Module 3

Reflection: But, I read it on the Internet, it has to be true!?!?

The topic of module 3 is online reading comprehension. Online reading comprehension is learning to search and sift through information available through the internet. So, no, not everything you read on the internet is true. And, it is our job as future educators to teach our students that. In addition to teaching our future students about everything on the interest not being true, it is our job to teach them out to decipher whether it is true or not and if it helps them find the answer they are looking for.

The internet is changing literacy as we know it. As it was mentioned in the slideshow, children (and adults) do more online reading than offline reading. So how do we teach our children to be competent when it comes to online reading?? Let’s break it up into parts.

The first part is questioning. We need to teach our students to be able to restate a question and forumulate keywords from that question. This means taking questions and basically making it easier for them to type in into a search engine to find the answer they’re looking for.

The second part is locating. We need to teach our students to use different search engines then be able to decide which website to go to to look for their answer.  This also includes being able to ignore unnecessary information that pops up within that website.

The third part is evaluation. This is when the student should be able to decide if the information they have found meets their needs. In addition, students should be able to tell if the information they found is credible to not.

The fourth part is to synthesize. This is when students begin to figure out what information to ignore when reading online, the useless information. This is the part when students are able to figure out that they have found their answer.

The fifth part is communication. In this final part of online reading comprehension, students will be able to communicate the conclusion, or answer they have come up with based on their research.

I have decided to include each part of online reading comprehension because I think each part is important for us to teach our children. I believe that breaking it into parts also makes it for the students to grasp in the long run.

The video (https://youtu.be/fiGabUBQEnM) where John Seely Brown discusses entrepreneur learning I thought was a great resource. He explains that an entrepreneur learning is someone who is always looking for new ways and ideas to go about completing tasks. I had never heard the term “entrepreneur learner” and really liked that term. He explains that to learn it, you have to be IN IT! I love this! As an early education major, I am all about the students being “in it” through play and active experiences in the classroom. Mr. Brown also pointed out how teachers should be a coach, mentor and coordinator to the kids. This goes hand-in-hand with Piaget’s beliefs. Piaget believed that teachers should be a facilitator of learning. Mr. Brown also mentions how learning is social. Again, this goes with other theorists’ beliefs… Lev Vygotsky.

In conclusion, I do think it is important for us to teach online reading comprehension to our students. However, I think it should be through a trial and error type way. I do think it is important because our society is moving toward such a  digital age and we need to prepare our kids the best we can.