tweet for help

I got an email tonight asking for approval of a computer literacy course outline revision. I’m slated to teach a section of this class in the fall. In past discussions, I’ve expressed a strong opinion that this class should focus on basic concepts and not specific software, something that has been just as strongly opposed. The revision included a reference to said specific software, so I felt it necessary to respond. I didn’t want to just toss out an unfounded opinion however. I sent out a tweet for help…

Almost instantly, I got what I was looking for, from Seattle, Ridgecrest, and Southern California. Read from the bottom up:

All of that gave me what I needed to write this:

It looks ok, although I would like to see the second SLO revised.

B. recognize and use industry standard application programs in the Windows operating system environment to create and edit introductory word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software files. This will be measured by projects and scored using a rubric.

This is a basic concepts class that is only 1 unit and is usually taught over a short period of time. I believe it is important to expose students to the basic concepts of word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software in a way that will give them a good foundation for understanding *any* version of those programs they come across, not just one geared toward a specific operating system or branded from a specific company. I assume “industry standard” is referring to Microsoft Office, although I may be wrong. Although Office and Windows OS programs are widespread, they are by no means the only options available, and locking students into a specific application does a disservice to them in the real world. Increasingly, other alternatives are being used, if not in Ridgecrest, then definitely elsewhere in the US and worldwide, including Croatia, South Korea, Turkey, India, France, and Brazil. Japan and Finland are seriously considering the move in an effort to “rely less on a single vendor IT software infrastructure”. The states of Maine and Indiana (among others), and a number of major school districts, including San Diego and Portland, Oregon are migrating to open source. The overwhelming trend in Europe and major parts of Asia is in the direction of open source software. Several major American companies like Novell and IBM are staunch supporters of open source alternatives to proprietary software.

Students, especially literacy level learners, are better able to gain a solid understanding of the underlying principles when introduced to basic concepts in a way that is clear and concise. I’m not suggesting that we ignore or neglect Microsoft Office. We have several series of classes (10 or more classes, if I am not mistaken) that will allow students who are interested in specific applications to learn more about specific software. I’m suggesting that the Literacy class is not the place to force exposure, based on the computer fluency level of the students. Those students will benefit from the general understand they have gained in the Literacy class and be able to transfer their understanding to any office application software they may encounter. Therefore, I would recommend that this SLO be revised to read:

B. recognize and use introductory word processing, spreadsheet, and presentation software files. This will be measured by projects and scored using a rubric.

Debby Kilburn

references:

Japan http://www.linuxworld.com/newsletters/linux/2007/0507linux2.html
Croatia http://www.linux.com/feature/56376
South Korea http://www.news.com/2100-7344-5084811.html
Brazil http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4471963
Turkey http://ec.europa.eu/idabc/en/document/7276/469
India http://news.zdnet.co.uk/software/0,1000000121,39205447,00.htm
France http://www.pcadvisor.co.uk/news/index.cfm?newsid=7687
Maine http://www.maine.gov/mlte/2006details.htm
Indiana http://www.crn.com/software/192201386
San Diego http://www.eschoolnews.com/news/top-news/index.cfm?i=46376&CFID=3985188&CFTOKEN=71198452
Novell http://www.novell.com/collateral/4621400/4621400.html
IBM http://www-03.ibm.com/linux/opensource/

What a cool example of the power of distributed social networks and instant communication!