Office of Curriculum, Technology, & Assessment

Description: This course focuses on strategies and practices applicable across the content areas for developing 21st century literacy skills.

This course is designed to enable you to:

• understand how literacy is evolving in the 21st century
• identify 21st century literacy and learning skills
• strive to continually develop your own 21st century literacy and learning skills
• integrate the learning and teaching of 21st century literacy and learning skills in your curriculum

10 modules to this online self-paced course

Each of the modules contains these components:

• Pre-Self-Assessment  

• Engagement  

• Viewing Guide and Resources

• Media

• Webfolio Report

Modules:

Module #1:Constructing Our L2L Learning and Teaching Framework
This module is designed to engage you in the exploration of learning and teaching 21st century literacy skills.

Module #2: Conversation as an L2L Tool
This module focuses on the value of conversation in its many forms to improve literacy and content area learning.

Module #3:The Role of Technology as an L2L Tool
Learn how computers can make the greatest contribution to developing 21st century literacy skills

Module #4: Writing as an L2L Tool
Our goal for this module is to encourage you to explore writing as a tool for thinking in your discipline. We will introduce a model for scaffolding reading experiences for teaching literacy and content.

Module #5: Integrating Visual and Media Literacies in Content Area Learning and Teaching
We introduce the new literacies on the block -- visual and media -- define them and demonstrate how they can enhance content area learning.

Module #6: Designing Pre-Reading Strategies
We continue our study of the Before-During-After (BDA) Reading model for scaffolding reading experiences and focus on the Before Reading stage.

Module #7: Making the During Reading Stage Interactive
We continue our study of the Before-During-After (BDA) Reading model and focus on the During Reading stage.

Module #8: Processing the After-Reading Stage
We continue our study of the Before-During-After (BDA) Reading model for scaffolding reading experiences and focus on the Processing or After Reading stage.

Module #9: Literature and the Literacy to Learn
We explore the value of integrating literature into content curriculum to encourage actively literate individuals

Module #10: Integrating Assessment and Instruction
We explore the value of integrating assessment and instruction and literacy's role in this process.

NSDC Standards for Staff Development

Context Standards

Staff development that improves the learning of all students:

• Organizes adults into learning communities whose goals are aligned with those of the school and district. (Learning Communities)
• Requires skillful school and district leaders who guide continuous instructional improvement. (Leadership)
• Requires resources to support adult learning and collaboration. (Resources)

Process Standards

Staff development that improves the learning of all students:

• Uses disaggregated student data to determine adult learning priorities, monitor progress, and help sustain continuous improvement. (Data-Driven)
• Uses multiple sources of information to guide improvement and demonstrate its impact. (Evaluation)
• Prepares educators to apply research to decision making. (Research-Based)
• Uses learning strategies appropriate to the intended goal. (Design)
• Applies knowledge about human learning and change. (Learning)
• Provides educators with the knowledge and skills to collaborate. (Collaboration)

Content Standards

Staff development that improves the learning of all students:

• Prepares educators to understand and appreciate all students, create safe, orderly and supportive learning environments, and hold high expectations for their academic achievement. (Equity)
• Deepens educators' content knowledge, provides them with research-based instructional strategies to assist students in meeting rigorous academic standards, and prepares them to use various types of classroom assessments appropriately. (Quality Teaching)

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