One of the criticisms of my generation is that technology is making us a group of horrible writers. We can’t spell because of spell check (guilty), we wouldn’t know a full word if we saw it (thx), and we use punctuation to express emotion : )
Sure, we’re teaching younger generations that texting is the norm, facebook and twitter are tools of the trade, and blogging is a great way to get information. These might be true, but if you noticed, most of these items include words. Written words.
So do we think that these advances in technology will increase literacy?
I’m not going to present you with research done by professionals, but by my own observations.
First, we learn through necessity. I took typing classes for years and was awful at it. I barely passed the classes because my left hand could never keep up. I’ve tried to play musical instruments and had this same problem. Then one day, two things happened. I had to retype handwritten stories for the newspaper I edited, and it sucked. At the same time, AIM made life easier. If I learned to type faster, I could get through the stories quickly and chat with my friends at the same time. So I learned. And I type almost as fast as I think.
Next, technology enables the generations. I was a day care assistant through college. My kids had computers in the classroom at age 3, and many were using computers long before then. Often computer time was a treat. They were learning through this technology because it was considered special and fun. When presented with traditional methods on paper, the connections between the letters and words weren’t always made. But the same letters and words were immediately recognized on the computer screen. Is that an example of learning based on similar vs. different cognitive states?
Finally, as a nanny for a family, I watched the youngest child catch up to the reading and speaking level of her elder sister at a surprising rate. I know that often younger siblings can accomplish their “firsts” much sooner when in the presence of an older sibling. There’s a need to be included, to be the same as the older child.
Again, none of this is official. But by my observations, our learning abilities adapt. So, to make a hypothesis, advances in technology might actually help literacy. Ready to break out your stats book? Next I’m going to break out correlations.
We may lose rules of grammar, and spelling will just go out the window, but perhaps this is a cycle of literacy we have to go though. Go back to simple general education of the masses, then focus on the next level up again.
What do you think? Will technology, social media, and mobile communication improve literacy?
Photo from clipart.
This is really a great post. I have thought about this a lot – mainly because my Google Reader gets so filled with blogs that I sometimes neglect things like the NYtimes and I chastise myself for it. Then I realize that I am still learning, writing, reading, and adapting through the blog medium too. I think to a certain extent I will remain old fashioned. I am not clambering to get an e-reader, but I also thoroughly love social media and blogging. Is this part of the generational learning curve we are all going through? Maybe, but I think (and hope) that in the long run, it will make us all a bit wiser.
P.S. – learned to type b/c of AIM also!! It was the best tool. None of that “learn the home keys” stuff.
I know, do you ever notice when you attempt to follow grammar rules, things just don’t sound right? Like never ending on a preposition. It doesn’t seem to work anymore. There is a link between old and new, and that is something to love. I have an e-reader myself, but still buy most of my business books in hardcover or paperback. Maybe it’s because I hope someday I’ll get the author’s signature… 🙂
As a teacher, I can see the positives and negatives of e-speak every single day. I think the difference is that we generally speak in every-day language on-line while my students use far more trancated words and slang than we do on-line.
Another issue is creating a broad knowledge base rather than the ability to find specific informatin–for example: my students have a weekly current event on a specific area of the world. One student’s mother is a librarian and makes him use a hard copy of a paper. He always knows what’s going on in the world but complains that it takes him forever to find the most interesting article for that area (bit of a perfectionist that one!). The other students ridicule him because they just use Google News search, narrowing by the last week and their country search term. They maybe look at 3 articles to find one that interests them while the first student searches through 20-30 as he skims the A section of the paper each day. I’m not sure which one is a better idea (broad and slow or quick and minute) but I think it’s an interesting example.
Love that you are bringing a bit more of an official perspective to this. Your point about broad knowledge vs. specific info is very intriguing. Our ability to search and retain information is impacted by what we learned when we were young. It’s like programming our brains. Sure, we can reprogram, but it’s harder.
Keep us posted on what you’re seeing. Sounds like you have great examples right in front of you!
Hi Emily,
First off, congratulations on launching your blog this week! Second, I, too, took years of learning “home row” in elementary school but became a typing wizard with thanks to AOL/AIM.
There’s actually a larger issue related to your post and that’s about media literacy. I went to a meeting yesterday that discussed how we should start teaching people media literacy in undergrad years whereas I think it should be started much, much earlier. Like you said, 3-year-olds have access to the computer. My friend’s 5-year-old daughter shows me more videos on YouTube than my husband does. The issue is still about writing skills but also appropriate communication technology-specific skills.
In other words I don’t know if all of this has improved literacy, but it’s definitely changed the game.
As much as I enjoy writing- I hate typing. I can do it at speed rather well but I’m impatient about typos and making sure I actually wrote something that makes sense. Thus I’ll publish posts that may have a typo or two- which I hate because I don’t want to look like I’m a bad writer.
I type as fast as I think, which is pretty fast.