Over the past decade an emerging line of research has suggested that innovative uses of digital video arts and communication technologies can provide powerful tools for learning. These new technologies bring multiple forms of “new literacies” for negotiating meaning within and against the backdrop of a digital world. (Alvermann, 2002) Understanding and incorporating this broadening of literacy to meaning-making systems beyond printed text is essential for 21st century teacher education.
Reality for the “Millennial Generation” includes new literacies embedded in new technologies-such as Internet instant messaging, electronic interactive games, computer dating-and multiple new capacities, such as copying recorded music, enhancing or changing photo images, immediately accessing digital information once housed only in physical libraries, and creating state-of- the-art films from home video footage. As a significant part of youth culture, these everyday tools and artifacts bind adolescents together in a social culture through communication and meaning making.