Researcher's Postionality

Technology is Here To Stay!

There are key positions I take, some without even realizing, that definitely impacted this project, and emerged within it. How I subscribe to technology had a huge impact on using digital literacy with my students. In an early part of this project I nonchalantly discussed how one day during my classroom research I whipped out my iphone, recorded a nonfiction book club's book talk, and BAM a podcast was born. This was not a premeditated action. Pulling the iPhone out without thinking shows how technology is embedded in my life; from my phone, to constant email and text correspondence, to Facebook, to personal blogging, etc... This is not a positionality that every teacher has, so when reading my blogs about this project it is important to take note of how I subscribe to technology in an active way. Of course not all teachers are ready to be involved in this discourse as I am, but just as with anything in teaching it is important to make sure that we are active participants in what we are teaching our students. Just as we keep our own writer's notebooks in Writing Workshop, we need to keep our own blogs and make our own podcasts. We all can do this in small steps. There's no need to overwhelm ourselves, but it is important to begin the process. I never subscribed to blogs before beginning this process with my students. That is why I pushed myself to present this project in blog form, as opposed to a traditional research paper. If we push our students to try new discourses, how can we not hold ourselves accountable to do the same?

Why Are We So Critical?

It's human nature to be critical of ourselves and others. Many think of this as a flaw, but being critical, especially in literacy, brings us to new levels of engagement and learning that are crucial in order to be active and successful citizens in our democratic society. Without even intending to do so, my project was loaded with critical literacy elements. Students were asked to critically look at others' online creations for content, points of view, and perspective. They were also expected to be critical of themselves and others as they worked within these digital literacies collaboratively. I feel it is important to see how others working in these new literacies subscribe to a certain point of view or perspective, because the students needed to form their own with their creations. Critical literacy is fundamental in keeping the collaborative and social aspects of literacy thriving. "By re-framing children's online text production as a positive and creative activity, the opportunity to develop children's critical digital literacy, and increasing mastery as effective and safe communicators in the twenty-first century, can only be enhanced." (Carrington & Robinson, 2010)

Workshop for Everyone

My beliefs and positionality of the Reading and Writing Workshops played a huge influence on the success of this digital literacy action research project. Kids learn best by seeing someone modeling by wearing the love of what they are doing on their sleeve, by doing what is taught, and being coached as they begin their own collaborative and independent study. These are some aspects of workshop teaching, among others, that I value and found their way into my work with students in digital literacy. As Lucy Calkins says about Writing Workshop, "Children draft, revise, and edit their writing. They incorporate help from mentor authors, writing partners, and conferences with their teacher," (Calkins, 2001) I also believe these and other workshop elements enhance students' work with the various digital literacies. True workshop teaching creates and fosters the social and collaborative work that I expect students to do with these 'new literacies.'