Definitions of 21st Century literacy

These ideas, from David Warlick, Judy O'Connell and Darren Draper follow on from my previous blog entry, Reading in the 21st Century

"The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn, and relearn"
Alvin Toffler

"For the first time in history our job as educators is to prepare our students for a future that we cannot clearly describe. ... The best thing we can be teaching our children today is how to teach themselves." David Warlick

This concept, of course is being keenly taken up in NZ schools, especially with work around Information Literacy, Inquiry Learning, and constructivism.

David Warlick further discusses 21st century literacies, in this introduction to his presentation Literacy and Learning in the 21st Century:

"Being literate in this future will certainly involve the ability to read, write, and work with numbers. However, the concept of literacy in the 21st century will be far richer and more comprehensive than the 3 Rs of the one room school house. ... our notions of literacy must expand to address a rapidly changing information landscape where information is networked, digital, and overwhelming.

Being a reader today means being able to "find the information; decode it; critically evaluate it; and organise it into personal digital libraries."

David concludes his presentation with a statement that I've been thinking about a lot. Here it is...
"Stop integrating technology, and instead redefine literacy and integrate that"

Judy O'Connell is an Australian educator and information professional, who blogs as HeyJude. She has created a great slideshow on this topic: "Literacy Remixed in a Web 2.0 World"

Judy refers to Thomas Friedman's book The World is Flat, quoting a flat world as "a global, web-enabled playing field that allows multiple forms of collaboration, the sharing of knowledge and work, without regard to distance or geography, and soon even language."

This flat world means that our kids need new communications skill. Not just reading and writing, but reading words, images, sounds, video, interaction simultaneously. To learn new literacies about collaborating and networking, and to create, contribute, collaborate and connect.

This podcast, Pay Attention, was created by Darren Draper of Jordan District Schools, and referred to in Judy's slideshow. It takes the concept of our 21st century students and digital learning further. The podcast draws ideas from several leaders in the field of educational technology, namely Karl Fisch, Howard Gardner, Marc Prensky, Willard Daggett, David Warlick, and Ian Jukes. The statistics are from the USA, but if they don't apply to our students here yet, they will soon. Its well worth watching.