This activity is meant to invite the students to think differently and deeply about already defined terms and question them critically. To train them to question old definitions and try to redefine them depending on new elements and factors that were not there at the time of the original definition and we took illiteracy as a sample of application.Redefining illiteracy is a practical example towards thinking dynamically and critically to train the students to put already defined terms under study for analysis and re-evaluation in a modern perspective. This view to things is not new but mostly overlooked by students who prefer to refer to readymade conclusion without doing any more thinking to see to what extent those definitions or conclusions are still valid.
By using active learning activities, such as this one, the students become able to seek and develop key skills and knowledge to help them establish a critical approach so as to build bridges to a better future on solid basis. When we start thinking about redefining illiteracy for instance, new other skills appear to make the literate of the 21st Century very different from the way we perceived the literate of the past.
Accordingly, the students understand that the rapid change which characterizes this technological era make defining literacy very complicated because we suddenly can see the worst of all the illiterate people; those who are not able to read and write but those who suffer from Functional Illiteracy. It is not enough for the modern citizens to have reading and writing skills if these skills are not sufficient enough for their ordinary practical needs, at the bank, the airport, the supermarket, the post office and elsewhere. We no longer talk about literacy but about literacies.
Illiteracy thus must be redefined every now and then because the world changes rapidly and new skills manifest to make literacy very hard to identify. The same thing is true for other terms. Therefore learning itself should follow the same rule because what we learn today may get outdated in days time, so we need to recycle our knowledge and develop our skills according to the global information revolution.
