Levels of literacy

Yesterday I taught an introduction class. Two of my students had originally signed up for the intermediate class (called "Getting More") and after the first fifteen minutes decided they were in too advanced a class and left. During the day they indicated that they were very glad they had moved back a level, and one student is going to be taking another introduction class rather than a "Getting More" class for a different program. My classes are different than many literacy classes in that my students are expected to have certain literacy skills, and we only have one day to 'learn' the software. I think often of the more knowledgeable other I become in the front of the room. My students are anywhere from 18 to 70 years old, and come in with their own history and skills. I have to kind of corral those skills into a common area and begin to work with the group to bring them up to a common skill level. In the Getting More classes, the zone of proximal development becomes more important. I scaffold the students to become more proficient in software that helps them in their jobs, which is the primary reason people take these classes. Ms. Coiro (got it this time, Dr. M.) discusses literacy in a way that pertains to my work. Eymann's discussion of digital literacy resonated with me, because as I've written in previous posts, the literacy in computers is not the skills to perform the tasks, but the ability to use the skills to acquire knowledge. Everyone used Presi last week, which I've never seen before, but is evidently common in the academic world. So now I am once again illiterate; I will be working on my own to explore the software and see if it is something I can learn without instruction. I am self-taught in most of the software I teach, and students are sometimes amazed (their word) that I can learn software on my own. It's only recently that I realize that other people don't understand software the way I do - I always say it just makes sense to me. And yet there has been so much this semester that everyone understands that I struggle with. Another example of different literacies, the basis for this class. Off to school.

Close captioned

I've begun seeing different literacies in my life, as my posts have shown. Now there's another. I watch (too much) television with the sound off most of the time (in part because our televisions don't receive sound at the same rate, so there's an echo). I find that I almost enjoy 'reading' the text more than hearing the words. Sometimes I put the sound on and still have the closed captioning. It's interesting when part of the 'text' is left out of the captioning. Depending on the program, there are often way too many [bleep]s (that's how it displays) and so much conversation that doesn't make it into the captioning. One of my issues is names. So someone is named Vito; he's not Italian, and I'm okay with that. Then it turns out that his mother spelled it Veto. What?

In my community I speak a different 'language' than most of our friends, in part from school and in part from things I hear (my husband's friend says I have a musical ear) and read (and learn). I spent five minutes explaining to three women what baby mama drama is. Am I street literate? No way. But am I reading a different world? I think so. I read my world. My world is larger for my reading. I think all of us are fortunate that we have the desire and ability to read more of our worlds. So many worlds, so little time.

Viewing My Teaching

I teach computers. That's what I tell people I do for a living. In the past I've defined myself as a trainer, because that's what job descriptions called what I do. Years ago I took career counseling and one of the main recommendations was that I teach people to do their jobs. Twenty five years later, that's what I do. I think I do it well, although I always question my abilities after a difficult class (don't we all?). Now my sense of self sees a teacher. I thought I taught computer literacy, but Coiro points out that the digital literacy is so much more. In interviewing supervisors and managers, digital literacy was being able 'to tell a story with the software'. I actually heard that twice, in reference to Microsoft Excel. He writes, "Reading purposefully to solve problems using the Internet also means knowing what to pay attention to while being aware of the increasing range of digital techniques . . ." So now I can't even say someone is computer literate if they can work on the computer - they have to be able to understand how to use the computer to learn.

I teach Introduction to Computers and the Internet. I think everyone would be surprised at how difficult it is to teach someone what the internet is. For adults, it's teaching them that they can go somewhere that doesn't exist, get something that doesn't exist, and move it to somewhere that doesn't exist.

And for the record, I spelled reassurance incorrectly on a previous post. I know it's nothing, but it's been bothering me. My bad.


Joyce M.

The Power of the Pen and Those That Read It

Last semester I began graduate studies eager to uncover how much I still had yet to discover and learn.   I knew there was so much more to what drove a person to want to learn and how they took in the information that they sought.  I am still, and may forever be, uncovering the layers of the onion known as education.  My most recent "ah has" have absolutely come from the readings and discussions found on Tuesday nights in Adult 650.  Collectively I am discovering a layer that is so much more complex and powerful than I could even begin to imagine.  As the newly discovered (for me) and now revered Paulo Freire mentions in the video posted last week, "Literacy is a fundamental chapter of education as a whole." A "chapter" or layer I believe that is truly underestimated in its power. The words on a page can be used as a vehicle to get a message, skill, or ideology across.  But literacy can also go much further than just the text in one's hands.  What is the individual(s) true understanding of what they read?  Was it the message intended?  Or was it something else entirely?  What experiences and prior learnings do they attribute to what they have read and how they understand it, or even feel about it?  What then do they do with that comprehension? Perhaps these considerations and more were the reasons behind so many efforts historically to oppress individuals and their opportunities for literacy.   As Arnove and Graff cite in their article, "One basic reason for doubting the resolve of political and educational leaders in many countries is that widespread possession of literacy by a populace may lead to unpredictable, contradictory, and conflictive consequence."  Literacy can after all standardize language, expose cultures and perspectives, spread the religious word, and even promote continuous economic growth of a nation.  Literacy efforts can be paused by the limitations of support as resources are instead attributed to war; or literacy can be the key to what begins a war among us.  So while many may not yet truly understand the power that literacy can wield, perhaps sharing another quote from our readings this week may assist in putting it in perspective "literacy…(is) not just the process of learning the skills of reading, writing and arithmetic, but a contribution to the liberation of man and to his full development.  Thus conceived, literacy creates the conditions for the acquisition of a critical consciousness of the contradictions of society in which man lives and of its aims; it also stimulates initiative and his participation in the creation of projects capable of acting upon the world, of transforming it, and of defining the aims of an authentic human development." (Arnove and Graff, 598)  Literacy can truly be power and empowerment.