Lesson Ideas for Integrating Information Literacies

The lesson ideas I have are what I would like to start the year out with next year with my students. I want to set up a class blog in such a way that I can teach students throughout the year how to use and write in a blog as well as extend what we are learning in class. Therefore, the lesson ideas I have devised are a part of a series that can be used throughout the year.

Lesson 1: Creating a Blog

Grade Level: 9^th, 10^th Grades

Content Area: Biology

In this lesson, students will create their own blog in conjunction with our class blog. I will begin the lesson by discussing blogs and asking students if they have read or used blogs before and in what context.  I will then demonstrate the steps involved in making their own blogs that will be connected to our main class blog.  I will also provide tips or guidelines for what is and is not appropriate to post on a blog, because what we post out there virtually cannot be erased. These instructions will be posted to the main class page for students to reference in creating their blog.  Students will be allowed to get creative in designing their blog and will make their first post, which can include some introductory information about themselves and a favorite memory that relates to biology, whether that was inside or out of the classroom in times past.

Lesson 2: Blogging with Pictures or Videos

Grade Level: 9^th, 10^th

Content Area: Biology

In this lesson, students will add a picture or video to the class blog.  I will guide the students through this process in class and again post instructions on the main class blog for all the students to use as a reference.  Students can use an original picture or video or find one on the Internet but it must relate to what we are studying in class. Students will need to check a found picture or video for accuracy and how to do this will also be discussed in class and posted to the class blog as a reference.  For instance, if we are studying the cell membrane, students will post pictures or videos they have found helpful to them in understanding the concepts.  Students will be able to share these pictures or videos with their classmates and will explain how they demonstrate a concept or provide deeper meaning to a process.  I think this will serve as an extension to class as well as showing students that they can use multimedia resources in helping them understand concepts everyday.  Students will also comment on other students’ posts as they explore the work of their classmates.

Lesson 3: Sharing Google Docs

Grade Level: 9^th, 10^th Grades

Content Area: Biology

In this lesson, students will prepare an essay in Google Docs and will share this essay with the class blog by posting it to their personal blog.  The purpose of this assignment is to teach students about the features of Google Docs, while presenting an essay to the class for feedback and peer editing.  The essay will be a two- to three- pages in length and will discuss their viewpoints on a particular gene technology we have been discussing in class.  Students will reference information they have found using search tools on the Internet and what has been referenced on the main class blog.  Students will expound upon both sides of the technology and express their educated opinions as well.  Then students will be instructed to share this on their class blog, not pasted into the blog, but as a Google Doc.  Students will be assigned to peer-edit at least two other students’ essays before the assignments are due in class.  I think this lesson will expand classroom discussion, enable student writing, and encourage students to recognize there are easy ways to share their work with others and receive feedback on it.  

REFERENCES: A blog where these lesson ideas are modeled from is http://bgexemplar.blogspot.com. I like the setup and resources available from this blog even if it is designed for English classes.

Perceptions of Literacies of the Information Age

I created this blog in the spring for my RDNG 7545, Reading Across the Content Areas Course.  In this course, we discussed much about media and information literacy in conjunction with literacy in our content areas.  I was unable to begin blogging with my students this year, but intend to begin next year with class blogging to discuss science news, extend our discussions from class, and share with each other what we are learning in class.   I want it to be a forum for us to extend our class and share; therefore, I will start my reflections for this course here since it so readily applies to this module. 

No one can deny that we live in an Information Age where a vast amount of information is always at our fingertips, especially with so many devices that enable Internet usage.  As previously mentioned, I began this blog as part of an assignment for my Reading Across the Content Areas course this spring.  In this course, my eyes were opened to the increasing importance of not only making students scientifically literate but also enabling them to become media literate.  Prior to this, I thought it was my job in the classroom to focus on helping my students understand how science works, scientific principles, and scientific processes.  Indeed this is my job, but I can and should also work to broaden the scope of what I desire my students to discover and learn.  I became more aware of the nonlinear literature at our fingertips in such things as websites in general and blogging and some social media sites.  The idea of nonlinear reading was intriguing to me, but it makes perfect sense.  We typically read books from the front cover to the back cover but on the Internet, each person can experience a different order as they explore information. 

I enjoy using technology myself, and am constantly learning new things about it and I have tried to implement the use of technology in my classroom. What I have found is that my students, even at the high school level, do not know how to really use the technology all around them.  I have found myself very frustrated at seeing how limited many of their skills are with using and extracting information from the Internet.  They all talk about what is happening on Twitter or Instagram, but when asked to complete an assignment using the Internet and Internet tools, they often struggle.  I just assume that they know how to search and find reliable information without actually teaching them how to do it. 

That is what I liked about the “Discover Information Literacy” slideshow.  It presented a concrete way to teach and model for students how to extract good and reliable information from the Internet.  I think either implementing this or devising other methods for teaching students how to use various technologies would be valuable for my students.  However, like many other educators, I think my continual struggle is the time involved.  We all struggle to race to the finish with standards and covering our material and I find it hard to fit the information all in much less adding to what I am already teaching.   I want to find more efficient ways of teaching so that I can get a bigger “bang for my buck” with the time I have with my students. 

References:

Vacca, R.T., Vacca, J.L. & Mraz, M. (2011). Content area reading:  Literacy and learning across the curriculum, 10th ed. Pearson.

Campbell, A., Heller, E., Horney, E., & L. Slater. (2008). University of Mary Washington. Discover Information Literacy