Clark, J. Elizabeth. “The Digital Imperative: Making the Case for a 21st Century Pedagogy.” Computers and Composition March 2010: 27-35. ScienceDirect. Web. 11 Sept. 2010.
Even though the digital age continues to expand the way society communicates and interacts rhetorically, the college English/writing courses have not maintained the same speed of evolution. According to Clark, the traditional essay that still dominates composition classes is outmoded, and a new pedagogical approach of digital rhetoric that “engages students in the interactivity, collaboration , ownership, authority and malleability of texts” needs to be implemented. Clark integrates current digital technologies into her composition classes such as ePortfolios, digital stories, and blogs to aid students’ navigation of the “contemporary” digital worlds of writing.
Publishing their writings in the digital communities allows students “authentic authorial control of their own writing.” In a traditional classroom, it is difficult for students to recognize ownership of their own writing because it’s turned into the teacher only. However, in cyberspace, publication is immediate; therefore, they begin to formulate and carefully consider their online identities .
Creating a record of a student’s work throughout her college/university career, ePortfolios allow students to compose and receive immediate feedback digitally, either from the instructor, peers, or members of the digital communities. Because students’ writing becomes interactive and malleable in the digital realm where the public sees the writing, the student will reflect on her writing in order to tailor her texts according to the situation and the audience. Writing within online communities also prompts student writers to explore their public/private selves and to determine the ramifications of publishing in those communities.
Clark agrees with Andrea Lunsford that pedagogy today needs to teach students how to approach digital texts “critically and analytically.” Students socialize through digital means, but they are more comfortable with the traditional “essayistic literacy” in the classroom. Students need to know more than just downloading documents, they need to learn how to construct their own. One way is through digital stories or multi-modal composition , combining written text with visual text.
Another tool that Clark uses is the blog. She claims that students who create their own blogs teaches them how to “link to external support for their arguments” and how to differentiate whether those sites are reliable or not. Thus, students will be more particular about how their digital identities are represented.
As a high school English teacher who wants to integrate digital writing into her classroom, Clark raises valuable points about why it is imperative to prepare our students for the digital age. Any writing educator who wishes to promote authorship within her students will see that these tools –ePortfolios and blogs—create the space for this to occur. What I worry about is the point that Clark made about a student who created a digital story with graphic visual rhetoric; he learned how to strengthen his message with visual rhetoric and avoided using a “sanitized , less persuasive version” with just words. Won’t this weaken the student’s ability to use the power of the word and become dependent on gratuitous images for shock value and not rhetorical value? Despite this concern, Clark’s call to implement the “digital imperative” in the composition classes should be heeded.
