This week’s guiding questions:
How are our literacy practices shaped by communities of which we are part and in which we are raised?
What insights can be provided by conducting ethnographic research of literacy practices in communities?
How are literacy standards created, who do they serve and and how are they assessed for cultural bias?
Activity 1: What does the word “ethnography” mean? If you are not sure google it. Next, write down the definition in your own words.
Activity 2: What does it mean to annotate? Do you annotate when you read? What are the benefits? Here is an example of annotations of the Szwed article you are about to read.
Annotations_example_Ethnography-of-LiteracyActivity 3: Here is some additional information on ethnorgaphy and literacy.
Slide-Week-2Activity 4: Read the attached work by John F. Szwed to learn more about both ethnography and how it can be used to better understand literacy. When you read challenging articles, often the best way to comprehend the information, find engagement in the reading, and allow the reading to be a springboard for future academic work is to annotate. You can use online annotation programs or if you have a printer, you can print the article and write on it (see example above).
Activity 5: Read about the Sociocultural Perspective of Literacy. This excerpt, from Chapter 1 in Elizabeth Baker’s The New Literacies, written by her as well as P. David Pearson and Mary S. Rosendal, introduces the sociocultural perspective of literacy that is a centerpiece of this course.
Activity 6: What is orality? Research the term “orality versus literacy” to see what you can find out.
Activity 7: Post 2
Activity 7: Your enormous post (minimum 200 words):
1. According to Szwed, what are the 5 elements of literacy? Select one of them and describe it in more detail.
2. What method of studying literacy does Szwed recommend and why?
3. What does Szwed mean when he writes, in reference to ethnography, that “we must come to terms with the lives of people without patronizing them” (427)?
4. Imagine you are a literacy instructor at a high school in the Bronx: if you followed Szwed’s advice, how would you teach literacy?
5. What, according to Elizabeth Baker, is the sociocultural perspective of literacy? What are the four characteristics of literacy that Baker suggests we use and why?
6. What did you learn from researching the term “orality versus literacy?”
7. How are our literacy practices shaped by communities of which we are part and in which we are raised (reference at least one of this week’s readings here)?
8. How are literacy standards created, who do they serve and how are they assessed for cultural bias (reference one of this week’s readings here)?
+ Reply to one or more classmates.
