Purpose

The integration of on-line, multimedia resources are powerful tools to broaden the learning opportunities of learners/educators and to respond to the range of background knowledge and learning styles found among them. Technological resources also enable learners/educators at all levels to broaden their pedagogical content knowledge, specifically to acquire basic knowledge to understandings to address human variability. Thus, the carefully mediated use of technological resources are the means to gain content knowledge and to develop the technological expertise that is required to use technology effectively so as to motivate and engage learners at all levels in ways that are developmentally appropriate in order to meet challenging learning standards.

This multimedia module on Jesus Colon has been designed for pre- and in-service teachers with two interrelated purposes appropriate to a course on literacy across the curriculum:

1. To address the entry-level skills of teacher candidates who typically enter teacher preparation programs with some knowledge of the uses of technology in daily life, but relatively less understanding of its strategic and selective application to enhance the teaching-learning process; and

2. To broaden the pedagogical content knowledge of teacher candidates who receive little preparation in the history and intellectual contributions of Americans of Puerto Rican descent—a group that has remained invisible in the knowledge base for teaching and that has been misrepresented in the media and educational references.

Attention to both of these needs is critical considering that the new learning standards and high stakes testing are already having serious consequences on the educational achievement and attainment of students from economically marginalized communities at a time when a college degree is deemed essential for survival. The Puerto Rican community, in particular, continues to experience a disproportionate percentage of high school dropouts and low-college enrollment rate, one century after the Puerto Rican community established itself in New York City.

The module has been designed as a component of Literacy across the Content Areas course, but it is also adaptable to other courses, including, teaching social studies in the elementary school, educational technology, and children’s literature. It may also stand-alone. A unique and significant feature of this module is the linkages it creates with the on-line database of El Centro's Library and Archives.. The Archives are a repository of primary sources (e.g., photographs, letters, newspaper articles, short stories) that document the experiences and intellectual contributions of Puerto Ricans in New York City at the turn of the 20th century. However, despite the wealth of information of importance to educators, El CENTRO Archives are more frequently used by social scientists and students specializing in Black and Puerto Rican studies, nationally and internationally, and than by teacher candidates locally.

This module represents a first step in making accessible the vast wealth of resources contained in the archives to mainstream educators at the pre- and in-service level. It is assumed that access to the digitized databases of the Archives will facilitate the development of appropriate pedagogical applications to enhance the teaching-learning process in the elementary grades. These applications are important considering that the information contained in the archives does not exist in educational materials for elementary school students and, when it does appear, information is inaccurate or of low quality.

The module also creates linkages with a number of quality multimedia websites that apply multimedia technologies in creative and engaging ways. Although the use of multimedia technologies enhances the learning process, it takes time to become fluent in the use of these tools for pedagogical purposes; it also requires the appropriate hardware. Through increased exposure to and interaction with quality websites, it is expected that teacher candidates/educators will experience directly its potential as a tool for learning, and in a manner that is most useful to those working in schools with limited human and material resources. At the same time, these websites demonstrate or model technological enhancements and tools teachers may employ to present information in an engaging and interesting manner for a range of learning styles and preferences. In this module, appropriate applications include the creation of a web page or a power point presentation for an author’s study on Jesus Colon for elementary school students. It is also expected that teacher candidates will develop criteria for identifying quality websites. In sum, interacting with El Centro Archives and quality multimedia websites will enable teacher candidates to acquire the skills and competencies needed to integrate technological resources in creative new ways to enhance the acquisition of pedagogical content knowledge.

It is expected that this module will contribute to the improvement of the teaching-learning process by assisting teachers in building the background knowledge and existing language and technological skills of elementary school students, with the goal of enabling all classroom participants to meet challenging new literacy standards, including the successful completion of the 4th grade English Language Arts examination.

Objectives for Teacher Candidates

1. Develop background knowledge on the experiences and intellectual contributions of the Puerto Rican community in New York City by accessing on-line resources of the Archives of El CENTRO de Estudios Puertorriquenos.

2. Develop criteria for identifying and using authoritative on-line multimedia resources to broaden their knowledge of the literacy contributions of diverse authors, specifically the literary contributions of Jesus Colon, a bilingual journalist whose recollections make accessible in English a valuable record of the day-to-day experiences (social history) of Puerto Rican migrants in New York City during the decades prior to the 1950's.

3. Use technology tools (e.g., Web sites, digital cameras, scanners, photographs, etc.) to create knowledge products (e.g., a multimedia power point presentation/web page on Jesus Colon) for public elementary school students in New York City.