If any of you have read Mark Pegrum's reading for week 6, it goes beyond talking about print literacy, texting literacy and hypertext literacy and introduces us to a world where terms such as search literacy, information literacy and participatory literacy not only are used but consequently where the reader finds themself figurng out if they identify with each of these terms.
But first, let's consider print literacy. The simple idea of figuring out how a combination of letters become a word and a set of words in a speific order become a sentence that conveys the meaning of its writer. If we didn't have those skills, would the Web be of any use to us? I don't believe a person without print literacy will gain as much from the Web as an equally skilled person at navigating the Web but who also is print literate will. The idea that there are radicalists who suggest that print literacy is unimportant in this day and age stricks me actually as a very backward frame of mind as it appears to refer back to a time where people communicated using symbols and drawings except it will be done on a more sophisticated platform.
With that though, I do believe that the Web and technology advancements have evolved the use of our print literacy resulting in what people refer to as netspeak. What is it? It's the shrthnd lang of é technologically proficient 2day. This form of literacy goes beyond attempting to fit a single train of thought into a specified number of characters a mobile network gives you to being a language that is well suited to situations that require rapid communication and at the same time serves as a membership to a technologically savvy 'cool' crowd. In the case of children and teenagers, it may even be safe to say that the presence of netspeak has created a situation in which children are happily writing more and more without even realising it.
Can it and should it be used in the classroom? I think the answer to the question lies with the teacher of the classroom and how comfortable they are with having children using it in their classroom. If it exists as a foreign language to the teacher and ends up being more frustrating attempting to accommodate this new language then it's probably a better idea to discourage its use in the classroom. If on the other hand, the teacher views it as a fun challenge to see what new levels this new language can take the class to then the idea of 'codeswitching' and incorporating netspeak in daily tasks may be appropriate.
This leads me to the platform in which I first learnt to speak the language: Chats and Instant messaging. Hurrah for the days where I'd rush home from school to switch on the computer and log on to chat rooms and speak to people that surprise, surprise I had just spent 8 hours of my day at school with. I don't think there's any way to describe the allure of chat rooms and instant messaging except that if they were so captivating to me, why I should doubt the magical hold it has on children today. I say embrace it and be creative in how we can use it to create new and innovative ways for students to discuss their ideas.
Until my next post...
Mark's reading for week 6 really helped me out as I missed out on the workshop!
ReplyDeleteI can relate to your chatroom experices, Deb! I use to do the same thing as well! The minute I reached home (which was about 4-5pm during high school years), I'll switch on the desktop and 'catch up' with friends from school whom I saw less than an hour ago. Looking back now, instant messaging did assist me in developing a love for the English langauge. Not only did it provide a platform for us youngsters (back then!) to practice using the langauge, we became better in using multimodal texts as well!
Deb and Rosh, it's really interesting to read about your experiences with chat/IM. I agree that if you found it appealing, your own students are likely to do so as well if you can find pedagogically relevant ways of using it.
ReplyDeleteDeb, you make a really good point about netspeak: if it's like a foreign language to the teacher, it might be better NOT to try to introduce it in the classroom. A strong argument has come through in the research in recent years, suggesting that teachers need prior experience with whatever tools - or, in this case, language - they are planning to use with students, so that their students see them as credible sources of information who know what they're talking about.