We know that students are using social media and new technologies. We know that they write extensively in digital environments. And we know that they're pretty comfortable doing these things. That's why I think Carol Lee's notion of cultural modeling, which she writes about in her book Culture, Literacy and Learning: Taking Bloom in the Midst of a Whirlwind, is such a genius concept.
Quick run down
Lee believes students have certain "cultural data sets" or funds of knowledge that need to be accessed. The way she sees this happening is through "cultural modeling," whereby the teacher teases out already-present skills and leads the student to new uses for and conceptualizations of those skills.
Here's an example: Lee worked in inner city Chicago and wanted to teach a unit on figurative language. She knew that many of her students were familiar with the verbal-play of signifying (think: yo mamma jokes), and she knew that students interacted with figurative language on a daily basis (song lyrics). Lee uses those sorts of "data sets" to move into more difficult and more academic (some might argue) discussions about figurative language in literary texts.
Why does this matter?
Well, I think it matters because of the data we've seen in the Pew and WIDE research projects: students are living increasingly digital lives. They know how to navigate digital spaces. They know how to write in these spaces - just maybe not in the forms or genres we think of or value. That means, at least to me, that it's our job to access what they already know, what they already feel comfortable doing and transform it.
To me this means using spaces like Twitter and Facebook to create meaning; it means adding value to the sorts of things students already accomplish on a day to day basis, because, after all, what they're doing IS impressive because it's rich in semiotic modes and takes a good deal of dexterity even if it goes undervalued.
Lee's model shows how, sometimes, teaching becomes a process of making the latent manifest, a process of simply looking at student's skills in a new way. I'm not entirely sure what this looks like in terms of technology, but I know that there's a definitely a place for this mindset.
I'm thinking of assignments that require students to think about how they use social media: what are they posting? who's their audience? what sorts of semiotic modes are they using? what might happen if the audience changed? in what ways is the writing they do on the web similar and different to what they're expected to do in the classroom?
In a way, this piggybacks off the idea of TPCK because it asks a great deal of teachers. It asks teachers to create a super-amalgam of skills/knowledge. Teachers asked to:
1. know the material 2. know how to present the material in digestable ways 3. know how to use technology effectively to that end.
I think it becomes vital to know and understand how students are already so literate and to understand what those literacies look like.
For the future
I'll always remember how much time, effort and work it takes to do what Carol Lee did in the CPS. It takes an incredible initiative to find appropriate "cultural data sets" and to use them effectively. But, teaching, like writing, is hard work. Like writing, also, teaching requires intense reflection and revision. Lee's model of teaching owns up to this and embraces it. I suspect that her work would look much different if she were in a poor, rural school system somewhere in Downeast Maine or Western Georgia. By placing the onus on "using what's there," and teaching what needs to be there, Lee's model becomes very appropriate for those of us thinking about how we'll deploy technology in the classroom.
TECHNOLOGY
In terms of technology, there are four that I can't get away with for different reasons:
1. Twitter: Twitter is an inspiring technology for a couple of reasons. First of all: it creates a nexus of information that gets relayed at breakneck speed. Look, for instance, at the night Osama Bin Laden was killed. Twitter virtually broke the story. A single 140-character post can get passed-on to an audience of millions, making it extremely powerful. Secondly: it's a powerful networking tool. You can see what people in your discipline -- and people who are only tangentially related to your discipline -- are saying. Hash tags make it fairly easy to look at trending topics and allow people with similar interests to get on the same page.
2. Facebook: I don't know if there's been a technology since America Online that casts a wider net than Facebook. Everyone from elementary-school aged children to elderly folks are using it. For that reason I think it can be an effective meeting space (e.g. in a private group). Because its commands and controls are pretty familiar to a large group of people, I think it can function as a place sort of like Convore where conversations can persist and can happen basically synchronously.
Though my good friend John Lauckner makes a good point: both Twitter and Facebook are interesting in that they ask you to work with an existing identity (which may not be comfortable) or to create a new identity (which may not be desirable).
3. iChat: Call me old fashioned, but I still like a good instant message session now and again, and I've yet to find a more versatile messaging system than iChat (I know someone will call me out on this...). What I like about iChat is that it's multi-faceted: you can text chat, voice chat, video chat -- and you can even share your screen with another person, which can make resolving tech issues more manageable. The advent of ubiquitous webcams has really changed the face of online communication, and I think it's for the better. MSU seems to be way ahead of the game in terms of this, too. Last semester there were numerous times that we Skyped with the scholars we were reading, which, needless to say, adds a new dimension to class conversations.
4. InDesign: InDesign is the Adobe page design software. It's a place where writer-designers can take their visual and texual elements and put them together to make a document. What I like about inDesign (and the new version of Word) is that it allows designers to play. Unlike traditional word processing and even some page design softwares, InDesign affords the opportunity to think and learn in very non-linear ways. Rather than dealing with the chore of presetting tabs and page properties, InDesign allows users flexibilities that you don't see elsewhere. This can prove invaluable when talking about visual rhetoric.
If I were to summarize my thoughts and aspirations, I'd have to distill it down to this: the internet is a treasure trove of information. The information comes from all directions. This is a powerful situation that can make people, unfortunately, feel powerless. So as I advance as a teacher and a scholar, I want to think about ways to empower students/writers through my use of technology.
To me that means 1. using what's there and 2. using comfort zones as conduits to the new and unfamiliar spaces.
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