New+Literacy+Practice

**New Literacy Practice**
There were several examples of technologies used in our observations of different classrooms, opening the children “up in an interactive world that can support [their] literacy development in a digital world” (Hill, 2006, p. 325).

In Jennifer’s classroom, technology was used several times during her two-hour observation. Jennifer found that the most effective form of technology was the interactive smart board, used for modelled and shared reading. This enhanced the literacy lesson, as the children were able to read along with the interactive story together, whilst all being able to view it easily on the large board, as opposed to a significantly smaller book. Jennifer found this resource “to be a very resourceful tool” (Cock, 2011, p. 2). The children in Jennifer’s class were also equipped with their own personal laptops, however she believed the use of the laptops for the literacy lesson were not as effective as they could have been, as when there was a problem with the programs being used, the children were not able to fix it. This is an example that, whilst the use of multiliteracies has proved to be of great use in some aspects, it also proves that in some cases, the “lack of competence and experience with new technology [can be] a stumbling block” (Hill, p. 337).

Georgie and Trudie observed the same literacy lesson together. Like in Jennifer’s classroom, Trudie and Georgie’s also featured an interactive whiteboard, which was utilised several times throughout the lesson. The board was activated before the children arrived, and was used at the beginning of the lesson for a modelled reading session. The board had a story loaded onto it, which was read by a voice on the screen, while the teacher was able to follow the text with the mouse, allowing the children to easily follow the words being read. During the writing activity, the children were asked to hand write the task allocated (not surprising, as they were prep/one students, and handwriting was a focus point). The children however, were much more excited about completing their work on the computers positioned along the back of the classroom, and were constantly asking if they could ‘work on the Macs’.

In Kendall’s two-hour lesson, she did not witness any form of technology used to assist with the children’s learning. There was in fact, very little evidence of technology in the classroom, save for a few computers situated at the back of the classroom. This was surprising, given the technological environment children live in today, and according to Susan Hill, “now, more than ever, the lives of young children are saturated with multimedia..... [requiring] new thinking about literacy” (p. 322).

During our separate observations, we all witnessed very different levels of technology in our respective classrooms, ranging from none, in Kendall’s case, to extensive usage within the literacy lesson. As a group, we believe that technology in literacy practice is a resource that should be used to its full advantage, especially given our technologically driven society. As future teachers we all need to be aware of “the potential of new technologies to orient children towards literacy futures that will be very different from those of the past” (Hill, p. 323).