An Age Of Multimedia Authoring

Individuals within a 21st century society are becoming increasingly digitally literate with the repertoire of literacy skills rapidly expanding enabling us to more efficiently navigate our way though new and innovated digital media forms.

Since children today have become digital natives; they will never truly know a world that is not touched with technology. This means that the educational paradigm has to shift in order to keep up with the needs of our young learners (Jo, 2016). In the last thirty years, technological advances

We carry our cellphones with us at all times, and with all this online connection, you would think that stepping back and disconnecting is a huge achievement. But this is a new way of life. Nathan Jurgenson, in his article “The IRL Fetish” says, “We have come to understand more and more of our lives through the logic of digital connection. Social media is more than something we log onto; it’s something we carry within us. We can’t log off.”. He explains how we are so deeply connected with technology that it is nearly impossible to stay ‘old-fashioned’. We are learning to accept technological advancements because they are inevitable. In other words, to adapt to this new form of literacy is much easier than avoiding it. In recognition that texting truly is literacy, one English teacher had her students put excerpts of Richard III into “text speak” to show that they fully understand the material. Educators are embracing texting as a new form of learning because it clearly is not going away. Students enjoy texting as a way to escape reality and fail to recognize the literary benefits. Texting will continue to encourage students to read and write as well as improve spelling with phonological

Not So Fast,” Andrea Lunsford argues that rather than leading to a new illiteracy, the digital technologies in the modern world help students to develop their ability of writing. Not only that students are daferrors than 25 years ago, actually with less spelling errors. In order to help students with the challenges, the teacher should offer solid instructions and encouragement rather than derision.

Literacy, literacies and multiliteracies bears various meanings to different people. Some believe that literacy is developed by cultures, while others believe that literacy and cultures developed an individual. There are single and multiple definitions of literacy, literacies and multi-literacies. Based on research, literacy is very important and continues to be developed through our rapidly changing world. Throughout this essay, we will focus on views of literacy, literacies, and multiliteracies and how their different meanings affect our approach to teaching literacy.

We are currently living in a digital age where our students are notably technologically proficient. This poses a challenge with how some of our students are currently learning (or trying to learn) in our classrooms. Many students have grown tired of reading dense texts for homework assignments and tired of listening to long, boring lectures from teachers at school. The way in which students are currently analyzing and interpreting texts that they read and videos that they watch have not been up to our standards here at North Windsor High School. The thing is, a lot of our teachers are also struggling between teaching with both print text and by digital means. North Windsor High School acknowledges the fact that many seniors graduate not having the digital skills and print text literacy necessary to lead successful lives after high school. We are beginning to implement some changes with our teaching methods and hope to incorporate technology and print text in different and more engaging ways.

Online media is pushing literacy in different and cool directions. Kids and teenagers today are coming up with new ways of writing. Clive tells us in The New Literacy,¨The brevity of texting, and status updating, teaches young people to develop haiku-like concision.¨ When kids text they write short and fast things and don't go into much detail. Since we are changing the way we write, in four years from now when we have even more new technology imagine how many more ways of writing there will be. He also says that, ¨For Lunsford, technology isn't killing our ability to write. It's reviving it—and pushing our literacy in bold new directions.¨ But still most people think

Whilst investigating my literacy topic on placement I decided to not only interview my mentor teacher but also interview two students to gain their perspective on the use of technology. I believed their point of you view was valuable to my findings and wanted to discover firsthand if students are enjoying and finding the use of technology helpful in their literacy classes. Whilst assisting on placement I approached two children and interviewed them at different times, the two children in particular were very forward and honest when sharing their opinions with me. From their opinions they expressed in the short interview (refer to Appendix 1) it is evident the two students would rather read an eBook than a book and find it exciting and fun, this would cause more engagement and focus on the text. The two students also mentioned that pictures in the eBook are animated and this helps make sense of the story. It is clear that an interactive reading experience, acquires students with a greater comprehension of a text (Hutchison, Beschorner and Schmidt-Crawford 2012). These findings support my research question relating to the importance of learning literacy with the assistance of technology. Another artefact to support this matter (refer to Appendix 2) is a task students completed, which involved them writing up a draft of a poem and later they were to type up the final copy. A number of students were completing their draft on a laptop, I asked the teacher why they were not

In today’s society we are overwhelmed with technology. Technology is changing everyday, and will forever be a staple in our lives. The effect that technology has on our children has brought on some concerns and some praises. Children these days have no choice but to some how be influenced by the ever growing technology in our societies. Our common concern has been that although digital technology has boosted children’s talent for multitasking, their ability to process information deeply may be deteriorating (Carpenter, 2010). Many people have a wide range of opinions on if technology is having a positive influence on our children or a negative, there is a vast amount of evidence to support both of these arguments. Technology can refer to

As schools promote 21st-century learning, there has been a push for literacies which encourage students to be 21st-century learners. The two overarching literacies, new and digital, has taken over the three R’s literacy, reading, writing, and arithmetic. New Literacies continuously change due to the new technology emerging providing different ways to get information and communicate with others (Leu et al., 2015). In contrast, digital literacy is the ability to use digital tools to access information for understanding and communication (Jose, 2016). New literacies and digital literacies also differ in aspects of use in the classroom. New literacies are the building blocks for digital literacy; which are the skills students need to understand the internet (Maloy, Verock-O'Loughlin, Edwards, & Woolf, 2017). New literacies can be taught without the use of technology because students are learning to locate, evaluate, synthesize, and communicate information. Teachers can demonstrate these skills using encyclopedias and journal articles to gain a minimalistic comprehension. Once students learn the necessary understanding, teachers can transfer these skills to online which will promote digital literacy; furthermore, digital literacy can only be taught using digital tools. Teachers would teach students how to use computers and the social practices of the new literacies to gain an understanding of the digital literacy (Jose, 2016). Furthermore, digital literacies

This article attempts to enlighten educators to allow computers in the classroom as a workshop to help improve literacy. The computer allows for students to have both a visual and a verbal reference to a topic, thus, solidifying a concrete comprehension of the text, allowing the student to be further engaged and stimulated with the assignment. Over the years, educators have seen such a vast change in technology, especially in the classroom. It is time now, that educators embrace the change and use it to their advantage. “If students can be motivated and engaged when using technology, teachers should continue to support this type of learning when appropriate.”

Eshet-Alkalai, Y. (2004). Digital literacy: A conceptual framework for survival skills in the digital era. Journal of Educational Multimedia and Hypermedia, 13(1), 93-106. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/205852670?accountid=32521

The Four Resources Model was developed by Alen Luke and Peter Freebody in 1999 to adapt to the increasing importance of technology that we see prevalent throughout society and in our daily lives. We live in a digital age in which technology is constantly reinventing itself and without the education that allows us to use these new age inventions, we are stuck frozen in a technologically advanced world unable to move forward. Luke and Freebody (1999) envision a school curriculum surrounding a print based environment in which classroom and teaching practices coincide. An environment is encouraged, in which students are able to learn and explore the blending of more traditional approaches to reading and writing, with popular multimedia and cultural practices. Technology is encourages to be incorporated into classrooms, never before seen in education systems; to correspond with students in a way that merges existing traditional literate capabilities with meaningful literacy learning (Cope and Kalantzis, 2000). These advancements instigated future learning, considering and incorporating a variety of literacy experiences that children were enabled to engage with on a daily basis and acts as the basis for the Four Resources Model.

Nowadays, Digital literacy helps to understand and analyze information through digital technology. The use of technology plays an important role within the process of teaching and learning; it can be used to teach reading and writing skills by using digital devices such as laptops, iPads, Chromebooks, or desktops. However, within the context of the use of technology in the area of education, and specifically in the area of language, digital literacy would also encompass its application both in development of language skills and learning of languages (reading, writing, oral comprehension and oral production). Although there are many limitations to the technological advances of digital literacy I believe that the advantages are greater than

In a digital world, it is no secret that technology has influenced the way students learn in schools. As referenced by Robinson, McKenna and Conradi, in 2005 Leu, an educational psychologist and professor, “reflected that the internet as well as evolving technologies are not technological issues but literacy issues” (Robinson, McKenna & Conradi, 2012, p. 266). I agree with Leu since I believe technology is a positive tool for student learning if used correctly, however, there is a difference between using technology to support learning and using technology to do the learning. Digital versions of printed text included hypermedia which allows readers