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Technology & Literacy:
Supporting the Diverse Needs of Students
at the Secondary Level, Grades 7-12
Presented by Julie Coiro
Literacy Initiative Professional Development Series at SERC
January 14, 2003
New Literacies and Technology: Reading on the Internet
- Exploring new visual and media literacies
- Strategies for searching and comprehending search results
- Extending Literature Discussions with Online Reading Webs
Exploring New Visual and Media Literacies
Visual Literacy
(Adapted from excerpts in Brunner & Tally’s The New Media Literacy Handbook, 1999)
Images are often used in content area texts to illustrate new concepts or as evidence of a particular event in history. In online environments, learners have access to primary source images (ex. photographs) as well as new digitized images and animations. The strategies used to investigate images as primary sources (e.g., to observe, catalogue, and interpret the content of a photograph) are rarely explicitly taught. New technologies make it possible to edit, alter, combine, or otherwise manipulate images, blurring the distinctions between “authentic” and “fake”. New technologies may also lead to inadvertent or unintentional messages, emphases, or interpretations that distort the purpose or meaning of the information.
We can offer students a set of critical questions they can learn to ask themselves about any medium they use. These kinds of questions can also be described as “habits of mind” – ways to approach any media experience, whether the media are traditional or new.
1. How was this constructed?For this activity, you'll complete the following:
2. What values underline this?
3. What are the conventions used in this?
4. Who is the intended audience for this?
5. Who owns this? Who benefits from it?
1. Logon to the American Memory Digital Library.
2. Click on Search, then type in: The close of a career in New York
3. Click on the link next to 1. Detroit Publishing…The close of a career in New York
4. Click on the picture to get a bigger version.
5. Complete the History Investigation Worksheet with your group.
Consider and discuss your ideas about these two questions:
- What does this exercise tell us about the value of on-line historical archives in the classroom?
- What implications does this new type of literacy have for reading instruction?
ACTIVITY 2:Strategies for Searching and Comprehending Search Results
Beginning Strategies for Locating Educational Resources Use a search engine like Google.com designed for adults. In the search box...
- Indicate the subject area or specific topic.
- Use quotations to group two or more words together as a phrase.
- Indicate Internet project, lesson plans, webquest, quiz, or class project using quotations as needed.
- If level not appropriate, include the grade level or grade range in quotes (spell it out e.g. "third grade")
- Connect all items, including the first, with a plus sign. If search is too narrow, remove plus signs.
- Look for keywords in annotations of links located from a similar search.
- Follow links on one web site to locate other related links.
Begin with: "type of web site" +topic OR “title of book” +topic
Narrow down with: + "grade level" + topic + "type of web site"SEE THE EXAMPLE BELOW...
Example:
For information and activities about whales:
(use any of these)whales "lesson plans"+whales "second grade" +whales webquest +whales quiz +whales cyberhunt +whales -"pilot whale" +whales (to not get pilot whale sites)
For this activity,
- Use the search strategies you learned to locate classroom instructional materials using Google.
- Ask yourselves some of the "search engine" comprehension questions we discussed as you skim and scan the search results.
- Once you locate two or three good resources, try searching for the same topic using a search engine designed for kids (Yahooligans, Ask Jeeves for Kids or KidsClick) and notice the differences in the search results. Which do you prefer?
Search Engines for Teachers (Adults)
- Google is an impressive search engine that locates relevant articles quickly with very little clutter on its page. It features an automated method that ranks web pages according to their popularity and number of times they are linked to other similar pages. It's "I'm feeling lucky" button runs your search and then takes you straight to the web page of the number one hit. http://www.google.com
- Dogpile is a meta-search engine that searches 15 popular search engines (e.g. Alta Vista, Yahoo) at the same time and reports results with top 10 from each search engine. You can continue using just one search engine or can customize your search to include only certain search engines or customize the order the results are reported to you. http://www.dogpile.com
- Other search engine tools for teachers:
- FindArticles
- Microsoft Design Gallery Live (for Powerpoint images and clip art)
- ClipArt Today (through ArtToday search box)
Search Engines for Students (Kids): Just type in your search topic with no codes
- Yahooligans: The information at this site is indexed by general categories. You can follow the categories to more specific information or you can just do an open-ended search through all the categories at that site. http://www.yahooligans.com
- Ask Jeeves for Kids: This search engine encourages children to ask questions in "plain English" and then helps learners fine tune their questions with a series of pull down menus and more specific questions.There is also an adult version of this site called Ask Jeeves. http://www.ajkids.com
- Kids Click: This web search for kids was designed by librarians and search results are reported back in reading levels! It also includes nine Internet searching lessons that teachers and parents can do with learners. http://sunsite.berkeley.edu/KidsClick!/
For more subject specific search engines, try some of these resources:
ACTIVITY 3: Extending Literature Discussions with Online Reading Webs
See your handout for more information.
The Future of Literacy
Amy Norton will provide an overview of some of the newer technologies like palm pilots, ebooks, hypertext, paperless classrooms while we consider the implications they have for teaching, learning, and assessment of literacy skills and strategies.
