HUMA 5105
Colloquium 2004
At the heart of every school is a
motivation for human contact, growth and understanding. The human encounter between teacher and
student is what truly inspires a school to function well. Teachers teach because they want to make
society better; they try to give their students skills to make them successful
in the outside world. However, the
challenges that a teacher has do not only reside in a child’s behaviour,
motivation, and level of intelligence, but also in certain outside forces that
are at work. Curriculum changes,
funding needs, standardized testing results, and other factors can drastically
change the relationship between a teacher and a student, as well as change the
way a school is run, and in turn change the meaning of a school
altogether. Lockerby Composite School
not only has to contend with all these kinds of pressures that every school feels,
but it also has to live up to the reputation it holds as being a
technologically oriented and innovative school.
My purpose at Lockerby was to assist
Marlene Rantala, the literacy coordinator, by conducting a few lessons on
literacy to applied level grade 9 science and grade 9 geography students. However, I spent most of my time working one
on one with students in the resource room in order to gain some insight into
how these students cope with literacy problems. At the personal level, my challenge at Lockerby was motivating
very unmotivatable students into completing their homework and participating in
lessons. At the academic level, it was
determining how to analyze literacy issues in light of the school’s
technological backdrop, and also finding a way to do it without subverting both
the teacher-student relationship, and the rather close relationship that I have
with some teachers at Lockerby.
Lockerby is not a new school for me. My expectation when embarking on this
practicum was to find a school that is run smoothly, without too many glitches. I was a student at Lockerby myself, and that
was always the impression the institution gave me. I attended from 1991 to1996, and during that time I was a student
of the Science and Technology Education Program (STEP). This program focuses on teaching the
relevance of technology to help students get a head start in an increasingly
technologically oriented workforce.
Many things have changed in my eight-year absence from the school. Since my attendance, Lockerby has further
emphasized the importance of technology with the introduction of a laptop
learning program. Enrolment at the
school increases every year as students try to become a part of this fairly
prestigious educational practice. The
purpose of this paper is to examine the ways in which technology interrelates
with literacy issues at Lockerby.
Literacy.
Literacy
levels have been dropping substantially in recent years. There has been much speculation as to the
reason why this has occurred. Some say
that it is due to a rise in computer use, including games and the
Internet. Others say that it is due to
some different ways of educating that gained popularity in the
nineteen-sixties, such as collaborative learning, open-concept educating, and
holistic approaches to reading. There
remains an ongoing debate as to whether learning to read holistically or
learning to read phonetically is the better route to acquiring good literacy
skills. Yet most people generally agree
that both methods should be used. The
reasons literacy levels have declined will be touched on only briefly in this
paper. Instead, I would like to discuss
some initiatives that the Ontario government is undertaking to counteract this
decline.
A drastic curriculum change
was phased in during the 1999-2000 school year. High school became a four-year endeavour; 40 hours of community
involvement became mandatory; students were assigned Teacher-Advisers who
helped students to make Annual Education Plans, wherein students could set
personal goals for their academic careers. The Ontario curriculum has increased its emphasis on training
outside of the school environment in the form of co-operative programs and
apprenticeship programs. For the purposes
of this paper, I would like to focus on another change in the curriculum: the
Ontario Secondary School Literacy Test (OSSLT). The OSSLT is conducted by an organization that is run separately
from the government—the Education Quality and Accountability Office (EQAO). EQAO conducts other forms of standardized
testing, but none seem as controversial as the OSSLT. Every student in high school needs to pass the OSSLT in order to
receive his or her high school diploma.
Students are allowed to fail the test twice. After that, a student’s final option is to pass the Ontario
Secondary School Literacy Course (OSSLC) in order to graduate. The 2003-2004 school year is the first in
which this course has been offered. I
was able to observe such a class at Lockerby for a few weeks in January before
the first term ended.
There are a number of
arguments against the OSSLT. For
instance, there have been some assertions that the marking of these tests is
rather arbitrary—some students are failing by only a few marks out of over 100. One marker might see such a student as able
to pass, while another might not. Also,
while some students are allowed deferrals from writing the test, all have to
write it eventually. Students who use
French as their first language, but who attend English schools are required to
write the test in English. Such a
student might be quite literate in their first language, yet still fail the
test because it is written in their second language. Finally, the general pressure to pass this test for students who
are simply not as bright as others is tremendous.
Responses to this test are
not all negative, however. Some see it
as the only way of identifying students with literacy troubles. More emphasis has been placed on the
importance of literacy because of the test.
Literacy specialists have become a standard resource in many
schools. The job of the literacy
specialist is to address the pressures that academically weak students face and
to make the experience of writing the OSSLT as painless as possible for the
students. Funding for these specialists
has increased substantially in the past few years with the government’s more
concentrated awareness of at-risk students, students who are academically very
weak. At-risk students are less likely
to function well in society—especially economically—because they do not have
the knowledge to succeed in the workforce.
To many teachers and parents, a knowledge of computer technology will
increase a student’s chance at attaining this success. Therefore, focusing on issues of literacy
with at-risk students and teaching using technology are combined in an effort
to make the student “marketable” to the workforce. This is the interface of
literacy and technology at Lockerby Composite School I will describe.
There are a number of
initiatives that Marlene Rantala, the literacy coordinator at Lockerby, is
undertaking to make literacy a priority.
Her position in the school is a relatively new one; she officially began
this task in the fall. She has been trying
to promote cross-curricular activities in order to show that literacy is not a
problem that can be allocated to English teachers alone. Every teacher in every subject has a
responsibility to increase students’ literacy levels. I think that every teacher is aware of this responsibility, but
some are unsure how to proceed in teaching literacy. Mrs. Rantala has conducted staff meetings with suggestions. (While I was at the school I taught a few
lessons in grade nine applied science and geography classes in order to improve
reading skills and vocabulary recognition.)
The literacy specialist is responsible for organizing after-school
reading programs, and also for analyzing the statistics of the OSSLT results
for Lockerby. She then has to determine
ways to improve Lockerby’s results.
The final literacy results
determine to an extent Lockerby’s “standing” in the Rainbow District School
Board. Lockerby’s EQAO test results
prove that this is an academically-oriented school: it had the highest
percentage of passing students in the board both for students writing the test
for the first time and for the second time.
This standing makes obtaining funding a bit easier for the school. Most schools feel pressured to come up with
funding alternatives. Funds are more
likely to be donated by local businesses if there is something substantial and
worthwhile to donate to. Lockerby’s
“product” is a technologically adept and innovative student, and because of
this the school is more likely to acquire funding. Ranking and funding also intervene in the relationship between a
student and a teacher. There are
pressures for students to fit with the marketable profile of the school.
For Lockerby to retain its
current ranking of one of the 50 best schools in Canada (according to a recent
Fraser Institute report), it has to live by and promote this technological way
of teaching. There is tremendous
pressure (and pride) from parents, Lockerby’s administration, and the Rainbow
District School Board’s administration to keep this rank. It seemed to me that sometimes the level of
pressure in keeping this rank and stature overshadowed the individuality of
each student’s needs. All of the
surveillance on teachers sometimes seems to make keeping the rank as important
as helping a student. Lockerby’s method
for conducting the OSSLT is different from that of other schools in that every
precaution is taken and every avenue is explored that will give their students
an opportunity to pass the test. Some
other schools in the Rainbow District School Board exercise different practices
in conducting the test; often students are simply shuffled into a cafeteria to
write it. Lockerby’s approach is
better, in my opinion. Lockerby uses a
software that the EQAO office provides that enables the test to be downloaded
onto computers. Every student writing
the test gets access to a computer, which helps out in detecting spelling
problems. Personal attention is paid to
these students as well: every student knows beforehand at which computer they
will be situated, and every student gets an all-important motivational candy at
the beginning of the test.
Technology.
In the case of the OSSLT,
technology is used in a helpful and practical way. However, the overall effects of the use of technology on literacy
levels are hard to determine. An uneducated
critic might say that technology is in fact causing a decline in literacy, or
at least exacerbating the problem. When
using the Internet, children are not necessarily allowed the time to absorb
what they are reading. By its very
nature the Internet provides quick information; users often click their way
through different sites and are unable to trace their steps back to their
starting point. This kind of action
does not illustrate much logic in trying to gain information. Children are sometimes not able to see the
connections between websites. The idea
of finding information quickly and easily is appealing, and often helpful, but
is difficult for a struggling reader.
Struggling readers may become overwhelmed with the amount of information
available and unaware of the logical processes of finding information. Another aspect of the Internet that has been
said to cause problems for some children is that it is often difficult to read
because there is too much information, and too many different ways to decipher
and prioritize it. For instance, many
popular websites use text, pictures, graphs, sound, Flash technology, and a
multitude of colours. A difficulty
arises in how to read different visual aspects of websites, and in what
order. Reading no longer entails
decoding a book or an article from left to right, from top to bottom. Other ways of reading have to be employed
when looking at certain websites.
To say that poor literacy is
developed with computer use may be true, but it is a moot point. Computers are simply a fact in our
culture—they are not going to disappear.
Most Canadian households have a computer. They have become a necessity that most people cannot do
without. Students should use computers
in schools for two reasons: to learn about new technologies and thus be more
adept in certain kinds of employment, and more importantly, for those students
who have trouble reading, to help them to understand technology and be able to
recognize certain traits that websites use.
They have to be able to understand what they should be looking for when
encountering a website. They should be
taught the different components and characteristics of websites and ways by
which they can interpret them.
All of that aside, there is
a formal counter-argument to the idea that computers exacerbate
illiteracy. Some critics say that the
same difficulties that arise when reading a website also arise when reading
certain textbooks, like math or science.
Here too are mixtures of text, formula, graph, and image that have to be
decoded. So, the problem does not lie
in children’s increased computer use, but in the very way in which reading is
taught. Reading lessons were traditionally
allocated to English teachers, but there is now an increased emphasis placed on
other teachers to teach reading skills as well.
Gender and Literacy.
Research shows that there is
also a gender difference in the ways that literacy is acquired. Girls are generally better readers than boys
(Booth 22). Reading is thought by many boys
to be a “girl’s activity.” Good reading
habits are usually acquired through observation; if a father does not read,
chances are the son will not read either.
Reading is then implicitly perceived as deviant from a demonstrated
masculine norm. While not widely
encouraged to read books, however, boys are encouraged to engage in
technological pastimes more than girls are; computer games and learning about
computers are thought to be a boy’s pastime.
Regardless of
role models or so-called gendered activities, there are certain ways of
learning that are common to both boys and girls. Research shows that there are different ways to access and
acquire knowledge. One convincing
article I came across suggested seven different ways of learning (Armstrong 78):
§
Spatial Learning. In order to read we have to “see” the words and be able to
distinguish them from pictures.
§
Kinesthetic Learning. Physical movement is used in order to learn. Students can “act out” sounds of words. This works for those who use sign language.
§
Logical Learning. This kind of learning requires students to become like
scientists—creating hypotheses out of what they are reading and trying to prove
them. They restructure “theories” about
what they are reading as they take in more words.
§
Musical Learning. When reading, punctuation provides a kind of musical rhythm that
makes words and sentences easier to understand. Sometimes reading through song lyrics, reading out loud, or chanting
words makes a text easier to understand.
§
Intrapersonal Learning. Reading is not simply a technical skill to
be used; good readers need to engage emotions.
Being able to connect the reading material to one’s own life is at the
heart of this kind of learning.
§
Interpersonal Learning. This involves thinking about the social
dimension that lies behind any text. If
students know how to learn this way, they are able to put themselves in the
author’s or a character’s shoes and understand his or her social and cultural
context.
§
Naturalist Learning. The brain is automatically more readily able to understand and
interpret words that are directly related to nature. Reading outside is sometimes beneficial. Teaching word sounds in terms of nature
sounds in early learning is especially essential. This could be as easy as teaching phonemes like shh for the sound
of the wind, and sss for the sound of a snake.
A discussion of all of these different kinds of
learning implicitly shows the flaws in any structured educational
facility. Most teachers can see the
value of each of these different ways of learning, but few are able to
implement all of them. Happy indeed
would be the teacher who would be able to take those students who are having
trouble reading outside, or be able to have students speak aloud in chanting
rhythms in order to understand the content.
But some ways of learning are simply not suited to an institutional
set-up. Therefore, the building itself
and the institution’s rules intervene in what should be a close and direct
relationship between the student and the teacher.
Teaching With Technology.
Lockerby’s
solution for struggling readers and writers is to offer a number of
technological devices to help the students.
The two most popular are computer programs that allow students to read
and write with more fluency. The
Rainbow District School Board funds both of these programs, and every special
education department in the board receives them. The first, Kerzwell, reads a text back to a student after
the student has scanned it into the computer.
It also has a highlighting feature, whereby main ideas or sub-points can
be expressed and highlighted in different colours. Then, after the student has finished highlighting the material,
the program can take all of these highlighted ideas, move them to a Word document,
and label them “Notes”—homework is finished, and students are not too
distracted or too lost in the text to discover a meaning. However, there are some faults with this
program: pages that have italics or graphics anywhere on it are difficult for a
computer to interpret. In this
situation, the computer will mispronounce words. So, just after the text as been scanned in, much attention has to
be paid when the computer reads the text back to the student. Another problem with this program is that it
finds it hard to interpret columns. If
a student were to scan a newspaper article in it, the program would read from
left to right straight across every column, so more time has to be spent
manually “zoning” certain information that has to be read first. Manual corrections have to be made, and
some students might not know what the corrections should be. Thus, the teacher might find himself or
herself adjusting settings and correcting the computer’s interpretation. However, once these corrections have been
made, the saved text will be readable for students, and, time consuming though
it may be, it only has to be done once.
Lockerby students have access to quite a large collection of different
textbooks-on-disk that have already been scanned and corrected. Even with the corrected copy students have
to be focused when using the program.
There is no fluctuation in the computer’s voice—a currently unavoidable
problem—so it sometimes sounds choppy and full attention has to be paid to it
to understand it.
The second program Lockerby uses is called Dragon
Naturally Speaking. The premise of
this program is that as a student reads out loud off of a page into a
microphone, the text comes up on the computer screen in front of him. This allows notes and essays to be typed
more easily. The chances of making a
grammatical error when reading out loud are far less than when writing or
typing a sentence for some students.
This program allows students to become better writers. Also, students who have certain physical
disabilities would find this an easier method of completing homework. Students are greatly encouraged to use this
program, and indeed, I saw a couple of students finding it helpful. But for the most part, I have noticed that
many students find this program extremely frustrating, and as a consequence
they give up easily. This program only
works properly with a consistent and continuous use. The computer has to “learn” the sound of an individual
voice. The first few times it is used
it often interprets words incorrectly.
For instance, it might interpret “ice cream” as “I scream.” Again, manual correction is needed to teach
the computer how to interpret properly, which is a long and tedious task, and
one which many students whom I have worked with are not at all motivated to
undertake. Instead of focusing on
teaching a student directly, teachers are forced to teach an intermediary, the
computer, which in turn somewhat distances the teacher from his or her student. Their relationship is changed with
technology.
Although some technological assistance, like the
computer programs mentioned above, is given to at-risk students, there is a
great divide between academic and applied streams of study in Lockerby. As I mentioned before, one of Lockerby’s accomplishments
was the implementation of laptop learning in 1999. There is an implicit level of prestige in being a part of this
program. Lockerby was the first public
school in Ontario to implement this kind of program. One can assume that there may be an economic advantage that
students in this program have over others; parents of laptop learning students
must cover the cost of the student’s laptop computer. In order to be a laptop student, one has to also be a STEP
student. Lockerby graduates are offered
in excess of $400 000 in scholarships to post-secondary institutions each
year. Technological education is a
lucrative undertaking for the school, as well as for many students.
Standards in the STEP program are not set by
economic status, however, STEP students are required to maintain a minimum of a
70% average in order to stay in the program.
If students do not live up to this requirement, they are sometimes
forced to leave the program. What STEP
implies is not so much a heavy focus on technology, but rather, a focus on
different ways of teaching with technology. Clearly this program offers its students new and exciting
advantages in school, but it seems to be directed towards those students who
are already academically inclined. In
general, technology’s purpose is to keep evolving in order to make certain
aspects of human life easier. By using
laptop computers in the classroom, then, the goal is to make learning easier—as
indeed it does. Students can reflect on
classes, go through the material for a second time, have clear notes, and can
learn at their own pace. If laptop
learning facilitates all of these things, it seems to me that it is being
directed towards the wrong kind of student.
At the very least, its exclusivity is somewhat paradoxical. It is to those students with little desire
to learn or with learning disabilities that this laptop technology should be
directed. As I alluded to earlier,
however, the unfortunate reality of the situation is that many applied students
come from economically poor backgrounds and cannot afford to become a part of
this program. And of course, student
responsibility and accountability have to be addressed, and these things do not
come easily in any classes in the applied stream. Students have to be responsible for the technological equipment
that they are allowed access to, and they have to demonstrate a desire to
learn. It is unfortunate that this
beneficial technology and these different kinds of teaching methods cannot be
offered to everyone.
In conclusion, the overall treatment of applied
stream students is not any better or worse than the treatment of academic
stream students, but the allocation of funds and access to different kinds of
teaching methods certainly makes this intellectual dichotomy more
apparent. The development of the OSSLT
has prompted a more heavy reliance upon technology at Lockerby Composite
School. The school’s ability to
interpret the needs of the students and use technology to improve students’
performances is accurate and well timed.
Access to computer programs such as Kerzwell and Dragon
Naturally Speaking, even with their setbacks, is a way in which students
can make reading easier and perhaps even enjoyable. Although the school’s focus on rank, prestige, and funding capabilities
sometimes overshadows the needs of its academically weak students, the
opportunities that students receive to improve their education because of this
focus are quite beneficial. Even
though the relationship between a teacher and a student changes due to some
pressures (like those mentioned above) that are beyond their control, the
motivation to teach is not lost at all.
I have witnessed the genuine desire to make each student a better person
by working with some of the teachers at Lockerby. It’s encouraging to see how so much dedication can affect a
positive change in a students attitude, especially in light of so many outside
pressures that teachers face.
Works Cited
Armstrong,
Thomas. “Making the Words Roar.” Educational Leadership. 61 (2004): 78- 81.
Booth,
David. Even Hockey Players Read:
Boys, Literacy and Learning.
Markham: Pembroke Publishers, 2002.