This stupid presentation

Regardless of whether I end up in Lubbock, and more on those roadblocks later, I have to come up with this presentation for the session; but the damned thing is making me crazy. I can’t figure out what the hell I’m trying to say. Maybe I’m in that stupid place that we all end up in when we have a title/abstract that made sense months ago but now doesn’t make sense anymore.

So where am I? This is the abstract:

“Don’t Think of the Technologies: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate” George Lakoff in Don’t Think of an Elephant, suggests that we need to know our own values and reframe debates based on those values, not on others’ conception of what we do. This presentation describes the values embedded within NCTE’s successful and popular ReadWriteThink website and the practices that grow out of such values. ReadWriteThink is based on the premise that sustainable digital environments must focus not on the technologies themselves, but on the literacies and pedagogies they support. Accordingly, when people ask how to use software to teach, they are in turn asked how they already teach–or aspire to teach. The advice they receive then emphasizes how technologies can support their current or future practice.

Okay, I can use the "Don’t Think of the Technologies" part of the title; that
really is the point. We have to focus on the literacy instruction, not the technologies
that we’re using as part of the instruction. Sure "the medium is the message,"
but we need to foreground on the message part. And naturally we talk about
how the medium shapes the message and vice-versa. But if asked what we teach,
we focus on the message, the communication, rather than the medium, whatever
it may be—it’s always some technology.

So right, I can deal with the pre-colonic. The post-colonic though. Sigh. Okay,
"Know Your Values" works too. Our values lead us to focus on the literacy
interaction, the message. Moreover, they focus our attention on whether and how
the technologies fit the literacy interaction in question. Our values are what
ends up focusing our efforts on the discrepancies among definitions of technology
in education. As dear Cindy explained:

The prevailing cultural understanding of [technological literacy] as simple competence
with computers serves to misdirect the energy put into the national
project to expand technological literacy—limiting the effectiveness
of literacy instruction as it occurs within schools and homes in this country
and hindering efforts to formulate increasingly complex and robust accounts
of technological literacy. (xx, Technology and Literacy in the Twenty-First
Century)

Not only do we consider how these differences affect our teaching,but we
also ask students to pay attention to how these definitions shape their
interactions with the world around them. It’s oppositional in a way—to
focus on the ways that technology in education goes beyond simple "competence
with computers" we are better off focusing on the educational goals and
allowing the technology part of the equation to slip into place naturally.
It can be simpler to expand technological literacy by taking the focus
off the technology and attending to the literacy. That all feels okay to
me. I can come up with something that relates to that part of the title.

Where I run into the biggest trouble is the "Frame the Debate" part of
the title. What debate was I imagining that anyone needed to frame? To
be honest, I can’t tell you. I’m not sure who exactly it is that I’m debating.
I guess the debate is over how we talk about technology in education; but
who am I trying to convince of that position? Darned if I know. Maybe the
point is that it’s not a debate for us so much as the conversation. If
the "prevailing cultural understanding of [technological literacy] as simple competence
with computers"—and I believe that it still is—then we
need to talk about technologies in education in ways that focus on the
cultural values that are in line with our own values. When we talk about
digital technology in the English language arts, composition, or literature
classroom, too often what others here is a discussion of competence with
those technologies rather than significant literacy education. There are many
ways that we talk about and identify what we teach:

• orality [but I think this one can’t be included if it’s to make sense?
  hmm… I dunno]
• media literacy
• visual literacy
• film literacy
• technology literacy
• multimodal literacy
• technological literacy
• game literacy [???]
• out-of-school literacy
• adult literacy
• computer literacy
• multimedia literacy
• cultural literacy
• information literacy
• adolescent literacy
• young adult literacy
• new literacy
• multiliteracies
• content area literacy [???]
• early literacy [???]
• emergent literacy [???]
• aural literacy [???]

And for us, the differences between these terms are meaningful and significant.
The challenge is that they are often meaningful and significant ONLY to
us. To the many people we encounter outside our discipline, these words
can be confusing. How well does the average family member understand the
difference between technological literacy, computer literacy, and multimodal
literacy? For that matter, would our colleagues who spend more time with
literature be able to explain such terms?

I guess this is all the "debate"—how we talk about our work
to the general public.

I guess my argument is that we have to focus on literacy, and expanding the
definition of literacy itself, rather than sub-dividing literacy and
adding descriptors that tap so many differing areas, we should focus on unifying
and expanding. I think. I dunno.

Hell, all that to just get through the title. So the abstract itself then.
You know I never write this way. Why the hell am I having to think things
through this way now? This is totally silly. But the abstract.

George Lakoff
in Don’t Think of an Elephant, suggests that we need to know our own values
and reframe debates based on those values, not on others’ conception
of what we do.

Surely I’ve dealt with that sentence. Next part.

This presentation describes the values embedded within NCTE’s
successful and popular ReadWriteThink website and the practices that grow
out of such values. ReadWriteThink is based on the premise that sustainable
digital environments must focus not on the technologies themselves, but on
the literacies and pedagogies they support.

Hmm. I should be able to do that part in my sleep. But the part that is problematic
for me is the "sustainable digital environments" piece. Well, the
word sustainable in particular. I don’t have a handy argument for the
reason that focusing on literacy leads to sustainability. Maybe the argument
is simply that technology in education has to go beyond simple competence
with computers. Whether we are talking to colleagues, students, families, administrators,
or the general public, the focus must be on the education that takes place
in the spaces rather than on the technologies in those spaces. It just feels
like such a wishy-washy argument. I need to read up on sustainability, but I
really don’t have much time left. Hell. I’ll come back to this, but let’s
get through the abstract. Next part…

Accordingly, when people ask
how to use software to teach, they are in turn asked how they already teach—or
aspire to teach. The advice they receive then emphasizes how technologies
can support their current or future practice.

Now I know what I said that part originally, and it sounds good, which is how
it got into the collaborative version of the abstract. I’m not totally sure
how it connects to ReadWriteThink however. It came from my rambling about
when I was at Daedalus. When teachers using the software (or thinking about
using the software) wanted to talk about how to use it in the classroom,
I always turned the conversation back to what they were already doing. Tell
me what you’re already teaching, tell me what you value pedagogically, and
I’ll tell you how to tap digital technologies. Don’t start with the technology.
Start with the pedagogical goals. But how do I connect any of that to ReadWriteThink?
No one is asking me how to do any of this for ReadWriteThink. Maybe I have
to pretend or conjecture here. I wish I could make those two sentences go
away.

I’m not sure where any of this leaves me. A lot of rambling and I still don’t
know completely what I am doing. Damn it all anyway. Maybe if I publish this
and reread, I’ll be able to figure it out. Or maybe I"ll skip the rereading
and go deal with the laundry instead. There’s just too much to do if I’m
to get in the car anytime soon. Bleh.