DE.] [Online Serial]. Available: http://www.readingonline.org/newliteracies/lit_index.asp?HREF=/newliteracies/leu

 

What are some examples of the challenges that all Internet readers face and what can we teach to address these questions?

© Julie Coiro (2005) 

DOWNLOAD THE HANDOUTS [pdf] THAT ACCOMPANY THE LESSONS BELOW

Challenge: GENERATING QUESTIONS - What would I like to know more about? Learning Objective: Exploring the power of the Internet

See page 4 of handouts for activity template I wonder... Let's explore a few places to learn more... Model search engines use and citing sources Model summarizing, synthesizing, and evaluating Generate a new source of information to share with others

Challenge: LOCATING INFORMATION - Where do I read first? Learning Objective: Previewing websites

See page 5 of handouts for activity template STOP AND THINK Preview left menu and top menu bar Anticipate where each link will lead Anticipate multiple levels (closer or further) Explore interactive mouseover functions Note the author/webmaster/sponsor Understand unique website search features

Challenge: EVALUATING INFORMATION- Which link is most useful? Learning Objective: Evaluating search results

See page 6 of handouts for activity template What clues to the words after the link give me? Are the results in any special order? Who sponsors the site? What's missing from this list? How do you know? and Why does it matter?

Challenge: EVALUATING INFORMATION- How do I know it's true? Learning Objective: Evaluating the validity of information

See page 7 of handouts for activity template Does this sound like it makes sense? Where else can I look? Who created the website and for what purpose? Who IS the author? Who is linking to this site? (LINK:URL)

Challenge: SYNTHESIZING & COMMUNICATING INFORMATION - How do I come up with an original synthesis? Learning Objective: Sorting, organizing, and synthesizing

See page 7 of handouts for activity template Expect to search in more than one place for different pieces of the information Generate synonyms to locate related information Expect to read on more than one website Develop an electronic system for sorting and organizing information and sources Expect to construct an original response

So, where do we go from here???

How might we begin to support high AND low-achieving students as they learn in complex online reading environments? 

Since we know that...

• Students with high interest are more likely to apply deep processing strategies to complex reading tasks (Guthrie & Wigfield, 2005)
• Prior knowledge is an important predictor of comprehension success (e.g., Pearson, 2005)
• Motivated students are likely to read more often and more widely across other domains (Guthrie & Wigfield, 2005)
  

I'd like to propose a model that suggests...

• Effective learning environments for supporting challenged readers as they learn new online comprehension strategies should:
  
  • Recognize individual strengths and abilities
  • Emerge from personal interests and meaningful problem-solving tasks that incorporate the use of new information and communication technologies
  • Relate to familiar topics initially to build on individual strengths
    
  • Gradually expand to other domains and more challenging online texts

© Julie Coiro, 2005

If we take advantage of the potentials of the Internet while preparing students for the challenges inherent in rapidly changing online reading contexts…

• Less skilled readers will become more engaged;
  
• More skilled readers will continue to be challenged;
• All students will develop the high-level comprehension strategies that are critical in today’s digital information world AND these strategies may very well transfer back to more traditional reading contexts. 
  

In review...

• The Internet requires us to broaden our current perspectives of reading comprehension.
  
• The Internet has the potential to foster higher level reading comprehension and engagement.
• The Internet presents new challenges to the reading process and the reading curriculum
• A model of online comprehension strategy instruction that builds off student interests and prior knowledge may indeed support all students as they read, respond, and construct new ideas on the Internet. 
  

This page was created by Julie Coiro on May 1, 2005