Literacy Technologies

Template A – Assessment Task 1 – Investigation 1

1.      Build a timeline and record the most significant literacy and numeracy technologies (crayons, pencils, picture books, records, ipods, etc) that you have used and the year in which you first used them.

2.      Next, write the reasons that you began to use each item of new technology.

3.      Finally, recall your initial reaction to the new technology; if your initial reaction has changed record when and why it changed.

Year/s	Literacy Technologies	Reasons for use	Initial Reactions	Later Reactions
1970	Pencils, crayons, chalk, paper, picture books & charts.	Primary school education.	The only memory I have of these early years involves some interaction through plays (role-playing) mainly used in English and the use of charts which were popular for reciting times tables as a whole class.	Upon reflecting now, these are so basic even for today’s students at Prep; let alone, in year one.  Today my son (5 y.o. in Prep) uses the same for only part of their learning and more-so an interactive whiteboard, iPad & desktop PC with internet capability.
1975	Blackboards.	Primary school education.  Teacher allowed use of their blackboard predominantly for English & math lessons to test our recall knowledge.	No memory of my reaction to use.	Whenever I see a blackboard now, I recall my years in public and private educational institutions.  Lessons mainly involved rote learning and you were instructed on “how to learn, as well as, what to learn”.  A teacher was feared and demanded respect.   You either learnt or were punished.  No choice.
c1980	Tape players, Beta and VHS video players & calculator	Secondary school education.  Although limited application.	I remember being alert to the fascination of the world beyond my classroom and seeing the country and other areas of Australia on TV that I had never seen before.  It was different and inspiring.  However, you only got to use advanced literacy technologies; like the tape player or a Beta or VHS video, if you behaved. Tape players were used to coach us in foreign language classes such as year 9 French classes.  This was great.	Tape players played a vital part in my life providing a medium for further education via post-secondary correspondence courses in the early 1980’s.  They also provided entertainment as the medium for music sales.  I no longer found this technology useful once CD’s came into existence in the mid 90’s.
Year/s	Literacy Technologies	Reasons for use	Initial Reactions	Later Reactions
1982	·  Type writer – daisy wheel ·  Electronic type-writer ·  Word processor	Post-secondary education and office work	I was excited to learn how to touch type using all fingers and thumbs.  However, when mistakes were made, and often, corrections were difficult.  Realignment of document, using liquid paper to cover up and then the daisy wheel made auto-correction possible.  All you had to do was hit the X to erase the last character typed or continue to hit to erase a whole word or sentence.	It wasn’t long before the electronic type-writer entered the market.  Much faster and easier to erase errors.   Soon to be replaced by the word processor.  Basically, the first computer of sorts.  A personal computer with build-in word processing software and nothing else.  A small thin rectangular LED display on the front could show about 100 characters.  Fantastic.  How good was this.  A lot to learn in a short time; but, hang on for the ride, that’s not all …
1983	Commodore 64 & ATARi personal computers, TV monitor & 5.25 inch floppy disc.	Complete a correspondence course on personal computers.	These tools allowed tutors to deliver correspondence courses to remote students in a more engaging and personal manner. The onset of the computer and 5.25 inch floppy disc changed my life, allowing data to be saved and forwarded to others as a means of communication.  Mostly prefilling specific program forms.	Without an introduction to these systems early in my life I doubt that I would have followed a career path leading into administrative supervision and eventual management positions.   Regardless, these technologies are now out-dated and of no more interest to me other than history.  As software and PC systems developed rapidly I had to relearn continuously and attend many courses.  The development of the office software packages like Lotus works and Microsoft changed correspondence from written to word-processed documents.
c1986	·  Mainframe systems ·  PC Networks ·  3.5 inch FDD ·  Internal HDD ·  The Internet & Email!!!	Mainframe systems provided me with my first administrative job as a data entry operator.  Basically, codifying as much of the paper-based information within a business as possible.  I thought I was at the pinnacle of working with technology.   I could write code to filter specific information from thousands of files and produce an overnight	I was excited by the changes going on around me and engaged rapidly and freely in wanting to learn about as much as possible.  Learning was fun, as everything was new and advanced.  I wanted to be a pioneer in using new technologies in my workplace.  I knew this would improve things and make it easier for all and from this I would also gain recognition and security.  I loved to share my knowledge with others and found great satisfaction from	And now we move forward very quickly dispensing with prior technologies, yet building upon our technological knowledge and know-how.   We’re riding the technology boom ... still the technological developments were occurring faster than the ability to communicate these changes.  That is, by time the end user had obtained and learnt how to use their new technology, a new development had been born and was on its way to market.  This was my era.  If I was having issues trying to keep abreast of the developments as an employee in industry, what opportunity had the students of this time had to prepare themselves?  Answer, impossible given the slow change of education.  This era required industries to become more flexible and respond to
Year/s	Literacy Technologies	Reasons for use	Initial Reactions	Later Reactions
		report.  Beat that! What about communicating with other businesses (B2B) without having to leave your desk or speak a word.  Email.  A gift or a curse?	establishing new systems to include these technologies to better our workplace.   I first used the internet to communicate B2B and established a credit referencing system for Greyhound Australia.  I did not understand the power of such communication at the time.	frequently changing demands.  I also had to adopt a similar outlook toward learning for the future.  I learnt to do this and soon became a vital asset for industry in the near future.  I never dreamed what might be possible given the internet or the present pace of technological hardware & software developments.  Maybe today many students still have not developed the ability to reflect on the past, examine current reliable information and to think about their future possibilities.  I certainly never had that ability as a student in the 70’s & 80’s and did not develop this skill until a manager in the early 90’s.  Upon reflection, I thank my schooling for developing me as a person who could do great things when he is provided the information (a resilient machine of sorts); however, they failed to provide me with the skills to research and process information for a changing environment.  Hence, after obtaining this skill, I became a great “change manager” for the 90’s; yet again, falling of my perch when the knowledge economy came to fruition.  Now I have learnt that technological developments and change is something that will remain with me for my entire life.  I am now learning to relearn, developing skills to become a life-long learner and have gained more skills to cope with an uncertain future and prepare others.
c1990 – c1995	·  Analogue Mobile ·  VHS Camcorder ·  Pocket organizers ·  Video-conferencing ·  Compact disc (CD) ·  Home PC, Macintosh ·  Laptops ·  Microsoft Software ·  Proprietary software ·  PDET’s ·  Radio Frequency (RF) Infra-Red (IR)devices	I was introduced to this group of technologies through the workplace.	As will all previous technological developments I was pleased to have something else to learn about and to share with others my excitement.  This is one of the fundamental principles underpinning e-learning teaching strategies.  To engage students in an area of interest and provide a real world experience for them to donate their experience and knowledge external of the classroom.	While most of these technologies are still relevant to today’s learning and or workplace environments, with exception to analogue mobile phones, I believe they will at some stage in my future become redundant technologies in their own right.    Each of these products have undergone significant enhancements since their initial release and are likely to change again in the near future, most if not all will change several times.  Software, for example, is frequently superseded by annual releases making this an area that one must continually learn in order to remain abreast of current trends.
c2000 2009 - 2011	·  DVD & DVD R/W ·  Mini-Camcorder ·  USB Memory sticks ·  Pay TV ·  Netbooks ·  iPod, iPad & iPhone ·  Google & Twitter ·  Blogs & Wiki’s ·  Podcasts (Digital Pen’s ) ·  Vodcasts (Youtube) ·  Avatars, 2nd life ·  Flickr,Prezi,Slideshow ·  Google Docs / Earth ·  Wikipedia ·  Audio manipulation & creation (Incompetech,  Audacity, Pandora) ·  e-portfolio(Mahara) ·  RSS Feeds ·  AutoCAD 2D ·  Parametric 3D Modelling Inventor,Solidworks ·  Digital conferencing (Skype; Elluminate) ·  Learning Management Environments (Blackboard,Moodle) ·  Electronic Books ·  Online publishing (Blurb – Booksmart) ·  Abobe (Photoshop, Flash, Dreamweaver)	I have been exposed to these four technologies as part of my normal daily life over the past decade. The listed technologies have only been available within the past 5 years.  They have been discovered as part of my further education with CQU while researching better ways to engage students in the learning process using ICT’s.	Like previous technologies, I welcomed the change and engaged with them immediately or as I could afford at the time.  This highlights another educational issue of exclusion due to technological developments, availability & affordability.	I am overwhelmed by the vast amount of resources available to educators and how these could be applied to engage students in learning activities in the 21st century classroom.  My priority while still a pre-service teacher is to explore as many of these opportunities as possible and select a number that I wish to become proficient in using.  These I will then share with other educators and hope to gain further insight to other technologies from others in exchange.