In Our Own Voices: Karen Sweeney Defines Parent Education

In Our Own Voices: Karen Sweeney Defines Parent Education

Using Emerging Technology Must be Like Learning Grafetti Art and Tagging

      I continue to learn about two things in using technological tools.  I am learning that I really am becoming more capable of things like downloading and setting up programs on my Mac.  This has been a bit of a challenge for me at times and I make visits to the Apple store to make sure that I am “doing it right”.  Each time I also get some more advice on how to make it easier for me to use as well so the Apple store visits are not a waste!  I am also learning that I need to just need to relax and try.  Try to experiment and try things out.  This is so much easier for me to do in real life and yet I am apprehensive about this with technology.  I am too quick at just throwing my hands up and feeling like “I can’t figure this out or it can’t be done” and quit.  It was so cool when a classmate suggested that I save a power point as a PDF as I was not able to load into Moodle because of the size.  I didn’t even know that could be done.  And I did it!

      For the first time in my life, I entered a virtual learning landscape.  I nearly fell of laughing uncontrollable when I found the first assignment in a class to set up my own avatar.  My youngest son Joe is obsessed with avatars; and to be told I would be setting my own up nearly knocked me off my chair.  I haven’t played video games in years and have never visited a “virtual landscape”.  I found that after spending some time in it just playing around and trying, I was actually able to do some things like change my appearance and fly and run.  I was a bit disappointed that I couldn’t give my avatar a cane tike I use but I guess my avatar will be my pseudo self and not limited. 

        As I was trying this new environment and wondering if I would look silly with my classmates (that kindergarten fear which haunts us all our lives), I realized that I was not silly and probably not the only “first timer”.  I was really glad that I spent some time several days before class trying this environment (virtual reality) out to give me some time to struggle and figure things out.  That’s what I do in real life, as stated above.  I had images in my mind, of a “first time” beginner graffiti artist.  Wondering how to have their tag look good in passing for the passersby and not look juvenille.   What must the beginning look like for a graffiti artist?  I’m sure their first tags weren’t as nice as the ones in this post.  And how do they figure out how to paint and tag to pass along these covert messages to the community they are messaging?  To everything, including virtual worlds, evolution is at work.

        Through looking at the work of others during this learning process, I was amazed and amused at approaches to doing assignments and using technology.  I was amazed at the ways one person really integrated her own art work into her power point program.  I was amused at another person’s approach by using humor and light heartedness in discussing his work history.  Other presentations gave me ideas about how important it is to “frame” what I am trying to do in its’ simplest terms.  I found myself thinking about how it will be important for me in my work with parents in a Parent Education group, where I am adding in technology, to really try to keep topics and tasks simple and easy.  It can be overwhelming to get bogged down with jargon.  I believe I can make new learning less apprehensive by trying to keep things plain and easy.

In looking ahead I still a bit nervous about how I will do with what I am trying.  I am trying to figure out how to integrate technology into learning for parents.  I have some nuts and bolts work to do from the beginning.  For one, I need to develop rubrics for: what do I want parents to learn and how, how to know “is what I am doing working” and ways to evaluate.  More importantly, I have to lay a solid framework for the ethics of what I am attempting to do and how I will address issues or problems when using new technology.  I believe that using new and emerging technology and social networking tools will break through barriers that exist for adult learners in parenting education. 

       In terms of new media and new literacies involving technology, I believe it is important to keep it simple and to relax.  And to try and encourage adult learners with whom I am working with to do the same.  Perhaps as I move forward with working on my web site, I need to relax and sit back and see it as an evolving project and not something that has to be perfect.  I want to see my web site as the wall of a building where the beginning tag grows into a beautiful piece of graffiti art.

What are Guidelines on Information Literacy and How Are Guidelines Developed?

Guidelines for Information Literacy are a framework for how libraries are developed for use and how librarians help learners and Educators to use information and provide guidance in seeking resources for use in scholarly research and planning for the continuing evolution of education practices.  As a “Digital Immigrant” (Marc Prenski), my memory of Information Literacy in library practice was centered around Librarians helping learners to understand the Dewey Decimal Card filing system (see photo to the right).  Librarians helped learners to find sources found in the library and understanding how to cite resources.  Today, over 30 years later, librarian’s and libraries are charged with helping Institutions, Educators and learners with understanding how to use the internet with all of it’s vast resources of print and media resources.  This way of “understanding” has grown to include how to find reliable resources, how to learn about the Transliteracy (cultural ways of communicating), and to be able to use various different ways of accessing information for learning and teaching that go beyond using computers and include using various new and evolving technologies used to teach.

Gail Bush Ph. D. from the National College of Education (1989) states that Information Literacy is “about how to be critical”.   She asserted that the focus of the 21^st century thinker of Information Literacy will have to evolve beyond “how to answer questions” (20^th century approach) too thinking about “questioning answers” instead.  Information Literacy has evolved immensely in the last thirty years.  It has grown from requiring basic skills for accessing information in library settings and having trust in the value and reliability in knowledge resources, because librarians were choosing and selecting information for us to draw on, too having to be able to decode and evaluate resources that are now available.  Information Literacy is now focusing on how to think critically and judge and compare resources and is a skill that “ordinary people” need to have to do research and make claims.

            Everyday people need to be able to think critically and back up claims due to amount of research and information that is being accessed.  This is discussed in part, in Sue Thomas’s lecture to the IOCT Master’s Program.  She discusses the use of multi- media and digital research approaches being used with students.  She cites Bruce Mason (1988) who wrote that, in regard to “the plethora of new media devices and affordances we should be able to look at the roles these abilities play in social life, the varieties of reading and writing available for choice, the contexts of their performance, the manner in which they are interpreted and tested, not by experts, but by ordinary people in ordinary activities” (Thomas, 2007), www.transliteracy.com. 

Due to the increased use by “ordinary people” in interpreting and using many different modalities found in Web 2.0, learning, communicating and drawing conclusions, understanding Transliteracy is increasingly more important.   Referring back to Mason, the promise of what can be learned (transmitted) through use of ordinary people is what is really important to the field of understanding what is being passed on through new media and how it can be used by regular people to learn.

            Given the vast amounts information available, array of resources and increase in the ways these resources can be used by everyday people, Guidelines on Information Literacy (library practices and development) have had to evolve and change to address the new and unique needs placed on learners, libraries and Institutions.  In my research of current developments in the field of Information Literacy, I first looked at lifetime learners.  In a final draft of Guidelines on Information Literacy for Lifelong Learning (2006), the Guidelines are broken down into critical components in: 

(1.) Information Literacy Concepts 

(2.) Information Literacy and Lifetime Learning

(3.) International Standards

(4.) Action Planning for development

(5.) Learning Instruction Management

(6.) Learning Theories and 

(7.) Learning Assessment. 

This collection of guidelines is clearly written and articulated and the IFLA uses a variety of illustrative flow charts to show how intentions impact with learning and how this is carried back and forth between learners and the institutions  They use a “Constructivist Approach where students are (viewed as) engaging with information to solve a problem and thereby creating new understanding through active investigation and thought, instead of memorizing facts presented in class lectures” (p.9).   The multiple ways in which Information Literacy occurs happens through input from: 

(1.) Information Fluency 

(2.) Library Instruction (skills) 

(3.) Bibliographic Instruction 

(4.) Information Competencies (skills and goals of information literacy) 

(5.) Information Skills (focusing on information abilities), and 

(6.) Development of Information Skills (facilitating information skills).

Unlike the clear and comprehensive outline for Information Literacy created by the IFLA, The NYC Schools developed a much more comprehensive and overwhelming 466-page guide called the Information Fluency Continuum.  The continuum is founded on four major concepts.  First, libraries “enable students to explore content deeply and pursue their own interests”.  Second, libraries “surround students with high quality, engaging resources”.  Third, that libraries serve as a place where students collaborate together and present their work.  Finally, libraries “integrate independent learning skills by teaching inquiry and technology skills and provide professional development to teachers” (p.1).  At each grade, student improvements in abilities are measured by three standards.  The first is, the “students use “inquiry to build understanding and create new knowledge”.  The second is, students “pursue personal and aesthetic growth”; and the third, students “demonstrate social responsibility”.  Throughout the K-12 education, expectations for cultural understanding and a growing set of ethics are espoused and is a standard that is measured.

I was surprised to see how little the Empire State College web site has in regard to Information Literacy on the web site.  http://www.esc.edu/suny-real/global-learning-qualifications-framework/learning-domains/information-literacy/  There are four short and simple dropdowns. The first lists questions to encourage thinking about information literacy.  Questions posed are: What are the types of resources are available to me to learn? If I had questions, where would I go? How did I find resources about my topic? How did I evaluate?  How have I conducted research or investigated my topic?  How have I been able to shape, engage and interpret ideas around my topic? How have I gained critical perspectives or developed new strategies and How have I used quantitative information to improve my understanding? 

There are 3 other simple drop downs that include: Examples of Evidence of Information Literacy, Lower-level information literacy and Upper-level information literacy.  There is no discussion about the role the library plays in the institution, with Faculty or identifying the librarians as leaders for professional development.  There is also no discussion in regard too collaboration, ethics or increasing cultural literacies that has been noted in the IFLA and The NYC School Library System.      

References

Bush, G. (1989).  American Library Association Presidential Committee on Information Literacy, You Tube video January 10, 1989, Washington, D.C.. 

Lau, J. (2006).  Guidelines on Information Literacy for Lifelong Learning.  International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions (IFLA), Information Literacy Section, Universidad Veracruzana, Boca del Rio, Veracruz, Mexico http://www.ifla.org/files/assets/information-literacy/publications/ifla-guidelines-en.pdf

New York City School Library System (2010).  Empire State Information Fluency Continuum, Benchmarks Skills for Grades K-12 Assessments/Common Core Alignment.  New York City School District.

Thomas, S.  (2007). Transliteracy Lecture by Sue Thomas, Presentation to the MA in Creative Writing & New Media Class, The IOCT Masters’ Degree.   You Tube video October 24th, 2008. www.transliteracy.com.

Two or Three Little Birds, (2013). bookish reminiscing for Sunday.  Goggle Image Posted on April 28, 2013. http://www.twoorthreelittlebirds.com/?p=1577

Here's To All the Dad's that Choose to be Dad's

Jeff Neff (Advertising Age, January 2015) quotes Devra Prywes as stating, “ad’s showing dad’s tend to outperform others in terms of sharing and positive sentiment”.   He also cites Census data as showing an increase in single dads from 3.2% (2006) to 4.1% in 2013.  So advertisers are beginning to pay attention to the increase in dad’s that are shopping.  Ads featuring dad’s also affect women that are part of dad’s lives.  So in all, advertising to dad’s is practical from a business sense. 

As a dad, Toyota moved to the top of my list last year with the tear jerking, insightful, endearing, and informing documentary styled Super Bowl commercial from Director Lauren Greenfield, “Here’s to all the Dad’s that Choose to be Dad’s” (https://youtud.be/mI9nW8k1xZA). This 6-minute-long commercial rolls out like a documentary asking dad’s: how did you learn to be a dad, if you didn’t learn it from your own dad how did you learn, and how can you be a great dad without having one yourself? The fathers represent a wide variety of dad’s.  Featuring some NFL Players mixed with a variety of other dad’s “regular Joe’s” effectively bridges the many different kinds of hard working dad’s raising children.  This is quite different from typical media that marginalizes fathers that are failing and brushed broad strokes about fatherhood in general.  The other dads also represent a variety of fathers of different races, ethnic backgrounds and birth parent experience, as well as illustrates the different ways men become fathers (adoption). 

 

The commercial is all male, with Lauren, a woman, asking questions from an interviewer perspective.  The film is shot against a bland tan background with dad’s sitting around a black table.  The simplicity allows the viewer to be sucked into the color, life and individual aspects of the dad’s that are talking.  The narrator transforms the discussion to include asking questions of their children (sons and daughters), such as: how do you know your dad loves you, what’s the best thing about your dad, what have you learned from your dad and how do you know your dad loves you?  This is just a sampling to name a few.  And as the children are answering questions the camera lens opens wider for the viewer to see that they with their dad’s next to them, are sitting in a classroom.  A place of learning and transformation.    

Toward the last 30 seconds of the commercial, the camera lens opens up so that the viewer can get the “big picture”.  The big picture includes the dad’s building things with their children, doing school work, walking down hallways and even one son in a wheel chair racing his dad at the school.  From the beginning to the end, there is a quiet piano playing simple long notes building it’s crescendo.  The final message from the dads’ is: “being a dad doesn’t have anything to do with blood, it’s not biological, it’s a choice you make to love your children”.  Toyota’s tag line message, simply written and not spoken at the end is, “one bold choice leads to another”.

This estimated 45-million-dollar commercial (http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/02/how-much-does-super-bowl-ad-cost) drove it’s product (Toyota Camry) home to consumers without ever mentioning the name or showing an image of a car.  The entire commercial was a nice and fluent mix of all the different kinds of dad’s that make up our culture without playing up or down to anyone else.  The feelings that this commercial creates for the viewer about Toyota are those of: care, dedication and loyalty.  This certainly had to be a subliminal message they wanted viewers to get and I believe they did so instrumentally. 

Toyota’s ad is an attempt at creating a more socially responsible way of looking at fatherhood in our culture.  All too often, the dominant culture, media, news, and advertisements, make fun of dad’s as buffoons or look at the isolated population of fathers that are not a part of children’s lives, and terms them with the popularized “dead beat dad’ slogan.  While there are fathers that are struggling, Toyota gave credit to the many dads’ that are loving and caring fathers that make a difference in our culture.  This ad is also about citizenship.  The commercial starts out with some dad’s talking about what they lacked as a role for fatherhood in their experience and how they were going to “break the cycle” and transform fatherhood for their children, both boys and girls, creating stronger children though fatherhood connection, care and concern.    

 

Resources

Greenfield, L. (2015).  https://youtu.be/mI9nW8k1xZA, Published on Jan 26, 2015. Toyota Camry commercial.

Neff, J.  (2015).   Move Over, Mom, It’s Dad’s Turn In Ads.  Advertising Educational Foundation, Advertising Age.  Crain Communications, January 27, 2015.

 http://www.aef.com/industry/news/data/2015/1502/:pf_printable?

Schwartz, N..  (2016). Stunning Infographic Charts the Skyrocketing Cost of a Super Bowl Ad.  USA Today, February 6, 2016  3:12 pm..   http://ftw.usatoday.com/2016/02/how-much-does-super-bowl-ad-cost