I’m not very good a sitting around feeling unproductive so I was fortunate to land some work with our Department of Education this summer.  Lately I’ve been doing a bit of writing preparing some resource pages for a new Innovative Learning Fund that teachers can access (that’s a whole other post!) 

One of the things I’ve been thinking about – prompted by something Will Richardson threw out in Memphis – is how the fundamental structure of reading and writing is changing. 

While my generation grew up reading in a linear fashion (words, lines, pages in sequence) this generation is now learning to read in a much more complex environment.  Networked information often contains links to other sections or documents, interrupting the continuity of the written text.  Sometimes images, audio or video are embedded.  This results in multiple layers that allow readers to jump back and forth, up and down through many layers.   

Our kids seem comfortable with this.  I wonder if most teachers are?  As I prepared the documentation, meant to be shared in an on-line environment, I debated as to the best format that would be the least threatening to teachers.   

But this leads to another question.  How do we teach kids to write in a multi-dimensional environment?  What are the new rules of grammar?  How do we teach students to reference their materials – is a simple hyperlink enough?   

As we prepare our young people for their future, we need to be focusing students as producers of digital information, composed of multiple media and designed to be shared in a networked, open and digital environment. 

As Will said…are we teaching kids to write with hyperlinks?

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