Digital Literacy in Schools

This week’s (or rather, week 10’s) focus was digital literacy in our schools, and the impact on schooling and students. In Andrea’s presentation, and I’ve linked to her blog here, she spoke a lot about the importance of really integrating technology into our classrooms, and one thing that she said that really stood out was that:

“As our world grows increasingly digital, students need more than just basic knowledge of technology. They need comprehensive digital literacy to thrive in the future.”

Andrea, I hear you. Oh, I hear you.

And I love this idea. I really do. I agree that we not only need to have it in the classroom, but we also need to teach it. Just because students have access to technology doesn’t mean they know the ins and outs of different programs or websites or apps, and you might think that school would be the place to embed aspects of that. It should be embedded.

But “should be” and “could be” and “are” take us to very different places.

I think I’ve mentioned this before, but I work in a high school with around 1600 students. Give or take. Before this year, we had 35 computers in the library, 5 computer labs that were fully booked for classes, and so inaccessible to other classes, and we had five laptop carts, with 30 laptops on each (if you were lucky, and some hadn’t gone missing/been borrowed/needed fixing). So embedding technology into classrooms last year was nigh impossible. You were lucky if you could book weeks in advance and get them for three days in a row. Can I project things? Absolutely. And when the interest is working, and I can find the time to update some of my older lessons, I absolutely do. But students need to play, they need to try and fail and try again, and explore, and they weren’t doing that last year.

Jump to the this year. We have 11 laptop carts with 35 computers each (wooo!)…which still only averages out to about one computer per 4 students. So do we have more access? Yes, kind of. As long as the internet is working (which it hasn’t been this year – and our router update is now three weeks overdue and counting), and other classes haven’t booked ahead of you (which happens), and even then, when you do get them, you’ve usually got a specific topic or focus that you are hoping to achieve or complete, and don’t have the time to let students explore or play.

So ok. Maybe we need a class? Or a unit? Except our curriculum documents are so dated, and the new ones that are coming out aren’t taking this kind of shift into account, so I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.

I don’t know what to do, and we aren’t being given any guidance. There, that helps fix things a little bit.

If this class has highlighted anything for me, it’s that we need to shift the way that we are helping students to develop certain skills. It’s not that we need to change a lot of what they need, there aren’t a bunch of new skills we suddenly need to add (although you could argue there are a few), but the way we get there, the way that we are teaching, needs to change. If we want our kids to be kind and empathetic individuals, if we want them to be critical thinkers, we have to show them how to do that in person, and online. This isn’t knowledge they’re going to gain through osmosis. Looking at a screen doesn’t make them any smarter about what they are viewing on the screen. And our understanding of society and responsibility needs to shift, too, to account for our online presence.

My mind is jumping in so many different directions as I try to reconcile all of this new information, and I haven’t fully processed, so I apologize if I’m sucking you down into the swirling vortex of my thoughts.

Do we need to change? Yes. 5 years ago, we needed to be changing. But how, or to what? That’s where I’m not so sure. So if anyone else has the answers, please share!