M2 Blog Post 1: Defining New Literacies and Why They Matter

What's New? 

“As society and technology change, so does literacy,” the National Council of Teachers of English clearly lays out for us. (NCTE, 2019) In 2026, it is still true that “conventional literacy education may not be able to fully prepare students for challenges in the modern working and social life.” (Sang 2017, p. 16) As a social studies teacher of primarily 11-14 year olds, I appreciate the American Library Association’s framework (NCTE, 2019) for mastery of handling digital content:

·        Finding

·        Understanding

·        Evaluating

·        Creating and

·        Communicating

 

               The ease with which students can access information on Chromebooks, and especially with the addition of AI answers, for example, today, creates many challenges, however. I agree that there are different skills required for success than with conventional literacy. The digital world can still be just as challenging for students who are not strong readers. In addition, middle school students need to build the tools to be able to screen what they are reading. I have actually argued with elementary teachers about their encouragement of use of citation generators because students do not learn to take a critical look at the source material when they rely on them at young ages. As Beecher writes, “students who are digitally literate know how to do research, find reliable sources and make judgments about what they read online and in print.” (Beecher, 2023) As a teacher, I would answer no to many of the questions posed in the National Council of Teachers of English position paper (NCTE, 2019). My learners weren’t “critical, savvy producers and consumers.” They often could not find reliable sources. They hardly ever used visual cues without explicit direction, and they often did not consider the authenticity of all sources.

               In contrast, I’ve also seen an instance where a student intuitively understood how to use the internet even though she often struggled with traditional schoolwork. She was like a different kid when using her phone for research, especially in the area of current events. English was her second language and another language was spoken primarily at home and I have often wondered if that played a part. If you are adept at the digital world in one language, maybe those skills transfer. I agree that the focus on one dialect, academic English, in conventional definition of literacy is extremely limiting.

               What I found most interesting about the broader definitions of new literacies was the inclusion of student agency. That “literacy changes to create forms that never existed before.” (Sang, 2017, p. 18) The fact that new literacies are more participatory, collaborative and distributive in nature (Sang, 2017, p. 18) lends itself to richer curriculums and teaching methods. Student agency, the ability of a student to select resources from their own experience and to generalize that knowledge as Sang writes about are ways I notice that the teaching of history has changed since my childhood and I believe that is in a good way.

              Should age/grade be taken into account in some of these definitions? Are they outdated?

 

References 

Beecher, C., Gurjar, N. and Meacham, S. (2023). Methods of Teaching Early Literacy. Iowa State University Digital Press. https://iastate.pressbooks.pub/teachingearlyliteracy/chapter/what-is-literacy-multiple-perspectives-on-literacy/ 

Sang, Y. (2017). Expanded Territories of “Literacy”: New Literacies and Multiliteracies. Journal of Education and Practice, 8 (8), 16-19. 

National Council of Teachers of English. (2019, November 7). Position Statements: Definition of Literacy in a Digital Age. https://ncte.org/statement/nctes- definition-literacy-age/