SAS-SAF: Literacy 2.0

Logo designed by Elizabeth Dulemba

Last Wednesday, Share a Story, Shape a Future did a flash forward and looked at the digital age.  Wait!  I believe we are in the digital age!!  Danielle from There's a Book took on the topic of Literacy 2.0 and had a multitude of guests to chime in on the subject.

Before I get to the specific links, I must make a confession here . . . I am old school!  I do not read anything but the physical books.  No ebooks for me!  And, at this time, I simply do not have the desire to buy an e-reader.  In fact, a couple of years ago, I even wrote a post on my feelings titled eBook or eNot?  My feelings have really not changed much, but I have begun to think about how my old school feelings are affecting my children who are growing up in a digital age.  Because of this very fact, I was really looking forward to this topic to see how I may be able to challenge myself, to step just a bit out of my comfort zone, for my dear children!

The first article that I read that really caught my attention came from Eric at Happy Birthday Author on using videos to enhance literature.  He gave a number of resourceful links for both consuming videos as well as ideas for creating your own . . . all in the name of literacy!  I would also HIGHLY recommend the personal birthday message to Mo Willems for pure entertainment purposes!

The Book Chook takes on all sorts of digital resources for both reading and writing, from stories being read to even creating your own comics.  Now that my son is a bit older, I have a feeling he is really going to be enjoying some of these sites and I look forward to exploring them further!

Melissa takes on the topic of Reading on the Go!  When you are out and about with your children, whether traveling or running errands, how can you still continue to encourage the love of literacy?!?  Check out this wonderful list of ideas.  I would like to add a few of my own games to the list . . . the alphabet game, played in a variety of ways . . . (1) Choose a letter and come up with as many words you can think of that start with that letter.  (2)  Search for the different letters on billboards, road signs, license plates, etc. OR  (3) Spell different words and have your child tell you what word was just spelled.  However, no matter which version you play, you must play along as well!  And, remember when playing the spelling version that it is okay to go with phonetic spellings!  They are learning the love of literacy and you have to start somewhere!!  In addition, both my children received their very own Doodle Pro that is to be left in the car at all times.  They not only draw pictures, but my son even practices spelling words on it as we run our errands and play the alphabet game!

I am really interested in learning more about skyping with authors after reading Mr. Paul Hankins' experiences with this bit of technology in his classroom.  In fact, now that I have a better relationship with my son's new school and parent-teacher conferences are next week, I am going to bring up this topic to his teacher and principal.  My son loved his first author event he attended a couple of months ago.  What if this author love could be shared with the entire class?!?  I see so many possibilities on this one!!

Surprisingly, after reading the posts for the day, you can see that I still was not swayed on the e-readers, BUT the digital world really is more than just e-reading!  In the years to come, I may eventually become swayed into the e-world, but for now I will be challenging myself with these other amazing tools.

If you are interested in the e-readers and IPads/IPods and all that e-jazz, then definitely click here to see the full line-up.  There are a number of great resources shared.  I'm just taking digital baby steps for now!