Integrating Technology into the Elementary Classroom: Technology-Mediated Literacy Instruction

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Integrating Technology into the Elementary
Classroom Technology-Mediated Literacy
Instruction

• Kimberly Rynearson Marcel Kerr
• Tarleton State University

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Integrating Technology into School Curricula

• Since the 1970s a debate has persisted regarding
  the effectiveness and importance of integrating
  technology into school curricula (Butzin, 2001
  Leu Kinzer, 2000).

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Integrating Technology into School Curricula

• Advocates argue that technology
• Improves student learning outcomes and prepares
  them for a technology-rich workplace (Butzin,
  2001).
• In support of those effects, technology can be
  used to
• Present material to be learned
• Help learners solve problems
• Assist in drill and practice
• Facilitate time management
• Increase computer literacy (see Abbott Faris,
  2000)

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Integrating Technology into School Curricula

• Critics argue that
• Predictions that computers and movies would
  replace schools have not come true
• American schools have spent large sums of money
  putting technology in schools yet, American
  students score lower than their international
  peers on measures of achievement
• Tight school budgets are further constrained by
  the need to invest additional money to maintain
  the technology infrastructure in schools

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Integrating Technology into School Curricula

• A growing body of literature supports advocates
  claims that technology increases student
  achievement, engagement, their technology skills,
  motivation, and workplace preparedness.

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Integrating Technology into School Curricula
Evidence

• Project CHILD (Butzin, 2001)
• Instructional model from Florida State University
• Incorporates technology into K-5 classroom
  instruction
• Longitudinal data show increased reading,
  language arts, and mathematics test scores
• Other effects fewer discipline problems, more
  positive attitudes toward school, greater
  engagement, and more positive parent involvement

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Integrating Technology into School Curricula

• This presentation contributes to the evidence and
  describes
• How technology changes literacy instruction
• How changes in literacy instruction affect what
  and how students learn
• A study investigating the use of Web logs (blogs)
  to support K-5 students reading and writing
  development

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Literacy Instruction and Technology

• Literacy is tied inherently to technology because
  technology profoundly affects how we communicate.

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Literacy Instruction and Technology

• Literacy
• A basic definition the skills needed to read and
  write
• A more complex definition the skills necessary
  to communicate effectively within a particular
  cultural context (Nixon, 2003)
• The second definition assumes social significance
  is associated with an individuals ability to
  communicate using the tools valued by a culture

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Literacy Instruction and Technology

• Assuming the more complex definition
• Culturally-compatible literacy instruction
  changes continually as technological changes
  influence how we communicate and how we present
  information
• Is this the case?

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Literacy Instruction and Technology

• Mackey (2003) notes that new readers learn about
  reading from extensive textual experiences across
  media
• These media include
• Computerized Story Books/eBooks
• Games
• Music
• Film
• Television
• Search Engines
• Instant Messaging
• Email
• Telephone calls via the Internet
• (Boone Higgins, 2003 Nixon, 2003)

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Literacy Instruction and Technology

• Literacy is not simply reading and writing, but
  communicating and sharing knowledge using the
  technology valued by a culture

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Literacy Instruction and Technology

• Four skill areas related to literacy instruction
• Collaborating with others
• Communicating with others
• Finding and evaluating information
• Solving problems by creating and communicating
  solutions
• How does technology influence what and how
  students learn these skills?

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What is Learned

• As technology evolves, the content of literacy
  instruction changes to include
• Non-linear texts with integrated graphics and
  hypertext
• Print and electronic formats for information
• Sharing of information beyond traditional means
  of written and spoken communication
• Instruction should foster a student-centered
  learning
• environment that encourages collaboration, active
  learning,
• and open communication

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How Students Learn

• A student-centered, constructivist learning
  environment assumes that learners actively
  construct and create their representations of
  meaning using their current and past knowledge
• Technology-mediated literacy instruction can
  support such an environment

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How Students Learn

• Social learning strategies
• As networked information resources change, no
  single individual will be fully literate in all
  technologies social learning strategies may used
  to support learning
• Learners will support each others attempts to
  become literate by modeling literate behaviors
  and sharing knowledge
• Cooperative learning activities will support the
  social negotiation of meaning and understanding
• (Leu Kinzer, 2000)

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How Students Learn

• Peer collaboration
• Elementary students used the Internet to search
  for information regarding a project
• As peer editors, the students assisted each other
  as they clarified ideas and chose which
  information to include/exclude
• The students also assisted with managing
  technical aspects of the information search
• (Kelley, Finley, Koehler, Picard, 2001)

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How Students Learn

• Self-regulated learning
• Teenage girls exposure to online communities
  encouraged them to teach themselves how to use
  different types of hardware and software
• One participant taught herself HTML and
  JavaScript in an effort to construct products
  valued by the online community
• Both girls were internally motivated to seek out
  additional information related to personal
  interests and their interactions in the online
  communities
• (Chandler-Olcott Mahar, 2003)

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How Students Learn

• The previous examples argue for authenticity when
  integrating technology into school curricula
• Web logs (blogs) can offer an authentic forum for
  practicing writing and literacy skills

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Web Logs

• Blogs can combine technology with academic
  content, practice, and assessment
• Kennedy (2003) describes blogs as part Web site,
  part journal, part free-form writing space ( 3)
• Education blogs allow students to publish their
  written work in a public forum
• Blogs also can include commentary, criticism,
  and/or interpretation (Kennedy, 2003)

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Web Logs

• In the elementary classroom
• Students write individually and may share their
  writing with other students by reading aloud or
  posting writing in the classroom
• This approach does not foster interchange among
  students
• Writing to a blog, however, may increase
  students motivation to write and their attention
  to what they have written because
• Increased attention to writing and motivation to
  write may improve organization, style, and
  sophistication of ideas (Tompkins, 2002)

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Web Logs in the Elementary Classroom

• The Texas Education Agency (TEA) states
  reading/language arts and technology Texas
  Essential Knowledge and Skills (TEKS) needed by
  the K-12 learner

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Web Logs in the Elementary Classroom

• For K-5 students, the reading/language arts TEKS
  are
• Print awareness
• Reading comprehension
• Literary response
• Writing for research
• Writing compositions
• Reading fluency
• Proper usage (grammar)
• See http//www.tea.state.tx.us/teks/index.html

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Web Logs in the Elementary Classroom

• For K-5 students, the technology TEKS fall into
  four categories
• Foundations
• Technology terms, acceptable use practices, using
  input devices, using software
• Information acquisition
• Acquiring and evaluating information from
  electronic sources
• Problem solving
• Using word processing and multimedia software
  using communication tools to interact with groups
• Communication
• Publishing information in a variety of media
• See http//www.tea.state.tx.us/teks/index.html

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Web Logs in the Elementary Classroom

• Using Web logs to facilitate students reading
  and writing helps them acquire the TEKS
• Importantly, Web logs are an authentic writing
  and publishing technology that is
  student-centered in the tradition of the
  constructivist approach to learning

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• The Texas AM Board of Regents Collaborative
  Research Grant has funded a collaborative
  research study to investigate how writing to a
  Web log influences first-through fifth-grade
  students reading and writing achievement and
  thinking

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Tarleton State University and Jefferson
  Elementary (Temple ISD) are examining how the
  additional writing and reading practice created
  by posting to a Web log affects two measures of
  learning
• Students scores on grade-level reading/writing
  achievement tests
• The sophistication of students posts to the Web
  log as classified by the hierarchical levels of
  Blooms (1956) taxonomy of skills in the
  cognitive domain

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Participating campus
• 411 students, K-5
• 59.1 economically disadvantaged
• 46.7 of the student population is identified as
  White
• Thus, the campus is socio-economically and
  ethnically diverse

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Primary research questions
• Are Web logs a viable technology for improving
  students reading/writing achievement?

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Sample consists of an experimental group (blog)
  and a control group for each grade level
• 1st 42 blog 35 control
• 2nd 33 blog 33 control
• 3rd 39 blog 39 control
• 4th 21 blog 44 control
• 5th 32 blog 17 control

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Data sources
• Reading/writing achievement aggregate student
  performance on end-of-year reading and writing
  achievement tests will be compared for the
  experimental (blog) and control groups at each
  grade level
• Classification of Web log contents according to
  Blooms (1956) taxonomy Frequencies of posts at
  each level of the taxonomy will be compiled for
  each month of the study and across grade levels
• See http//faculty.washington.edu/krumme/guides/b
  loom.html

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Study procedures
• Web logs
• Blogging groups at each grade level read four
  books (one per month from January 2004 to April
  2004) students post to the Web log what they
  normally would write during their in-class
  Reading/Writing workshop posts encourage
  students discussion of setting, plot, characters,
  and similar topics and skills emphasized on the
  K-5 TEKS for reading/language arts and technology
• Control groups engage in regular reading/writing
  classroom instruction

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Analysis of reading/writing achievement scores
• Aggregate student reading and writing achievement
  scores will be compared between the experimental
  (blog) and control groups by grade level using an
  appropriate independent-samples statistical test

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Investigating Web Logs and Students
Reading/Writing Achievement

• Analysis of Web log posts
• Contents of the Web log posts will be analyzed
  using the verbs most commonly associated with
  each level of Blooms (1956) taxonomy
• The frequency of responses in each level will be
  counted by month for each grade level
• Developmental trends by category and across grade
  levels will be determined with an appropriate
  statistical test for trend

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Conclusions

• This presentation has described the current and
  changing definition of literacy as a
  technologically-mediated skill
• An on-going study of the effectiveness of Web log
  writing in the instruction for first- through
  fifth-grade students was described
• The results of this study will inform researchers
  and educators about the effectiveness and
  importance of integrating technology in
  elementary literacy instruction

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Demonstration

• A demonstration of the Web logs used in this
  on-going study follows

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Blog Information

• Hosts
• http//www.blogger.com
• http//www.blogspot.com
• http//www.diaryland.com
• http//www.ebloggy.com
• Getting Started Using Blogs Tutorial
• http//www.tarleton.edu/7Eedulab/tutorials/blog/b
  log_overview.htm
• The Educational Blog Network
• http//www.ebn.weblogger.com/

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References

• For a complete list of references, please see the
  DEC 2004 Proceedings

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Contact Information

• Kimberly Rynearson, Ph. D
• rynearson_at_tarleton.edu
• Marcel S. Kerr, Ph. D.
• kerr_at_tarleton.edu