Print vs. New Literacies Keystone Paper

        Literacy skills are necessary in order to comprehend information.  Traditional literacy is about print on a page, or decoding and making sense of words, images and other content that a reader can string together and then begin to comprehend.  Over the last 15 years, technology has become so advanced, the nature of literacy and literacy practices are changing.  Students are reading texts in digital form which can sometimes be multi-layered.  With the onset of this new “technology reading”, students need “new literacies” as well.  “The term ‘new literacies’  describes literacy-related skills needed in an interactive multimedia environment, such as retrieving and evaluating information, comprehending information, and producing and publishing information through online technologies” (Hsu, p.69).  Some skills that are required when comprehending information either through print or technology are: activating prior knowledge, connecting, visualizing, inferring, questioning, and synthesizing.  Students require the ability not just to "read" but also to navigate the World Wide Web, locate information, evaluate it critically, synthesize it and communicate it.  All these skills are becoming necessary to success in this century's economy and workforce.

            In the three years that I’ve been teaching, I’ve noticed my students retain information better when presented through technology.  It keeps their attention, engages their knowledge, and makes them curious to know more.  Just some techniques I’ve learned to use in my classroom were blogs, Glogster, and wiki’s.  We need to teach our students new literacies so they can make full use of the technologies present to them. 

Old school pen and paper is starting to be used less and technology is replacing it.  Students can still learn through print literacy by repetition but new literacies have a greater retention rate. Why shouldn’t we keep up with techniques and technology that interest our students?  New literacies align with the 21^st century learning style that will better prepare our students for the future. 

References

Hui-Yin Hsu & Shiangkwei Wang (2010): The Impact of Using Blogs on College

Students' Reading Comprehension and Learning Motivation, Literacy Research and Instruction, 50:1, 68-88