I found creating this blog quite a different experience to my previous experience with blogs. Setting it up was the easy part. However, in my past life blogs were one of the tools that I used for CEO’s and Manager’s to communicate more effectively with their staff so I was somewhat removed from the personal side of it in writing for another person. Being more personal was probably the most difficult part of this blogging experience for me.
Setting up a blog provided an opportunity for deeper reflection on why I might ask a class to create a blog. I have learnt that the mechanics are simple, it is the relevance of the posting that is most important, and these activities should never just be done ‘because they can be done’ but because they provide a richer experience for students.
Wednesday, March 14, 2007
Crikey! Let's look at the 'Australia Zoo' website
The Australia Zoo website at http://www.australiazoo.com.au/ provides an interesting example of multiliteracy. This site clearly has numerous purposes, including attracting visitors to the zoo; selling videos and DVD’s; providing factual information about various animals and education programs; encouraging children to become involved with the zoo through newsletters and competitions; humanitarian aid; conservation; and plain old fun stuff (Crikey!).
The various purposes of the site allow the site to be used to teach a variety of literacy skills across the key learning areas. For example, the ‘Our Animals’ section provides information about specific groups of animals, including downloadable fact sheets for later use, making it useful for science and technology (Living things); HSIE (Environment or native animals within National Parks units), and Creative Arts (animals as subjects for visual arts). Similarly, the site’s commercial activities provide opportunities for investigations into Products and Services (Science and Technology) and persuasive language (English). This site would therefore be most useful for Stage 2, Grades 3 and 4.
This website would be engaging for students because of children’s fascination with Steve Irwin and the dangerous animals that he is famous for promoting and protecting. It also has the characteristics of an effective website, as Sharpe and Dieter suggest, in Callow (1999): the download speed is fast; it is attractive and innovative; it is easy to find information through various navigation paths; it is up to date (despite appearing to be outdated with references and introductions by Steve Irwin remaining after his death); and information is organised logically and segmented accordingly.
The site uses words, graphics and images to get its various messages across. The text on the site is well-written and the tone of voice varies depending on the purpose. For example, introductions and the ‘Adopt-an-animal’ sections are often more colloquial and typical of the stereotype of easy-going Australians, whereas factual sections of the site use more formal, technical language. Various text types are used throughout, depending on the purpose of the section. For example, commercial and call-to-action sections of the site could be used to demonstrate persuasive grammar, including modal verbs and adverbs, and evaluative language as part of an exposition text type. The ‘Our Animals’ sections could be used to demonstrate an information report, using general nouns, action and relating verbs, and technical terms to describe the various animals at the zoo.
The site is bright, and colourful. The dominant colours are green and gold (yellow) symbolizing the ‘Australianism’ of the site with a complementary palette of ‘nature’ tones – blues, greens and browns. Sections of information are presented within a central frame and a column on the right of the screen provides additional functional information or links (eg. Calendar, DVD advertisements, newletter sign-up, survey). At the very bottom of the home page is a table with a series of logos linking to other affiliated or supported sites. Disappointingly, there is no audio on this site (what about a ‘roar’?)
On loading, the home page has numerous image animations that slide in and bounce up. The logo is one of the first images to transition onto the page and this image changes according to special events throughout the year. The main banner takes up almost half of the space on the screen before the fold line, making it the most salient point along with an animated image of tickets for purchase to visit the zoo. Each of the images used on the home page banner creates a strong demand without being overwhelming as the framing and size of the images are roughly equal. The human subjects looking directly at the user effectively adds to the ‘personal’ tone of this site and the ‘pleading’ to join the family and support wildlife conservation.
Overall, this site provides loads of opportunities for teaching across curriculum areas and it also has stickiness – it encourages users to return- using competitions, diary entries and interactivity such as emails to Bindi or Zoo Keepers. I think other teachers will also find this useful for teaching various texts types, and visual literacy and spatial literacy, amongst other things.
The various purposes of the site allow the site to be used to teach a variety of literacy skills across the key learning areas. For example, the ‘Our Animals’ section provides information about specific groups of animals, including downloadable fact sheets for later use, making it useful for science and technology (Living things); HSIE (Environment or native animals within National Parks units), and Creative Arts (animals as subjects for visual arts). Similarly, the site’s commercial activities provide opportunities for investigations into Products and Services (Science and Technology) and persuasive language (English). This site would therefore be most useful for Stage 2, Grades 3 and 4.
This website would be engaging for students because of children’s fascination with Steve Irwin and the dangerous animals that he is famous for promoting and protecting. It also has the characteristics of an effective website, as Sharpe and Dieter suggest, in Callow (1999): the download speed is fast; it is attractive and innovative; it is easy to find information through various navigation paths; it is up to date (despite appearing to be outdated with references and introductions by Steve Irwin remaining after his death); and information is organised logically and segmented accordingly.
The site uses words, graphics and images to get its various messages across. The text on the site is well-written and the tone of voice varies depending on the purpose. For example, introductions and the ‘Adopt-an-animal’ sections are often more colloquial and typical of the stereotype of easy-going Australians, whereas factual sections of the site use more formal, technical language. Various text types are used throughout, depending on the purpose of the section. For example, commercial and call-to-action sections of the site could be used to demonstrate persuasive grammar, including modal verbs and adverbs, and evaluative language as part of an exposition text type. The ‘Our Animals’ sections could be used to demonstrate an information report, using general nouns, action and relating verbs, and technical terms to describe the various animals at the zoo.
The site is bright, and colourful. The dominant colours are green and gold (yellow) symbolizing the ‘Australianism’ of the site with a complementary palette of ‘nature’ tones – blues, greens and browns. Sections of information are presented within a central frame and a column on the right of the screen provides additional functional information or links (eg. Calendar, DVD advertisements, newletter sign-up, survey). At the very bottom of the home page is a table with a series of logos linking to other affiliated or supported sites. Disappointingly, there is no audio on this site (what about a ‘roar’?)
On loading, the home page has numerous image animations that slide in and bounce up. The logo is one of the first images to transition onto the page and this image changes according to special events throughout the year. The main banner takes up almost half of the space on the screen before the fold line, making it the most salient point along with an animated image of tickets for purchase to visit the zoo. Each of the images used on the home page banner creates a strong demand without being overwhelming as the framing and size of the images are roughly equal. The human subjects looking directly at the user effectively adds to the ‘personal’ tone of this site and the ‘pleading’ to join the family and support wildlife conservation.
Overall, this site provides loads of opportunities for teaching across curriculum areas and it also has stickiness – it encourages users to return- using competitions, diary entries and interactivity such as emails to Bindi or Zoo Keepers. I think other teachers will also find this useful for teaching various texts types, and visual literacy and spatial literacy, amongst other things.
Tuesday, March 13, 2007
Welcome to my literacy-linx blog
Where to begin? How to teach multiliteracies? These are the questions that I hope to answer in this blog.
I have found some great websites as examples and have decided on ‘Australia Zoo’. I am now convinced that there is a subliminal message in that ‘Bindi Kidfitness’ CD that my girls have played everyday (numerous times a day) since Christmas, but nevertheless…
I have found some great websites as examples and have decided on ‘Australia Zoo’. I am now convinced that there is a subliminal message in that ‘Bindi Kidfitness’ CD that my girls have played everyday (numerous times a day) since Christmas, but nevertheless…
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