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Multiliteracies for Collaborative Learning Environments

Event Cycle 5

Functional literacy

Thursday, Sept 29 to Oct 1, 2005
Tiny URL for EC5: http://tinyurl.com/68ea6

Selber writes that "Given the intellectual and human dislocation that technology can produce, computers may even be counterproductive in many educational settings" (p.5). Citing what he presumes to be a typical case of Florida State University, which has a computer competency requirement, Selber says the program promotes practical skills but "fails to offer perspectives needed for making rhetorical judgments." In listing some aspects of competence that "the requirement neglects ..." Selber, (p. 20) suggests that multiliterate persons are able to, for example ...

1. develop file-naming schemes that can be searched meaningfully
2. write effective email messages
3. participate appropriately in asynchronous discussion
4. analyze currency, authority, and reliability of website content
5. generate visual images that represent data relationships accurately and convincingly
6. situate technology in social, political, and economic contexts

To address these issues Selber (p. 25) presents in chart form: The conceptual landscape of a computer multiliteracies program

On p. 24 he makes what he says is the "one sweeping statement I am prepared to make. Students who are not adequately exposed to all three literacy categories will find it difficult to participate fully and meaningfully in technological activities." The rest of the book addresses each component in turn and in comprehensive detail.

Functional Literacy

Selber starts this chapter (p.30) citing studies indicating that students are often left to figure out technology on their own, and this is a persistent source of frustration for them. On the other hand, students need to be taught heuristics to enable them resolve certain issues with technology for themselves. To achieve this end, "peer tutoring and other informal methods of computer instruction" might be used. In suggesting what form systematic implementation of such schemes might take, Selber divides this chapter into three sections: (1) He gives "some good reasons for helping students confront the complexities of computer use," (2) he examines the tool metaphor to shed light on what "can be positive and not so positive about functional approaches," and (3) he outlines 5 parameters to make functional approaches to computer literacy 'more productive." (p.31)

Competing visions of functional literacy

Selber begins by saying that conceptualizations of functional literacy that dwell on software, hardware, and operating systems (programming no longer considered necessary) are potentially 'harmful' and 'damaging' and often become "a blunt tool with which ruling classes create minimally skilled workers." (p. 33)

"For teachers of writing and communication, constructing a workable functional literacy is crucial for several reasons." (p. 35) Students must ...

1. attain the knowledge, skills, and attitudes to learn to control technological resources in order to achieve goals particular to educational settings
2. "be able to understand the ways in which writing an communication activities are organized in an online environment" in order to evaluate their efficacy
3. demonstrate tech proficiency in order to compete for "rewarding work in the digital age"
4. "have access to the language of the powerful, including the discourse of technology" in order to "enact change"

Computers as tools

Selber devotes almost ten page to examining this metaphor, which is unique to the literature considering that the computer as a tool has been widely accepted as a workable metaphor for its use for decades; e.g. Taylor, R.P. (Ed.). (1980) The Computer in the School: Tutor, Tool, Tutee, New York: Teachers College Press, Columbia University. I also characterized the computer as a tool and, related that to its use by teachers posing as skilled workers who needed to know how to use those tools, in a plenary address I gave in Cyprus in 2001: http://www.vancestevens.com/papers/cyprus2001/plenary/index.html (particularly the part of the talk where I get into Tool based environments and Serendipitous outcomes in the workshop.

Selber says that "a tool metaphor invariably influences how users think about and work with computers." (p. 35, my emphasis). This has both negative and positive ramifications:

Negative

• Masks political dimensions of tech use
  • Tools fit into existing structures "in ways that do not challenge .. dominant belief systems" (p. 38)
  • Technology is neutral: therefore market driven, can become a library or a gaming system
  • P. 39: "If technology is indifferent to its own ends, and if public policy encourages the marketplace to determine those ends, then it follows that technical experts and other elites will continue to control the shape of technology and to benefit from the effects of the tool metaphor."
• Masks ways in which use of 'tools' structures (governs how we regard) a wide range of activities
  • Discouraging users from contemplating mediating role of computers and impact on everyday life "diminishes teacher understandings of the nexus of pedagogy and technology." (p. 40)

Positive

• People can exploit (have control over) medium
  • Prosthetic:
    • instills "sense of control in a world increasingly permeated by technology." (p. 40)
    • "As a human extension, the computer is not self determining in design or operation" (p. 40) hence users are responsible for skill and control, determine outcomes
  • Seamless:
    • "Good tools become invisible once users understand their basic operations." (p. 36)
    • Seamless tools focus on the task, not the user
    • "This design philosophy encourages interface designers to develop online environments that approximate physical realities for example, the writer's desktop," etc.
  • Instrumental (subject
• Helps people "keep their task objectives and professional responsibilities in mind" (pp. 35-36)
  • Instrumental (subject matter experts can implement without expert knowledge of computer systems)
  • "Compatible with certain ways of knowing" (p.43)
    • Declarative knowledge (the "what" of learning) consists of facts and concepts, "it is just not possible for students and teachers to be aware of all there is to know about computers." (p. 43), anxiety arises from feeling that we should know more
    • Procedural knowledge (the "how" of learning), doing things in the real world, ""a proceduralist would assert that learning to use the computer productively also requires trying and testing it repeatedly in the framework of meaningful activity. In turn, the computer becomes defined by the chosen field of user actions. Leaving aside the criticisms of this epistemological perspective, it constricts what must be learned and situates technology in a context where it can be immediately understood, used, and practiced." (p. 43). Given a procedural approach "the level of agency it ascribes to users can help inculcate in them a sense of control over technology <so that> teachers can more easily imagine the parameters that might contribute to a more productive view of functional literacy." (Selber's last words on this topic, p. 44)

From Selber (2004) p. 45: Parameters of a functional approach to computer literacy

Selber's book is addressed at addressing what ought to be the components of courses on computer literacy in tertiary education. However, the importance of these literacies is not limited to students at these institutions. Therefore I am taking the liberty below of using the term 'user' where Selber (as in the chart above) refers to 'student.' Keeping this in mind and taking these parameters one by one ...

A functionally literate user uses computers effectively in achieving educational goals

Either Selber is referencing the world of computer literates (and not dealing with 'illiterates' who don't actively use computers) or he is assuming that we have reached a stage where those with no prior computer use do not appear on college campuses in the USA. Therefore he distinguishes only two levels of computer user:

• Computer-mediated users
  • Unable to manage change
  • Regard computers as alienating
  • Feel computers create debilitating personal challenges for them
  • Feel isolated, engulfed in information
  • Perform poorly in distance learning
  • Puzzled by level of abstraction in operating computers
  • De-skilled, disempowered in technological contexts
• Empowered
  • Integrate computers productively
  • Cope well in dynamic environments
  • Confront skill demands
  • Collaborate online
  • Explore instructional opportunities; "In other words, they employ computers as a tool in order to further their educational goals." (p.46)

Empowerment comes from controlling a computer, or having "the ability to harness technology in a seemingly systematic way." (p.46) Empowered users are trained to:

1. understand what computers are good at, BUT that they are NOT good at solving ill-defined problems. Selber uses the example of a grammar checker. Grammar checkers can:
   • catalyze discussions about language convention and usage authority
   • help students revise
   • illustrate where computers falter at an ill-defined problem
2. utilize advanced features in software that are generally ignored. To illustrate this, Selber asks why "many students today still operate the computer like a glorified typewriter?" Because teachers ...
   • discourage experimentation with fonts
   • encourage use of style sheets like MLA which still underline to indicate italics
   • do not train use of style sheets, masters, macros, and features beyond cut/paste; Selber points out where in collaborative writing, where the task is to cobble contributions into a cohesive whole, use of a style sheet can make the task more efficient and more doable.
3. customize interfaces - default settings help beginners over learning curves but do not meet particular needs; entails use of
   • customizable features of windows (shortcuts and beyond)
   • accessibility options
   • skilled us of bookmarks
     • customizing bookmarks at http://www.mybookmarks.com
     • creating bookmark files that can be shared
     • editing bookmarks so as to mount them on web pages for sharing more generally

This last skill segues into the next aspect of functional literacy, and that is going from the personal to the shared, or social. Here users must broaden the audience for their work and pay attention to navigation and transparency, according to social conventions particular to the networld addresses.

A functionally literate user understands the social conventions that help determine computer use

This section starts with an examination of some of the factors that shape discourse in email and newsgroups, as well as in online discussions in college writing classes. College literacy courses teach proper 'netiquette.' Although "each particular networld has its own culture and norms," (p. 54, a quote from Harasim) one study identifies seven violating behaviors:

1. incorrect or novice (newbie) use of technology
2. waste of bandwidth
3. violation of network conventions
4. violation of newsgroup-specific convention
5. ethical violation
6. inappropriate language
7. factual error

A functionally literate user makes use of the specialized discourses associated with computers

Typically, the language of computer discourse has been considered to be the vocabulary of its parts and what goes on inside a computer. But ... "Cultural privileges accrue through effective discourse practices. That is, one must effectively appropriate the language of a community in order to have a voice within it." (p.55) Nowadays, the discourse necessary to submit proposals and give presentations and to otherwise communicate in a digital age is broadening. This made me chuckle: "To date, the language of computer networks has captured a great deal of attention because teachers have confronted it repeatedly under urgent circumstances." (p. 56) Troubleshooters need specific descriptions of problems in order to repair them, and "students also need access to the discourses that constitute online environments." (p. 57)

Selber gives examples of how these discourses have broadened to include technical terms from the print and publishing, broadcast, and motion picture industries as well as that of computing. He points out how in English composition classes "students are often actively discouraged from seeing, for example, the discourses of typography or graphic design as important ... Nonetheless, multimedia texts depend upon this discourse, which pervades the software programs used to create them." (p. 58) Selber gives many examples; for example,

• users cannot understand Macromedia Director as a print publishing tool, rather its design and layout features utilize the discourse of the film industry
• to effectively utilize search engines requires knowledge of discourses associated with file extensions, VRML, ActiveX, and Boolean algorithms
• Selber employs task analysis techniques to help students decompose tech challenges to their component parts and exposes interfaces, for example that of DeskScann, where, in order to digitize images, one has to understand "What is a halftone? How is it different from other kinds of images? And under what conditions might I want to use one?" (p.60)
• Use of Adobe Page Maker is enhanced with knowledge of the history of printing and type

Therefore, (p.61) knowledge of specialized discourses can

• "help students develop conceptual schemata for the ways in which software programs operate"
• "remind students that the knowledges represented in online environments originate from numerous sources and communities, not just the computer industry."

A functionally literate user effectively manages his or her online world

"Because computers help students organize their work on a meaningful level, housekeeping cannot be the only management issue given due consideration. To some extent, how students handle work influences the elements that comprise the mosaic of thoughts associated with a writing or communication project." (p.61) Information can now be harvested with little effort and cost. However, there is a consequence. Users have changed their reading strategies, tend to regard what can be collected and saved as the totality of the online experience, and use Internet searches as their research tool while ignoring libraries.

Selber considers a few information management systems systems from file and directory desktops to applications that help manage information and meta-systems that handle large-scale searches on the Internet. "A functionally literate student takes advantage of software attributes that automate management activities in ways that are helpful," (p.63) such as email filters, listserv commands, personalized home pages with favorites and automatically updated content, bookmark utilities, data repair, recovery, and backup tools. Noting that teachers tend not to cover such tools, Selber suspects this is because they are considered the domain of the IT departments. He cites the example of teledemocracy to suggest that tech fixes to resource management cannot entirely succeed because there is always a social dimension to information gathering (in the case of democracy, the social dimension is vitality of issues). The result of teledemocracy is a glut of information that defies management to the extent that it obscures the issues.

"An important step for students is to be able to size up the management activities that can be successfully turned over to a machine." (p.64) Often this involves policies set by an institution (constraints on downloads on a network, size of personal LAN folders, management software available on the network). They also "unite technology and literacy in ways that require social judgements" (p.65) as illustrated in contrasting the management of an email attachments folder and an inbox. The former involves manipulating file formats, extensions, and directories; whereas the latter entails less straightforward priorities, relationships, and collaborative arrangements. In this context, Selber's students soon realize that to filter assignments and emails concerning collaborative activities, consistency of subject line is essential (a social dimension). The reason that users tend to NOT use filters is that "setting them up is a commitment to supporting long-term managerial structures" as opposed to the short-term convenience of sorting manually. (p.66) Selber describes how he has students filter course email in such a way that the inbox ceases to be the "sole focal point of their asynchronous communication" (p.67) a step which requires again a social change on the part of the students.

A functionally literate user resolves technological impasses confidently and strategically

The frustration of technological impasses is familiar to most computer users, and how these are dealt with is an indicator of our functional literacy. Symptoms of impasse include stalled projects and asymmetrical communications during collaborative projects. Two types of technological impasse are identified:

• Performance-oriented: involve the "various tasks of writing and communication." (p.67)
• Learning-oriented

Determinants of unproductive reactions to tech impasses include:

• 'digital generation gap' affecting those not brought up on computers
• Apprehension and anxiety
  • Self efficacy: low expectations, debilitating thoughts
  • High correlation of computer anxiety with math anxiety, moderate correlation with computer experience and mechanical curiosity
  • Race and gender significant, create self-fulfilling myths

Selber looks at systematic responses to user breakdowns (after King and McNeese)

1. Assessment
   Involves developing/using instruments, such as psychological anxiety measures, or attitudes surveys (Selber feels the former are not particularly useful to educators)
2. Treatment
   Desensitizing methods linked to muscle relaxation techniques (which Selber says would be 'unworkable' in educational settings)
3. Adaptive computing systems
   Interfaces that adjust to emotional and psychological state of user (again too expensive and experimental per Selber)
4. Collaborative support systems
   Selber feels that for educators, this "holds the most promise. Collaborative support systems supply a structure that enables users to share their fears and difficulties when it comes to computers. On a basic level, one can imagine the utility of an e-mail list where a community of engaged and generous students answer questions related to technological impasses." (p.69) This is exactly what Webheads do - Vance
   
   Teachers tend not to exploit such measures partly because "they are embarrassed to that they might not have all of the answers. Indirect attempts to provide support schemes are invaluable and should be carried on. That is, teachers should continue to" (p.70)
   1. take advantage of campus-wide resources
   2. invest in documentation
   3. prepare students as technical consultants
   4. set up help notebooks in which students record problems and solutions, and
   5. provide electronic environments that foster useful interchanges about technological impasses
   6. embed more formal discussions that help students reason systematically about breakdowns

If you substitute 'peers' for the word 'students' above, then again in points 3, 5, and 6 above, you can realize what role Webheads plays in helping teachers achieve their professional goals.

Systematic responses to user breakdowns (after Ben Schneiderman) <Click here for an illustrative example>

• Syntactic knowledge of technology (sequence of steps to perform a command, for example)
  • 'motley'
  • device dependent
  • learned by rote, forgotten quickly
• Semantic knowledge of technology (visualize process)
  • 'amassed in purposeful circumstances'
  • device independent
  • structured an more easily remembered
  • rooted in general theories or patterns
• In case a situation arises in which students have neither syntactic nor semantic knowledge, what to do?
  "functionally literate students should be able to call up heuristics that help them represent the impasse in a meaningful way and solve it in a systematic way" (p.71) Selber's suggested 3-part heuristic:
  1. Phrase the impasse as a qualitative question (focus on process and meaning rather than cause and effect; for example instead of wondering why the grammar checker gives unfathomable feedback, try to turn it off. Selber means by this stop trying to turn the grammar checker off by not writing 'ungrammatical sentences' - "In other words, some students have bought so deeply into the logic of the machine that they almost always see themselves as the causal root of technological impasses." (p.71))
  2. "locate the qualitative question in a classification matrix derived from empirical research on user-aided design." (p.71) After Kevin Knabe there are 5 questions types in the matrix
     • Goal (what can I do with this?)
     • Descriptive (what is this? what does it do?)
     • Procedural (how can I do this?)
     • Interpretive (why did this happen? what does it mean?)
     • Navigational (where am I?)
  3. Match the categories revealed with the appropriate forms of assistance

Selber ends this chapter on a cautionary note: "But because the tool metaphor tends to conceal the political aspects of computers, the peril of functional literacy is serious and real and should not be discounted. The instrumental lenses associated with the tool metaphor do not prod students to focus on biases and implications nor on what is happening with them and to them in technological environments. So although functionally literate students may be equipped for effective computer-based work, such work will remain obsequious and underdeveloped without the richly textured insights that critical perspectives can provide." (p.73)

Bookmarks from Bee: I was reading your sum up on Selber's Functional Literacy ... I would like to complement this with some content from links I read here and there,

• some food for thought maybe? http://brainfrieze.net/weblog.php?id=P249
• and a vision http://www.usatoday.com/tech/webguide/internetlife/2004-10-01-cover-web_x.htm
• Another good link from elearnspace...this time from Australia, detailing and illustrating knowledge management in corporate world...but can be transposed and adapted to teaching without any problem http://www.tafefrontiers.com.au/docs/KMfieldmap.pdf
• Glossary of Internet Terms - your online dictionary http://www.matisse.net/files/glossary.html
• Collaborative Learning Environments Sourcebook http://www.criticalmethods.org/collab/index.htm

How does Bee keep track of all this stuff? She says: "The best way to organize your favourite bookmarks so that you can have access to them wherever you are is to use Backflip. http://www.backflip.com/login.ihtml "

Bee Barbara Dieu Lycée Pasteur, Sao Paulo, Brazil
http://members.tripod.com/the_english_dept

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©opyright 2005 by Vance Stevens