Digital Literacy – Some Random Thoughts

Digital Literacy – Some Random Thoughts

With Thanks To …

My thanks go to Shelly S Terrell for prompting this post. You can see her blog at http://teacherbootcamp.edublogs.org/.
(And just in case you were wondering Shelly, yes I did write this whole post in HTML and inline CSS.)

What IS Digital Literacy

The phrase “digital literacy” seems to be being used these days in a sense that “either you have it, or you don’t”, in much the same way that you either do or do not hold a driver’s licence. However, for me digital literacy (by the way, I hate that phrase, but until a better phrase comes along, I’ll have to stick with) is just as much a skill as “ordinary” literacy (now perhaps you see why I have an issue with the “digital literacy” phrase) and numeracy.

It is a skill which can be measured on a continuous scale from zero (a new-born baby would have this level) to any world-renown technical expert in the area. By way of an analogy, successful journalists and statisticians are well above the mid-point for language and numeracy.

When Is Digital Literacy Important?

The answer to the question “When is digital literacy important?” must be “almost always”, but this rather ignores the question of “To what level?”. To that end, I am going to ditch the term “digital literacy” in favour of the term “digital competence” for the rest of this post.

This change of terminology then allows us to start asking all sorts of relevant questions, such as:

  1. What level of digital competence is required to perform in this job?
  2. What competences in the area of digital technology must this potential employee have?
  3. What are the gaps in this employees competences? (I.e. Training Needs Analysis)

Some Potential Issues in Achieving Digital Competence

I make no claim to being an expert in describing the issues that surround achieving digital competence. All I can do here is to share some thoughts gleaned from observing people and listening to their words.

I DON’T NEED DIGITAL COMPETENCE is an assertion which may be slightly wide of the mark, in that the speaker may be using such things as automated teller machines (ATM) to perform financial transactions and not realising that such an act is a digital competence, or it could be true; I have heard people complain that they have difficulty in using ATMs.

I HATE THIS TECHNOLOGY is another way of saying that they find it difficult to use, as in the case of ATMs above. The fact that they have demonstrated competence in that technology means that they are digitally competent for that task. (Sorry if that sounds tautological, but I am trying to make the point of competence for any specific task.) Practice, as we all know (do we?) makes things easier for the person practicing. One of the issues with people who have difficulty with ATMs (for example) is insufficient practice. Would you REALLY want to go withdrawing cash eight times a day?

I HAVEN’T GOT THE TIME TO LEARN could mean that the speaker has other priorities (well, it’s their life!) or they are engaging in avoidance behaviour, preferring to perform other tasks which lie more within their comfort zone. I have seen people who are perfectly competent in a wide variety of digital skills exhibit this sort of response. I think that the answer here lies in the steepness of the learning curve: the effort of learning is perceived as being greater than the benefit that will flow from achieving the relevant digital competence. The only way that I have found of overcoming this hurdle is when, by whatever means, the speaker realizes that the benefit outweighs the effort. One could imagine a tyrannical boss saying “Learn to do it, or your fired!”

4 thoughts on “Digital Literacy – Some Random Thoughts

  1. So you have convinced me to ditch “digital literacy” for “digital competency”! I would agree that convincing educators to prepare digitally competent students means convincing the same educators of the merits. One of the challenges you touch on is the investment of time. How do you convince an educator to invest the time in e-learning? Which apps, tools, and online technologies should we direct them to first in the hopes these educators are not easily scared away by the technology or that it is not way above their comfort level? These are questions I have often considered in helping teachers who are curious about e-learning. I have lead them to some blogs. The teachers seem to enjoy these sources. I have tried to teach them about using a RSS reader. Twitter I think is still above many of them. Are there other teacher friendly digital sources?

  2. Well, yes. In terms of how to educate such educators, I cannot give a stock answer, because (as an educator) I need to understand where my students are coming from (Any RPL? What is their background? What are their expectations?) before I can contextualise any learning that I can give. (I feel the need for such contextualisation for the sake of the student’s own interests; without it, I cannot function as a teacher.) I must confess that I am not digitally competent in the area of RSS, and I think that Twitter may require a particular sort of mind before that mind can use it as a learning resource. (I found Twitter initially almost irrelevant: I did not understand it due as much as anything to the way it was, and still is, being mis-“sold”.)

    Teacher-friendly digital resources? I am not the right person to answer that question. You could try tweeting it, and see what responses you get. (Being comfortable about using the Internet to find resources for my students, and being a highly self-directed learner, means that I tend not to come across “teacher-friendly” resources. 🙂 )

  3. Hi Phil
    Great post thanks for writing. I agree digital literacy really in a nutshell is about being competent to use digital resources and technologies in a purposeful and real way, which is relevant to our own lives, work and learning.

    In relation to getting educators on board, in Queensland public schools there is the Smart Classroom initiative. Teachers are being actively encouraged to document their digital pedagogies and work towards their level of competencies in relation to using digital resources & technologies within a classroom setting. There are three levels of competency in the digital pedagogy framework – certificate, licence and advance licence. http://education.qld.gov.au/smartclassrooms/

    The great thing about this is that it needs to renewed every three years to stay current! So this should mean that teachers don’t just do the necessary requirements to get the “piece of paper” then fall back to their prior methods.

    There is some reluctance among some teachers. But I think overall teachers are very aware that digital learning is a major key in today’s children’s culture, and can see how this can only benefit both themselves and their students if they embrace this.

    Again thanks for the techie point of view. I must admit I love chatting to our techie about change, tech issues etc.

    Cheers, Jodie

  4. Hi Jodie,

    Thanks for the comment and thanks for the link.

    It is great to hear that IT is now being integrated into the learning experience, rather just being an incidental add-on.

    From my own perspective (IT guy turned part-time educator), it seems to me that the phrase IT revolution (as in the sense of the industrial revolution) is not too wide of the mark. I was born and brought up in a world without computers (I first met them at age 17), but now that computers are ubiquitous today’s children regard them as just as commonplace as I did aircraft when I was a child. I would hazard a guess that in 50 years’ time people will wonder what all the present fuss was about.

    It sounds as though you are making great achievements!

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