David Warlick

I agree that David Warlick’s Priority of Education questions should be reversed. We as educators must ask ourselves WHAT should students learn. According to the reading and viewing I have done, I realize that educators must change with the times and current students. If instant messenger and emails are important to this generation, we as educators must find a way to integrate that type of writing into our instruction. In Warlick’s book, Redefining Literacy for the 21st Century, he states, “The challenge of this book is primarily to explore What students should be learning. If successful, the How and the How Well will follow as a matter of course, building themselves out of the context of a new literacy and the changing environment that demands it’(17). After viewing the videos and reading the weblogg-ed conversations and the Pew reports, I realized that teachers must integrate techonological social interacting into the classroom. To answer Warlick’s questions, students should be learning how to read and write/compose. Students should be learning this through authentic means such as blogs, for students are comfortable to express themselves freely. If students are allowed to use blogs in classrooms, they will learn to express their ideas with a large community and enjoy doing in.


The article “Technology and the Engaged Literacy Learner” by Linda B. Gambrell illustrates how effective internet learning can be. The internet can allow students to gain access to reading materials and information. When using the internet, “Students can pursue their interests in a range of topics and locate information from a wide range of sources”( 290). Instead of going to an encyclopedia, student can use google. This article also illustrates that classrooms that provide students with the opportunity to read online promotes student engagement with a text. Finally, the internet allows students to socially interact with others. Students can use these technological forms of social interaction to discuss texts, which helps them feel that they are taking ownership of their learning.