What skills and knowledge does someone need to fully participate in a modern, technologi-
cal, and democratic society? Efforts to answer this question are a major part of the national
debate over educational standards and the performance of schools. It is a difficult question
to answer because what people need to know is constantly changing. For example, I joke
with students that when I was in high school in the 1960s, we were not allowed to use pocket
calculators in math class. This was not because teachers were stricter or educational stan-
dards were higher, but because miniature calculators had not yet been invented. As recently
as 1983, when my in-laws offered to purchase a personal computer for my family, my wife
and I did not know what we would do with one. Today we each have our own computer at
home and at work and do not know how we would manage without them. Technological de-
velopment has fundamentally altered what we mean by minimum competency skills.
An additional problem is that minimum competency is not everyone’s goal. Few of the
people reading this book would accept it as the standard for themselves or their own chil-
dren. Why should it be an acceptable standard for anyone in our society?
To actively participate in today’s world, a citizen must be able to gather, sort, and evalu-
ate information on a number of topics, from a variety of sources, using different technolo-
gies. For example, to effectively select candidates for office, citizens should have at least
some information about other countries, the workings of the nation’s economy, educational
programs, and environmental concerns. If they want to influence the ideas of their neigh-
bors, they must be able to express ideas orally and in writing as well as know how to interact
with and organize diverse groups of people. Because each citizen will probably also need to
earn a living, maintain a home, and raise a family, they must be comfortable with basic math,
familiar with new technologies, and even conversant in more than one dialect or language.
The 21st century is certainly a complicated place. A number of commentators have made the
point that the technology of literacy has probably changed more in the last 20 years than it
did in the previous 2 millennia.
A useful definition ofliteracyis the ability to participate in a conversation with a level of
competence and confidence. This requires both skills and knowledge. In the early 1980s, pub-
lic television produced a documentary on nuclear weapons calledNuclear Strategy for Begin-
ners. A scientist from the Massachusetts Institute for Technology who was interviewed for the
project explained that concerned citizens did not need to know technical information such as
CHAPTER7 Literacy: How Can Teachers Encourage Student Literacies?
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