Inspirations

Yesterday afternoon I began a short course of ICT to support teaching and learning with a foundation degree police cohort.  As normal there are a range of confidences and competencies in the group, although I think it is mostly confidence! We began by discussing transferable skills that we have developed though use of ICT.  Interestingly enough most of the skills discussed were not ICT skills at all.  The top three were: problem solving, confidence and literacy.  We discussed literacy skills and the need to ensure that, children in particular, didn’t lose fundamental literacy skills that are in danger of extinction, such as spelling and grammar.  Something that I feel passionate about is the need to teach a broader range of writing skills though.  I think that unless we actually teach and embrace the new types of writing, such as texting, tweeting and emailing, we don’t capitalise on how useful these skills can be.  More to the point we need highlight that there is a vast difference in the way we write for these new technologies and that even within each of these there are formalities that need to be conformed to.  It isn’t enough to simply say this is the way you text or email, if you are texting or emailing your boss or your teacher, you should consider the language is different from that used if you are texting or emailing a friend.  So if it isn’t taught how do we expect students to just know?

Prior to the 21st century, literate defined a person’s ability to read and write, separating the educated from the uneducated. With the advent of a new millennium and the rapidity with which technology has changed society, the concept of literacy has assumed new meanings. Experts in the field suggest that the current generation of teenagers - sometimes referred to as the Net generation - possesses digital competencies to effectively navigate the multidimensional and fast-paced digital environment. For generations of adults who grew up in a world of books, traveling through cyberspace seems as treacherous and intimidating as speaking a new language. In fact, Prensky recognised “such non-IT-literate individuals as burdened with an accent - non-native speakers of a language, struggling to survive in a strange new world.”

Image is from http://fall11-eng-02.wikispaces.com/

ICT is a dynamic and ever changing subject that opens up many different future pathways for students to follow and the subject content will stay with them throughout their lives.  I expect students to develop, maintain and stimulate their curiosity, interest and enjoyment in ICT, as I encourage them to have an open and enquiring mind.  I expect students to become autonomous users of ICT with associated skills to support lifelong learning.