I want to expand on a definition of literacy that I’ve been working on through this class and my Music Education class. @jrbacch tweeted “Music a form of literacy? Music notes themselves, crescendos, learning how to read music, etc? #BMCed250” and I responded “thinking of literacy as access to a way of connecting w/ppl, ex cultural literacy, tech literacy makes music fit” [into a definition of literacy].

I spend a lot of my free time working on music for my a cappella group--I teach songs to the group and arrange music for the group to learn. When I’m deciding who will sing which voice part on any particular song, as well as while I’m leading rehearsal, I think a lot about who can read music. In auditions for my group, we ask if the auditioner can read music, because it’s a valuable skill. Within the context of a cappella, if I ask “can she read?” I’m asking about whether a singer can read music. And it does feel that fundamental to me. It is possible to be in the group and succeed without being able to read music, but it requires that I take a different approach in my teaching. I have to refer to notes’ position within the measure rather than their duration and name (e.g., “the altos need to watch the second-to-last note in measure 85--it should be longer and higher” instead of “altos: in measure 85, you’re jumping up a third, and it’s a half note, so be sure to hold it out”).

Throughout this first week of classes and the 360, one book keeps coming to mind as I have read the readings. In Teaching the Postcolony, we read a speech by Ivan Illich called “To Hell with Good Intentions,” which was a commentary about white middle class Americans going to “help” other countries. While I was reading it, I wondered how to reconcile this power relationship between middle class Americans and the Mexican population that the Americans were trying to help. Illich suggested that Americans go to study and enjoy new cultures instead of trying to help. An example came to mind from the book The Help by Kathryn Stockett on how to somehow equalize these relationships. The book is about a white woman in Mississippi in the 1960s writing stories about African American maids by interviewing them. When the white woman, Skeeter, asks Minny, one of the African American maids, to tell her stories for this book, Minny has the same reaction as Illich. She does not understand why a white woman of power and standing would want to write about African American maids. Minny completely disregards her good intentions to change attitudes and does not believe she can help at all. However, throughout the book, Minny and Aibileen both become close with Skeeter as they work on the stories of the maids in Jackson, Mississippi. These women who seem so different by society’s standards become friends who love and respect each other.

Check out this youtube!

This video immediately made me think of Adichie’s “The Danger of a Single Story.” As a homeschooler, I’ve encountered many of these questions (most of all, the pajama question). Although at times I liked getting attention for being an anomaly, overall, I felt very judged and limited by other people’s perceptions. I remember that, as a self-defense method, I would describe myself as “weird” so as to claim a description for myself rather than having it forced on me.

So this video was great. It didn’t capture my entire experience, but what I liked about it was that this guy – Blimey Cow – questioned certain beliefs merely by repeating them back. Rather than say outright, “homeschoolers are like this,” he repeats statements that might be said about us, as a sort of mirror effect. As if to say, “hmmm, did you really mean that?”

I love this word – debunking. “Let’s unpack that” – Let’s actually question those assumptions that we’ve accepted as realities. Because in order to truly respect other people, we must eliminate finite assumptions and be more open to complexities and details.

In Access, Identity, and Education – a course taught by Jody Cohen – we read an article by Martha Minow.  This reading discussed the “Dilemma of Difference” (I couldn’t find the entire reading online, but here’s a quote: “The dilemma of difference may be posed as a choice between integration and separation, as a choice between similar treatment and special treatment, or as a choice between neutrality and accommodation”). From what I remember, Minow pointed out two problems with “difference” in the classroom: if teachers recognize that students are different, and meet their different needs differently, they run the risk of isolating some students. They might create a “different from” mentality – a separation between normal and different studdents. However, if teachers DON’T accommodate needs, some students may not get the treatment they require for learning.

I am very excited about this course and the potential for great dialogue that it has thus portrayed. We have various means of communication, which I think is important to suit the needs of different learners and for the different ways that people express themselves. At the same time, I do have my concerns about the Twitter component. What irked me the first couple of tweets I posted was that the character limit would inevitably cut me off before I had finished saying what I wanted to say. It reminds me of the multitude of literacies we have discussed and will continue discussing throughout the semester. A new (for the newbies to Twitter as myself), different type of literacy is necessary when communicating via Twitter. You are not able to talk in long drawn out thoughts, but rather it teaches you, or more so requires you, to be succinct and to find the shortest and most effective way to express your thought. I have yet to make up my mind about how I feel about this aspect of social media, but I will say that I am interested in seeing how the combination and interweaving of Twitter and Serendip will play out, where in one you post short statements or links to articles, the other requires you to expand on your thoughts and lay them out in a more thought-out manner. It might just end up being the perfect balance between these two types of thinking and expressing oneself, lending itself to a constructive class dialogue.

So far I've taken classes in a few different subject areas and have experienced a wide variety to Academic writing.  Although all types of academic writing strive to make an arguement or prove a point the styles of writing are different. College level writing involves a lot of thought.  It's a careful process because you have to manage to tie in the ideas of different authors or researchers without stealing from them.

The hardest thing, for me, about Academic writing is making sure my ideas haven't been used by someone else.  In all honesty I don't understand what the goal of academic writing is.  There have been times in some classes that I've attempted to tie together sources to showcase an idea that I (thought) I created, only to have a professor write "site this!"  I get nervous because I feel like everytime I write a paper I need to do incredible amounts of research to make sure nobody has said the exact same thing that I'm saying without me siting them.  It really reminds me of the Harper's Magazine article in that way.  I completely agree with the idea that every idea I have is technically plagiarized from someone else. 

On a slightly different note I feel like this blurred line of what we can easily site and what is almost impossible to avoid "stealing" is a central problem with a lot of the internet banning bills.  We want to avoid plagiarism yes, but where do we draw the line between "stealing" and "creating?" 

            In the article What is Literacy?, James Paul Gee addresses the functionality of different discourses. A big part of literacy, as he describes it, is understanding the different uses of primary and secondary discourses. In order to master literacy you must know how to use primary and secondary discourses at appropriate times. In this case “function” indicates that these discourses have different uses or occur in different settings.

            When bringing a program that promotes literacy to Northern Ghana, it seemed like an important thing to establish is what kind of discourses occur in the region. In The Leap to Literacy and Life Change in Northern Ghana, there was an emphasis on community building as well as literacy. They stressed that they were teaching children functional literacy, and from the overview it seemed that this was done with a focus on their local life.

There was a stress on incorporating their mother tongue, and teaching the discourse that they were exposed to during a certain family trade. This is different than just teaching children to read and write. Instead they are working to incorporate their life into the classroom. Mixing both “acquisition” (learning through exposure) and “formal learning” seems to be beneficial to students who are trying to master literacy skills.