Internet, Reading Instruction, and "New Literacy's"

The increasing use of mass media has been influential on the changing roles of education and it is constantly being questioned whether or not the use of technology is beneficial to the growth of our nation's youth.  As technology is progressively being used in the average American school classroom, there are “new literacy’s” students must posses. Recently, Julie Corio wrote an article to help expand the understanding amongst educators of the new reading comprehension skills students must encompass for new literacy’s.  

Students using the Internet for Reading Instruction

Essentially, as technology has progressively become a part of our culture, it is not only important for children to start using it at a young age, but it is inevitable in becoming a part of educational systems for instructional purposes. When using electronic texts, there are different types of comprehension processes that must take place and a different set of instructional strategies.  Not only can navigating the Internet be difficult for young children, but also these new texts explore new types of story grammar and a variety of new formats. 

Students may not be able to pick up on these required abilities by just working with a peer, teachers may need to teach students new skills beforehand. These relatively new texts are typically nonlinear, interactive, and inclusive of multiple media forms.  Each of these characteristics offers new opportunities while also presenting a range of challenges that will require new thought processes for making meaning and understanding. 

As we may already know, information offered on the Internet is not always information that is correct and many hyperlinks can be used to express information. Not only must students understand how to differentiate between information that is relevant and provides truth to the topic they are studying, but they must understand the advantages and disadvantages associated with having ultimate control in the direction which the text progresses. Traditional text forms also typically include a combination of two types of media: print and two-dimensional graphics. Electronic texts can integrate a range of symbols and multiple-media formats including icons, animated symbols, photographs, cartoons, advertisements, audio and video clips, virtual reality environments, and new forms of information with nontraditional combinations of font size and color. All of this may be very new and confusing to students, therefore, teachers should review these new types of media to students before they are set out to do their own work and navigation on the Internet. 

For a secondary opinion on this matter, I interviewed Professor Codling, an instructor for the course “materials and instruction for creating skilled and motivated readers”.  When asked what exactly these “new literacy’s” were, Professor Codling responded with the many new skills that she believes are required in order to use the Internet as a means of reading instruction.  

The field of education is one that is constantly changing and developing, traditional methods of teaching are now being replaced with methods that are conforming to our developing society.  It is interesting to see the different perspective opinions on the use of technology being newly implemented into the average American classroom.  In order to convey different opinions on such use, I interviewed Professor Codling as she expressed how she feels about using the Internet as a means a literacy, as well as a student currently studying Elementary Education, Caitlin Virta.  

Caitlin Virta

 

PROFESSOR CODLING'S OPINION 

CAITLIN VIRTA'S OPINION 

Lastly, now that the Internet is being used for reading instruction, student's must not only learn how to specifically read, but they must use inferential reasoning skills and contextual clues to discern one type of hyperlink from another.  They must understand which information is factual as oppose to which information is useless and in order to begin steering students in the right direction, teachers should provide instructional methods on how to do so.  One website which I believe sets a great exemplar for teachers to use for implementing the Internet as a means of reading instruction comes from National Geographic, originally a popular magazine with factual information for the purpose of distributing knowledge to young children.   


This website can be used to direct reading instruction when students are to research all different types of animals around the world.  In using technology for reading instruction, a lot of the time teachers are worried that students will come across websites where the validity of the information is questionable.  However, teachers can be certain that this website is factual because it is an extension link to the website of National Geographic, a legitimate organization.  In allowing students to search this website on their own, they will be able to use some of their newly learned skills to browse the website, but there will be a specified region in which they will be allowed to explore.  In using this website, teachers will have a better watch over their students and not only be able to assess their students progress in browsing the web, but will also be able to ensure that students do not venture off to any inappropriate or unrelated sites to the topic being explored.  Since they will be allowed to browse only within this particular website which is quite simple, it will be good beginner practice. 


I believe this site to be an exemplary site because it not only includes the different classes of animals separated by categories as well as a bunch of different animals under each category, but it also includes a description for each specific animal.  The descriptions can even be seen as a small book as you turn the pages to continue reading!  There are also photographs included in the same light, as well as many other features included that will keep students interested in exploring the information provided.