Teaching Global and Cultural Literacy through the Use of Technology
Abstract: Youth of the United States are less culturally literate than young people in many other industrialized countries. The digital era has enabled educators the opportunity to transform students’ ethnocentric point of view by accessing information across nations and cultures. This session discusses the implementation of an innovative online graduate teacher education course focusing on global perspectives. Over the course of the semester, teachers learn how to use social networking sites as a tool to cultivate a greater understanding of their own stereotypes and prejudices while learning how to enhance the global literacy of themselves and others. In addition, through the creative nature of blogging, this course provides strategies for teachers to draw on personal experiences as they develop their own network of classroom consultants across the globe to foster a greater level of cultural literacy in their students.
Presider: Diane Marks, Appalachian State University