{"title":"Language Today: Promoting Ela Content Area Learning through Collaboratively Engaged Social Media Practice","authors":"C. Young, Nicolette Filson, Rachael Debnam-O’Dea","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009010","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009010","url":null,"abstract":"Structured Abstract \u0000Purpose – To examine the potential social media has for increasing pre-service English language arts (ELA) teachers’ language interest, awareness, and content knowledge by engaging them in an ongoing collaborative effort to seek out, make observation about, and highlight contemporary examples of language, literacy, and culture in action in global media using Twitter as a platform. \u0000 \u0000Design – The research design was qualitative and included a thematic analysis of Twitter posts from the pre-service teacher participants during the semester, informal feedback about the experience during the semester, and written reflections at the end of the semester. Students worked independently on the assignment throughout the semester, outside of a few brief, and informal check-ins during class by the instructor. At the end of the semester, students completed an open-ended survey to reflect on their experiences with and takeaways from participating in this Twitter-based language exploration activity. The theoretical frameworks that were foundational to the study included the technological, pedagogical, and content knowledge (TPACK) framework (Koehler & Mishra, 2008) and Andrews’ (2006) criteria for language exploration and awareness. \u0000 \u0000Findings – The findings of this qualitative study indicate that engaging pre-service teachers in an ongoing collaborative effort to promote language, literacy, and culture via social media has great potential in terms of students increasing not only their knowledge of language and language awareness, but also their TPACK overall. Specific examples of how participants responded to the experience are provided. \u0000 \u0000Practical Implications – This study contributes to the literature on the potential impact of social media on content area learning and teacher preparation by providing concrete, research-based suggestions for how both English teacher educators and middle and secondary ELA teachers can engage in collaborative efforts to learn more about, expand definitions of, and promote aspects related to ELA content, like language awareness, variety, and dialect. It includes recommendations for both teacher educators and middle and secondary ELA teachers to expand their notions for defining and teaching aspects of language that go beyond a narrow focus on grammar and to consider ways that social media and digital literacies can enhance these efforts.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"115396678","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Taking the Book Review on Air: Bringing Young Adult Literature to Life in Teacher Education","authors":"M. Buckley-Marudas","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009013","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009013","url":null,"abstract":"Structured Abstract \u0000Purpose – To examine the results of requiring a book review podcast project within an Adolescent and Young Adult Literature (YAL) course in a teacher education program. This inquiry pays special attention to the ways in which sound can be used to elicit and evoke listener emotion, and enrich and expand pre-service teachers’ (PSTs) technological repertoires as they move forward as teachers in this digital era. \u0000 \u0000Design – This inquiry into PSTs’ experiences creating and publishing a book review podcast as an explicit part of their teacher preparation program draws on critical literacy traditions and critical inquiry-based pedagogies. The research design included collection of book review podcasts, written reflections from PSTs after completing the podcasts, written peer feedback, and ethnographic field notes. The author uses qualitative methods including critical incident and descriptive review analyses to gain insight into how PSTs engaged an invitation to write, record, and publish a book review podcast. The work is grounded in a conceptual framework around socio-cultural constructions of literacy, new media ecologies, and arts-based literacies. \u0000 \u0000Findings – In order to create an engaging book review podcast, PSTs must be supported to think about the value and purpose of the sonic as part of the whole composition and provided challenging, sustained opportunities to experiment with different sonic elements as part of their composing processes. Although used in different ways, sound was a critical variable in podcast production. Sound played a vital role in engaging listeners by drawing on and manipulating elements such as pausing, voice inflection, intonation, and music that are not characteristic of the typical book reviews. Despite PSTs’ engagement with and interest in learning how to use and compose with these additional elements, many found this activity to be time consuming and difficult; having no previous exposure to this technology. The nature of this assignment and the novelty of the podcasting platform also shifted some of the typical discourse patterns in online discussion boards from that of academic dialogue, to a heightened sense of encouragement and commendation. \u0000 \u0000Practical Implications – This inquiry contributes to the literature on teacher education, especially literacy education and English education, and has implications for understanding the unique opportunities and challenges of entering the teaching profession in this digital era. For teacher educators willing to commit to supporting and extending PSTs’ digital literacies, including podcasts in particular, a number of recommendations on designing a similar project are included, with a focus on inquiry-based, student-centered pedagogies.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"122775691","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Designing E-Books: Enhancing Prospective Teachers’ Digital Literacy Skills","authors":"Chinwe H. Ikpeze","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009003","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009003","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract \u0000Purpose – The purpose of the study was to understand if / how making e-books can facilitate digital literacy skills among teacher candidates. \u0000 \u0000Design – The research design was a qualitative case study. Data were collected from the student’s e-book, student’s e-book reflective commentary, and questionnaire as well as course reflection. Multimodality and the technological, pedagogical content knowledge (CK) provided the theoretical framework. \u0000 \u0000Findings – The findings of this qualitative case study indicate that making e-books do facilitate the acquisition of digital literacy and technological pedagogical content knowledge among teacher candidates. In addition, the project promoted transmediation and differentiation of instruction. It facilitated divergent thinking and knowledge of instructional design as well as the affordances and constraints of multimodal tools. \u0000 \u0000Practical Implications – This study contributes to the literature on e-books and their role in digital literacy development among teacher candidates. The study supports the need to provide teachers with the opportunity for inquiry-oriented and design-based projects that enable them to be knowledge generators. Teachers should be allowed to experiment with digital and multimodal tools, and in the process, create opportunities for transmediation and differentiation of instruction for their students.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"123855449","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Use of Techscaffold to Foster Teachers’ Decision-making Processes to Support Technology Integration","authors":"R. Beach, John M. Scott, Greg Klotz","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009014","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009014","url":null,"abstract":"Structured Abstract \u0000Purpose – To describe the use of the software platform, TechScaffold, for use in teacher education to provide pre-service and in-service teachers with decision-making heuristics to select apps based on formulation of their instructional purposes for using those apps; participate in a community designed to foster knowledge and experience about effective, purposeful uses of apps; and share project reports to illustrate the use of apps to achieve certain learning objectives. \u0000 \u0000Design – The authors draw on research related to decision-making associated with purposeful uses of apps as well as analysis of the limitations of similar instructional design tools to develop features for TechScaffold. They sought to scaffold teachers’ decision-making through users formulating open-ended responses to queries with responses matched against a database of apps identified according to platform, purpose, grade level, difficulty, and cost, as well as ways for users to participate as members of a community to share projects illustrating uses of apps. The authors also obtained feedback regarding the potential usability and value of TechScaffold. \u0000 \u0000Findings – Given research indicating the importance of scaffolding decision-making processes regarding uses of apps, feedback from users indicated that they perceive TechScaffold as a useful tool within the context of teacher education as well as for professional development in schools to foster effective decision-making associated with purposeful uses of apps. \u0000 \u0000Practical Implications – Teacher educators can employ scaffolding activities to help pre-service and in-service teachers make decisions regarding productive uses of apps through their open-ended formulation of certain purposes through use of a tool such as TechScaffold.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"131096669","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Digital Internships: Enriching Teaching and Learning with Primary Resources","authors":"Jenny Martin","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009008","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009008","url":null,"abstract":"Practical Implications – Digital internships contribute to best practices in teaching digital literacies by providing examples of how EPPs can design curriculum that situates teacher candidates to observe pedagogy in online environments. These internships provide candidates the opportunity to mentor K-12 students in these spaces and provide teacher candidates time to process how they can best motivate students and give specific feedback to encourage learning. Furthermore, digital internships can include primary resources to enrich units of instruction across content areas and grade levels.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125477447","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Index","authors":"","doi":"10.1108/s2048-045820180000009016","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/s2048-045820180000009016","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"130555161","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Tactile Picture Book Making and Multimodal Composition: Students Design for Equity in English Language Arts","authors":"Bridget Dalton, Kirsten Musetti","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009015","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009015","url":null,"abstract":"Practical Implications – Multimodal composition and making can be effectively integrated into pre-service candidates’ literacy education, as well as high school English Language Arts, to develop multimodal communication and inclusive design skills and values. Success depends on interdisciplinary expertise (e.g., children’s books, tactile design, making technologies, etc.), and sufficient access to physical and digital materials and tools.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"121172388","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Using Backchanneling Technology to Facilitate Dialogic Discussions about Literature","authors":"J. Chisholm","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009006","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009006","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract \u0000Purpose – The purpose of this study was to understand how, if at all, backchanneling technology supported an early career English teacher’s facilitation of literary discussions in his 10th grade classroom. Although emerging findings from studies of backchanneling in teaching contexts have illustrated its potential power, little attention has been given to how teachers learn to use the tool or reimagine their pedagogical roles as they use backchanneling for instructional purposes. \u0000 \u0000Design/Methodology/Approach – Discourse analyses of 16 face-to-face (frontchannel) and online (backchannel) transcripts of discussions exposed how participants used these two venues to interact simultaneously around a literary text. Methods from Nystrand’s (2002) dialogic discourse analysis isolated each teacher interjection in the contexts of each discussion. \u0000 \u0000Findings – The teacher used the backchannel to probe for elaborated student responses and model dialogic discourse moves. The teacher’s behind-the-scenes support limited his participation during frontchannel discussions, allowing for open discussion among students without the teacher’s consistent interjection, which disrupted the initiation-response-evaluation discourse structure that is pervasive in US schools. \u0000 \u0000Practical Implications – Although backchanneling technology can be used to archive records of students’ participation that could be useful for assessment purposes, the teacher’s skillful capacity to negotiate two discussions at once reconstituted his role during the discussion from facilitator to a fellow reader with his students as they explored meaningful questions that literature provokes – a less obvious and potentially more powerful affordance of this digital tool for instructional purposes.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"127900477","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Digital Literacies and Climate Change: Exploring Reliability and Truth(s) with Pre-service Teachers","authors":"James Damico, A. Panos, Michelle N. Myers","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009007","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009007","url":null,"abstract":"Practical Implications – This study contributes to the literature that considers the ways pre-service teachers work with websites about socioscientific topics. It highlights how an instructional model can help promote digital literacy practices that center on evaluating the reliability of websites about climate change. It also includes a companion framework called fake experts, logical fallacies, impossible expectations, cherry picking, and conspiracy theories (FLICC) that can be used to guide students to better understand techniques and practices of science denial.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125509198","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Beth Beschorner, Jamie Colwell, A. Hutchison, Lindsay Woodward
{"title":"Using the Technology Integration Planning Cycle to Prepare Pre-service Teachers for Multimodal Instruction","authors":"Beth Beschorner, Jamie Colwell, A. Hutchison, Lindsay Woodward","doi":"10.1108/S2048-045820180000009002","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1108/S2048-045820180000009002","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract \u0000Purpose – Teachers should plan instruction that integrates digital tools into instruction in meaningful ways to promote students’ use of multimodalities. Therefore, it is useful for teacher educators to expose pre-service teachers (PSTs) to a systematic approach to integrating a variety of digital tools into their instruction. In this chapter, the authors discuss on the Technology Integration Planning Cycle (TIPC; Hutchison & Woodward, 2014a, 2014b) as one systematic approach for teachers and teacher educators to consider. \u0000 \u0000Design – This chapter describes the promise of using the TIPC with PSTs to demonstrate and practice how to plan effective literacy instruction to support students’ use of multimodalities. The chapter includes a rich description of how the use of the TIPC might take shape in a literacy methods course based on a composite of courses, students, and activities that the authors have experimented with over time. \u0000 \u0000Findings – Using the TIPC with PSTs requires a structured approach (Hutchison & Colwell, 2016) that includes modeling and scaffolding of PSTs’ knowledge of technology and pedagogy (Beschorner & Kruse, 2016). Therefore, the Gradual Release of Responsibility (Pearson & Gallagher, 1983) might be valuable to consider as a guiding framework for planning course activities and assignments that utilize the TIPC. This chapter provides an example of this type of instruction. \u0000 \u0000Practical Implications – There is a significant need to prepare twenty-first century learners to read and write multimodal text. Thus, supporting PSTs to increase their self-efficacy in using technology for instruction and providing the conditions necessary to develop pedagogical beliefs that make it likely for them to be able to integrate technology in meaningful ways is vital (Ertmer, 2005). Using the TIPC in a literacy methods course in the ways that model and scaffold its use, might be one approach to creating these conditions.","PeriodicalId":309500,"journal":{"name":"Best Practices in Teaching Digital Literacies","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2018-08-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"125570341","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}