The following are my notes, reflections, and slidedeck from my ASCD literacy presentation.

I presented this session with Angela Maiers, a true guru in the land of literacy.

Angela and I began our presentation by asking the participants to answer the question, “What is literacy?”  Certainly there has been much written and discussed on this topic, and we explained that our approach to the subject is rooted in communication; specifically, how we input and output through various mediums and modes.

We briefly discussed the work of Luke and Freebody and their Four Resource Model.  We discussed how these four resources work both as we input and output in communication.

We then discussed how important the medium is and how much it has changed.  This change is significant, and that significance is evidenced in videos like this.

We asked the participants to then consider the medium and the mode of communication and which one we most often use as adults.  We typically favor speaking, but what do we require our students to use the vast majority of the time they are working to communicate their learning?  What if we started changing our expectations and removing some of the barriers that trip kids up when they are trying to communicate?  What if we let them tell their stories and demonstrate their learning like this?

We discussed a practical example of the way we traditionally teach literacy by using an example of the book Number the Stars.  We explained how we could be doing so much more with our students and expecting them to dig so much deeper in their exploration of reading.  We showed two videos, and explained how the second led to an incredible learning experience for the entire school based on a comment someone left on the students’ YouTube post.

We wrapped up the session discussing how dramatically the web has changed in recent history, and we discussed the implications for literacy based on this change.  We ended the session with this video and explained how important passion and audience are for our students.

A couple things ran through my mind today as I flew into San Antonio for the 2010 ASCD conference.  Both related to education.

On the trip, I started reading 21st Century Skills: Learning for Life in our Times by Bernie Trilling and Charles Fadel.  Admittedly, I’m not the biggest fan of the name.  I don’t necessarily like it, but I do get it.  While these skills have absolutely been a requisite part of our society and learning for many centuries, and they aren’t unto themselves new skills by any means, there is a new context in which we should be engaging them.  I agree with that.  Emphatically.

It seems over the past decade, our education system has temporarily lost the use of its mind.  We went from focusing on a more complete education of our youth to a finite focus on basic skills.  And we ramped up the testing and the accountability for those very specific skills, and we left many important things behind as a result.  Now the focus of many instructional programs is on test preparation.  And the majority of those skills apply very narrowly to the experience of taking a standardized test and can then be discarded by students once they are done with that two week window.  We do this at the cost of creativity, innovation, collaboration, problem solving, and other important lessons students should be learning about being a part of a democracy.

Frankly, it’s tough to watch.

And the watching led me to my second thought.  Airplanes.

What is it that airplanes are designed to do?  Really designed as their most core function?  Fly.  Take hundreds of people up thousands of feet in the air and fly them over the earth at mind numbing speed.  Transport us across the country in a matter of hours rather than months.  They are truly amazing, and though that word has been prone to overuse in our society, in this context I believe it is a perfect descriptor.

But what must an airplane also be able to do as a necessary utilitarian function?  Drive.  On the ground.  I was struck with this thought as I looked out the window when taxiing at the airport.  The comedy of it.  Looking out and seeing these incredibly elegant flying marvels of science lumbering around the holding grounds.  All that ingenious design and the power of jet propulsion being used to move along the ground at the speed you or I could match on our bicycle.

And that’s when I realized what we’ve been doing this past decade.  We’ve taken the airplanes and tried to make them cars.  We’ve told our students the most important part of what they learn is the utilitarian function of powering down all their potential to crawl around the ground.  There’s a reason we don’t use airplanes to commute to work on our highways.  The basic functioning of driving on the ground is such a minute part of what makes an airplane so powerful.

But that’s what we’re doing with our students.  We’re leaving behind the best part of what they could be doing with their education.  Forgive the Lifetime Original feel-good movie of the week payoff at the end here, but I have to.  We aren’t letting our kids fly.  We’re keeping them grounded and using metrics to measure how well they taxi as airplanes rather than how well they could be flying.

Though I still don’t care much for the name, I really do hope that we will find ways to begin moving our focus, conversations, and effort to the 21st Century Skills approach to learning.  Remember that there’s a whole lot more that we could be having our students do.

This quote is listed at the beginning of 21st Century Skills: Learning for Life in our Times.  Will it every come to pass?  I don’t know.  But I certainly can hope.

“I’m calling on our nation’s governor’s and state education chiefs to develop standards and assessments that don’t simply measure whether students can fill in a bubble on a test, but whether they possess 21st century skills like problem-solving and critical thinking and entrepreneurship and creativity.”  -President Barack Obama

I think it’s time we start getting education off the ground.

*Cross posted at Tech & Learning Advisor blog.

Thanks to Drewski2112 for the use of the Flickr image.

This week I had the distinct privilege of presenting two sessions on Communication and Collaboration at District 30 in Illinois with Andy Kohl. Although we had enough material to last us through the day, we tried to cram it all in a 90 minute time slot. Needless to say, we didn’t get to everything.

I think the conversation was outstanding, and I believe we should all take the time to wrestle with these ideas together with other staff members. I’ll share the session notes and presentation here, and please feel free to use anything that will be useful for you. And really, I mean it, go have these conversations with other members of your institution. I think you’ll find it an excellent opportunity for growth and learning for everyone.

Introduce Moodle and backchannel to attendees. Invite them to join in the process, building collaborative notes.

9:30 – 9:50 = Introduce ourselves. Introduce Moodle and Backchannel. Ask teachers to define collaboration. Use Etherpad to have them build this definition together.

9:50 – 10:00 = Review the definition and reflect on the process with them.

- What was different about this experience?
- How could this look different for the classroom?

- Discuss portions of the Panitz article.

Review questions asked in the article.

Students must learn to routinely ask questions such as: “Are we thinking clearly enough? Are we being accurate in what we say? Do we need to be more precise? Are we sticking to the question at issue? Are we dealing with the complexities of the question? Do we need to consider another perspective or point of view? Are our assumptions accurate or are they faulty? Is our purpose fair-minded, or are we only concerned about advancing our own desires? Does our argument seem logical, or is disjointed, lacking cohesion?

In other words, these important standards of thought must be applied to all of the important structures of thought: to its guiding goal or purpose, to the central question, to the information used with respect to the question, to the judgments that are made with the information, to the concepts inherent in the judgments, to the assumptions that underlie the judgments, and to the implications that follow from it.”

10:00 – 10:20 = Roundup of tools which can help provide these learning experiences for kids.

- Moodle
- Wikis + Google Sites
- Google Docs
- Blogging

- Look at the bowdrill video from YouTube. Talk about this as a collaborative experience for this student. Use this as a transition to the topic of communication.

10:20-10:40 = Discuss how communication has both changed and stayed the same.  Show “Can This be His Home.”  Discuss the result of new mediums and the “four resources model”.

10:40 – 11:00 = Time for teachers to work on a lesson example or retool an existing assignment.

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We only got to the point where we showed “Can This be His Home.”  Lots of good stuff in the Four Resource Model.  Maybe we’ll get to it next time.

Thanks to American Backroom for the use of the Flickr image.

There exists a philosophy of technology that states we should be dedicating specific time in our school day to teach students finite skills of operating computing technology.  That in order to prepare our students properly for the world, we must teach them how to word process and how to operate Power Point and how to keyboard.  The computing instruction is an end goal.  The students should learn these skills because the skills themselves are the important part of technology, and if we don’t stop throughout the day and teach them how to specifically operate the tools or applications within a computer, we will be failing to equip our future.

I’ve had discussions with individuals who say they’d rather see the students learn technology skills in isolation, and it isn’t necessary to embed or even relate this instruction to curricular content or goals.  The important part is that students learn how to operate the computer and properly work the word processing application.

I’ve found this to be a fairly popular philosophy and culture in many circles of public opinion.

So, you are in this conversation with someone.  Someone who believes adamantly that we must focus time and energy and effort on explicitly teaching students how to operate specific technology.  Someone who says we should have a checklist of computer proficiencies for each student so that we will know they can operate a computer successfully.  That if we fail to do so, we will be failing to prepare our students to succeed in the future.

And you respond by saying…

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Thanks to Flickr user wZa HK for the use of the image.

In my opinion, most often discussions of “new literacies” are really discussions of new skills in applying literacy to new contexts. Let me explain.

Literacy, at its core, is about gathering and conveying meaning through communication. In the very beginning, before modern language, there was showing and viewing. I’d show you how to hunt a wooly mammoth, and you would view my showing. There would be meaning gathered through the act of showing and viewing.

Then the establishment of language brought in speaking and listening. I could now tell you how to make a spear, and you could gather meaning by listening.

The advent of written language allowed for the explosion of information we are experiencing today by allowing someone to write their thoughts and meaning can be gathered by reading these thoughts. No longer did people have to be in close proximity to share information. That is exactly what is happening right here. Yes, the vehicle has changed, in this case a blog post that resulted from a conversation on Twitter, two things not in existence 15 years ago, but the nature of what we are doing remains the same. I am writing my ideas, and you are gathering meaning by reading them.

This brings us to the new literacies. In my opinion, unless we’re talking about a new core way to convey and gather meaning through communication, we are talking about the application of literacy rather than the nature of literacy itself. In response to Will’s question today, I would maintain understanding transparency in my writing as technology changes is a skill rather than a core literacy.

I think this is important because it is very similar to my dislike for the Partnership’s establishment of their notion of 21st Century Skills. What they are calling “21st Century” are really rather timeless skills. We have communicated for centuries. We will continue to collaborate for likely ever. Problem solving has always been a major skill in life. Again, the application and context of these skills are certainly changing, but the skills themselves have always been relevant and meaningful.

If we held these things, the foundational learning skills as well as literacy, as timeless, we would be able to focus more on how we are engaging them in a relevant way in our modern culture rather than constantly fighting to redefine them.

And in my opinion, it’s how we apply these foundational pillars of learning that will yield true progress rather than the constant redefining and confusion brought on when everyone tries to requalify literacy and learning skills.

Thanks to Frederic della Faille for the Flickr image.

I’m thoroughly enjoying the excellent discussion going on here about the whole notion of 21st Century Literacy.  I find it fascinating, and the conversation has me thinking about this in ways I never would have had we not all engaged in the discussion.  That’s certainly a testament to the power of collaborating and communicating, but I surmise that’s a whole separate blog post.  I’d like to take this one to focus on some clarification I’ve had on the idea that there is not such a thing as 21st Century Literacy.

First, and foremost, I don’t believe this is a mere discussion about semantics.  Well, that’s not entirely true, to be honest.  Semantics is the study of language and communication, and that is certainly at the heart of our discussion.  More to the point, semantics is the only reason we’re having this discussion.  Someone recently told me this whole topic is just another semantics discussion when we should really be focusing on what to do.  I find that most interesting.  How, exactly, can any of us do anything when we haven’t decided in which direction to begin the doing?  That’s like me saying that I want us all to start advocating.  Just go advocate.  That misses the entire point.  The only reason we advocate is based on the cause of advocation.  The same is held true for this discussion.  If we want students to learn to be truly literate, aren’t we required to define that which want them to be?

The second point is that I’ve realized we’ve really started misusing the term literacy.  It’s now being applied to mean comprehension, or proficiency, or even understanding.  Look at this example.  For every type of literacy, the word proficiency could and perhaps should be used.  Why aren’t we using that word, instead?  Why take a word which focuses on the core of how we communicate and misapply it to mean a proficiency in a given context?  That’s where I truly disagree with these “new” literacies.

Finally, I believe there is a distinct difference between literacy and skills.  Literacy is based wholly on how we communicate.  In fact, it is the very nature of how we communicate.  We share and gather ideas from one another by writing, reading, speaking and listening.  That is entirely how we form meaning from another’s ideas.  Well, I shouldn’t say entirely.  Just recently Gary Stager suggested on Twitter that perhaps “showing” would be one more way.  If I’m standing next to you, I might show you my ideas through specific movements.  For example, I might show you how to hammer a nail by doing the act itself while you gather meaning from my actions.  Which then begets the need to add “viewing” as well.  I need to think more on this one, but it does have great merit.

If literacy is the way we communicate thoughts and ideas, then what about text messaging, creating videos, using a tool like VoiceThread, or any of the host of emerging technologies we’re utilizing to communicate?  Shouldn’t those be called new literacy?  Probably not.  I would maintain we can only use those effectively by engaging the main four tenets of literacy.  The specific execution of the tool does require a finite skill set, but a skill set is entirely different than a literacy.  Let me get specific using VoiceThread as an example.

VoiceThread is an excellent way for people to post an idea and have others add value through conversation.  At first blush, it may appear that in order for this communication to happen, a new literacy would have to be formed.  A person must understand how to post on the internet, and perhaps the person would want to do so recording an audio comment, wherein he/she would have to have the ability to operate both a computer and a recording device.  This is all true, but those are finite skills specific to a certain tool or even era.  At some point in the future, VoiceThread won’t be necessary anymore as something else will come to be that will do what it does, only better.  Or perhaps the tool itself will evolve into a better iteration, but either way, the user experience will change, thus making the specific skill set required to utilize VoiceThread simply a finite set that will change over time.

The real essence of using VoiceThread, however, is in engaging the true process of literacy.  First, I must either read or listen to the original idea being posted.  Once I’ve gathered meaning by doing so, I can formulate a response.  To respond, I will either speak or write my thoughts.  If I can’t do these core tenets of literacy effectively, VoiceThread will be useless to me.  It is the very act of engaging literacy that makes this process meaningful.

This same rationale applies to all the aforementioned tools that appear to be changing the nature of literacy.  The nature isn’t changing.  Yes, the skills are, but skills are different than literacy.

So why this whole discussion in the first place?  I think it is imperative that we all work together to help better the learning experience for students.  If we’re all calling and advocating for different things using the same terms, the result will be to dilute the power of what is most effective.  Some have said that the words we use don’t matter, but the fact we have the conversation and talk about this is what’s really important, and while I think the conversation is good, I think establishing what is most effective is better.  If we come to the conclusion there are 21st Century Literacies and the 21st Century Skills are really simply those which have always been, what will happen when we present these notions to the decision makers in our districts/regions/nations, and they find the obvious holes in the entire structure and leave us appearing as though we’re espousing an empty philosophy?  We will be discredited, and our effective efforts to support change will be blocked.

There’s still much to talk about, and certainly I hope in the near future the talk will turn to action.  But again, I would hope we can resolve exactly what the action will look like before we sit atop the horses and begin the charge for change.

Thanks to j /f /photos for the Flickr image.

I don’t think I’m a fan of the whole 21st Century Literacies concept.  I think there’s something fundamentally wrong with the entire approach.  I did say “think”, so I’m still working through all this.  Let me explain.

The traditional definition of the term “literacy” means to be literate.  This comes from the most current version of Webster’s Dictionary.  That begets the question, what does it mean to be literate?  Again, according to Webster, being literate is being able to read and write.  Typically, traditional literacy also includes speaking and listening as well.  So, if this is the case, what’s the 21st Century distinction of the term?

I believe this is where the whole notion is lost on me.  If we’re talking about literacy, let’s talk about literacy, as in reading, writing, speaking, and listening.  If we’re talking about other skills that people need to be successful in the modern era, then we’re probably talking about skills rather than literacies.  If we’re being specific about these skills applying uniquely to the 21st century, we should probably call them such.  Although, are there really any skills that are being called 21st Century Skills that are new in the 21st century?  Think about it.  The Partnership for 21st Century Skills believes demonstrating originality, communicating, being open and responsive, acting on creative ideas, utilizing time efficiently, accessing information, etc. are all 21st Century Skills.  I’d retort that in reality, these skills have always been in existence and of the utmost importance.  They don’t need to have the 21st Century moniker on them to make them significant.

And I think that’s the heart of the issue for me.  The whole idea of qualifying all of these skills, or even literacies if you want to adopt a broader sense of the term beyond the traditional, with 21st Century confuses what the real focus should be.

A perfect example of this is a discussion I heard recently on the “It’s Elementary” podcast.  Angela Maiers was the guest, and at the beginning of the conversation, she established her working definition of 21st Century Literacies. She gave a definition that included the traditional aspects of literacy as well as collaborating, investigating, and communicating.  A few minutes after stating her definition, she explained that all of this comes from research that is over 5 decades old.  Again, if what we’re talking about is what we’ve been talking about for so long, why do we feel the need to throw the catchy buzzword in?  Why can’t we just accept that we’re still talking about traditional literacy?  Why this great sense of urgency to rename it?

Coincidentally, while I disagree with Maiers’ naming conventions, I do believe her approach to teaching literacy as she explains later in the show is dead on.  She talks about teaching kids to inference and reach deeper levels of comprehension, and she advocates that we stop focusing so much on the oral fluency piece devoid of comprehension.  Being one who has witnessed many assessments that only test students based on their oral fluency rate, and then places them in intervention groups based on that rate, I can say that I wholeheartedly agree with Maiers on this.  I just really wish she wouldn’t call that type of instruction 21st Century Literacy instruction.  Simply put, she should just call it excellent literacy instruction.

It’s rather self-evident that society has changed dramatically over the past 100 years, and the way we engage students has changed as well, but the fact remains that the primary vehicle we use to educate is still an iteration of communication.  Technology is playing a vital role in the way we will hopefully shift from an industrial model of educating to a new learning-centric model that has yet to develop, but the technology itself isn’t the point.  The 21st Century whatevers aren’t the point.  The point is learning.  I believe if people were more prone to discard the rhetoric and engage in true learning, the conversation about what we call it would be rendered rather moot.

Thanks to Ken-ichi for the Flickr image.