"The Revolution Will Not Be Televised"

Borrowing a phrase from Gill Scott-Heron's famous spoken word poem, for me, captures what the underlying tone of the Chapters 1 & 2 of Michele Knobel & Colin Lankshear, NewLits book. (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTCQSk2l8bc) In the poem, Scott-Heron juxtaposes prevalent 'images' from an everyday medium, television, and the 'real' social cultural struggles for power that impacted African American people during the sixties. He attacks the television medium in a way that highlights the power and influence of marketing and what "dominant" culture deems important. It is a call to action for people. This revolution could not be televised because it, as Scott-Heron states, "would be live". It would be an event, not a headline. (I hope my choice for an opening does not offend anyone because this is not my intention.) I had a hard time finding the right words to capture my feelings and thinking after this week's assignment.

The late hour and the several cups of coffee aside, I finished the reading and felt that the new "mindset" Knobel & Lankshear are discussing can/will have a revolutionary impact, as Schrage points out, on the way in which we think about our work as "reading" teachers and the ways schools will have to "re-orient" themselves. Prior to the reading I expected to read about how digital technology can be incorporated into what we were already doing. I didn't expect that this would problematize the very foundation of what I believed to be right things we are doing for schools and our students. I didn't expect to find myself feeling like an unwitting accomplice in maintaining the same "oppressive" practices that hinder our students from becoming literate. This reminds me of the first time I heard of Marxist theory from my Pan-African professor during my semester abroad in Zimbabwe. It was if a "new" world was being revealed to me that seemed to contradict what I understood about the world. It shattered my own preconceptions of history, present day, and the future. It is interesting that my professor used the work of Freire to highlight the ways we "know" the world is manipulated by forces in order to exact control on its citizenry. This new sense of the world continues to shape my own perspective.

So what does this have to do with reading?

If new literacies are about reshaping our "relationships between people and between organizations", it will obviously force us to reevaluate the entire structure of the educational system. I cannot draw any conclusions at this point but simply ask more questions:
1. How can we create pedagogy of power for literacy learning that meets the traditional standards imposed by state and national standard?
2. How can we effectively train teachers, through professional development opportunities, to meet the new pedagogical approaches necessary to meet the demands of these new literacies?
3. How can we properly support students who are "struggling" readers using new literacies?
4. Is there room for technology "tweens" in the "newcomer" and "native" paradigm (i.e. people in the 28-34 bracket who have their feet in both 'worlds'? How do we differentiate professional development for these "tweens"?
5. Where do we start?