The emergence of the Internet pre-dates the birth of even seniors at Brainerd High School, making students in high school inarguably "digital natives."
So if our student body is "digital native," why is it necessary to teach digital literacy?
There is a shift happening across education. In an era of instantaneous Google searches, teachers can no longer be sage on the stage "deliverers of content." Rather, we need to operate as facilitators and guides, helping our students learn how to function in a world that increasingly requires collaboration skills, problem solving ability, communication, creativity and, yes, a "digital native" skill set.
Many of today's kindergartners will eventually step into jobs that do not exist today. Recognizing the need to equip our students with 21st century career-ready skills was the impetus for a new fall 2015 course called Digital and Media Literacy. Thirty Brainerd High School seniors signed up for our inaugural class.
The course is an elective English class with a twist - our text is taken directly from today's headlines, journals, blogs and media posts. When we write, the final drafts might look different than the traditional English essay. Our tools for the most part are tech-based: iPads, Chromebooks, Web2.0 apps. Students create content for a variety of purposes and for a variety of audiences, learning how to work independently and on collaborative teams. The class is nearly completely paperless, with class agendas, notes and student work managed through a Google Classroom environment.
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In addition, students are learning about digital citizenship, using curriculum from Commonsense Media that focuses on a range of topics including cyberbullying, the appropriate use of social media, and the recognition of our mobile device-driven "fear of missing out society." Sometimes, the best lesson in a technology class is knowing when to set the technology down and focus on the people and ideas around you. We also have studied copyright, fair use and Creative Commons attribution, essential when creating content in a digital age. And, we are learning about crafting positive digital footprints, understanding how the messages we post follow us, and how to present ourselves in a positive manner. More and more, potential employers and college admissions offices are looking into students' social media profiles, making student awareness of appropriate use essential.
Part of being digitally literate is the ability to read, comprehend, and communicate in a variety of mediums. And so we have also been studying media literacy: learning how to "read" images and video the way a student might learn how to read a text.
Our class has also had an e-Mentor experience, organized by the nonprofit group BestPrepMN. In the e-Mentors program, each student is paired with a business professional from a Minnesota company. Our students are working with mentors from Xcel Energy. The pairs email for eight weeks over a variety of pre-selected topics, focusing on the importance of teamwork, nurturing a positive attitude, workplace ethics, and advice on successfully preparing for college, tech school, and career readiness. From a practical standpoint, students hone their writing skills, working on mechanics, grammar, writing style and tone. The e-Mentors have been enthusiastic coaches and respond weekly with 4-6 paragraph answers to our students' questions.
This past Tuesday, we visited Xcel Energy corporate headquarters, where students toured the company, met their e-Mentors and learned more about their jobs and the paths taken to get them. Tuesday's field trip also included a visit to The Minneapolis Institute of Arts (MIA), where students completed a visual critique exercise (learning about the meaning found in images and media). They explored the MIA and analyzed artwork, producing short videos on iPads, documenting their response to selected works of art.
It takes a community to help prepare our students for the 21st century workplace. The bus for our field trip was generously paid for by a grant from the Baxter area Walmart. The e-Mentors are all volunteers. And our ISD 181 District Media staff helps keep this class on track by keeping our technology humming.
We are an English Language Arts class, but the focus is to make the class relevant to today's learners in a way that prepares them for success in the 21st century workforce.
Audra Lind is a language arts educator at Brainerd High School.
