Literacy Now

by Joan A. Rhodes

Have you ever found yourself perplexed about the best way to integrate technology in your language arts program? Perhaps you question whether incorporating video production in your reading class will really result in better student learning. If you find yourself wondering about these or other issues related to media and technology, pay a visit to Matthew Needleman’s blog, Creating Lifelong Learners.

Needleman, an Apple Distinguished Educator, aims to provide elementary teachers practical information for teaching new media literacies and integrating technology in classroom instruction. A seven-year elementary educator and current literacy coach in the Los Angeles Unified School system, Needleman brings a wealth of experience for using technology and video to support literacy instruction to his richly populated blog. He believes that the “goal of technology integration is not just for teachers to show off new toys but to put technology into the hands of students to have them participate in higher level thinking, collaboration and project based learning” (Needleman, 2011,”Mr. Needleman” para.1). 

Blog entries, updated approximately monthly, offer concise descriptions on topics ranging from how to download YouTube videos to the correct way to show movies in class. Needleman provides direct explanations of how to use a variety of software and technology resources without reverting to the use of jargon. Even the most hesitant technology user will find the blog content understandable and ripe for classroom implementation.

The Creating Lifelong Learners blog emphasizes the use of video production to support learning in the elementary classroom. Blog entries, such as “Royalty free photos, music and video list (updated)”, help teachers locate media products for classroom use. Links to Needleman’s personal websites offer a wealth of resources for all elementary grade levels. Video in the Classroom provides a rationale for incorporating digital storytelling at the elementary level and videos like Tales from the Yard, Video in the Classroom Introduction, and Mr. Winkle Wakes may be useful resources when seeking financial support for media literacy activities. Treasures Resources.com is one of several linked websites created specifically to align technology activities with a specific reading/language arts basal series.

Educators who read Creating Lifelong Learners will find themselves spending more time than expected perusing this expansive blog. Comments and reactions from multiple educators further enrich the content provided by the author. RSS feed, author contact information and links to social media are easily accessible and are just a few features that make Creating Lifelong Learners a great means of keeping up with technology integration at the elementary level. 

References:

 

Worldwide, countries understand that improving access to quality education is a critical part of improving their economies and societies. Technology access for students, teachers, and parents is a critical enabler that makes it possible for anyone, anywhere to get a top quality education. Shape the Future, a new three-year program sponsored by Microsoft and the Clinton Global Initiative, is aimed at providing low-cost computers, software, and broadband Internet access to 1 million U.S. students from low-income households. 

Shape the Future helps governments build the Public/Private Partnerships (PPPs) that create meaningful and effective solutions to their educational, economic, and social challenges by making technology access a right for all, not a privilege for some. For all citizens, access to a "digital society" delivers tangible economic, employment, and social opportunities. For governments, increasing digital inclusion accelerates the growth of a high-employment economy by accelerating global competitiveness.

Click here to read more about Shape the Future.

by Denise H. Stuart

Students today come to the classroom “multiply literate” (Kadjer, 2010, p.6). The web 2.0 tool, VoiceThread encourages the collaborative, creative and interactive use of multimedia for composing online. 

The Children's Literature and Reading SIG focused on older readers (in grades 6-12) for the conclusion of their book review series that includes books that feature characters' adventures with reading.

Bauer, J. (2011). Close to famous. New York: Viking. 

Foster McFee just finished sixth grade by the skin of her teeth, but now she and her mother are on the run, avoiding an abusive and controlling boyfriend in Nashville. Despite the fact that she can’t read and her grades in school are abysmal, Foster is a talented baker, able to whip up scrumptious cupcakes and muffins. She memorizes the recipes she hears on cooking shows and hides her inability to read from the rest of the world. With the help of a somewhat reclusive, highly strong retired actress and her family and friends, Foster summons the determination to break the alphabetic code and master the art of reading. Bauer serves up delectable descriptions of the desserts Foster prepares, but in sympathetic yet accurate fashion she also describes the lengths to which Foster goes in order to hide her inability to read. 
- Barbara A. Ward

Resau,  L. & Farinango, M. V. (2011). The queen of water. New York: Delacorte. 
When she is seven, Virginia is given away to a middle mestizo class family in Ecuador. Having been punished by her teacher for speaking her original language, Quichua, Virginia resolves never to go to school again. Over the years, though, she realizes that literacy and education provide avenues to the life she wants to lead, and she teaches herself to read secretly, studying the science texts of her mistress, conducting secret science experiments, and reveling in words such as “photosynthesis.” Although she is ashamed of her illiterate, indigenous parents and their poverty and culture, she eventually comes to realize that the family with whom she is living will never truly allow her to be a part of their world. They will always consider her to be “less than” because of her own background. Virginia struggles with her own self-identity and disconnection from her own culture throughout the book’s pages. Reminding readers to be true to themselves and their roots, the story of her ultimate triumph over difficult odds is inspiring as she writes a play that is performed by her classmates and is named Queen of the Water. 

- Barbara A. Ward

Schmidt, G. D. (2011). Okay for now. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Moving to a new town and a new school in Marysville, New York, isn’t easy when you’re a middle grader—especially when you’re a boy with a secret. In this companion book to The Wednesday Wars, Doug Swieteck’s secret turns out to be his inability to read. Although the book is about much more than that particular struggle, Schmidt nails accurately the rising anxiety experienced by Doug as his teacher begins round-robin reading. As tough as things may be for the seventh grader already, he knows that once his inability to read is unmasked, life will be insufferable. Luckily for Doug, he has help: an artistic outlet in the library as he studies the bird paintings of John James Audubon under the tutelage of Mr. Powell, a kindly librarian, and Miss Cowper, who has him play the part of a novice reading in her thinly disguised tutorial called the County Literacy Unit.  Later, after much work, Doug is sounding out the words he needs in order to read bedtime books for the Daugherty children he babysits. Doug’s literacy journey serves as a poignant reminder that it is never too late to learn how to read. 
- Barbara A. Ward

We hope you enjoyed this book review series from the CL/R SIG. Click here for more information about the CL/R SIG. 

BY MRS. MIMI
I love a good To-Do List. Most of the time, there is no better feeling than admiring my color-coded week and reveling in all that productivity. Just look at what I’m going to get done! It’s going to be amazing! I’m going to be amazing! Crossing items off my list is going to be amazing!

Usually, when I am feeling crazy and unbalanced, list making somehow calms my nerves and reassures me that everything will be okay, that it will all get done. (This last sentence implies that there are times when I am feeling balanced, which we all know is basically an impossible feat for a teacher save for perhaps the summer. But I think you get my point.) A good list gives me a clear plan and as a teacher, a clear plan is everything.

Friends, it pains me to type this next bit, but I have to admit it’s true. Lately, it feels as if my To-Do List has grown to such epic proportions that it has rendered me less effective and robbed me of the joy I used to feel in the classroom.

Is it just me, or did I hear gasps from the crowd? Yes, I think that was definitely a collective gasp.

As teachers, our plates are becoming so very full that they are more like troughs filled with responsibility, accountability and just-get-it-done-ability. Not only are we all pulling our hair out wondering how it is all going to get done, we are becoming robots. Programmed to make a dent in the Almighty To-Do List, I notice myself and others around me just getting through the day, unable to think about turning our classrooms into spaces filled with wonder, excitement, and joy.

Let’s use the read-aloud as our example. The read-aloud is what I consider to be one of the most important parts of the day. It’s what we all fantasized about when we were naïve education majors dreaming about our future classrooms. It’s what we all remember from our own days in the classroom. It’s pretty much one of the best parts of the day. And on more than one occasion, it has been my sanity.

Do I need to remind you how painful it can be to sit through a bad read-aloud? Just the other day, I listened to a teacher who was so determined to cross things off her list that it sounded like she was reading the instructions that come with a piece of DIY furniture rather than giving a rousing rendition of INTERRUPTING CHICKEN.

I watched as she encouraged the class to dig deeper! Turn and talk! Stop and jot! Chart your thinking! Mark that place with a Post-it! (Talk about an interrupting chicken.)

Despite her wonderful intentions and good instincts to actively engage her students, there wasn’t any joy left in that room. Not for the teacher and certainly not for the students. When I spoke to the teacher later, she looked at me with tears in her eyes and said simply, “Sometimes it’s all just too much.”

It is too much. There is too much on the list. The list is no longer our friend. But we can’t throw the list away because that would be unprofessional and we are better than that. We are teachers! We walk into our classrooms every day ready to work it! We strut our educational stuff, don our superhero capes, and do more work in a day than most people can fathom.

I may be pretty fabulous, but I can’t wave my wand and give you five extra hours in the day, or supply you with enough caffeine to put down a horse. (Besides, you probably do just fine with that last part on your own.) But I can tell you what I’ve been doing.

When I choose a read-aloud, I pull from books that I love because they make me laugh, or make me cry or make me want to scream from all that juicy picture book goodness. I take that book and perform the living you-know-what out of it. I use voices, dramatic gestures, and facial expressions my mother tells me are going to give me serious wrinkles. I work that book until we all feel the joy.

Then, in the true spirit of the teacher-who-must-get-it-all-done-and-do-it-the-best-way-she-knows-how, I come back to that same book another day and mark it, turn and talk it, and dig deeper. I will make sure we cross things off that list and I will relish the moment that I do just that. But first, always first, I make sure we feel the joy.

I know some of you are shaking your heads right now and thinking, “Wow, Mrs. Mimi has finally cracked. What’s with all this joy talk? What’s next, hemp necklaces and patchouli?”

I haven’t lost it, friends. I’ve just decided that the joy of reading and learning and investigating together needs to trump everything else. Because, honestly, all that other stuff on your To-Do List isn’t really going to get done very well in a classroom that feels like a factory.

So go buy yourself some new list-making pens in a rainbow of colors that puts a smile on your face. (Admit it, a good pen makes every teacher smile.) Uncap your favorite color and put “Feel the Joy” at the top of your list.

Cross that off and then we’ll worry about everything else. Because we can do it all.

Mrs. Mimi is a pseudonymous teacher who taught both first and second grades at a public elementary school in New York City. She's the author of IT'S NOT ALL FLOWERS AND SAUSAGES: MY ADVENTURES IN SECOND GRADE, which sprung from her popular blog of the same name. Mimi also has her doctorate in education from Teachers College, Columbia University.



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