Procedural literacy

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This page will explain what procedural literacy or computer literacy is and what role it has or has not in today's (and tomorrow's) educational technologies. Author: sugarch0

Introduction

What has prompted the writing of this article is the question wether "digital natives" as Prensky has called the generation born after the development of digital enironments not only are better users of information technologies but also if they understand the underlying technology better than any "digital immigrant", as Prensky calls people that have not been born amidst a warm nest of interconnectedness but in an era where phones were still attached to the wall by wires.

First interesting views were found in the article "Procedural Litearcy: Educating the new Media Practitioner" by Michael Mateas. Further readings showed that the term "procedural literacy" is new (today in 2010) and one of the latest expression of a long series of definitions of literacy that include information-, computer-, media- or digital literacy (Badwen 2001).

Several other authors (Sheil 1983 and 1993, Proulx 2002) join the idea that procedural literacy should be part of the basic culture of any digital device and/or web 2.0 users ("natives" or "immigrants")if they are to be truly literate in the present time. The call for procedural literacy seems to confirm that the education of digital natives, but also of any user of information technologies, is not complete without an “understanding of the interplay between the culturally embedded practices of human meaning-making and technically mediated processes”(Mateas 2005).

History and context

As old as the computers themselves

Although the expression "procedural literacy" is recent, calls for a true literacy of computation have been made already in the sixties, at the very beginning of computer development (Mateas). Papert's work on the programming game logo (Papert 1980) is only one of many educational programs and research projects that still develop today and that are intended to transmit a general understanding of the programming language. This language should be treated as “a universal representational medium for describing structure and process” (Mateas 2005). This call is echoed for example in France where in the eighties there is a discussion around "numeric alphabetization" (Proulx 2002) that has regained importance with the development of internet but does not find simple answers regarding how a general computer or procedural literacy could be taught to the most. Finding a realistic model for teaching computer literacy is discussed from the eighties on (Sheil 1983 and 1993)

Web 2.0 and procedural literacy

Selwyn: use of computers by digital natives is varied and often unspectaculer. Not necessarely better technological knowledge/user knowledge. Proulx: link with open source communities could open the minds for prooceedural literacy.

Definitions and issues

Definitions: Procedural literacy:Procedural literacy is going beyond "black box programs" and programming languages themselves to develop an understanding that “the space of computation is bigger than the particular view of it embodied (enforced) by any particular programming model”(Mateas 2005). Being literate in computation or acquiring procedural literacy means an awareness of the constraints of specific tools (or programming languages) and being capable of considering a larger space of computational possibilities.

Literacy and its implications: social, cultural, educational, for a successful career. use of technology still a factor of socio-economic status and social class gender geography (cf difital divide)

Issues: What to teach for procedural literacy, how to teach it? Should the computer be used as a cognitive tool to acquire procedural literacy?(proulx)

games as the vehicle for transmitting computer literacy as well as span the culture divide humanistic - artistic and scientific-technical and for learning procedural literacy (mateas 2005)

Bibliography

Badwen, D.: Information and Digital Literacies: a Review of Concepts. Journal of Documentation, vol. 57, No2, pp 218-259, March 2001

Mateas, M. : Procedural Literacy: Educating the New Media Practitioner. On the Horizon, Vol. 13, No1, 2005

Papert, S.: Children, Computers and Powerful Ideas, Mindstorm, New York: Basic Books, 1980.

Prensky, M.: Digital Natives, Digital Immigrants, On the Horizon, MCB University Press, Vol. 9, No5, October 2001

Proulx, S.: Trajectoires d'usages des technologies de communication: les formes d'appropriation d'une culture numérique comme enjeu d'une socuété du savoir, ANN. Télécommun., 57, No3-4, 2002.

Sheil, B.A. : Teaching procedural literacy, Presentaion abstract, Xerox Palo Alto Research Center, 1983.

Sheil, B.A. : Coping with complexity, information technology and people, Vol.1, Iss.4, pp295-320, 1993.