Digital+Literacy

=Digital Literacy=

toc = = = = =Investigate=
 * By:** Josia Schloegl and Josh Ilori

//Research you topic and provide a definition as well as background material. Also provide a justification as to why this topic is included in the set of nine elements for digital citizenship//. __**The Task**__ Our task is to ultimately give a presentation to an audience on the topic, digital literacy. The audience can be anyone that will benefit from learning about the topic, most likely a class in the school. The aim of the presentation is to have the audience educated on digital literacy, so that they will know when and how to use technology for their own good. As well as the actual presentation, we will need to have all the sections of the design cycle fully complete for the whole project.

Our presentation at the end of our project is going to be for a fifth grade class. We have chosen grade 5 because they surely will have some knowledge about computer usage and what programs you can use or how to use them. But they still do not know when to use a lot of the available programs or which one is the best to use. But even more importantly, they do not know how to use some of them. So we can talk to them about things they will understand,but that they will not have known or understood before. So they are in the stage that one doesn't have to explain all the old basic things, but still have a lot of things that need to cover and to teach them, which gives us the chance to talk more about things like how to fill out forms for hot mail,instead of talking about what email is. So we can actually focus on the actual topic of digital literacy and not have to cover the basic information.
 * __Audience__**

One site related to digital literacy is The Educational Arcade (TEA) it is a website that explores games that help people learn in an interactive way. Their description of themselves is... The Education Arcade explores games that promote learning through authentic and engaging play. TEA’s research and development projects focus both on the learning that naturally occurs in popular commercial games, and on the design of games that more vigorously address the educational needs of players. Our mission is to demonstrate the social, cultural, and educational potentials of video games by initiating new game development projects, coordinating interdisciplinary research efforts, and informing public conversations about the broader and sometimes unexpected uses of this emerging art form in education. Education Arcade projects have touched on mathematics, science, history, literacy, and language learning, and have been tailored to a wide range of ages. They have been designed for personal computers, hand held devices and on-line delivery." ([|http://www.educationarcade.org/about)] Also there is a part of North Carolina (United States) in which a community college (Beaufort County Community College) has provided students in areas up to 50 miles (87 kilometers) by stationing vans with WiFi (wireless internet) thanks to a state funded program. This is also a common practice in other rural areas in America, this is also used on the Qatar Academy (and eventually the Qatar Foundation) campus. This new technology has allowed adults who work long hours to continue their education without quitting their jobs. ( [|http://www.wired.com/techbiz/media/news/2003/09/60594)] Yet as usual, there are always people who abuse technology because they chose to or they do not know any better. One such example are hate sites, one was created for a fifteen year girl by the name of Jodi, there was even a date of death for her on the site. ([|http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/nottinghamshire/2933894.stm)] There are other sites such as ratemyteachers.com where students are allowed to give their autonomous opinion on their teachers, I found ratings for schools that I have attended and would have attended in the United States one student passed this comment on her humanities (social studies) teacher saying ' [|She simply has no clue. I don't like how she talks about other students and other teachers. That's just mean.]' But it is also fair to say that some students have posted things like 'Mr.Coen was by far one of the greatest teachers I've ever had' because most of the schools have blocked this site due to its critical nature. And this site makes it easy to get out what ever you feel like saying to a teacher without any consequences what so ever (or so they think).([|http://www.ratemyteachers.com/)] Digital literacy is the process of both learning and even teaching people about technology and the way you can use it. So it is very much telling us how to use technology appropriately, so that it can help us and make what every we are doing easier. But it is also the way how to teach learners how to learn in a digital society. So that once new technologies arrive people know how to use them quickly and appropriately. Note: Due to the time at which most of these links were found many have been erased from their sites.
 * __Information__**
 * __Defention__**

=Design=

//Design a lesson or series of activities that will raise awareness of your topic. Find a real audience (another class, a group of parents or teachers etc). Design how this can be collected onto a Wiki page(s). Decide what age group these are aimed at and then prepare the following://


 * //A handout//
 * //A short video/multimedia production//
 * //A group activity (game)//
 * //A short documentary sideshow based around an interview of an expert on your topic//

The time of the presentation is still not one hundred percent certain. However we do have certain dates and day set. We will present the presentation only after the winter break. But then we will present it on a Tuesday's IT class so that we do not have to waste time of another lesson or break or lunch. So it will be after the winter break on a Tuesday in period 5 most likely.
 * Time of Presentation**

We have had mainly two ideas of what we should do with the grade fives in the presentation to make it more interesting. One idea was to make a Bebo account as an example of what technology should be used for and what it should not be used for, nothing too bad of course but things like bullying and saying bad things about people using the Bebo.
 * Activities**

But we also thought of writing a short script for the students to act out themselves.Then they could be given the short scripts that we wrote and they would then read and act out what we wrote as good as they can just as a type of introduction to digital literacy. I think this is a great idea and because I think the fifth graders would have fun seeing their class mate’s act out the script and i will try and make it funny so that the other students watching will find it funny and enjoy it as well.

But one other thing we could do if the other options would not work, is make a short movie of us acting out a little skit as an intro to the topic. This would be easier, as then the kids would not have to be organized. But on the other hand I think they might like it more to see class mates act than see us act. As we would know what to act and the class mates would not know what to act so they would be funner to watch. So this would make it fun for the watchers. but we might have to contact the teacher to see if he knows what students would enjoy presenting and not be embarrassed or not want to do it. So then we will have it being fun for both audience and even the actors them selves.

It is likely that we might try and book the computer lab so we could give the students a paper that goes over what we will be talking about during the lesson. Things such as appropriate use of internet sites, filling forms to join web sites such as face book and Myspace. Using instant messenger and email in appropriate ways. And a short skit explaining what giving your personal information on the internet, and how it is just like talking to strangers as a little kid (that idea is subject to change, since we are debating if it is too little childish for fifth graders).

=Plan=

//Establish a time line in order to plan to complete all work. Include a date for when you will be delivering your lesson or session to your audience.// This is the time line for our Digital Literacy project

For presenting Digital Literacy to the fifth graders we will try and make it fun for them, for it to be an experience they will remember. Firstly we will give them a little script for them to read through and then act out, that will connect the main theme of digital literacy – to use technology appropriately- to a common thing they will know about, like “don’t talk to strangers”. Then after that, we will take an example of a Bebo account that we made, of what to do and what not to do. But we will also really focus on how to sign up and fill out forms for things like Bebo and other websites. Plus how to use the email and msn messenger appropriately in a way that will benefit everyone. But then we will mainly use the Bebo as hard visual examples of what to do and how to do but also what not to do. We will present one of the Tuesdays very soon after the winter break probably the second or third Tuesday back from the holidays in our period three IT class. So with these things included in the presentation the children will have a memorable presentation from us and even more importantly, be more likely to not only remember what we said, but remember it so well, that they use what we said in their lives.

Digital Literacy =Create=

To start up our presentation, we acted out this short little mime.

Digital Literacy Mime
Josia comes on stage; he sits down and takes a fork and a spoon out of his pockets. He pretends to unpack his food and star to eat it. He then pretends to try and cut something with the spoon. He tries cutting as hard as he can, but at the end he cannot. When he is tired and catches breathe, Josh walks in from behind. Josia continues to struggle, Before Josh sits, he sees Josia’s problem he sits down and taps his shoulder. Josia looks at him and Josh pulls out a knife. Josia does not know what it is and is confused. Josh wants and then takes Josia’s plate and knife and then demonstrates how to cut with fork and knife. Josia is looking closely and nodding, then Josh gives back the fork and plate and his own knife. Josia tries to cut and then makes it. Josia looks up at josh and both are happy. Then they freeze and we are done.

Then we stared to present the power point embedded below. Josh did some slides and i did someothers, mainly he did the slides he made and i did the slides that i made. So the ppt was split up well.

At the very end of the power point, we had a very short quiz with a few questions and at the very end we had a hard bonus question, which was how the mimerelated to digitalliteracy. the trick for the quiz was that if youget a question right, you get a treat and the bonus question was worth 3 treats.



Lesson evaluation from Mr Davis



This is the PowerPoint that we showed after the skit along with the questions shown at the end

media type="custom" key="449083"

Josia's Blog:
(It can only be viewed by a logged in user)
 * http://eduspaces.net/josia/weblog**

Josh's Blog:
[|**http://eduspaces.net/jilori/weblog**] (It can only be viewed by members of the 9th Grade Bloggers community)

//Put all of your work on this Wiki page(s). This project is collaborative so it must be shown through the history tab and the discussion tab of the Wiki that each partner has contributed.//

=Evaluate=

Josia Schloegl 24-01-08 9c

Digital Citizenship Presentation Evaluation
The Investigation part of this project was good I would say. Josh and I found a lot of information on the definition of Digital Literacy. But then aft6er I found that, Josh went on and did a lot of other research on websites that might be good examples of digital literacy and he found a lot of things. So while he was doing most of the research, and righting it up on the wiki, I looked at it made it shorter and corrected a lot of the mistakes it had. So would say, I could have done a bit more to the investigation, because when we wrote our own investigation, we used the information on the wiki only. So he did more of the investigation really than I did. But in the end I thought I was good, not the best for sure but okay.

The design stage was decent as well I thought. We had some good ideas and both of us contributed to them. I had the idea that we should make a skit and suggested the topic of the skit so it would relate to the topic of Digital Literacy. So the ideas, we really did develop together and I was the one who wrote up this part mainly as well. But the main problem was that we were not very sure on what we would be doing at the end. We were sure that we would go and present to the 5th grade, they would have some knowledge, but then also need to know more as they are about to go to the senior school. Our ideas for what we should do in the presentation I thought were good. The skit idea would be good if we asked how the skit related to the topic, because if they get that, they understand our topic. But then Josh’s idea with giving them an example of a Bebo, so they could see what it is used for and what it is not used for. Making a movie of us was more of an alternative to the skit, in case they did not want to act it out, or incase the acting out would take too long. So the design stage we completed well and the ideas we had were good too.

The Plan was however a bit harder; we now had to make a full decision on when we would present the lesson, and when we would make the skit and all those things. But we were not really ready for that yet. We were still working on the bebo, and just realized that it would not work as you need a bebo to look at a bebo, so we went to make a MySpace and then ultimately dropped that whole idea. So at this stage, where we should have been finalizing things, we were forced to make big changes to our presentation and therefore our plan was not so good at all. It is really short and does not really say much on it really. We made a short little timeline that was very general, just because we were to ready to finalize these decisions yet. this project is also one we could easily use as a C&S project for several reasons. Mainy, we have spent alot of time to make a presentation to educate the grade fives on digital literacy and prepare themfor the senior school by telling themwhat programms they will often use there and why. But Josh and i are both doing recycling for the whole year, which counts as over 2 C&S projects,so we di really not need another project. Plus we did not want to type up all the stuff one needs to for a C&S Project, unless we needed to. So that is why we chose not to use this project as a C&S project this time. I think it was good choice, as it would have been too much work if we would have used it as a C&S projects. So it was good that we did what we did for sure.

When we were told we had to go and present the presentation demo to the class in 2 weeks, we actually really started to work on it well. Josh made the PowerPoint and I looked at it and corrected it. But when we actually presented, it was already a lot later that all the other groups and the presentation still was pretty bad and got a lot of criticism. The biggest problem was that it was not nice to look at; it was filled with words and barely any pictures at all. So that was the first change we had to make. But then also, it was apparently talking often about things the kids were already very acquainted with and that we were almost talking down to them with our topics. After we did the presentation the teacher basically said it was crap and we had to make some major changes for the next day! I didn’t like that at all, as we have no idea what the fifth graders were using on the computer and the teacher could have told us earlier it was something they already knew. So then I changed the power point at home a lot and made it look a lot more interesting. I took out some slides added some others and mainly changed the slides, by just putting on key words. Then when we got to class, Josh and I integrated our 2 power points and then ended up not even presenting as we ran out of time. But the teacher came around real quick and said it was looking a lot better then. So then later we added effects, images and questions at the end of the power point. So the final project actually looked very different from what was in our design and plan write ups.

The actual presentation went well though. I had changed the skit to a mime, that josh and I would act out real quick which was better than having us memorize lines. The after that, we started up the PowerPoint and went through it nice and slowly. The thing that made it a lot easier was, that I had brought treats for the kids who got the answers right. So they actually listen and were paying attention. Plus the teacher was great and always made jokes and said stupid comments all the time, this made it a more relaxing environment and enabled josh and I to talk easier and make jokes as well. Plus the kids laughed a lot and found it nice. So at the end when we go to the quiz, they all knew the answers and were participating well. What I was most surprised with was that they got the bonus question really well. The teacher in the class even laughed and kept telling us what a great question it was. So the student that answered first said the partial answer and then teacher and I had to sort of squeeze the rest of the answer out of her, but she got it well. So I was very pleased, that they listened so well and found it fun. So I thought it was a good ending to sort of shaky not so good project beginning and I am glad it went so well.

Josh Ilori 9a Information Technology Jan.29.08 Evaluation on Digital Citizenship Project.
 * Josh's Evaluation**

I personally feel that our presentation was pretty good, there was room for improvement but it was not as bad as if could have been. The lesson itself went great since it was short and when you are presenting to fifth graders you do not want to make them sit through something long and boring. We could (and should have) practiced what we were going to do during the actual presentation. Even though we looked like we had rehearsed the presentation and what we were going to say I did not go over anything and more or less freelanced when I was explaining the slides to the students. Part of this was clear when I was constantly looking at the slides and I failed to move around. I also was talking in a monotone which did not help, yet I was able to a certain extent to keep the students attention with the animations. I also am happy that I took the time to change from my original idea which was to use a blog to teach the students since from what I noticed about the attention span of some of them, they would not have been able to sit though the original presentation idea. That would involve a lot of talking and hardly any class participation. Our presentation could have benefited from the presence of hand outs (we decided against that when planning for the since we thought it would just a waste of paper). This would have been something better to do since it would have given the students something to take with them so they do not forget about what we taught them. While I was working on the project I felt that I spent my time reasonably well. There were days where I did absolutely nothing but there are also other days where I was proficient in everything that I did. Over time our project went through a lot of changes, the biggest of which was the transitions of blogs. At first Josia and I had agreed that we would use a social networking website known as Bebo. That was going well until we found a problem; you needed to have a bebo to access it. This messed up my original idea to have the students work at there own pace and answer some quiz questions. This caused a major problem. So then I considered using a MySpace account instead but that presented problems since MySpace had too many places where the students could wonder off and was less ‘child-friendly’. Unfortunately, by this time this has all happened it is already January so I was forced to rush my presentation which caused it not to be as good as I had hoped. Yet that turned out to be good. Since was finding all the information about four years to young for me this made it the prefect type to present to a classroom full of 5th graders who had a bake sale that day. Bibliography


 * "E-Mail Privacy: What You May Be Giving In When You Are Flying Out." __masternewmedia.org__. 14 Jan 2008 <[|http://www.masternewmedia.org/privacy_and_security/email-privacy/air-travelers-emails-collected-for-security-purposes-20070303.htm>.
 * "Books Online." __Kimbooktu__. 14 Jan 2008 <[|http://kimbooktu.wordpress.com/2007/02/>.] 


 * "Web 2.0 -- All About Social “Networking." __Profittimo__. 14 Jan 2008 <[|http://www.profitimo.com/Portals/0/Blog/Files/13/49/Networking.gif>.]

//There are two types of evaluation for this project: peer and self. Peer evaluation will be in the formative stage of the project to help you get ready for your presentation. Self evaluation will be summative and include all elements of the project as a concluding reflection.//

Final assessment Josh - Josia -