Print vs. Electronic Texts

Well said by James R. King and David G. O'Brien from a chapter entitled "Adolescents' Multiliteracies and Teachers' Needs to Know: Toward a Digital Detente:"

"In schools, print predominates" (41).

Why? Tradition.

I think it's fair to say that some schools are technologically behind, many still clinging to lesson plans born thirty years ago. Many schools are adapting many digital strategies towards lessons, but print is still the dominant textual source.

Shouldn't schools be embracing this new surge of electronic constant access of information as a gift? I remember being a sixth grade student, and the internet was fresh and new. I was so excited to be able to access any information I wanted immediately. I could not pry myself away from the computer screen. Isn't this reaction what we want out of our students--that thirst for learning? We can promote their learning; we just need to know how to do it right, because most of us will be placed in conservative schools.

So what do we do from here? King and O'Brien suggest to give "assignments challenging enough to be interesting, yet flexible enough to provide students considerable leverage in controlling the level of difficulty" (46-47). This approach stimulates interest in assignments, gives freedom for assignments, and allows students to challenge themselves beyond the borders of the original assignment. They can intellectually grow with this allowed space to learn.

Why else would digital texts be preferred over traditional print texts?
Using digital sources "promotes increased student ownership of classroom learning," meaning that students are finding their own texts online, creating their own opinions and judgments from them, commenting on a publishing source, having a voice when they might not feel heard on lined paper handed in solely to the teacher, and displaying their work, creativity and intelligence to a national audience (46). The classroom then does not become teacher-centered, where the teacher is the sole distributer of information; the students work together in a learning community.

If we, as ELA teachers, want to promote literacy, we need to think in terms of multiliteracies, and that includes printed texts to digital texts. If we know students are interested in electronic media and texts, then we can promote their learning on that source. We can then additionally use print sources, but we must not rely predominantly on printed text sources. We must use both hand in hand, not only to stimulate interest, but to create multiliterate individuals who can communicate to a variety of audiences, both digitally and non-digitally. Communication, nowadays, is dominantly electronic, so we need to adhere to this shift and engage students further into electronic communication.