Are you interested in digital literacy? Would you like to do some professional learning from the comfort of your living room? Then read on to learn about 11 upcoming opportunities to jump-start your digital literacy knowledge!
Drew University’s DrewTEACH program is offering a full slate of free virtual professional development on digital literacy this spring. Learn about topics such as collaborative annotation, fake news, and ethical communities from the comfort of your couch by registering for the free series that begins January 21 and runs through April 7. [ . . . ]Read More
For this month’s Digital Literacies Collaborative(DLC) social reading, I invite you to read and annotate Troy Hicks’ (2018) excellent piece from Voices in the Middle on “.” In addition to joining the ongoing discussion throughout the article, I especially invite you to think publicly about your next steps or goals as a teacher of digital writing.
In the article, Hicks reflects on the evolution of digital writing instruction and highlights five educators’ innovative practices. Hicks describes his purpose as follows:
Reflective digital writing educators themselves, DLC members should have a lot to say about Hicks’ suggestions for our next ten years of work. October 20 is NCTE’s National Day on Writing, so October is the perfect time to reflect on our digital writing instruction.
**Plus, Troy Hicks will be visiting Drew University on October 25 as the featured speaker to kickoff the #DrewTEACH Lecture Series.**
This is why I’m inviting DLC members (and anyone else interested in technology and/or the teaching of writing) to write about writing with me by (via Hypothes.is).
Using Hypothes.is for Social Annotation
This is not the first time educators have gathered asynchronously to annotate Hicks’ article. I must give credit to educator Kevin Hodgson (aka @dogtrax) for the original invitation to annotate Hicks’ article, which he extended this summer. Hodgson reflected on emerging themes among the annotations on his idea-filled blog, Kevin’s Meandering Mind.
When you , you will notice dozens of yellow highlighted segments of text. That’s because several readers have already annotated this article and replied to each other’s annotations.
You’ll also find a menu with options on the right-hand side of the page that pops out when you click existing annotations or begin to create a new one.
To create a new annotation, highlight a segment of the text and click “annotate.” (You will need to complete a quick sign-up via Hypothes.is.)
Pro Tip: To hide the existing annotations to view a “clean” copy of the article, simply click the eye icon on the right-hand side of your browser.
View of Hicks’ article with visible annotations.
Ready to Dig Deeper with Hypothes.is?
Once you’ve gotten a feel for Hypothes.is, you might be ready to think about using it in your classroom. Here are two resources to help you do so.
Try out the CROWDLAAERS website that can pull stats on all of the Hypothes.is annotations on a particular site. For example, paste our article’s URL in the search bar () and you’ll see all of the annotations, which can be sorted by user. (For example, you can find annotations by Troy Hicks himself on his article.)
