Tiffany Altman

What is the purpose of education? How does this belief influence your pedagogy?
Education has many purposes.
The biggest and most obvious purpose is to function in our society. A productive and contributing member of our society must be literate and knowledgeable of other basic skills. Other purposes of education include: individual ambitions, interests and competition with other countries. Education can be as small as striving to achieve, “what you want to be when you grow up”, to competing internationally with other countries. These purposes influence my pedagogy in many ways. They have the most impact on how, what I am teaching, relates to the real world and my students’ lives. Some of the curriculum and programs that are required are out of touch with students and the real world. I’ve found myself using many Kagan strategies to teach teamwork, sharing and a safe environment. These are all essential skills in any work place and in many societies. I’ve also been using more realia to help students make connections and have some authenticity to their learning.
How do you define literacy? How does this definition influence your pedagogy?
I have tried to explain literacy to my students and have found that it is best to show them what literacy means with examples. I like to show them things they can read, like: words on a page, number sentences, patterns, charts, clocks, faces, gestures, signs, technology and symbols. I also show them things like blueprints, drafting designs, scripts and scores. I tell them that these are all different types of literacy and while most of us have basic literacy skills, as we get older we learn more specific literacies based on our interest and our work. I hope this has an impression on them and how they think of literacy. I intend for them to realize that literacy doesn’t just mean reading a book or any other words on paper. Literacy has become very electronic lately. It has effected how we communicate and this is another challenge in how we define literacy. Technology has become an important part of literacy and I found that many of my students come to me with multiliteracies. Many of the students in my class can use a cell phone to communicate in many different ways but they are unable to send an email or write a letter. While using a cell phone is important they must also be able to use other technologies.