How New Literacies are Relevant to Us

 

 

At the day care center, we do try to avoid screen time with the children. Our technology at the center are CD players and tablets, which we use thoughtfully. Each classroom has tablets to play music during nap time, listening to books on the tablet or the CD player. We do create opportunities for children to use these digital skills in meaningful ways. For example, if children express interest in a particular subject, we might watch a brief educational video, encouraging curiosity and enhancing their understanding.  While we previously provided computers in every room, they became outdated and were phased out. “Students must have the skills and knowledge necessary to express oneself creatively for a variety of purposes in diverse contexts using the appropriate platforms, tools, styles, formats, and digital media necessary to reach different communication goals.” (Digital Literacy This Brief) We provide opportunities for children to share their thoughts and ideas through storytelling, art projects, and in what their interests are. This helps the children in expressing themselves in various contexts. By encouraging exploration and experimentation with different media, we help our young learners become confident communicators, ready to navigate the world around them.

 As noted in the literacy leadership Brief: “classroom technology uses should more clearly mirror the kinds of work environments that we expect students to eventually encounter.” (LITERACY LEADERSHIP BRIEF) With this in mind, we emphasize social-emotional learning in our classrooms, helping children develop into strong leaders as they grow. At the daycare we focus so much on their social-emotional learning. The foundations of social emotional learning and the confidence it provides will hopefully help them while they are learning new technologies later in life.

 

 

 

 

Digital Literacy This Brief. (n.d.). https://www.air.org/sites/default/files/TSTMDigitalLiteracyBrief-508.pdf

 

LITERACY LEADERSHIP BRIEF Improving Digital Practices for Literacy, Learning, and Justice More Than Just Tools. (n.d.). https://www.literacyworldwide.org/docs/default-source/where-we-stand/ila-improving-digital-practices-literacy-learning-justice.pdf

Comments

  1. Stephanie SchwartzSeptember 25, 2024 at 4:46 AM

    Hi Kelly, I really liked your post! I think it's really cool that you give the children the opportunity to watch educational videos about the topics that interest them. It's great that they can learn more about those topics as well as the other topics taught at the day care center. I also love that you listen to stories on the CD player. As a high school teacher, I am a big fan of providing links to audiobooks for my students to listen to the books we read. I think that this is a great tool that combines traditional and digital literacy!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Annotated Bibliography on Digital Storytelling in Preschool

Annotated Bibliography on Digital Storytelling in Preschool   I picked Digital storytelling for my research project. Digital storytelling is a great way to help preschoolers build early literacy skills. When kids create and share their own stories, they practice important skills like narrating, using new words, and understanding stories. It helps them learn about story structure—beginning, middle, and end—and lets them express their ideas in fun, visual ways. When you have a child who is bilingual, digital storytelling can be helpful. It allows children to tell stories in their home languages and then translate them, showing them the value of their backgrounds while engaging with English. Digital storytelling can promote teamwork and communication. Kids learn to share ideas, take on different roles, and work together on the story. Overall, digital storytelling can greatly enhance the curriculum and give preschoolers important skills for the future! Maureen, I. Y., van der M...
Read more

Defining New Literacies and Why They Matter

Image
 In my role as a former preschool lead teacher, the concept of new literacies extends beyond print or even spoken language and into the age of technology and communication strategies. In the Definition of Literacy in a Digital Age they say “Recognize and honor the multilingual literacy identities and culture experiences individuals bring to learning environments and provide opportunities to promote, amplify, and encourage these differing variations of language. (National Council of Teachers of English. 2019)” One experience that I had involved a child in my preschool class who had just moved to the U.S. from China. This child spoke no English, and while his parents spoke broken English, communication between us was difficult. The first couple of months were incredibly challenging, as the child did not understand me, and I struggled to understand him. I tried using my usual techniques—asking the parents to share key words in their native language and spelling them phonetically so I ...
Read more

Using the Game "ABCya! Alphabet Bingo" for Early Literacy Learning

Image
    Game Introduction The open-source game I’ve chosen is ABCya! Alphabet Bingo, a fun and interactive online game designed to help young children recognize and learn the letters of the alphabet uppercase and lowercase or the sounds of the letters. The game can be found on the ABCya website (www.abcya.com) and is free to use. In Alphabet Bingo, children listen to letter sounds and match them to letters on their bingo card. This simple but engaging game encourages listening, letter recognition, and phonics skills.   Integrating ABCya! Alphabet Bingo in a Classroom Activity This game would be a great addition to a unit focused on alphabet and phonics learning, which are key literacy skills in preschool. For this unit, my learning objectives would be to help students: 1. Recognize all the letters of the alphabet. 2. Identify letter sounds. 3. Match letters to sounds in a fun, pressure-free setting.   Using Alphabet Bingo in the classroom can reinfo...
Read more