Return-Path: <nifl-family@literacy.nifl.gov> Received: from literacy (localhost [127.0.0.1]) by literacy.nifl.gov (8.9.3/8.9.0.Beta5/980425bjb) with SMTP id IAA05588; Mon, 20 Dec 1999 08:50:13 -0500 (EST) Date: Mon, 20 Dec 1999 08:50:13 -0500 (EST) Message-Id: <NCBBKFFJEKBIIPDOPFOGMEDBCMAA.nsledd@famlit.org> Errors-To: listowner@literacy.nifl.gov Reply-To: nifl-family@literacy.nifl.gov Originator: nifl-family@literacy.nifl.gov Sender: nifl-family@literacy.nifl.gov Precedence: bulk From: "Nancy Sledd" <nsledd@famlit.org> To: Multiple recipients of list <nifl-family@literacy.nifl.gov> Subject: [NIFL-FAMILY:2614] LINCS for the Millennium Conference X-Listprocessor-Version: 6.0c -- ListProcessor by Anastasios Kotsikonas X-Mailer: Microsoft Outlook IMO, Build 9.0.2416 (9.0.2910.0) Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Content-Type: text/plain; Status: OR HI all! Last week, there was a great conference in New Orleans, LA, for NIFL list moderators, state adult education directors, LINCS hubs' advisory committees, and others. About 150 folks altogether. The downside is, I came home with a horrible cold and laryngitis. Anyway, Helen Osborne, the list co-moderator for the HEALTH list summarized everything so well, I want to cross post this to you. I hope you are all having a wonderful holiday season. Nancy Sledd, NIFL-Family list moderator To the NIFL-Health subscribers, I'm just back from the "LINCS for the Millennium Conference," sponsored by the National Institute For Literacy. It was a wonderful opportunity to hear about the role of technology in literacy education, learn about LINCS, find out about some great resources, and talk with other list moderators. While it's nearly impossible, of course, to capture all this information, here are some highlights that I think might interest you: Dr. Richard Adler, president of People and Technology in Palo Alto, gave the keynote address on "The Future of Technology and the Impact of the new Technology on Education." He talked about some significant changes in how people communicate, and said that: 1) There is a new "information infrastructure," that includes going from analog to digital (photography, for instance), from narrow-band to broad-band (speed is increasing dramatically), from dialup to always-on (the internet will be a "resident" of our computers), and from location-specific to ubiquitous (pagers, for example). 2) There is a growing "digital divide" in our society, with the elderly and those with the least education being the least wired. 3) The definition of literacy could be expanded to include visual literacy, computer literacy, digital literacy, technical literacy, and information literacy. He defined "information literacy" as the ability to read, think critically, manipulate symbols, and publish one's views. LINCS (www.nifl.gov/lincs), the Literacy Information and Communication System, is a service of the National Institute for Literacy. Its mission is to use technology to strengthen the adult basic education and literacy community, and does this by providing tools to find literacy information easily, locate literacy resources, and discuss literacy issues online. Currently, LINCS gets over 1,000,000 "hits"/month, and has 140 web sites, 134 lists, and over 10,000 subscribers. LINCS is a wonderful resource, and I encourage everyone on this list to check it out. Special features to note include the search functions, data bases, discussion list archives, special collections, and hot sites. There were over 100 participants at this conference, and we exchanged many ideas and resources. I think that you might particularly be interested in NALD (http://www.nald.ca), the National Adult Literacy Database, Inc. from Canada, and www.eastendliteracy.on.ca/clearlanguageanddesign, a dynamic site about clear language design. Moderators from many of NIFL's lists met to share experiences and brainstorm new ideas. We talked a lot about ways to use some of the features of LINCS. Suggestions include Special Collections - especially the Health & Literacy collection where you can find the "Health Literacy Compendium," My LINCS as a way to get the latest resources in your areas of special interest, and use of the archives to search our list or cross-search other lists and retrieve information sorted by date, author, subject, or thread . Phew! A lot of information of read, think about, and act upon as we enter a new year, a new century, and a new way of looking at health and literacy. Happy holidays to all of you, Helen Osborne, MEd., OTR/L Co-moderator, NIFL-Health & Health Literacy Consulting, Natick, MA Phone: 508-653-1199 * Fax: 508-650-9492 Helen@healthliteracy.com * www.healthliteracy.com Nancy Sledd Training Specialist National Center for Family Literacy 325 West Main Street, Suite #200 Waterfront Plaza Louisville, KY 40202-4251 (502) 584-1133 ext.142 (502) 584-0172 fax
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