In this video Yi talks about the increase usage of google and how it has improve over the years and had been made easier for everyone to use. But he states a problem about how frequently everyone uses it without evaluating to see if the informations are actually accurate.
The article, Connecting the Digital Dots: Literacy of the 21st Century, is arguing the point that the types of literacies are expanding every day, and people need to be kept up on them. The authors, Barbara Jones-Kavalier and Suzanne Flannigan, state that to be a fully functioning member of society, you must acquire and understand a new literacy; a digital one. They also state, "Today, we still seek better communication methods, only now we have myriad more choices, along with new tools and strategies and greater knowledge of effective communication". Technologies will not just be used to communicate though anymore, it is being to "create, to manipulate, to design, to self-actualize". In the New Literacy and Education paragraphs, it is stated that classrooms today are less advanced for the students who are being put in them. Almost all of these students are digitally literate, but teachers are presenting ideas in the ways they always have. Maybe, it is not just the classrooms that need remodeling, but the teachers need to attend workshops and become more accustomed to dealing with these new types of literacies. Schools who are looking to hire teachers need to look at what background the interviewees have, or require a pre-requisite for computer literacy. The authors also state that today, students are "digitally savvy". They don't believe that teachers should be re-typing overheads into PowerPoint's. There are so many different technological ways to teach things to students. It just isn't the same anymore to just use a whiteboard and an overhead projector. "As an example, now teachers can do a PowerPoint presentation with streaming video, instant Internet access, and real-time audio-video interaction, and they can do it with relative speed and ease".
Barbara Jones-Kavalier and Suzanne Flannigan in their article "Connecting the Digital Dots: Literacy of the 21st Century" state the reason the definition of literacy has gradually changed through time, will always be changed, and that the history behind why it has changed leads to the definition itself. They assert that through the technological advancements the thought processes in the humans mind have drastically changed; and in order for literacy to keep up with this rapidly changing "E-generation" Jones-Kavalier and Flannigan express that our minds need to be open to this change. They state that "vision combined with practical, recognizable goals and incentives that encourage people to embrace new digital and visual literacy skills individually and collectively" will allow there to actually be a change universally.
This article discusses how literate once meant a person's ability to read and write. Now that technology is rapidly changing, our society is learning to adjust to it. Now, literacy has a new definition. According to the authors, "Literacy includes the ability to read and interpret media (text, sound, images), to reproduce data and images through digital manipulation, and to evaluate and apply new knowledge gained from digital environments." Older generations are having a more difficult time adjusting to it than the teenage generation. Learning technology is starting to seem like learning a new language. Although, it's a priority for society to learn to acclimate to these changes in order to learn and communicate effectively.
The article "Using Instructional Technology in Transformed Learning Environments: An Evaluation of Project CHILD," by Sarah Butzin, claims that students are able to learn more and are more motivated when they are able to use technology and implement the Computers Helping Instruction and Learning Development (CHILD) project. Butzin studied the effects of technology by comparing two schools that were both technology-rich. One school implemented project CHILD and the other school implemented a more traditional design. According to the author, the CHILD method involves a cluster of three grades that are broken into smaller groups and remain with the same teachers throughout those three grades (K-2 and 3-5.) The more traditional learning style still involved the use of technology in day to day learning, but every year the students changed teachers and only worked within their grade level. The CHILD implementation makes it so that children can learn at their own pace and switch stations that include bookwork, one on one or small group time with the teacher, working with technology, and hands-on experience. Butzin claims that this style of learning showed positive outcomes for testing scores, classroom motivation, improvement in behavior, and increased parent involvement.
In this peer-revised journal, the authors give an evaluation and analysis of integrating more technology into classrooms across America. Not only do they bring in material that deals with success stories of some school districts with computer technology but they also look at more in depth matters like the teachers' uses of these new technologies. They give evidence to show how significant of an impact technology has on education as well as why some teachers are frustrated at the idea of more technology.
In National Writing Project National Reading Initiative Keywords Project by Marcie Wolfe with the New York City Writing Project, there are many "keyword articles" that have to do with education. The keyword that is most applicable to my research project is assessment. In this article Wolfe compares what peoples views are about what the definition of reading assessment is. She describes it as "data, interpretation, and formal evaluation." She emphasizes on student work over time like a portfolio.
Rose Garrett writes an article called Is Standardized Testing Failing Our Kids? which is basically questioning the purpose for taking the test. It talks about how the test hurt the students who need the help the most and is adding a lot of pressure to both the students and the teachers. It states how teachers have to teach to the test instead of teaching in a way that will not end up on paper. This article says that we should have a different kind of testing that is called performance based assessments and it is based on the idea that kids should be evaluated on what they can do and not for the purpose to see how successful they are. It allows kids to be creative and to shoe us what they actually know instead of taking a test. It seems clear that a standardized test only shows wheatear a student got the question right or wrong not how well they know the material or how well they can answer a question. The author states that until we can decided what we want kids to learn than it is hard to give them a test on things they may or may not know.
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