Adolescence and Digital Literacies

Between both of our informational texts for this course, I have been enjoying Sara Kajder's more. For whatever reason, her writing seems to make more sense to me. Don't get me wrong, the Hicks text is well written and full of useful information, but it is in a very generic textbook form. One big problem I have is reading textbooks, because they simply don't hold my attention. I could read a passage three times and still not remember a thing it said. On the other hand, Kajder is writing in something like a first person informational narrative form, and that keeps me interested! I like how she includes personal classroom experiences as well. This all makes for an enjoyable and informative read. I spent alot of time in chapter two, because I chose to include it in my research for our digital conference presentation. I really like what it had to say about how students are constanly interacting with technology rather than just using it. That is one thing I plan on stressing as a teacher: that students should add their knowledge to technology, rather than accepting only what it gives them. The situation where Kajder tells about her student Molly was inspiring. The idea that a student was able to email a poet whom she was doing research on shows just how positive the internet could be in the classroom