Blog Post 3 - Leveraging Tools, Texts, and Talk in My Teaching Context

 

Balancing our focus across these areas can help ensure that technological tools do not become the driving force of instruction, even in a digital age.” (Aguilera, 2017) I used this quote in my last one, but I think it is crucial to remember that there needs to be a balance in the classroom. For preschool-aged children, the goal is to create meaningful, hands-on learning that encourages curiosity and social interaction. We also need to try and incorporate new digital literacies in a mindful and age-appropriate way.

For my preschool room, you can incorporate digital literacies starting with having a conversation about it from a story that you read. For instance, I can read a story to the children and ask the children how they think a character in the book might communicate if they couldn’t speak face to face in the story. This will open the dialogue about how technology can help people connect when they are far apart from each other. They can use the telephone, text, zoom, and Facetime, among other ways.

Example of an activity:

One activity that can blend analog and digital learning involves storytelling. We can create a collaborative storybook project.

 The analog component can have the children working together to create a story through drawings and verbal storytelling. Each child can have a page to draw what they would like to draw and have the teacher write what they say. The teacher can also help grow their vocabulary by adding new words to their language. The digital component can be once the students are done drawing and the teacher has conveyed their words in writing onto the page, the teacher can then take a picture of all the pages and upload them to an app or a slideshow to create a digital version of the book. The children would be able to read their books digitally. This can introduce the children to the concept of digital publishing in an age-appropriate way.

Young children should have minimal screen exposure, yet digital literacy is becoming important in our day-to-day activities. This can be one tension that emerges from this activity. If most of the children's time is creating their pages for the book, then the technology can just enhance their work and incorporate technology into the classroom at the same time. 

Equity is addressed by ensuring that all children participate in the analog part of the activity. Technology can just be a way to enhance the learning experience. It can be a great resource and an introduction to technology but in the preschool-aged classrooms it should not be the primary means of engagement. “Rather than stifle or promote specific forms of digital engagement, our schools could more intentionally marry digital practices to analog sense-making. We have an opportunity to optimize students' use of digital tools by returning our pedagogical scrutiny to real-time moments of discovery and human interaction.” (Garcia 2017)

By having meaningful conversations about technology and hands-on experiences that the children can relate to, can create a rich learning environment that supports new and traditional literacies. There needs to be a balance, especially in the day care settings.

 

 

Aguilera, E. (2017). More than bits and bytes. Literacy Today, 35(3), 12-13. https://sunyempire.idm.oclc.org/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Ftrade-journals%2Fmore-than-bits-bytes%2Fdocview%2F1966006470%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D8067

Garcia, A. (2017). NONDIGITAL SKILLS. Literacy Today, 35(3), 24-25. https://sunyempire.idm.oclc.org/login?qurl=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.proquest.com%2Ftrade-journals%2Fnondigital-skills%2Fdocview%2F1966005428%2Fse-2%3Faccountid%3D8067