New Literacy Project Reflection

Throughout this course, my conceptual idea of literacy has changed a lot. At the beginning of this course, I remember literacy was only reading and writing in an English language class. Thus, by doing new literacy project, I learned there are different kinds of literacy such as cultural, emotional, environmental etc. My topic was cultural literacy and at first I did not even know what it was. Though now I learned what cultural literacy is and how much it is important for children to learn about it.
I have investigated cultural literacy and used a technology PowerPoint. PowerPoint was not a new technology but I only could use basic stuff such as just adding texts, clip arts, and changing font. So, I wanted to explore more about PowerPoint such as adding sound, put animations, and download pictures from internet and put it in a slide. Our classrooms are becoming more diverse as time goes, so it is important for not only teaching reading and writing but also teach various types of literacy such as cultural. For example, last semester there was a Taiwanese ELL student in my placement. None of his classmates knew anything about Taiwan but I knew Chinese and some of Taiwanese culture. So I talked to him and showed that I know something about Taiwan. This made him to open to me and he started to ask me for help.
PowerPoint could be used in the classroom. Both as a teacher and as a student, one could use PowerPoint to present their own culture by putting sounds, pictures, videos, or other visual aids to help others to understand one’s culture.