I am currently involved in a Teachers as Researchers project with the Department of Education of Newfoundland, the Eastern School District and Memorial University of Newfoundland. This is my second year participating in such a project, but my first year focusing on literacy. The first Teachers as Researchers project involved teaching mathematics in the grade one classroom. For those wanting to read the research results, you may indicate in your posting that you wish to receive a copy and I will send one to your inbox.
For the project this year I am focusing on critical literacy, and using technology to represent student's learning, as the heading suggests. Critical literacy is not a new concept, but addressing it in the form of "new literacies" is somewhat recent. In today's society, children are bombarded with multimedia and multimodal images. Do they understand what these images are about and how it is positioning them in society? Are they aware of the influences these images may have on their interactions with each other?
I am hoping to provide opportunities in my classroom for children to examine various forms of multimedia and multimodal text, as well as using a critical approach to examine everyday situations.
The first activity I hope to do is an assessment of the children's internet experiences as I am not even sure who has a computer in my class.
Another activity will consist of examining several children's websites in a critical manner by asking questions such as:
- Who wrote this text?
- Where did the text come from?
- What is the author's intent?
- Who is represented?
- Who is missing?
- What is the text trying to do to me?
- Is the text from a reliable source?
(These questions came from Dr. Allan Luke: The New Literacies Podcast)
To view this podcast, click on the link below:
http://www.curriculum.org/secretariat/may31.shtml
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