Digital Literacy

Marsh (pg. 19-38) Young Children’s Digital Literacy:
I thought that there were some interesting themes running through the writing. The development of Children’s Digital Literacy has some parallel to development of skills; including issues of time spent and parental involvement. I understand from the article that there has not been much study of digital literacy with young children, but I think I personally have some questions I would like to see addressed in relation to young children:
1. What was the role of pretending to use media compared to actual use of electronic media with young children?
2. There were questions about parent involvement and development of independent media use; yet what are the differences of in development of digital literacy depending on who (parent or child) directs the use?
3. How is digital literacy development influenced by the presence of older siblings?

Finally, I thought there was an important identity question in relation to all ages. Marsh mentions that digital identity revolves around consumption and less obviously production (pg. 34-35). I wondered what level of consciousness of consumption and production influenced online identity.

Alvermann, (pg. 39-56) Ned & Kevin’s emails:
The email discussion in the Ned & Kevin case study has interesting implications for education and in particular for the varying roles/ positions of power between students and teachers, teachers and parents, etc. in using email. I also thought the question of “valued literacy practices” for specific ages and for all ages was interesting.
There were two areas that I wished Alvermann would have explored further in the discussion of the case study:
I wondered why Alvermann was challenging or setting out to change the models of youth in research. It was not addressed whether this was something that grew out of the larger research study, a movement within the field, or some other influence was present.
I think there were important issues about the cultural or shared perspective between Ned and Kevin that were not addressed. The degree of overlap in shared “language” between the correspondents would seem to make a difference in the communication. My curiosity in this area may go back to my feeling that current students do not have a strong sense of “audience” when writing communication because of the speed of correspondence with technology.

Knobel & Lankshear, (pg. 72-94) Weblogs:
It was interesting to read about the history and evolution of blogs. I thought the first paragraph of the reading was particularly interesting.
The idea of what makes “powerful writing” is interesting in the context of such a readily accessible “literature” as blogs. Would you define powerful writing by the number of comments? Number of visitors to the page? The readers’ experience?
I thought it was interesting that Knobel & Lankshear said that blogs should have a purpose and a definite point-of-view. I wondered whether there were more recent versions of blogs that would change or add more criteria to their list of blog characteristics. I also wondered how you can factor in private blogs…ones where you must be invited via email to be able to read the blog.
Finally, I thought that their discussion of the “shadow” that education blogs are compared to other blogs had interesting implications for education. How should education blogs be? Who should direct them? How can they be meaningful to students and yet still educational and safe for students?