Technological Literacy

The third article that I had to read for this week's online PGCE course was Technological Literacy by Carmen Luke (1997), published by the UCLA Graduate School of Education & Information Studies (GSE&IS). The article gives a good historical overview of technology, but having in mind that it was written more than 10 years ago, the information is not up to date.

The “Pedagogy” section of the article gives a few very good IT based activities, some of which I might even try next school year:

- Daily weather report: First thing in the morning, students have to find on the internet the weather report for specific cities, in my case Bangkok, and, let’s say, my home town. The article suggests NASA’s website, which seems the most appropriate choice.

- E-mail partnership project: Students correspond by e-mail with students from other countries. This seems to me like a great idea, so if there’s anyone interested, let me know. I can “provide” about 20 Grade 5 students (age 10) starting mid-May. The good thing about this project is that the e-pen friend doesn’t really have to be in the same age group. The article writes about primary kids corresponding with university students.

- Hypothetical class tip to __name of country__: Another very good problem-based learning project that has the students plan a trip abroad. The students can be divided into groups, each group dealing with different aspects of the trip: plane ticket and hotel reservation, sites to visit, budget, visas, passports etc. Information can be then gathered in a small booklet and “donated” to the school library.

All these activities involve computer mediated learning, which “tends to generate group rather than solitary learning, it encourages collective risk taking…, collaborative problem solving and information sharing,” as Carmen Luke concludes her paper.