Web Literacy standard community call: 7th March 2013

[Doug Belshaw]

Hi everyone,

We had a productive call last week looking at what constitutes a 'learning standard' and are looking forward to this week's discussion!

Date: Thursday 7th March 013
Time: 8am PST / 11am ET / 4pm GMT
URL: https://etherpad.mozilla.org/weblitstd-community-7mar13

This week we're focusing on the current categories listed at http://mzl.la/weblit, asking a number of questions to prompt the discussion and provide usable outcomes. You'll find these questions on the etherpad listed above. :-)

Join us!

-----
Doug Belshaw
Badges & Skills Lead
Mozilla Foundation

[Ian O'Byrne]

Hi all,

Sharing some resources about the Online Research & Media Skills curriculum I developed with a colleague. Keep in mind...not trying to push us to Ed, or the Common Core State Standards...would just like to provide a goal for teachers, students, and tech.

The focus is on three "pillars", or whatever you want to call them: online reading comprehension, online content construction, and online collaborative inquiry. We've used these in schools, in PD with teachers...and to help guide university faculty as to how to authentically and effectively integrate tech into teaching and learning.

The best reading so far on this is a couple of pubs we put together for CRAJ (http://www.ctreading.org/journal). There is a paywall...so email me and I'll "discuss" them with you.

I also have a PPT and video screencast of me presenting this to a university in Argentina last year. (http://wiobyrne.com/negotiating-the-intersection-of-literacy-and-technology/). Please excuse the limited resources on the site...I'm slowly moving over to Wordpress after Doug's blog post urging us all to do so.

I still view this as a work in process...even though we've been working, writing, and presenting on it for a couple of years now. I'd love to use the collective intellect, and the review process working with you all to put together a great standard that will change the world.

-Ian (wiob...@gmail.com)

[Alvar]

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On 07/03/13 08:23, Doug Belshaw wrote:
> Hi everyone,
>
> We had a productive call last week looking at what constitutes a
> 'learning standard' and are looking forward to this week's
> discussion!
>
> Date: Thursday 7th March 013

I can not get the call today, but I'm checking the etherpad.
A question: The international call numbers of the Tuesday call work on
Thursday call?
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[Doug Belshaw]

Hi Alvar,

Great that you're interested in joining us on the weekly community calls. :-)

The number we use is different that the Tuesday ones but if you're outside of the US (as I am most of the time) you can just use Skype/VoIP to call in for free!

Doug Belshaw
http://dougbelshaw.com
http://five.sentenc.es

This email is:
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On 7 Mar 2013, at 12:53, Alvar <alvar...@gmail.com> wrote:

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>
>
>
> On 07/03/13 08:23, Doug Belshaw wrote:

>> Hi everyone,
>>
>> We had a productive call last week looking at what constitutes a
>> 'learning standard' and are looking forward to this week's
>> discussion!
>>
>> Date: Thursday 7th March 013

[Doug Belshaw]

Thanks for the contributions so far. Just a quick one to say that the recording of this week's call is now available here: http://weblitstd.tumblr.com/post/44868263276/weekly-community-call-7th-march-2013-in-this

[da...@plml.org]

Diving into the 'personas', I can describe how we (an organization) might utilize a set of Web Literacy standards & would love to learn how others might apply it in their context (particularly for badging!).

One of the most significant challenges that we have as producers is to produce instructional lessons & media that fit neatly into an existing K-12 instructional context. Mapping across contexts - content to technology standards - is helpful in as much as the specificty exists to make it happen.

For instance, one of our goals is to teach young people how to explore data for its patterns. Existing standards (including Common Core) touch this area ever-so-indirectly. ISTE and ALA standards also treat this area non-specifically and indirectly. However, we see enthusiasm for teaching and instructing in data when recommended state technology guideline/frameworks help tie one to the other.

So, to us, one of the most important aspects of the Web Literacy Framework (WLS!) is to provide something to map against, both for producers and educators.

Does this resonate with those who represent orgs? Or, how does it differ in utilization from those who might apply it for badging? Would love to know!

Cheers,
--Dave

[Doug Belshaw]

Thanks everyone for the contributions so far. If I may, I'd like to guide this discussion towards the specific issue for this week: namely, to what extent do we feel like we can align with the following 'buckets' or 'categories' (we need a better name for these!)

- Exploring
- Creating
- Connecting
- Protecting

Specifically, I'm interested in the area of 'Identity' and to what extent we need to consider that separately from the above. Please do review the etherpad from the call (http://bit.ly/weblit-7mar) and weigh in with your views on this thread! :-)

-----
Doug Belshaw
Badges & Skills Lead
Mozilla Foundation

Email: do...@mozillafoundation.org
Blog: http://dougbelshaw.com/blog

[Ian O'Byrne]

Hi all,

I think the "buckets" you've already developed are fine. I mentioned in the call that they could be referred to as strands, elements, frameworks, etc. Strands might be the most fitting. I'd see them weaving together to form this understanding of web literacies. I'm sure a lot of effort and thought has gone into developing these buckets, and my vote would be that they stay for now. I can challenge the title of each of them, and push for a different term or phrase, but then we delay for something as simple as word choice. As this all fleshes out, it'll be obvious if something needs to be changed. Usually this occurs as we define the constructs...or start to develop assessments and rubrics of these elements.

I would see the next phase of work to be the trickiest, working to agree upon the subconstructs involved for each...and the definition of the strands and the subconstructs. Additionally, I would suggest identifying what Doug brought up in the call...where does the "Web" start and end...at least in relation to these literacies. Finally, within each of these strands, what are the knowledge, skills, and dispositions involved when someone "explores", or "creates", etc. This came up a couple of times in relation to the "soft skills". I prefer to view it as knowledge, skills, and dispositions...I think especially in terms of literacy, and online literacies we need to include affective variables such as dispositions.

In terms of identity...it's an interesting concept. I think it is needed, but it could be an overarching piece that is embedded in the four "buckets", or a separate thread. My vote would be to progress as you currently have it framed, and try to embed it across the current standards. If it doesn't come out as we define and assess everything...then we'll have to develop it on its own.

My two cents...I'd love to hear everyone's thoughts.
-Ian

[da...@plml.org]

Ian,

I agree with your thinking about the "buckets"; strands is a fine word. Ultimately, the content of each strand is most important, rather than the descriptor.

Indeed, "identity" is tricky. At the minimum, there's "identity" in terms of online presence; there's historical sense of identity, based upon what might have been published at an earlier point in online life, and there's identity theft, linked to an entirely different set of understanding (e.g., that digital information might be applied for offline ends).

By treating "identity" as knowledge inseparable from its applied strand-specific skill, we ensure that it's learned as its understanding would be applied in practice. For instance, teaching about identity as it relates to credibility leads one down the path of learning about who an author is (and about their trustworthiness, etc). Or, teaching about identity in the context of online password security is linked closely to preventing identity theft (which leads to a discussion of why identity theft != good).

Does this make sense?

Cheers,
--Dave

[Jacob Caggiano]

While identity is a complex issue to unpack, I think there are ways to weave it into the four strands that Doug has proposed.

Off the top of my head:

- Exploring (identity)
discovering how online personalities are built and distributed across the web i.e Twitter, blog comments, blog posts, Facebook photos.

- Creating (identity)
learning how to share a slice of who you are with the digital world, i.e. building a portfolio, covering something about your community on a blog
part of this may be based on what you see from others during the "exploring" strand.

- Connecting (identity)
interacting with others on the web expands your identity, provides a multi-faceted channel of who you are, how you respond to issues, how you contribute to the overall discourse.

- Protecting (identity)
learning who owns your identity (data wise), learning how your data is hosted and how you can gain/lose access, how to manage it, who else has access to it i.e. Google, Apple, Dropbox, etc.
there's also protecting your identity in sense of perception, so how to respond to vandalism, slander, etc.

~Jacob

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[Carla Casilli, Webmaker Badges Project Lead]

Hey all,

Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the categories/buckets. It's been my perception that identity is not just integral to all of the categories but that its an essential aspect of being. Identity is who we are as we do things and that changes with different audiences. Consequently, its overarching effect tends to make it a thing unto itself.

And maybe this is also a dimensionality question. Instead of thinking in the 2-D world of categories, how can we also address the third dimension of overlapping requirements and sense of self definition. And to me, this is where it gets quite interesting: how do we think of ourselves as we do different things. We will be asking people to assume new and different roles as they learn: in what ways do those new roles alter personal perception of self? Indeed, a learning standard does ask an individual to undergo fairly significant cognitive--and quite possibly affective change.

Let's try thinking of these areas as a 3-D combination of categories and layers. If we do so then we can accurately begin to represent how different viewpoints and lenses can produce radically different learning goals from the same basic standard components.

Identity is a layer that blankets categories. So, with this approach we can have and interleaving categories and layers, roles and perceptions. By adding in the element of time we round out our equation. Including time allows us to address the primary way that learning will be achieved: through pathways. Pathways can be newly forged or merely followed. And they will occur in multiple temporal ways, i.e., sequentially, concurrently, and sporadically.

I've covered a lot of ground with this comment and I'd love to hear your thoughts on these ideas, as well as how you think this might work in application.


Thx!
Carla

---
Web literacy / Webmaker Badges Lead
Badge System Design Lead
Mozilla Foundation

[Ian O'Byrne]

Hi all,

Thanks for the opportunity to think deeply about this. I have a couple of ideas.

1. I think the role of identity should be an overarching, or surrounding factor. I've been playing with it developed a heuristic based on the work in the Rand Reading Report (http://www.rand.org/pubs/research_briefs/RB8024/index1.html), and work by Bronfenbrenner. Given the ideas about Identity and Carla's thinking about 3D as opposed to 2D, I propose the following heuristic. https://www.evernote.com/shard/s2/sh/57d190ff-57d4-49e3-928f-0cbdc2f73e13/4643a6a0db83c6cf0a338fac38207d92

I see it as being the four strands linked in the middle, surrounded by "purpose", then "identity", then "sociocultural."

2. I also...I know I argued against this previously...but I would suggest changing "explore" to something a but less passive. If we're discussing literacy, then explore implies that we're randomly skimming. I would suggest something more rigorous, something that implies some degree of reason and purpose. I'd want to suggest that this strand implies some degree of actively constructing and extracting meaning from online text. My vote would be for "research". You could also possibly use comprehension, extract, or understand.

My two cents...
-Ian

[Ian O'Byrne]

We're finishing up this week's phone call...and I think this idea makes a bit more sense now. I think we could remove protecting, empowering, etc...and fold this in to purpose, identity, or some of the sociocultural aspects...

-Ian

[Ian O'Byrne]

Sorry about spamming up the thread...

I blogged about my thinking before, during, and after today's call.
http://wiobyrne.com/towards-a-framing-of-web-literacies/

-Ian