IDK. Go Google It.

I define literacy as the ability to read and comprehend what you are reading. But to me, that doesn’t always mean reading a book, magazine, or other printed materials. So much of my world as a student involves being literate in the online and virtual setting. I need to be able to read really, really, long, boring psychology textbooks one minute and navigating the internet for a 10-page research paper the next. I think there needs to be a balance between text-based and other forms of writing. We’re in a society that is so far beyond what it was in technology 50 years ago that we have no idea what it is going to be like for our kids in 20. I think it’s important for a student to know how to interpret writings that a critic might have written on Shakespeare 100 years ago; but also when reading a less formal form of composition, like a blog, that may not be as in-depth. I’ve never been much of a blog writer; I like structure. But you need to be able to compose in all different forms because you never know what a school assignment, or even a boss, might ask you to do. The English language has expanded into so much more than just stuffy old men cooped up in libraries writing about boring topics. There are blogs, journals, research papers, websites, etc, etc, etc. English classrooms should learn to expand too. I read a book almost every day, and spend – god knows – how many hours on my laptop looking up research for classes. There’s a balance. And personally, I love Google. I Google all the time. =]