TL Under Construction

I’ve got my hands on a copy of Teaching and Learning Multiliteracies: Changing times, changing literacies by Michele Anstey and Geoff Bull. Thankfully it’s a slim volume because I’ve decided to get my head  firmly around multiliteracies before I start on the next two subjects of my M.Ed TL course. There’s just never enough time to absorb everything. Yet working in the little alternative primary school where I am, I recognize there is a gap between the way many of the children gather and use information in their ‘home’ world and how they are working with it in class. I’m betting this is not unusual for most schools, but I want to tackle this by first raising my own awareness.

I’m reassured by the preface of the book that it’s going to first introduce me to the language of the new literacies so I can hang terms on concepts. I’m glad because ‘jargon’ or professional language is not one of my strengths. I may have a very good handle on something but often can’t remember the term for it. Second, I like that it has reflective exercises.  I can write my reflections here for re-reading. Third there are practical examples so you can take theory to practice. And that’s the whole point isn’t it?

Chapter One offers a little history; how literacy in post-war schooling was basically about print — reading, and writing.  Anstey and Bull (2006, p.2) point out that pictures then were mostly decorative. This was certainly the system I was educated in. I don’t remember many illustrations having labelled parts, cross-sections or adding to the context in any real sense. And examining older texts (still weeding these out of the collection) I can imagine as a child being overwhelmed by the dense columns of words, getting to what you hope is an oasis only to find that the illustration has nothing to offer you beyond colour and a break in the page. It certainly seems designed to separate the men from the boys. Either you can read and succeed or you can’t read and you’re a failure. It’s a message, I certainly don’t want to send to my students with their varying levels of ability.  The urgency to weed these old books out has just increased.

——

Anstey, M., & Bull, G. (2006). Teaching and learning multiliteracies: Changing times, changing 
     literacies. Kensington Gardens, S.A.: International Reading Association and The Australian
     Literacy Educators' Association.
Photo: Too much text by seventhsamurai on flickr

Fellow blogger, ghostlibrarian recently posted about preparations for teaching ICTs in primary school and the special considerations when conditions are not of the textbook sort here and here. Shortages of computers and lack of collaboration between teachers and TLs are situations many TLs must work around. And there are ways to do this as well as resources to help.

Our small library has only two computers, one of those is used for circulation and is the main catalogue search computer. When I did my original SWOT analysis at the beginning of the year I listed this as one of the library’s weaknesses. I wanted to teach cybersafety to all the grades in first term.  If I wanted better computer odds than 10:1, I needed to move Library sessions out of  the library and into the classroom. And why not? It lowered the ratio to 4:1 and had the added bonus of the teacher often coming in at the end of the session and seeing what was happening, sometimes even being a bit involved. It also set the stage I think for the system to begin thinking more flexibly about the LRCs best resource, the TL. Why shouldn’t we be as ‘borrowable’ as the books? I’d like to bring the administrative thinking around to me being reserved/booked for work in the class with the teachers during project times to support both teacher and students in their information searches and ICT use.

A 4:1 ratio of kids to computers may still not sound ideal, but after watching Sugata Mitra’s video on Ted’s Talks called “How Kids Teach Themselves” you may change your mind about breaking up that little clump of kids that hang around behind someone on a computer. There is a lot more going on than I first assumed. Mitra’s project proves that children are natural collaborators and are another great resource that we often overlook.

I’m very lucky to be part of OZTL_NET an online forum for Teacher Librarians and other information specialists. They are the most generous group I’ve ever met, there is nothing they don’t know or can’t immediately assist each other to find/access. Recently a member brought to our attention the work of Andrew Churches in NZ. He has been working with Bloom’s Taxonomy to create Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy. Here’s a brief quote from the synopsis of his paper:

The Original taxonomy and the revised taxonomy by Anderson and Krathwohl [2] are both focused within the cognitive domain. As a classroom practitioner, these are useful but do not address the activities undertaken in the classroom. This Digital Taxonomy is not restricted to the cognitive domain rather it contains cognitive elements as well as methods and tooling. These are the elements that as a practitioner I would use in my classroom practice. Like the previous taxonomies, it is the quality of the action or process that defines the cognitive level, rather than the action or process alone. (Churches, 2008, p.2)

Churches’ take on Bloom’s Taxonomy is an invaluable resource for people like me trying to decide how to assist primary students to use ICT at levels appropriate to their development. There is a lot of information out there for students in highschool. Those students are ready for the challenges of higher order thinking skills. But for children in primary/elementary, developmentally just on the start of their thinking journey, there are far fewer resources available to guide us. As Kuhlthau (1995, p. 8 ) points out, the age of a child will make a difference in the way they are able to deal with information. Before the age of 11 or 12 children are still not able to deal with abstract notions and will need to concentrate their research efforts on concrete topics and problems. This means they are still operating mainly in the lower areas of Blooms Taxonomy and this will affect how ICT  will be planned and carried out .

Churches’ new Blooms Taxonomy is well worth a look for teachers and TLs/LMSs wanting to get the right tools to the right kids at the right times. After looking at Andrew Churches paper, you may also wish to access more of his resources through his wiki ” Edorigami“.

_______________________________

Kids Hand on a Computer: http://www.flickr.com/photos/16873103@N05/1819182353/

Churches, A. (2008). Bloom’s Digital Taxonomy http://edorigami.wikispaces.com/file/view/bloom%27s+Digital+taxonomy+v2.12.pdf

Kuhlthau, C. (1995). The process of learning from information [Electronic version]. School Libraries Worldwide, 1(1), 1-12.

The Information Environment class I am studying (CSU ETL501) asks its students —

What is your opinion of Wikipedia? Should TLs encourage students to use it with care or should they advise students against using Wikipedia? What is your experience of using Wikipedia in terms of its realibility and accuracy?

Oh dear, here is where I have to confess that Wikipedia is one of my best friends. I have my trusty little laptop near the sofa and as we watch TV and wonder about things, we cruise Wikipedia for background information. It could be anything from Doctor Who directors to the name of the capital city of the Yukon territory.

Having said that, researching topics for academics is a different story. I still encourage students to use it (they will anyway so no point in trying to discourage it), it is an excellent starting place.

As a TL in a primary school, I find the information the 2/3/4 classes go to Wikipedia is general knowledge. Most of them will not end up using the information from Wiki at that age independently, the reading level is too high for them (eg. spiders). But from this age I let them try as the searching is good practice and I point out the hyperlinks at the bottom of the articles as possible places to search for more information. At this age books are still the best.

I read an article ’somewhere’ (lost in my saved bookmarks) about print encyclopedias and their role in teaching the organization of information (topics and subheadings etc) and that online resources full of hyperlinks in fact work against that organisational development. It made me look again at the presented projects and sure enough children who had relied exclusively on web sites seemed to have a lot less organization to their finished products (anecdotal evidence only, maybe no correlation at all, but I always take note now). But I stray (like a hyperlink )

With the grade 5/6 students I encourage them to look at the fascinating stuff going on on the discussion page of whatever the topic is that they are researching. It’s a whole other world ‘backstage’ with raging debates, nitpicking and colossal feats of collaboration. Information comes alive then. They see that learning is not some cut and paste activity, the answers they were looking for are not black and white. Many of our best discussions about the reliability of information have come from those pages. Take a peek! Here’s a link to the discussion page of stort story “The Library of Babel” by Jorge Luis Borges which I think was mentioned in our study guide – clickhere

Photo from:

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/47/190041904_7ef208610f.jpg?v=0