Literacy and democracy – A repost

November 12, 2013 Leave a comment

digitalwordcloudEffective communication is the cornerstone of a democratic and literate society. And everyone has the right to engage freely. There are few people in the western world who would disagree with this. But the reality is that there are groups of people who have a much more limited capacity to communicate, than perhaps, a generation ago.

To understand why this is, we must first understand the nature of a ‘literate society’. The boundaries of literacy are changing. Where once, literacy meant being able to read and write, these days literacy necessarily incorporates use of the various technologies and platforms utilised to interact meaningfully in society.

So much of our interaction occurs online, that limited access to the hardware (smartphones, tablets, laptops, etc) means limited engagement. Shopping, watching television, booking accommodation and travel, or movie and concert tickets, paying bills, banking, and importantly – socialising, is increasing conducted in cyberspace. True, these are all first-world activities, but our reality is that if we cannot (or do not or will not) engage at this level, we cannot effectively consume or contribute to the society in which we live.

To all but the digital natives, these things do not come naturally. They need to be taught. And while once teaching our kids to read and write meant arming them with literacy for life, now teaching literacy means so much more than reading and writing. Literacy has become much more about being able to consume and create a range of multimedia in multimodal formats. Teaching kids to become life-long contributing literate members of society means providing them with the skills to decode a range technologies not yet invented, for purposes not yet defined, to engage in occupations not yet created or identified.

But what happens when subsections of the community are not able to access the tools required to become literate entities in this new and emerging technological environment? Are they relegated to a further position of disadvantage because of it? And who might these people be? The answers to these questions may surprise you. It’s not only socio-economic disadvantage that precludes people from engaging meaningfully.
Even if people do have access to the necessary hardware, if we don’t have the knowledge or skills to teach kids effective literacy, how do we teach them appropriate social and economic engagement?

And it’s not just kids who are in danger of becoming less-than-literate in a 21st century sense. There is a generation of older people who have not had access to digital instruction, and their children and grandchildren (gen x-ers and y-s) who may have adopted the technology but are self-taught and not necessarily offay with the ins and outs of effective engagement. It’s these generations who tend to leave themselves wide open and are overrepresented as victims of hackers, identity theft or trolls. And it’s these same generations who are teachers and parents. Therein lay the issue.

Kids are starting school with the knowledge and expectation that they can and will engage and perform technologically at a level that, more often than not, surpasses that of the adults in their lives. Parents and teachers want to do the best by their kids, but working in schools, I get to see both ends of the stick. I hear about kids as young as five accessing the internet on their ipods and DSs, in their bedrooms unsupervised, and scrolling through youtube videos looking for something to watch, and inadvertently accessing a Barbie video – a pornographic parody of a Barbie video. At five years old. At the other end of the scale is the 11-year-old who is not allowed access to social media of any kind, which means she is ostracised from her peer group socially and unable to engage effectively in digital citizenship lessons at school. Both sets of parents want the best for their kids, but both are damaging their kids in irreversible ways by not having a full understanding of what it is to be literate in a digital world.

21st century literacy is about ‘reading’ danger, communicating effectively, differentiating between a ‘selfie’ and sexting. 21st century literacy is about creating meaningful content, engaging in appropriate texting, understanding cyber etiquette, and locking down your profile. 21st century literacy is about understanding copyright and plagiarism, and recognising reliable research. And most importantly 21st century literacy is about knowing how to communicate via soundbite, image, video, and text — appropriately, positively, comfortably and meaningfully. How literate are you in the 21st century?

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Academia versus Creativity

October 1, 2013 2 Comments

keep-calm-and-enjoy-writing-your-story-1Something concerning is happening about the way in which young people are pressured to view writing. Writing and reading are intrinsically linked—they always have been. It’s a well-known fact that the more you read, the better you write. But the way in which young people are reading is changing, and though this is not necessarily a bad thing overall, it is having an unexpected effect on the way they view writing.

I’ve been running writers’ groups for teenagers now for four years, and even over that short amount of time, I’ve noticed some alarming changes. Creative writing seems to be taking a backseat in lieu of the more structured academic writing.

When I first began running the groups, the creative writing workshops were very popular. Teenagers seemed to enjoy them and would attend at least for a term at a time, many for a semester, but most came for a year. They enjoyed the exercises and loved developing a creative work from the ground up. But it began to wane.

I wondered why. It couldn’t have been cost because I hadn’t put my prices up over the four years. It wasn’t content because the evaluations kept telling me they enjoyed the range of exercises and writing games.

But this year I have had many more requests for ‘essay-writing’ workshops than I have had for ‘creative-writing’ workshops. I’ve had students show up to groups expecting to be hot-housed for Selective schools, or for HSC, and then dropping out when they discover that the groups are designing to encourage people to engage with the process, take risks with their writing, but mostly to enjoy writing.

“My dad is not paying for me to have fun,” one boy told me when I asked him why he was not coming back. He was in Year 9. Fourteen-years-old. I felt incredibly sad for him. But he was annoyed with me for refusing to approach the teaching of writing with high expectations, lots of homework, and hard-core pressure.

In all the years I’ve been teaching, both primary and high school,  and running writers’ group, I have found that a student learns much more easily when they are engaged with the process and enjoy what they do. And importantly, writing skills are transferable. Many parents, and some students themselves, seem to be oblivious about this.

When someone learns to write narrative, they learn to structure their sentences to convey meaning. They learn to use the technical conventions necessary (particularly grammar and punctuation) to communicate emotion, represent character, set the scene, and dictate rhythm. Writing narrative successfully is no piece of cake. But it can be a lot of fun! Exercises to create character, strengthen description, convey emotion, for example, are specifically designed to fine-tune the technical aspects of writing.

Developing and maintaining a narrative arc and ensuring a consistent plot provides a challenge to many an adult writer of fiction. But with rich imaginations still relatively intact, kids are natural storytellers. And developing the skills to communicate their thoughts effectively is enriching in so many ways.

Not only does it give them an opportunity to exercise their creativity, it helps them to develop a clear focus and alternative means of communicating (or escaping from) their realities — whatever their realities are.

When a student has to write an essay, they need to develop a coherent argument. They need to communicate simply and persuasively. They need to use correct grammar and punctuation, and write effective sentences and paragraphs. And in the case of exams, they need to do it spontaneously.

All these skills are developed and practised while writing narrative. The more one writes— no matter what style of writing—the better ones writes. The more ones reads, the better one writes. The more comfortable one is writing, the better one writes.

Learning to write is so important. Why spoil it for kids by placing so much pressure on them to write academically that they never get to enjoy it? When kids disengage from the writing process, by default they disengage with the reading process. This is never a good thing.

Let kids write. And let them enjoy it.

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What do teens and seniors have in common?

August 25, 2013 Leave a comment

olderwriters“We live in a changing world. Multi-modal communication is a fact of 21st Century life. And in the context of the developed world, that means no one need be socially isolated— irrespective of local or global geography. It means the condition of physical or mental health, or socio-economics, is less of a determining factor to engagement and acceptance, than it once may have been. As long as one can write well. “

This paragraph was in the middle of a post I wrote a few months back about the importance of writing well. The post focussed on teaching kids to write well as a process of empowering them to participate fully in a changing society. The core theme of the post was about people finding themselves at a great disadvantage by not being able to communicate effectively in an electronic environment.

Recently, I was chatting to a group of older people about my teen Writers’ Groups. Sometimes I can get carried away by my passion for teaching writing, and this particular occasion was no exception. But at a lull in the conversation, one of the conversation participants told me that he really wanted to learn to write well. I was surprised.

The man told me he was about to retire from working life and wanted nothing more than to write his father’s life story. I thought that was a fabulous project for him to embark on and told him so. He then explained the barriers he faced. He was mid sixties and had a background in science so had never really learned to write in the style necessary to write memoir or narrative. He said that for the last 45 years of his life, he had not written much at all.

The conversation turned to other barriers facing older people as they left the workforce and a big one that seemed fairly common among the group was the use of technology. They could mostly use email, but as one woman said, hardly anyone emails anymore; instead “…they SMS (short message service) and DM (direct message), IM (instant message), PM (private message) and AM (???). I asked what AM was, and amid a lot of laughter, was told it didn’t matter because none of them knew what any of the Ms meant. And that was the problem— they couldn’t communicate with their families anymore because people rarely used the phone to talk, no one could read their handwriting because it wasn’t “a standard font”, and email was passé.

I’ve been going over and over this conversation in my head now for weeks. And I realised that I’d been so focussed on providing services to develop teen writing so that young adults could become effective social participants that it had never occurred to me older people were equally as vulnerable. I had written about barriers to technology for people before, in the context of literacy and democracy, but had not necessarily considered the plight of older people specifically.

But it’s true. The speed at which technology is not only developing, but is integrated into everything we do is mind-boggling. Even for an early adopter, like me. Just when you have a handle on a particular piece of technology, it’s obsolete and the next edition is out. But what has all this got to do with writing?

Back to my group of older Australians, “writing has changed so much since we were at school,” they said. “That even my basic written expression alienates me from my grandkids.”

It’s true, I suppose. Technology has changed the way we write in so many ways, leaving whole demographics confused and disoriented. So what am I doing about it? I am broadening my focus and as requested by my group of older friends, I am starting a Writers Group for Seniors.

Interested? Drop me a line!

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Publishers, cybersafety and the real world

August 4, 2013 Leave a comment

whoareyouA few years ago when I began submitting the novel FAKE PROFILE to publishers, one of them said to me: “Is this really an issue for kids that young? The story has to be believable.” For those of you who don’t know, FAKE PROFILE is about a group of 13-and-14-year-old friends. A few of them create a fake Facebook profile for one of the others as a joke. It starts off being funny but when a post goes viral, it ends up having devastating consequences that none of them could have predicted.

When that particular publisher asked the question, I was a bit annoyed. After all, I was the one who worked with teenagers of the age for which I was writing. I was the one who conducted Social Media Safety seminars for students, parents and teachers. And I was the one who had quizzed students about their social media use before, during and after writing the book.

Last year I asked a class of Year 7 students at the high school where I’d been teaching writing, which of them had a Facebook profile, 29 out of 29 students indicated in the affirmative. When I asked whether anyone had created one in a name other than their own, 11 out of 29 students indicated they had. That’s almost a third!

My ‘research’ on teenage use of Social Media is informal and anecdotal, it always has been. But in this weekend’s Sydney Morning Herald, there is a story informed by research conducted by Newspoll on behalf of The Australian Media and Communication Authority about the demographic most likely to be cyberbullied. There is no surprise (at least not to me) that the “most likely candidate for cyber-bullying is a 14 year old girl who checks her Facebook account daily”.

The report states that “Girls aged 12 to 17 who used Facebook daily were most likely to be cyber-bullied. Within that cohort, 38 per cent had ended a friendship over their bad experience, 32 per cent had a face-to-face confrontation and 41 per cent had felt “nervous about going to school the next day”.

It’s interesting that the very issue about which FAKE PROFILE was written two years ago should be highlighted in the media today. Actually, it’s not as interesting as it is concerning. Use of social media and cyberbullying have been issues for years; it’s only now that it is getting the publicity it needs for people to become aware and informed about it.

Parents and teachers are in the best position to educate and support teens on their use of social media, but first they need to educate and inform themselves about this very real, and very concerning issue. Perhaps that’s why FAKE PROFILE is read in equal numbers by adults and teens, and why teachers kept asking for a teaching program (which will be ready very soon) to accompany the book for use in the classroom.

And THAT publisher? Well, as FAKE PROFILE continues to gain traction in schools, he may well be wishing he’d been a little better informed himself.

FAKE PROFILE is available here. A Stage 4 English Teaching Program based on the new National Curriculum due to be implemented in schools across Australia can be pre-ordered here.

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Calling all Australian Authors

July 29, 2013 Leave a comment

Writers’ Web is an Australian initiative geared toward providing Australian authors with an alternative to the plethora of online book distributors popping up all over the place. I recently chatted to the team from Writers’ Web to see what it was all about.

writersweb

What is writers’ web?

Everyone knows that a farmers’ market connects the producer direct to the buyer. writers’ web is just like that but for writers – it connects would-be authors directly with readers online to create a community of readers and writers.

It’s really only been possible because of the changes to the publishing industry and technology. Publishers are no longer gatekeepers to the release of new books. YouTube allows musicians to showcase their work direct to the public and now writers’ web does something similar for Australian writers.

How did you come up with the idea?

Everyone knows the story of JK Rowling having the Harry Potter manuscript rejected by publishers, 12 in total. If she had given you her manuscript, you would have passed the word to ten of your friends and them to ten of their friends, going viral. In today’s connected world, this is entirely possible and the idea that underpins writers web. We’d love to discover the next big Australian writer.

Like many good ideas it involved a glass of wine! A few years ago at our bookclub, co-founder Emma Mactaggart was lamenting how easy it is to get stuck in a publisher’s slush pile – it’s so demoralising not to hear anything from publishers after you’ve submitted a manuscript.

It’s this bottleneck that prevents writers getting their work out into the public domain. “Why not change the paradigm?” piped up now partner in writers’ web, Janet Kieseker. And so we did. It took a few years to work through the logistics and technical side of things before we launched at the end of 2011.

How does it work for writers?

Writers complete an online registration form, then submit information to build their writer profile and so we can put their book into our online shop. Our reviewers are invited to read the work and review it. Reviews are posted here. Authors may then use these reviews in their own promotional material.

What is the cost to writers?

There are no up-front costs for writers. We take a 35% commission on book sales.

Is it only for eBooks?

No, writers who have produced hard copy books can be part of writers’ web (WW).

What are the benefits for writers?

There are lots of advantages for writers, including:

  • There is no rejection – every book or manuscript we receive (as long as the content is not inappropriate) goes out to our reviewers for their feedback
  • Using the feedback from the reviewers to refine their work
  • A means of promoting emerging Australian writers for no up-front cost
  • Helps writer “discoverability” to targeted Australian reading audiences and as a possible springboard to publishers
  • Speeds up the process of getting a work into reader/purchaser hands
  • Provides an exclusive or additional promotional channel for authors and their books
  • Builds an author’s reading and purchasing networks
  • A channel to sell their books.

Are you currently looking for more writers?

YES! We have over 120 reviewers in our system waiting to read the works of writers.

Which genres can writers submit?

Both fiction and non-fiction genres are covered and if there’s enough interest in a genre other than the ones we currently offer, we will look at including it.

Non-fiction

  • Biography/memoir
  • Cooking/food/wine
  • How to
  • Articles

Fiction

  • Chick lit
  • Children’s
  • Comedy
  • Crime/mystery
  • Fantasy
  • General fiction
  • Literary fiction
  • Historical fiction
  • Romance
  • Short story
  • Young adult

Writers’ web sounds like a perfect hunting ground for publishers looking for some fresh talent – is that the idea?

Yes, writers’ web complements traditional publishing by providing a chance to demonstrate commercial viability as an author to “traditional” publishers. In today’s competitive market, proven authors have a higher degree of success in securing deals. We would love to be the go-to place where writers “get spotted” by mainstream publishers through the reader reviews and reader profiles on the site.

It’s for emerging Australian writers – how do you define them?

They might be self-published, unpublished, with an edited manuscript or traditionally published through a publisher with a new work not taken up by that publisher. Or already published authors looking for a new way to promote their book.

What’s in store for the next 12 months?

We look forward to having more emerging writers join us. We would be thrilled to discover the next big name Australian author!

Written answers provided by writers’ web. For more information, visit the website at writers’ web. Or email them here. They’re a friendly bunch who would be very happy to answer any queries you may have.

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Can Pozible make it Possible?

July 27, 2013 Leave a comment

possibleAn International Conference accepted an abstract for my paper on how technology is changing the way readers read and the way writers write. I’m over the moon! It’s a wonderful opportunity for me to take to the world stage to present my work.

But in my enthusiasm and excitement about being accepted to present at the conference, I’d overlooked one small detail. The conference is in Greece. And I don’t have the capacity to get there.

Friends and colleagues urged me to explore the crowdfunding option and I resisted for a while. But after overcoming the initial fear, I’ve decided to go ahead. With a bit of a push (or rather, a massive shove) and a reminder that it is not a process of randomly soliciting money, I have put myself out there to offer what I have and what I can do, in exchange for funds that will enable me to travel to Greece to deliver my paper.

Pozible is the crowdfunding site I’ve chosen to list my project with. It’s an all or nothing site, which means if the total goal is not met the funds do not exchange hands.

It operates on a system of rewards. A person may contribute any amount they choose to the project; there is no minimum or maximum.  But there are set amounts at which contributors may select a ‘reward’. The rewards vary according to the amount of funds contributed, and will be delivered at a time negotiated after the completion of the campaign.

The rewards are of most benefit to teachers and writers, as these are the areas in which my expertise lay. I am also offering paperback copies of my novel Fake Profile, or eBooks.

For writers: you may want an article or blog post written for your newsletter, website or blog. There are also Writers’ Workshops, manuscript edits and advertising space on my website for your books.

For teachers: professional development opportunities on Social Media Literacy and Cybersafety; or a seminar on the emerging MetaLiteracy environment students are engaged in.

I would love you to check out the campaign. See if there is anything there that benefit you or your colleagues, and jump on board to help me get to the conference.

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Crowdfunding for Writers

July 22, 2013 Leave a comment

crowdfundingLike most writers, I have to work to support my writing. While I am very lucky to be able to earn enough to eat and pay bills, I yearn for the day when I can throw myself into my writing without having to worry about finding the extra funds necessary to pay a professional editor, graphic designer, and publicist for my books.

Imagine my surprise when, recently, someone suggested to me that I list my current project on one of the crowd-funding sites available to creative artists to source the necessary funding. Now I’ve always assumed that if it ‘seems too good to be true’ then it probably is. And being able to list a writing project online and have money pour in from unknown sources, in different amounts to reach a predetermined goal amount set by me, seemed way too good to be true. So began an extensive investigation into the phenomenon of crowdfunding.

Crowdfunding is the concept of an individual, usually a creative artist, receiving small contributions via the internet from many sources in order to finance a particular project or venture. It evolved out of the crowd-sourcing movement where one might solicit content, a service or project online from multiple contributors all over the world. It’s a business model borne out technological globalisation where anyone, anywhere that has the required skill has the opportunity to provide a service. Individuals and businesses alike are increasingly turning to crowdsourcing as an alternative means of reducing costs.

There are many sites for the purpose of crowdfunding, and more are popping up all the time. How it works it this: you list a project on whichever site you choose, and offer some form of award to contributors, for example, a musician crowdfunding to make an album might offer copies of the album, a writer may offer copies of the book, etc. You set an end date for the campaign and then publish and promote your campaign to all your online networks. People then pledge contribute amounts of as little as $1 to as much as thousands. If your target is reached by the end date nominated, the site releases the funds to you, minus their fees and charges, at which point you are obligated to release whatever rewards have been claimed. But if you do not reach your target, no money changes hands.

But it’s not as easy as it sounds. Most sites are ‘all or nothing’ sites, where if a particular campaign, so even you fall short just a bit, you don’t get the funds. Because the campaign takes place online, it’s important to have already established online networks. A fan base, so to speak. It is, after all, these contacts that you will be calling on to fund your project. And as with any venture you embark on online, there is fine line between promoting your project, and spamming your contacts. Much caution is required to walk this line.

Some fabulous projects have been funded using the crowdfunding model, albums, books, documentaries and movies, to list a few. But many many more have failed due to the project listers displaying more enthusiasm than project management skill. Running a campaign requires hard work and lot of preparation as well as strong belief in the project mixed with a heart-felt enthusiasm.

I spent quite a bit of time browsing the various sites based here in Australia, and overseas. And I found that crowdfunding is branching out further to include such initiatives such as educational scholarship and university research.

The socialist in me quite likes the concept of sharing financial resources to enable talent to be developed equitably. The capitalist in me likes the idea of investing in a project that will, in turn, give back to the economy. But the human side of me struggles with the idea of putting myself, and my work, out there and asking others to contribute to its development.

Regular readers may know that in addition to writing, teaching writing, and writing about the writing process, I’m also doing a PhD in Writing. You could say writing is my passion.

Still, I’d been struggling with the concept and notion of creating a crowdfunding campaign to get my second novel published and I remained a little ambivalent about using the crowdfunding model for myself.

But then, as a writer and academic researcher, I was presented with a fabulous opportunity where crowdfunding was the only realistic option that would enable me to accept it.

I had an abstract accepted to present a paper at an international conference on Writing. And I am about to step way outside my comfort zone to embark on the campaign of my life to be able to present my paper, which is about how technology is changing the way we write, at the conference.

Check out my Pozible Campaign!

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