Connecting Multicultural Education and Multiliteracies

Posted on January 28, 2015 by Bridget Dalton

by Thomas DeVere Wolsey

During the last year, Dr. Diane Lapp and I had the opportunity to work with several prominent thought-leaders to explore how multiple literacies and multicultural education intersect and promote greater learning and understanding amongst our students. The result, under the guidance of Dana Grisham, was a themed issue of Reading and Writing Quarterly that was just released online. In the introduction, Diane and I wrote, “Digital technology, whose users comprise ever-changing communities, permits previously disconnected worlds to find commonalities and explore differences. Technology has the potential to connect students and educators across cultures, and, at the same time, make it possible for students to participate more fully in their own cultures” (Wolsey & Lapp, 2015, p. 97).

cover of Reading & Writing Quarterly journal

The six articles in the current special issue of Reading and Writing Quarterly each address topics that demonstrate how technology can facilitate learning, build students’ understanding of their culture, and construct bridges across and to other cultures. The table of contents may be found below. Please take a few minutes to visit the special issue on the Taylor and Francis website (preview and abstracts) or through your university electronic library resources.
• Imagining Writing Futures: Photography, Writing, and Technology by Cheryl A. McLean & Jennifer Rowsell

• Fostering Students’ Science Inquiry Through App Affordances of Multimodality, Collaboration, Interactivity, and Connectivity by Richard Beach & David O’Brien

• iPad Deployment in a Diverse Urban High School: A Formative Experiment by Nancy Frey, Douglas Fisher & Diane Lapp

• The Council of Youth Research: Critical Literacy and Civic Agency in the Digital Age by Antero Garcia, Nicole Mirra, Ernest Morrell, Antonio Martinez & D’Artagnan Scorza

• Multicultural Education and Multiliteracies: Exploration and Exposure of Literacy Practices With Preservice Teachers by W. Ian O’Byrne & Shane A. Smith

• A Digital Tool Grows (and Keeps Growing) From the Work of a Community of Writers by Nancy L. Roser, Melissa Mosley Wetzel, Ramón Antonio Martínez & Detra Price-Dennis

Reference:
Wolsey, T.D. & Lapp, D. (2015). Introduction to teachers and students as creators in blended learning environments. Reading and Writing Quarterly, 31(2), 97-101. doi: 10.1080/10573569.2014.963906

Filed under: multimodal, new literacies, technology integration | Tagged: , , , , | Leave a comment »

Using Technology to Improve Reading and Learning

Posted on September 28, 2014 by Bridget Dalton

Book cover of Using Technology to Improve Reading and Learning

When friends write a book, of course, you’re excited for them and can’t wait to read it.  What’s even more wonderful is when you read the book and it’s terrific – one that you know you will use in your own teaching. Using Technology to Improve Reading and Learning by Colin Harrison and fellow Literacy Beat bloggers Bernadette Dwyer and Jill Castek is just such a book.

I found this book to be exceptionally useful for many reasons, but I will highlight just two of those reasons here.

First, Colin, Bernadette, and Jill are not only experts in technology and new media; they are first and foremost experts in literacy instruction. They have taught children how to become engaged and successful readers and writers, and they have taught and collaborated with teachers on effective literacy instruction and technology over many years. Their deep knowledge and on-the-ground experiences with children and teachers is demonstrated in every chapter. They speak directly to teachers, acknowledging the realities of today’s schools and the pressure to achieve high academic standards with all students, while offering a vision and concrete classroom examples to inspire us to embrace the challenge.

Second, this book provides a comprehensive blueprint for integrating technology so that children are more successful with print-based reading and writing AND are developing the new literacies of reading, learning, and communicating with eBooks and on the Internet. Bernadette, Jill and Colin complement a chapter on reading eBooks and digital text with two chapters on Internet inquiry – one focusing on the search process and the other focusing on how to compose and communicate through multimodal products. These are areas where we need to make tremendous progress if we are going to prepare our students for a future world that will be more multimodal, more networked, and more dependent on individuals who are creative, strategic, and collaborative.

I’ve copied the table of contents below. You will see that this book offers teachers multiple pathways for moving forward on their own journeys of technology and literacy integration. Enjoy (I know I will)!

Table of Contents

  1. Using technology to make the teaching of literacy more exciting
  2. Strategies for capitalizing on what students already know
  3. Strategies for using digital tools to support literacy development
  4. Strategies for using eReaders and digital books to expand the reading experience
  5. Strategies for teaching the information-seeking cycle: The process stage of searching for information on the Internet
  6. Strategies for teaching the information-seeking cycle: The product stage of searching for information on the Internet
  7. Strategies for encouraging peer collaboration and cooperative learning
  8. Strategies for building communities of writers
  9. Strategies for building teachers’ capacity to make the most of new technologies

Filed under: collaboration, Common Core, Dalton, digital reading, digital tools, Dwyer, electronic texts, multimodal, new literacies, technology integration, writing | Tagged: , , , , , , , | 2 Comments »

Power Up What Works!

Posted on May 10, 2013 by Bridget Dalton

I want to share an excellent resource to support technology integration, the Center for Technology Implementation’s Power Up What Works website (http://powerupwhatworks.com).  With funding from the US Department of Education, EDC, AIR, and CAST have partnered on this project to develop a comprehensive set of online resources for using technology to support literacy and math (of course, I have focused my attention on the literacy materials!).

What makes Power Up unique is its special attention to the needs of students who struggle with learning, including students with special needs.    As a member of the Power Up Advisory Board, I’ve had the opportunity to see the resource evolve and want to share a few of my favorite features.

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Power Up with Technology Blog

Stay connected and get up-to-date information and teaching ideas through the Power Up with Technology blog.   The April 17 blog post caught my eye, since it was about “create your own interactives”, something that I find key to my own teaching. It highlighted three resources that offer lots of potential:

Did you notice that the blogger noted whether the resource was free and/or fee-based?  I find this incredibly helpful, since like most teachers, I have limited funds and want to take advantage of the high-quality free resources that are available online.

You can find the blog on facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/pages/PowerUp-What-Works/127625650650645?group_id=0

The Learning Center

http://powerupwhatworks.com/content/render/LearningCenter

The Learning Center has a wealth of information and resources to explore. Since literacy is my thing, I’ve spent most of my time in the Reading and Writing sections.  In Reading, the focus is on comprehension and vocabulary, while the Writing section focuses on supporting the writing process, from idea generation to publication.  Throughout, you’ll notice the links to the Common Core State Standards.  You can get information at the level and type that is useful to you. For example, each of the Reading sections includes an overview of the strategy (e.g., self-questioning, summarizing, visualizing, context clues, s semantic mapping and word analysis), a description of how to teach the strategy, an extended classroom example, a list of resources, research, and tech tips.

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PowerUp Your School

Teachers are the ones leading the way on integrating technology into their teaching and their students’ learning.  While teachers are ‘making it happen’, sometimes one classroom at a time, we know that more is usually required to sustain effective technology integration over the long term.  If your school is interested in developing a school-wide plan for integrating technology, Power Up offers a range of resources to support you in developing a school-wide plan and building a team that will work together to support one another in making technology a meaningful part of children’s learning.

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I know the Power Up team is eager for feedback, so let them know what you find especially helpful and share suggestions for improvement.

Filed under: Common Core, digital tools, students with special needs, technology integration, Uncategorized | Tagged: , , , | Leave a comment »