What is Digital Literacy?

When I think of digital literacy, I think of being able to use and understand technology in order to communicate and gain knowledge. After some research I have found that it means to use technology to the best of the abilities in an effective manner by understanding it, interpreting it, reproducing it, evaluating it and applying it.

The University Library of The University of Illinois defines digital literacy as:

* The ability to use digital technology, communication tools or networks to locate, evaluate, use and create information.

* The ability to understand and use information in multiple formats from a wide range of sources when it is presented via computers.

* A person’s ability to perform tasks effectively in a digital environment

* Literacy includes the ability to read and interpret media, to reproduce data and images through digital manipulation, and to evaluate and apply new knowledge gained from digital environments.

Here is a fun short video that breaks down the definition pretty well:

Why is it important for teachers to understand Digital Literacy? 

Back in the day, literacy in itself as the above video describes,was a privilege! Only those who could afford it, could learn how to read and write. Even without being literate,  people were still able to be successful but after a while, it became an absolute requirement for anyone who wanted to succeed at all! If you did not know how to read and write, you had less opportunities. Still true today but now, that is just basic! You must have digital literacy which means you must know how to use digital tools such as computers, smartphones, tablets and others and you also need to be able to utilize many programs and applications so that you can make your own digital resources.  We cannot forget that you need to know how to evaluate all of it because the digital world, through the internet,  can be a crazy one if not used with care. 

As teachers, we need to teach digital literacy. This is not just the IT teacher's job but everyone's job because the IT teacher will only be able to teach so much! For example, in the school that I currently work, most students only get about one hour a week in the computer lab actually receiving education technology classes; this means that all teachers must take it upon themselves to incorporate teaching digital literacy in all curriculum. 

What makes it complicated is that even to the day, many kids do not have a computer at home, or they are not able to use it as much and still, many others do not have a reliable Wi-Fi connection. This means that we also have to provide screen time for students so they can practice these skills and help families recognize the importance of these resources being available for children at home and share other resources such as libraries, after-school care and some affordable computer/Wi-Fi programs that help low-income families be connected at home.  

The ISTE standards that call out Digital Literacy are the following: 

And because having digital literacy requires also to be fluent in language in itself, we need to take the ELA common core standards into account. We can teach our students how to write a blog but they need to know how to write in order to produce a blog post. We can teach students how to make awesome videos, but they need to know how to speak eloquently to communicate their ideas! The ISTE standards go hand in hand with the ELA Common Core Standards.

I love technology, I love writing and I absolutely enjoy learning languages and I hope I can transfer this passion to my students. I love it when I am at work and I can help my co-workers who may not be as digital literal as I am and even though I am not as young to be a "so-called" digital native, I feel that I have been exposed for a very long time to technology and I feel that I understand it! I am always eager to learn more and I like to incorporate it in my teaching as much as possible as long as it makes it better and also,  to teach digital literacy as it is a responsibility of all teachers.

I watched this great TedTalk  called The essential elements of digital literacies by Dr. Doug Belshaw is a Researcher/Analyst at JISC Advance where he researches and advises on issues around open education and innovation about Digital Literacy and I loved it! He brought up the concept of: Memes and I think this is a great way to understand what technology has done to the way we communicate. I am one that loves memes and I can see how many older generations do not understand them as much as younger generations do. Dr. Doug talks about 8 essential elements which align pretty well with the ISTE standards.

Finally, I wanted to add that being digital literate has also become a way of making money for many people. YouTube has made many people famous! and it also has helped many of us learn things that we were not able to learn before or at least not have an actual video to know how to do something. I even have a YouTube Channel with my daughter and even though we have not made much money, it has been great to have an audience and just being able to actually stream something you have done yourself. This also means students having YouTube channels of their own! I actually have some 2nd graders who already have YouTube channels. It all started with cats and now we have YouTubers who have become celebrities! All of this involves digital literacy because we need to make sure we understand this and if desired, we can create our own videos and channels.

So next time you plan your lessons, think: DIGITAL LITERACY! 

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