Digital Media Effects on Conventional Reading and Writing Practices

Quote 1: "Yet, the quality of what someone puts down on paper, posts online or types into a Blackberry cannot necessarily be held to a single standard of good versus bad writing.  Instead, it depends on an old concept: audience.  According to Baron, there is a difference between a grammatically suspect, poorly spelled email to your writing professor and an email sent to a friend.  In one case the quality of writing absolutely matters. In the other, it may not."

I'm not quite certain what Mr. Baron is getting at here, but grammatically suspect is grammatically suspect no matter who you're audience is. Yes, friends and close associates may understand the grammatical errors and imprecision and as long as those are the only people one need ever associate with, all's well; but we generally belong to many communities and each has a different standard or set of standards by which they judge member communication efficacy--standards that impact membership.

Choosing a word that is precise in its context than one with a little more ambiguity can be the difference in a rocket leaving the atmosphere and one that explodes at launch.

I personally feel the cognitive connection between the physical act of writing; picking up a pen or pencil and setting words to paper, and the assignment of word meaning are primal and a currently necessary basic element for achieving literacy.

Like math, reading and writing are academic yoga--they calm the mind and prompt for focus. Although it will seem a shame when the physical practice of writing disappears (as clearly it must after we've become the Borg), perhaps there will be collateral payoffs as usually is the case during great upheavals in the technological zeitgeist (i.e., the industrial revolution--the mistake  I believe many educators make, is believing there is no historical precedent for any of the radical cultural changes being coerced by current technological advances--there are).

One of the very first tools

There seems to be an implied notion in the readings that the possibility of stopping the forces of change wrought by the tech revolution exists, if we believe those changes to be somehow destructive. I believe that's fallacious thinking. The constant negotiation between people and progress will mold these new tools into powerful engines for learning and exploration and I think the simplest explanation is that people will want it. People want to know things.

Quote 2: "Some traditionalists warn that digital reading is the intellectual equivalent of empty calories. Often, they argue, writers on the Internet employ a cryptic argot that vexes teachers and parents. Zigzagging through a cornucopia of words, pictures, video and sounds, they say, distracts more than strengthens readers. And many youths spend most of their time on the Internet playing games or sending instant messages, activities that involve minimal reading at best." NYT

     If, being multi-modal means using all the tools at your behest to communicate your thoughts, ideas & concepts, then what the author is talking about here is composition. A cornucopia of words, pictures, video and sounds that conveys meaning well will be more effective than a sloppy one. Multi-modal story-telling is like building a story with sentences and paragraphs; each has a clear effect on the rhythm and design of the composition. Arts education is a perfect platform for exploring and refining mediated composition.

It is ultimately up to the academic community to explore and deploy best practices that combine those things they believe necessary as the basic building blocks of literacy.