Journal 1
"The distinctive contribution of the approach to literacy as social practice lies in the ways in which it involves careful and sensitive attention to what people do with texts, how they make sense of them and use them to further their own purposes in their own learning lives" (Gillen and Barton, 2010, p. 9)
They way I see this text is that it explains literacy as a tool. It isn't simply one object that you obtain to use in one way. Instead, it's used in a wide variety of ways to for many purposes. Whatever anyone wants to achieve, they can use texts to further their own ambitions. Not all literacy is the same. For instance, reading a scientific journal is much different than how one would read a historic speech. Each new use of text requires (at least to some degree) a new skillset. If someone wants to be any sort of scientist, they would need to know the writing conventions of their medium. Knowing how to write a scientific paper however, does not qualify them to be a speech writer (not that no one can do both, but new skills would have to be learned before crossing over). The right tool is needed for the right job. For anyone with a goal in mind, literacy can be a great tool to help them progress.
Hi Tim,
ReplyDeleteLiteracy is a part of our every day life, and it did not take long for me to realize the frequency in which we rely on being literate. I am fond of your statement, "...they would need to know the conventions of their medium." in regards to understanding text. I find that literacy looks different for different subject areas. For example, a teacher may not necessarily understand certain terms or concepts that are used in my classroom, but their own students may understand the language that I am using. Literacy is a tool, as as technology increases in our workplaces and within society, I can't help imagine that it may cause the generations that are older than us to have difficulties. I remember not using much technology in early elementary school, and I am always blown away with what students can accomplish using technology. As students get older, I find that being literate in society is a large part of making their own informed decisions on the texts that they read and what they do with said information. Thank you for highlighting the importance of literacy in our lives and the implications of being literate.