"The distinctive contribution of the approach to
literacy as social practice lies in the ways in which it involves careful and
sensitive attention to what people do with texts, how they make sense of them
and use them to further their own purposes in their own learning lives"
(Gillen and Barton, 2010, p. 9).
After reading this
statement a few times I was a little confused I decided to first take a look at
the term literacy. Literacy, the
term's meaning
has been expanded to include the ability to use language, numbers, images and
other means to understand and use the dominant symbol systems of a culture.[
(UNESCO. "Education
for All: A Global Monitoring Report". UNESCO. UNESCO.
p. 150).
When thinking about what people do with texts
and how they make sense of them, I thought specifically about the environment I
teach in. Teaching college students, you
really get a different take on literacy as opposed to kindergartners or even baby
boomers. For example, there are two key
concepts in literary studies that exhibit this in my environment. 1) There can
be different literacies in different domains of life. I witness this often working with college
students. For example, at times my students
may use an abbreviation or “text message” language when writing a paper for
class. 2) Institutions are important in
shaping, sponsoring and supporting people’s practices. I find it beneficial to assign an array of
assignments to students where they can exhibit their many different types of
literacy practices. I create assignments
where the students create a blog, social media pages, and a term paper. With that we’re able to discuss and decide when
and where to use each practice. Taken
together, these concepts provide a powerful language of description for
investigating digital literacies, applicable to all participants whether
adopting the role of student or teacher in education or learner in one’s professional
and/or everyday life (Gillen and
Barton, 2010, p. 9).
