What Does it Mean to be Literate in the 21st Century ?

This Century’s graduates are different than those in the past. They are different in the way in which they learn. Prensky, believes that the brains of people who grow up with technology are physically different from those of past generations who did not. As a result they learn differently than past generations. What I know is that how I learnt as a child is not how my daughter is learning, nor my students. Telephones and face to face conversations with other students was the only way to collaborate in my childhood. The major sources I used to find information were books, magazines, newspapers and television. Today, these technologies are being added on to and/or being replaced with google, wikis, instant messenger and email (to name a few students have mentioned to me recently). Students in my room have made Youtube videos, websites, play games and use instant messenger - a lot. Even my four year old has made Photo Booth movies of herself making goofy faces, reading and role playing.

No longer are students passive recipients of a few people’s ideas which are distributed through media. Now students are producers and consumers of media. With this shift it follows that there needs to be a change in the skills that students will need to be literate and a full participant and citizen of the 21st Century. As the Annberg School for communication and Journalism’s New Media article suggests the skills of play, performance, simulation, appropriation, multitasking, distributed cognition, collective intelligence, judgement, transmedia navigation and networking need to be taught. NCTE notes that these are also the skills employers are seeking.

Technology is not going to go away and as a teacher I think it is my responsibility to help students develop the skills which will allow them to participate fully as citizens of the 21st Century.