My end of semester musings.

Literacy Self Reflection

Nobody is going to believe me, but I have been so anxious to do this reflection. I have been keeping notes for a couple months (of course, I can’t find all of them right now when I actually need them).
So the big question I am going to address is, What have I, Lauren Morrison, learned abut literacy? Well, besides learning some pretty big and impressive words, I learned something about my perceptions of what literacy is and isn’t. I believe I am going to look at literacy, and all of its entanglements with a different, possibly more critical, but way more accepting eye. I am guilty of being a book snob. I say snob, not because of quality of reading, but because of quantity. There have been times in my life where I have read two to three books a week. That may seem like zilch to a bunch of English majors, but in the world I inhabit, people think I’m smart because I read so much, and I have a vocabulary where I can throw in multi-syllabic words. It wasn’t until I started Chico State that I realized how not smart I am. The first day I was in over my head. I had never written a real academic paper; community college does not prepare students well in the art of writing. The professors are uber-bright and have high expectations, and for the most part the students challenge the professors to stay on their toes. I have witnessed and interacted with so many bright young people; it makes me wish I had gone to college when I was young. In summation, I guess I am trying to say that my interpretation of literacy and competency in literacy depends upon your point of view.

I was mulling some thoughts over in my head the other day and thought I’d share them now. Would it be completely out of the ballpark to look at literacy as a concept of comprehension? I was thinking that so much is put on this word Literacy, when it could be any word, like peanut butter. It’s all in the meaning, or gravitas, if you will, behind the word. If I am out of the ballpark, sorry Kim!

I am looking at some of my old posts, and I guess the mood left me to unpack them and examine them. What I thought I could do, is address the stuff that’s been on my mind all semester and just vent. I think it will show that there has been some true reflection.

I was going to add some textual notes to Just Girls, that I thought needed to be addressed, but now that I look over those areas again, I am uninspired. What I was thinking though, as I rummaged my bookshelves for Just Girls (it got a little dusty) was how neatly Finders’ observations and suggestions about how to change the dynamic in school with regards to literacy and practices ties in so well with my work in 21st century literacies. This is the future. This is obviously the now for some programs. Finders argues for a junior high curriculum where “cultures meet, clash, and grapple with each other, (126) where students can use their writing to “investigate the cultural conflicts that serve to define and limit their lived experience” (127). Through my research of current trends in school pedagogy, the students are doing precisely what Finders argues for. What is needed is to blanket these new ideologies and permeate them within every school district until every kid has the same kind of access and agency and opportunity. Because it was easy to see that when they had the access and agency, there was no stopping them. I was blown away at the high level of comprehension these kids brought to the table through their collaborative work.

That term, collaborative, is key, I guess. I’ve always been sort of a loner, and I have trouble finding my niche in groups. But everywhere I looked there was this clamoring for collaboration. The message seems to be that by working together, we unite diversity and challenge each other to rise to levels not possible alone.

I take the bus everyday to and from Oroville, and as the semester progressed I started watching how people practice reading and writing. There is major diversity on the bus: It swings right by the jail every morning on the way to Chico. There are college students, people who are mentally and physically challenged, some people have more teeth than others, some have darker skin than others, some haven’t washed their hair in what looks like years, there is at least one person whom I can’t tell if they are male or female,(now that’s androgyny Zoe Saldana). So in summation, there’s a lot of diversity. You get the picture. I found myself watching people on the bus, this time not for the stories they tell that might wend their way into my bestselling memoir Tales From The Bus, but for their reading and writing practices: There is the guy who reads the local paper from front to back, and from previous overheard conversations his life is no cake walk. I think there is past jail time, bouts of homelessness, and various domestic disturbances. The androgynous person reads advertising circulars from local retail establishments. I already told you about the kid I met on the bus who was reading his first book Harry Potter (sad cat meme Katelyn!). The college student who was using some kind of smart pen that scanned her notes and did some other wowzy stuff that I can’t remember, other students frantically trying to read that last chapter of a textbook. The young man with the palest blue eyes who goes at least 300lbs and is part of some work program for mentally challenged adults; he reads these steamy westerns, and sci-fi books (yes, I peeked over his shoulder one day!) The day I met the handsome young man in the back of the bus and we got started talking. He never made it past a third grade reading level he told me. He had just gotten out of a twenty-four hour stay in jail for drugs, cocaine, if I’m not mistaken. He is on parole from an 8-year stint in prison for Grand Theft Auto. He told me he boosted some kind of new truck and kept it for two weeks before he got caught. He was a well-spoken, if slightly jittery, nice young man who told me that all of his tattoos that covered his arms and I’m guessing other parts of his anatomy, were gang tattoos. He told me he is well known throughout Chico as a gang member. The reason I mention him is because he asked about me, and I told him I went to Chico State. He said, “Man, I need to get into there, I gotta keep clean and off the streets.” Like he could just walk into admissions and sign up. I, oh so kindly, suggested he look into Butte College first. The other reason I mention him, is, just a few days before I met him I was looking online for volunteer programs. I am committed to giving back someday (how’s that for rhetorical?) and I saw that they need literacy tutors for inmates with non-sexual crime backgrounds. After meeting this guy, I thought, “I can do this.” So that’s my plan. Because of this class, and meeting some stranger on a bus, I plan to get involved in this program.

The last bit I want to address is teachers in 21st century literacy. I sometimes think I want to teach at a community college, or adult school level. But this need to be current on digital trends in teaching scares me off. Who teaches the teachers? Who or what keeps them current? It seems that a teacher needs to know more than the student, so how does that look? What resources are there for dumb-asses like me who don’t know squat? Is 21st century literacy going to weed those with good intentions, but crappy skills, out? Everyone is so focused on student-learning, what about teacher-learning?
Okay, enough ranting.
Grumpy cat meme out: