The New Literacies

I came into class today feeling a step behind because I missed the first class. This is how I sometimes feel with my kids, a step behind, because they seem more saavy in the new literacies than I do. At the start of class tonight I was feeling confused about what these "new literacies" are, but through our group discussion, I have begun to realize that they are not so much a set of discreet domains (like reading and writing), but rather an evolving set of skills that change as the technology changes.

As a teacher, I have worked in a school in which each student has his or her own laptop and also in one that has only one -- a PC in the library. At the former, I struggled to stay one step ahead of my students using a wide array of tools from the internet to "smart boards". At the other, I brought in my own laptop for students to experience what it is like to use a keyboard. To me, then, I feel that the way in which a teacher integrates technology into the classroom is highly dependent on the tools they have available at their school. At either end of the spectrum, I think that teachers need to be creative in how they incorporate new literacies into the curriculum.