Digital Literacy Exploration

I have really enjoyed exploring different technologies. It is a great interest of mine to become more fluent in today's up and coming technologies, especially in their uses for classrooms and students. Although, I realize there are some frustrations that come with the territory, this is also part of the learning process. My particular exploration dealt with visual literacy and digital storytelling. These two components fit together nicely because the technology uses images to influence a viewer, a main purpose of visual literacy.

I also took a look at one of my peers exploration on social literacy with blogging. Blogging can be a very useful tool for students in a classroom. It can be used to create an online community, post upcoming assignments, and keep absent students up to date with the events of the classroom. These are all components of social literacy and create a technological/ digital community of learners.

Through this exploration I have been able to learn about different and new technologies and the various ways they can be used in classrooms. In my future teaching, I will be able to look back on this experience and use the ideas I have learned about. I have also become more well-rounded in my understanding of "literacy". There are so many different aspects of literacy that can be handled in thousands of ways. Students can benefit from the different literacies, and I am glad that I will be able to assist my own students in this area.

First Graders Debate Religion

When I was in my field placement last week, I overheard a very interesting conversation between a few of my first graders. Many of the students live in the same apartment building and talk about their experiences together about being at home. One student was talking about the building she lives in. She started describing to me that all of the doors in the apartment were green. This really bugged her and she said that she wished they could all be a different color. The other girl agreed and said she wished she could change it too. I suggested to the girls that maybe they could make some artwork and hang it outside the door to decorate a little more. The girls thought this was a good a idea but then started complaining about the smell in the hallway. The first girl said, "Those dang Russians are always stinking up the hallway." I was really taken off guard by this comment. She went on, "Those Russians stink up the hallway because of all the food they make. Their food smells sooooo bad. And they cook a lot. But sometimes though they can cook up some really good meals." Well, I asked her how she knew they were Russian, and she tried to avoid my question. The best answer I got was that she had heard it from an older girl who also lives in the building. Then from the rest of the conversation I got the impression that she had been invited to dinner to eat sometime before, but I wasn't entirely sure because her comments were not consistent. This made me think that this girl had these preconceived notions about the "Russians," based on what she had been told by different people. It seemed to me however, that she very strongly believed that only the Russians in her building would cook strong smelling food. I just found this conversation very interesting and found it worth mentioning. This was the result of a young impressionable girl taking on ideas that may or may not be true of a group of people. I fear that these notions will stick with her, and begin a cycle of stereotypes or worse. It is important that as teachers, we realize how impressionable these kids really are, and that they are influenced by many outside sources. This is why in teaching it is so important to get at the students misconceptions and previous knowledge, ideas, and understandings, in order to start breaking those walls down.

First Grade Writing

Fortunately I have been able to observe quite a bit of writing at my field placement. These first graders never cease to amaze me because some of them write around 5-7 sentences in one journal entry! My CT sets aside time each morning during the literacy block to have the students write on a journal page. Sometimes the students are given writing prompts and sometimes they can write about whatever they want. It is really cool to see a student get excited about an idea they have and just run with it in their writing. I experienced this when I taught my lesson. I had the students journal about a time when they had a conflict with a friend. One student, Julianna, thought of a story she could write immediately. She was so excited that she just wrote and wrote and wrote until the entire front and back of her paper was filled and she drew a picture to top it off! I was really excited to see my teaching make an impact and motivate even just one student to enjoy writing. That was probably the best part about my lesson :)