What is digital literacy?

[Terry Freedman]

Here are my views about digital literacy. Challenge me.

Digital literacy should be one of the key parts of any curriculum.

What is digital literacy? Let's express this in behavioural terms.

I believe that it should not be possible for young people to leave school without being knowledgeable enough to be safe online (not just from sexual predators but from financial, racist, and other types of predator too).

It should not be possible for anyone to leave school and then leave laptops in the back of cars, usb sticks containing sensitive data in pub car parks, or sell hard disks containing data on eBay. All of these kinds of actions are undertaken by digitally illiterate people in my opinion.

Digital literacy should not be seen only in defensive terms:

A digitally-literate person will be able to express herself by creating a presentation, a podcast or a video. She will be able to validate data before putting it into a model, and then verify the results of the modelling process in terms of the accuracy and plausibility of the data.

A digitally-literate person will be able to use software applications in elegant and efficient ways, and even perhaps in ways that could not have been foreseen by the program's creators.

There are, or should be, lots of opportunities for pupils to apply and practise their digital literacy skills, right across the curriculum. However, in order to do so, they need a deep, not a superficial, understanding of the processes involved. These are not trivial. Take, for example, the concept of data validation. It's quite sophisticated, and quite necessary. It's summed up in the adage, "garbage in, garbage out", meaning that if you put rotten data into a computer you'll get rotten results. Someone has to be able to ensure that the data going into the computer is not full of errors, or of the wrong type.

It's been found recently , by the government inspection body in England, that teachers tend to teach technology up to the limit of their own knowledge, and that this effectively holds children back. In my experience, where technology is taught by non-specialists, this kind of "dumbing down" goes on as a matter of course. It's not deliberate: teachers don't know what they don't know. It's therefore not a criticism as such. If I taught English, it would almost certainly be superficial, because I'm not an English specialist, even though I've been speaking the language for over half a century. Why should we assume that if we send someone on an interactive whiteboard training course and give them a laptop for producing their worksheets, and they book their vacations online, that they're qualified to teach technology?

In fact, if we are really serious about embedding technology in the curriculum, the answer is not to get rid of it as a subject and farm it out across the curriculum, but to do the precise opposite and increase the amount of time spent teaching it. That would give pupils a much firmer skills base to employ in other subjects. It would also give non-tech teachers more confidence in using technology in their classrooms because of the knowledge that the youngsters pretty much know what they are doing.

Thoughts? Comments? Let me know!

[Terry Freedman]

Thx Jordan. I agree with your idea about increasing the time spent with the technology.

[Steph N]

I think digital literacy is when people can use electronics well. Also, knowing about the internet and problems with it. I agree about people needing to know more about technology and electronics. Mostly because people are using computers a lot more now. So they should be aware of the good and bad things of computers.

[Terry Freedman]

Hi, Steph. Not sure I agree with you about electronics, but maybe you use it differently in your country. Here in UK taking a course in 'electronics' involves getting wires and widgets and building radios and stuff. Are you saying that people need to know about all that in order to use a computer well?

I'm a pretty good driver, but I don't have the foggiest idea how my car works. Do you think I should take a course in motor mechannics?

;-)

[Lucas A]

I agree with you 100 percent about this digital literacy. You shouldn't leave your computer in the back of your car with important stuff because someone can take it and do so much damage to your life and you won't be able to do anything. You shouldn't sell bad disks either because you sell it a person and they screwed over they are going to be looking for you and they might kill you if its one of those big boss type people who won't rest till they get there money back from the person who sold to them.

[Terry Freedman]

Exactly, Lucas. Just one thing: the laptop left on the back of a car seat had other people's data on it, not the person's who left it there!

[Ryan G]

I agree you Mr Terry. Students should have knowledge to be safe online. You need to be safe on the internet. I really like how he said and agree with a digitally-literate person will be able to use software applications well and in other ways, that the person who had created the website may not know how to do or use it. If you can get taught in a classroom you will be smarter on the street and you can get work done much faster. I think what he means by "garbage in,garbage out" is totally correct and if you put something terrible in, that will be your result. The internet will teach you about the real world and how it works, and you communicate everday.

[Terry Freedman]

Thanks, Ryan. The 'garbage in, garbage out' thing is dead right in my opinion too.

[Gabrielle E]

I agree with you 100%. Kids now a days really need to be though about the dangers about computers and they need to no the proper things to put on the computer. there are so many things that could happen to you on the computer and i really agree with you that people should not be able to leave school with out completely understanding the danger that could happen to them if they put out the wrong info thats why i think its a really good idea to teach kids about digital literacy .

[Terry Freedman]

Thx, Gabrielle :-)

[Justin M]

I completely agree with you, people have to understand how in depth this goes just to be able to communicate with each other. A lot of people aren't very understanding of technology, so when other people want to learn about digital literacy, they better hope they're learning it from someone who understands it themselves. This is a very important subject, and when taught properly, students can learn important and necessary things that can help them for the rest of their lives.

[Terry Freedman]

I agree, Justin. It's importanbt for students to be taught digital literacy by people who understand it themselves. Well said.

[Matt B]

Theres some ways i agree with you, but some i don't. The internet should band all myspaces or u should need a photo I.D to aces the internet and about 500 passwords. mostly on the way how u said the internet should be safe enough, to block out sexual predators and racist. sometimes you may leave youre personal data (like on a flash drive) in your car and any man could walk past your car and take i and have more information than you think. i think the internet is only a minor sourse. people should be reading books and looking things up in encyclopedias. i think the internet is bad most of the time.