1.
How have these readings changed, confirmed, or
complicated your thinking about the effects of digital media on young
people's abilities to read and write?
After reading all of the articles I feel that I’m still on the
fence on whether digital media has a positive or negative effect on young
people’s ability to read and write.
Texting increases literacy, and it improves, of all things, spelling
(Scholastic Teachers, 2014). I just sit
and think about how many times my auto correct helps me out when I misspell a
word but also how many times it totally jumbles my text up and leaves me trying
to explain myself when it sends a messages I didn’t intentionally
type/send! I feel that so many students
know how they should write and when using acronyms is acceptable and not
acceptable but get so caught up in the texting fury that they convey texting
into their “formal” writing assignments, which of course is unacceptable. Referring back to ELML (Educational Learning
and Mobile Learning), 2012, “Students are using texting as a major method of
their day to day communications, and because they are writing on compact and
small keyboards they invented these acronyms to get their ideas across with the
least typing time possible. There is nothing wrong with this except when it spills
over into the formal writing territory then it becomes a problem.” This is exactly what I’m talking about and
see first-hand almost daily while teaching!
- How
have these readings changed, confirmed, or complicated your thinking about
the effects of school-based writing instruction on young people’s
abilities to read and write?
I feel that digital media has a positive effect on young people’s
ability to read but hinders their writing skills. All students need to be readers and writers
in a variety of subjects, but teachers need to scaffold their learning
(National Council of Teachers of English, 2011). I do feel that this is important because
students read at different levels and the internet and resources we have at our
fingertips allow us to find material available at all reading levels for our
students. Students can chose a topic
they want to read about and the material can be found on their specific and
appropriate reading level. Nearly
two-thirds of teens (64%) say they incorporate some informal styles from their
text-based communications into their writing at school (Lenhart, 2008). This is where I continue to agree that
texting is not beneficial when it comes to improving school-based writing
instruction!
- What
changes do you think educators need to make so that reading and writing in
school have a more positive effect on children's abilities
to read and write?
What a loaded question!
We can only control what our students look at and read during the time
we have them for class instruction. I
think we should make them aware of all the educational websites they can use as
resources when writing and how to research and read articles and journals from
educational libraries online. We also
need to try to emphasize the importance of not using our text lingo when
writing formally for classroom assignments!
It will take a lot of preaching and re-preaching the do’s and don’ts but
I think one day they may eventually stop and begin correcting themselves when
they know it is class work, for a grade, and reminded they are to be writing
formally!
- Find a
video, online article, and. or blog post that supports your line of
thinking. Summarize the information and explain how it provides evidence
to support your thinking about the role of digital media on young people's
abilities to read and write.
I found an online article The
Effects of Texting on Your Grammar that has great views and input from both
sides of the fence! It tells how many
people text message, how much is made by businesses from text messaging, and
who is helping this new language and way of communication develop. It asks questions such as: Is texting helping the English language? Is
texting ruining the English language? Then it gives views and supportive facts for those
who feel it does help and then views and supportive facts from those who feel
digital media/texting have hindered young people’s ability to read and
write. Everyone should definitely click
and read: http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/10/the-effects-of-texting-on-your-grammar.html
- Find an
image that supports your stance on the value of using digital media to
support reading and writing instruction in school. Please provide
proper attribution for any images you embed in your Blog (see support for
providing attribution below.)
(Photo from Educational Learning and Mobile Learning, 2012).
References
Educational
Learning and Mobile Learning.
(2012). The Effects of Texting on Your Grammar.
QuinStreet Inc. Retrieved on
May 28, 2014, from http://www.educatorstechnology.com/2012/10/the-effects-of-texting-on-your-grammar.html
Lenhart,
Amanda. (2008). Writing,
Technology and Teens. PewResearch
Internet Project. Retrieved on May 28,
2014, from www.pewinternet.org
National
Council of Teachers of English.
(2007). Adolescent Literacy. James
R. Squire Office of Policy Research:
Urbana, Illinois. Retrieved May
28, 2014, from www.ncte.org
National
Council of Teachers of English.
(2011). Reading and Writing across the Curriculum. James R. Squire Office of Policy
Research: Urbana, Illinois. Retrieved May 28, 2014, from www.ncte.org
National
Council of Teachers of English.
(2008). Writing Now. James R. Squire
Office of Policy Research: Urbana,
Illinois. Retrieved May 28, 2014, from www.ncte.org
National
Council of Teachers of English.
(2009). Writing Outside of School. James
R. Squire Office of Policy Research:
Urbana, Illinois. Retrieved May
28, 2014, from www.ncte.org
Teaching students about using the web for research is a great way to help our students reading and writing skills. I agree it will be a lot a repetition from the teacher to make sure the students understand the process as well as the important of not using text lingo in formal writings but it never hurts to hear important information 1 more time.
ReplyDeleteBritney- I am also on the fence of whether digital media is a beneficial use for our students or not. On some hands I feel like it is a beneficial tool to use in the classroom but I also feel as if it can also be a great hindrance in our classrooms. I really liked you comment about texting often correcting our spelling and helping us out! I have also had the experiences when it also sends words I absolutely didn't mean for it to assume I meant! Great post!
ReplyDeleteCommented on Britney Greer
ReplyDeleteHow does their thinking about the effects of digital media on reading and writing differ or is similar to your own?
Britney made the point of text-speak often spilling into students’ formal writing. This is unacceptable and students need to be told when this language is and isn’t appropriate. I can see her point on it being detrimental if teachers “allow” it to be. Teachers have control over this text-speak language in an English class. As long as clear boundaries are set, students should know the difference.
We don’t agree with regard to writing. She feels that digital media hinders writing skills. I think digital media improves students’ skills in both reading and writings.
What compelling evidence for their link of thinking do you find compelling? Why?
She does make a good connection with scaffold learning. This method is helpful from NCTE. Also with regard to guiding students with their correct use of online research using articles, journals, and libraries, so their web time is focused while in the classroom and they are using their media in a teacher approved way, this is a very good point.
What ideas do they have about improving literacy instruction in school align of differ than your own
Scaffold learning compartmentalizes assignments for students to better grasp concepts or break down processes. This helps in any subject as well as with literacy instruction. I agree with this method as a viable option.
I referenced how stupid my autocorrect makes me feel and look all the time, Britney. So, I agree with you. It is hard to overlook it on a continual basis and try to stay positive about incorporating texting and other social media into our teaching. There are some good activities out there; though, and several were displayed in the Scholastic article. I will agree with you that digital media has more positive outcomes on reading than it does with writing. We do without a doubt have to do a better job, as you say, in scaffolding their learning as well as preaching and repreaching (or teaching and reteaching). I liked your "texting" image. Great job.
ReplyDeleteI think providing opportunities to move between different purpose for writing will solve some of the text lingo in formal writing problem. Consider allowing it for informal writing assignments like exit slips where you are just interested in hearing their opinion about something or checking for understanding. Then be sure to let students know when you expect their writing assignment should adhere to academic conventions. Of course, a lot of the text message lingo is showing up in school assignments to send a message that they don't care much about the assignment. This is why it is so important to create authentic writing assignment in which students have audiences other than the teacher.
ReplyDelete