Insiders’ Views of New Literacies, Schooling, and the Purpose of Education: “We Should be Teaching Them more Important Things”

Abstract

Given that most preservice teachers have grown up in a technological world, it is commonly accepted that they will bring their new literacies knowledge and skills into their future classrooms. However, little is actually known about preservice teachers’ perceptions of the place of new literacies in elementary schools. Therefore, the purpose of this paper was to investigate preservice elementary teachers’ perceptions of the need to support or teach new literacies in their future classrooms. Using survey design, descriptive analysis, and thematic analysis the following three findings were identified: (a) the participants of this study were insiders, (b) the participants favored teaching traditional, school-based literacies, and (c) the participants assumed that the purpose of education was to do well in school. The findings suggest that rather than assume preservice teachers will simply bring their new literacies practices into schools and help their future students engage in the multiple literacies needed for success in and out-of-school, teacher educators must explicitly prepare them to do so.