Blog Post #5 "Taking It to the Classroom"

After reading Turner and Hicks, I wanted to go back and reteach my argument unit.  Although I found Chapter 1 to be very dense in content, it was necessary to lay the groundwork for the rest of the book.  Chapters 2 and 3 provided so many activities that I could use in my classroom.  From my earliest education courses, professors have discussed ways to make learning meaningful.  Students need to connect to the content in a personal way in order to be vested and engaged.  A professor at CCRI used to say, "Kids need something to hang their hat on."  The activities that used Yelp and Amazon were excellent examples of how to engage students in digital writing by using content relevant to them.  Additionally, students had the opportunity to have real world experience in crafting rebuttals from the actual comments posted on their reviews.  Turner and Hicks state, "Careful reading of arguments in social media shows the ability to respond to counterclaims with decorum sets apart thoughtful, mindful individuals from a mass of knee-jerk reactors."  All of our students are digital natives!  They were born into a world where they are surrounded by technology and, for many, their parents may be considered digital natives.  Explicitly teaching how to read and respond to counterclaims is an important skill that may care over into other parts of our students' digital lives.  I digress for a moment, in a time when cyber-bullying is very real and very relevant, any opportunity to have students stop and think (preventing a knee-jerk reaction) before posting, speaking, texting, is a golden opportunity!   The many activities offered in these chapters gives us as educators an entry point in teaching digital literacy.  The common types of evidence presented in Chapter 2 resembles the anchor chart of verifiable evidence hanging in my classroom right now.  This was my ah-ha moment to go back to a completed assignment from our argument unit and expand it to incorporate digital sources and discuss their relevance. 

Ms. Richer's presentation last week also provided ways to start teaching digital literacy in our classrooms.  I loved when she said that she knew her kids could do more, referencing more than just what the standard had stated.  Again, taking commercials that students were familiar with to push their thinking about what is really being said, who is it appealing to, and most importantly, who is being left out.  These questions have our students thinking early on to critically view media through more than one perspective and to recognize the biases in our society.