Literacy Is More Than Readin’ and Writin'

If you are here on the SHS Literacy Site and reading this blog, chances are that you already know that literacy is more than the traditional idea of reading and writing. These days, our world is so rich with texts - on paper and via technology - that it seems a shame to limit the definition of literacy to traditional text and traditional writing. It is not that our students can dismiss learning about formal writing, but when working with the great faculty here at Stevenson High School, we are often reminded of the vast array of ways teachers ask students to authentically show their learning in order to assess growth. Non-traditional writing is occurring more often these days.

Today, our students, digital natives, produce written text in a variety of formats. While many students have moved on from blogs, Facebook, and Twitter, there are still technological pathways that interest and inspire students to engage with content. And of course we cannot forget that the ELA Common Core Standards (9-10.W.6 & 11-12.W.6) call for students to use technology to produce and publish writing. So with all of that on our mind, we thought we would highlight some ways that our teachers are asking students to engage with the digital world to authentically show what they know.

Recently, instead of responding to an AP Biology essential question with traditional writing, students were asked to recall learning, explore information, and show their learning by creating a meme. If you are unfamiliar with memes, you might learn about them here. This lesson idea was sparked by a recent Literacy Committee meeting which focused on the merits of creating engaging essential questions. After the meeting, the teacher and literacy coach continued the conversation resulting in a cool lesson for students. To begin with, students were asked, “If the entire human population adopted a vegetarian (or vegan) diet, what would happen to the biosphere?” Then, through the course of the next 75 minutes, students used their prior knowledge/learning, explored the website procon.org, and created memes that answered worked with content and explained the meme choices. Here are a few samples:

On the other end of the academic spectrum, our 10th grade Academic Literacy students are doing individual inquiry projects. This particular project appeals to students because it gives them control of content choice while continuing to flood them with reading and reading skills. Students are already immersed in learning how to identify real news as opposed to sources that might contain bias or misinformation. This skill is not only relevant due to the current political climate in America, but it is also important because it provides these students with a preview of skills they will use again next year in writing the junior research paper. But the interesting idea for having students demonstrate the knowledge gained from reading is to have students create a sample multigenre project. While using and teaching important aspects of writing, students will be required to provide a few different types of genres in their writing - sort of like this blog that includes links to articles, websites, and visual pictures along with the text: Four different genres. We see these multigenre projects popping up at the collegiate level as students show their learning by compiling learning in different formats - formats that often make sense to them as digital natives.

These two literacy ideas, along with a slew of other engaging teaching methods, are leveraging technology and literacy to reach a new generation of students. Whether it be with flipped classrooms requiring visual and listening literacies, through Twitter and Fakebook Social Media, or through memes and multigenre creations that engage and inspire students to use a variety of literacies, SHS faculty is working hard to make learning meaningful and useful for students. Have a cool non traditional writing format or know of a teacher using one, let us know! Until next time…

dan

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